Last month I noticed friends on Facebook and Twitter posting some very interesting images. They were often profile pictures, but they weren’t photographs. Not exactly, anyway. They had the look of paintings in different artistic styles. They were using an iOS app called Prisma, and as an Android user I was a bit jealous. MyContinue reading “Making Baseball Art”
An Eeyore Day at the Office
Yesterday work passed in a haze of malaise and gloom. I can chalk that up, in part, to the catalog section I was working on. Sixty-four pages of catalog copy. Around page 10 it felt endless. At page 30 it felt impossible. At page 45 it felt interminable. The word “orrery,” used precisely, is inContinue reading “An Eeyore Day at the Office”
Five Years After My Grandmother’s Funeral…
Facebook reminded me this morning that five years ago today was my grandmother’s funeral, just as on Saturday morning it reminded me that she passed away a hemidecade ago. I knew this was coming; a few weeks ago Facebook showed me pictures from Shore Leave 2011 (including John de Lancie and an experiment in makingContinue reading “Five Years After My Grandmother’s Funeral…”
Playoff Baseball in Towson on a Summer’s Night
There’s a reason you play nine innings — in a baseball game, so long as you have outs remaining, no lead is insurmountable. Last night I went into Towson for playoff baseball, my first in-person postseason baseball game since the fateful Game 2 of the 2014 NLDS between the Washington Nationals and the San FranciscoContinue reading “Playoff Baseball in Towson on a Summer’s Night”
In Towson, a Battle of Division Leaders
As baseball games go, last night’s contest between the Baltimore Redbirds and the visiting Bethesda Big Train at Towson’s Carlo Crispino Field was an intense affair. The Cal Ripken Collegiate Baseball League season is nearing its end, and last night’s game was the penultimate regular season game for the Redbirds. (Next week is the league’sContinue reading “In Towson, a Battle of Division Leaders”
Ted Cruz and the Kick-Off of the 2020 Campaign
Let me ramble on for a few minutes about Ted Cruz’s speech last night at the Republican National Convention. For those coming in late, last night Ted Cruz delivered a speech — that was known in advance not to be an endorsement of Donald Trump — that was, surprisingly to pretty much everyone, an anti-TrumpContinue reading “Ted Cruz and the Kick-Off of the 2020 Campaign”
The Republican Convention and the Potential for Future Violence
Last night, on the second night (of four) of the Republican National Convention, the Republican Party nominated Donald J. Trump as its standard bearer for this year’s presidential campaign. Presidential conventions in the last thirty years, since I was old enough to pay attention, are stage-managed, scripted pep rallies. Nothing unexpected happens. Nothing controversial happens.Continue reading “The Republican Convention and the Potential for Future Violence”
Live at the Hollywood Bowl!
I was never optimistic about a CD release of the Beatles’ Live at the Hollywood Bowl album for a number of reasons — the Beatles themselves weren’t fans of it (they didn’t have any right to veto the release at the time), and George Martin wasn’t happy with the sound quality of the recordings. ThisContinue reading “Live at the Hollywood Bowl!”
An Irish Weekend
Over the weekend, I went to the Annapolis Irish Festival, an annual event held near Annapolis in mid-July. This year, the scheduling caused some agony as the festival coincided with Shore Leave‘s weekend, back in July for the first time in a hemidecade, and Carbon Leaf, who are taking a sabbatical year, were playing aContinue reading “An Irish Weekend”
When the World Overwhelms…
Several years ago, one afternoon at work, I was reading an article on The Guardian about the Arab Spring and the violent reprisals various Arab governments launched, especially in Syria. The specificity of the memory — where I was, what it was about — is striking. What followed has stayed with me. There was aContinue reading “When the World Overwhelms…”