Leap Day

Sure, it only comes around every four years. Yet that doesn't mean nothing interesting has happened on February 29th in history.

The first Leap Day was in the year 45. It was also the last day of the year in the Roman calendar.

February 29, 1692 saw the first accusations of witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts. Hey, I didn't say everything which happened was good.

Hattie McDaniel won an Academy Award on Leap Day in 1940, the first African American woman to earn the honor.

Bandleader Jimmy Dorsey (1904) quarterback Fran Tarkenton (1932) and Michigan astronaut Jack Lousma (1936) were all born on Leap Days.

The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper album won the Best Album Grammy on February 29, 1968.

Hank Aaron of the Atlanta Braves signed the first $200,000 per year contract in baseball history in Leap Day 1972.

So it doesn't happen much, but February 29 has its historical highlights. Happy Leap Day!

Another dumb term

I went online this morning and I ordered a book. I selected the book, I entered my card information, I received a confirmation number as well as a confirmation e-mail. The book itself won't be available until September, but it's been ordered. I will get a copy.

I will stress it's been ordered. I will get it.

So why, pray tell, does everything and everyone involved in this situation (except me) insist that I've pre-ordered it?

Please tell me what I'm missing. I ordered it. It is paid for. I have a receipt. It is coming. What the hell is pre about that?

Should I be stressing over this? I think so. It is not what they're saying it is. It. Is. An. Order. For. A. Book. How hard is that to understand?

Or maybe I should have given them a pre-debit card and have the thing pre-shipped to my pre-address? It makes as much sense to me.

Curmudgeon rant over. But he will seethe about this for a few hours.

Waxing baseball philosophic

Hope springs eternal, in baseball anyway. As the Grapefruit and Cactus League games get played this month and next leading up to the regular season start on March 26, everyone's a contender. But can you contend with the past?

I don't mean that in a bad or melancholy way. I look forward to baseball as much this year as any other even as I've said excessively that sports mean less to me every day. There's just something about baseball which separates it from the pack. Better writers than me have tried to describe it for years. I think the crux of baseball is that it's transcendental.

There: that's your overwrought, ten dollar word of the day. Yet I find that it's apt. Baseball lives beyond everyday life, almost in the ethereal realm of the not quite true, not quite believable. It's the perfect blend of offense and defense. Everybody plays the both sides of the game (other than the monstrosity of the designated hitter). You could play with your father or grandfather, who could never run upcourt with you (and you had better never tackle Gramps). Whole families could play. Not so much with most other sports.

You can make baseball movies like Field of Dreams too, because baseball sees, accepts, and understands its place in Americana. Moonlight Graham says more for baseball than nearly anything else, and he hardly played. That's a far better statement for a sport than choreographed and fake celebrations after meaningless touchdowns.

Yes, it's time for baseball. Let's play two.

Gran Torino and the movies

While at my family's home last weekend in Newark, Ohio, The Ohio Cosgriffs, we watched a few movies. One of them was Clint Eastwood's Gran Torino. I liked it. Quite a bit.

For me it was a new movie. I know it came out in 2008 but I had always heard good things about it and always intended to see it. Eventually.

The fact is I don't go to the movies. Not counting special events such as Rifftrax, the last new movie I liked which I saw first in a theater was Casino Royale, and that was I believe 2006.

A lot of my decreased interest in films is that most simply aren't worth the time. They tend to be shallow and jammed with pop psychology. I can read a good book, be entertained more cheaply and, what's more, know more. Maybe it is only the old guy in me talking but they just don't seem to make 'em like they used to. To be sure, good movies do get made - Apollo 13 comes to mind - yet even that one's 25 years old.

Of course, you don't have to learn something for a book or movie to be good. They can simply be diversions, and obviously there's nothing wrong with that. To venture from the proverbial sublime to the ridiculous, a recent example for me would be Detective Pikachu, which I watched on demand a few weeks ago and very well liked. I had never thought I would like a film based on a character licensed to sell, but there you have it. I do recommend it if all you want at a given time is recreation.

I really want to say more about Torino but I hate to spoil what is a good, reflective movie for anyone who has not seen it. Suffice it to say that it does make me want to be a bit more serious about investing in new or more recent films. Even if I have to go back a decade for it.

The blinker

The things you see on the road.

This is true, this really happened. Honest.

As I was driving on Interstate 280 in northern Ohio this morning, I came across a van which was marked as working for a senior center. It even had painted across the rear windows, Over 60? Leave the driving to us.

I followed it for about four miles. And all four miles - I am not making this up - its left turn signal was on. The blinker was winking at me the whole time.

Do I even need to enunciate the joke?

A Question

Have you ever noticed that the people who want you to change rarely change themselves? That's because it's not about any sort of positive change. It's about wanting you to do things their way.

Just sayin'. It's a bit like tolerance. It sounds good until you realize how often it's only about you tolerating them. Their tolerating you, well, that's a whole nother story. You're wrong.

Again, just sayin'.

Extra coffee

I like my hotel in downtown Indy. And I think it likes me.

When I returned from the WWETT show yesterday my room was cleaned, as you of course expect. Bed made, fresh towels, carpet vacuumed; all the expected luxuries the First World delivers. And beside the coffee maker were not the anticipated two but rather the makings of three cups of coffee. Real coffee, not decaf, although the two individual servings of decaf were in the tray. I assume they were the two I left from yesterday morning. They'll still be there when I leave Indy tomorrow.

So I get three cups of coffee this morning. Yay me.

But that's just between us because I'm only supposed to have two. Don't tell my doc. I'll buy your silence with the English Breakfast Tea which is also on the coffee tray.

Nah, I won't. I'm drinking that too.