I killed a bird

Not deliberately anyway. I got up in the morning, put coffee on, and then went outside to get the paper in the driveway, unaware of the events that were about to be put in motion. If I had gotten up a little later or earlier, perhaps then things would have been different. As I walked between the truck and car in the driveway and approached the paper out near the sidewalk, a cat which roams the neighborhood, came out from under the car. I ran at it to scare it off our property. The feline ran down the sidwalk in front of the neighbor's house. Garbage and recylcling had been out in the neighborhood and there were birds around the neighbor's recycling walking and pecking around the curb. The cat, running down the sidewalk, veered to the left at the birds, and the next thing I knew he was running down the sidewalk with a feathered body in his mouth. I could only stand there and watch, being too far away to run at him in hopes he would drop the bird. I say "I killed a bird" only because I assume the bird didn't survive.

The Magic Number Is.........

Today the Mets' magic number to clinch a nonplaying spot in the post season is, I believe, 81. But for me the magic number is TEN. That has always been the number of games behind in past years where I automatically lose interest. And this morning I wake up and the Mets are ten games out. Of course you are probably saying that there is the wild card, and for that they are only 6.5 games out. Whoopee! There isn't a chance in hell that they are making the playoffs. I will stick with ten as my number to not care anymore. If they reach ten in the wild card then they will be closing in on twenty in the division. BUT, if by some miracle, as in 1969, when they came from ten back, they do get back in contention, I will be there. Fair weather? Not really. I still will follow them in the paper, and on the internet, but what I won't do is invest all the time in watching games that I have always done when they are in contention.

I need to get out more

I had an errand to run today and I opted to drive my truck. While sitting at a traffic light I looked at that small sticker they put in the corner of your windshield when you get an oil change. It is there as a reminder, but since it is always there I never really pay attention to it, and in many cases you can't even read what is written. But I could read it. It said that my next oil change should be at 43,000 miles. That meant that my truck's previous visit to the maintenance bay was at 38,000 miles. The fact that it is a five thousand mile span while some places put it at three thousand is not up for discussion in this posting. With the mileage on the small sticker it is sometimes accompanied by a date when you should bring it in, on the outside chance that the date should come before you drive the five thousand miles. After taking in all this information I looked down at my odometer. Not a true odometer, or at least in my mind, which is one that has numbers on a wheel and they roll over as your vehicle moves down the road. Today's vehicles have digital odometers. Mine said.... actually it didn't say anything ....... it read 40,298. Now that I had that information I could determine by simple subtraction, that I had driven 2,298 miles since my last oil change. BUT, I needed one more piece of information, and that was when did i get the last oil change. Then the light changed and I drove on. When i got to my destination I remained in the truck, opened the glove compartment (does anyone really keep gloves in there?) and pulled out the small pile of receipts from all my oil changes and vehicle services. The most recent one was dated 12/9/08. Again, simple calculations gave me the amount of time elapsed since then; seven months. I think it is time for another oil change because if I wait for the five thousand miles almost a year will have passed. But the gist of this entry is to state that in sieven months I drove my truck a mere 2,298 miles. Again, with some division, that is 328 miles a month, or extrapolated out, would be 3936 miles a year. Little old ladies don't drive that small amount of miles. So, I do need to get out more.

Mets Suck? Or....

Well, the Mets do suck. But is it what is supposed to be? There was a distinct hope prior to the start of the season that there would be the chance of winning the division or at least of capturing the wildcard. But all that is far in the rear view mirror now. Well below 500, mired in fourth place with only the hapless Nationals below them I can safely say that only a miracle can save this season. But my question was ,do the Mets suck, or was it something that should have been expected? Should there have been a suspicion of bad things coming once the real home of the Mets was turned into a pile of rubble? Sure Shea was a stadium well past its prime, but it was a place that held some great moments, great games, and one of the most notable plays in baseball history. To replace it with a homage to the Dodgers instead of a celebration of Shea, past players and teams must have angered the Gods of Baseball. They have decided that this will not be the Mets year. But what worries me is how many seasons will they demand of this organizaion before they are satisfied that the suffering is enough.