Ups and downs of the week.

Red Sox – As a long suffering Red Sox fan, I’m used to the roller coaster ride by now. I just hope interleague play goes as well for them this year as it did last year. They need the wins.

 Mannys’ High Five catch – Simply amazing. This guy loves to play baseball and have fun.

 Sen. Arlen Specter – What a waste of Congressional time. Hopefully the good people of PA will now smarten up and vote to this jackass out of office.

 Jayson Werth – Three home runs; a 3-run blast, a grand slam, and a solo shot. By himself he decimated the hapless Blue Jays. Amazing.

 Celtics – Yet another road loss. They dominated the whole season and now they can’t win on the road to save their lives. They came close tonight, but another lackluster quarter (the 2nd) put them in a hole they couldn’t climb out of.

This one is in Ramsau, Germany. Beautiful sunrise.

Ups and downs of the week.

Red Sox – Looking much better. 8-2 in their last 10. They should be riding a seven game streak now, but…

UPDATE and CHANGE OF STATUS: Papelbon blows his second save in a row. Sox are now 7-3 in their last 10. They had sooooooo many opportunities tonight to put this game away and couldn’t come up with the clutch hits. Manny looks like he’s going into a slump. Only bright spot: Yankmees lost again.

Julio Lugo – The Sox as a team have 20 errors this year and 10 of them belong to Lugo. His fumbling of a double play ball on Wednesday night cost them a game they fought hard to win and broke their winning streak.

UPDATE: Make that 11 errors. This one cost the Sox 2 runs and essentially this game.

Celtics – Looking more like the championship team they are.

Spygate coverage – Enough already. It’s over.

School’s out – Summers are so relaxed when all the kids are gone.

My yard looks best this time of year. The cherry trees blossom nicely and the peonies haven’t yet bloomed and the grass is very green. Shame that the daffodils have bloomed and died already. They’d have added some nice color here.

Ups and downs of the week.

    Red Sox – First the pitching was bad and the bats were hot. Now the pitching is hot and the bats are cold. It’d be nice if they could get together. On the good side, of course.

  End of Semester – Nice to have no homework or projects to think about.

   Grass growing season – I’ll be glad when it doesn’t grow 6 inches in a week.

    Celtics – Not as easy as it they thought it would be apparently.

UPDATE: So the bats finally came alive (except for Manny’s). Good thing, too, because the pitching was only so-so.

One of the most powerful memory triggers is the sense of smell. An aroma can bring back memories from childhood that seem like they were from yesterday. And I’ve also noticed that other triggers can bring back memories of smells, which in turn bring up other memories. I was reading a blog post from last year that spoke of the smell of bacon and eggs wafting through the trees in the morning when my folks took us camping in our childhood. That smell is still one of my favorite. It almost is enough to make me want to try camping again. Almost.

One of those other triggers is music. Back in the mid-80’s, I was working as a driver education instructor for Central Texas College over in Germany. I taught GIs how to pass the German written driving exam. I was always traveling to a distant Army base each week. One week I was driving back and forth to Stuttgart each day. It was about 100 miles each way, but in Germany, where there was no speed limit on the autobahn, the trip took less than an hour. As that week started, I had a new tape by Steve Perry (of Journey) called Street Talk. Lots of good songs on that album. I played it over and over during that week. To this day when I hear Foolish Heart, I can smell the leather in my ’77 BMW 633CSi that was my transportation back then. That was a very good time in my life and it seems the good memories are the strongest and most enduring. Just like camping when we were kids.

Ups and downs of the week.

    Red Sox – Three losses in a row, but still atop the AL East.

  Yankmees are also losing – So not gaining ground on the Sox.

   Mediacom Cable – Between the idiotic Emergency Alert System they over use and the useless DVR that resets itself every time they use EAS, I can’t dependably record anything. This is the 21st century, right?

  Celtics – Having an easy time of it so far.

    John Adams on HBO - I added HBO just to watch this mini-series and it was just ok. Now I need to dump HBO again.

  New lawn mower – Toro knows how to make these things right. 

Justin Masterson, in his major league debut, pitched 6 stellar innings and left the game with a 3-1 lead. Enter the Sox’s pathetic bullpen. Wavy Lopez and Manny Del Carwreck faced four hitters, all of whom got on base and eventually scored. They even walked in a run, which is inexcusable. Del Car Wreck couldn’t throw a strike if his life depended on it. In comes Okajima, who gives up a couple of hits, one of which Coco Crisp completely muffed, and now the 3-1 lead is gone and it’s 5-3 Angels. Masterson should punch Lopez and Del Car Wreck in their useless noses.

UPDATE: So four major league veterans could not do what a kid just up from the minors could and they ruined what should have been a memorable win in his debut. Final score, 7-5, and it wasn’t even that close. If the bullpen doesn’t improve or get some talent, it’s going to be a tough season.

Ups and downs of the week.

  Red Sox – Playing a little better now. Some good production from the bottom of the lineup and Manny is looking to have a great year.

  Gas prices – It all comes down to greed. Plain and simple.

  Spring is here – Finally into steady 70’s. Hope it lasts.

  School – Just doesn’t have the allure it did during my undergrad. 

 Big Papi – Breaks out of the slump in a big way. Grand slam over the Green Monster.

eckett was impressive tonight despite one rough inning. In the 8th inning he was still gunning down Yankmees with 94 MPH fastballs. Manny is a true Yankee killer and was the driving force behind the win. And Dustin Pedroia is the best second baseman in baseball. Papelbon looked a bit shaky but finished off the game despite giving up two runs. Still, an impressive win after last night’s blowout.