Ethics, Liriano & Slamma, Grace and Cement Posts...

Today Maura and I ventured to Target Field to watch the Twins battle the team from Cleveland. Cleveland had won the first two games of the series, but we had Francisco Liriano pitching today. That should make for a good game...

To make matters better, my old boss, Dick Lewis was in town and we met him outside Target Center (Dick was a bit confused by the "Target's". He was outside the basketball arena and seemed to not notice the crowd walking by heading to the next block and the ball park). Unfortunately, we were only able to get Standing Room Only tickets for today's game.

Happily, the Twins played better (even though Morneau was out, Mauer was out and our manager was gone) Big Drew Butera was our catcher. Observation: Butera is hitting .158, but he sure seems to call a good game. I think the team has won a lot of the games he has caught. Delmon Young continues to hit the ball, especially in clutch situations. Francisco Liriano continued to be a strong presence in the Twin's starting rotation, especially if he can get out of the first couple of innings. Another highlight of this game was watching Twin's rookie Anthony Slama make his major league debut. Slama gave up a single to Matt Laporta and then Slama struck out the next two batters before ending the inning with a ground ball to third. Great start son.

Cleveland's defense was also borderline-to-poor today. Still, I look for Cleveland to have a winning record during the second half of the season.

Maura left early to go be with Grace at Saint Sebrina's for a tattoo, and boy, did Grace get a tattoo. I was shocked at how bit it is, but after I got this note for Grace, it makes sense:

Haha thanks! I'm glad it turned out so well too! I got it as a tribute (I'm not really sure if thats the right word haha) to my mom. The Alzheimer's symbol is at the bottom and I wanted to show the growth of my emotional process in dealing with it. I think, at least at the beginning, that my mental state during the first few years of the disease became really twisted and painful so I kind of stopped moving forward emotionally. But what I've come to realize is that even if I stopped, life was still happening all around me whether I wanted it to or not. There is life during your hardships and, even if you feel like you might collapse under the weight of your struggles, you have to keep going. It's up to you to find the beauty of existence not just after the experince has passed, but also in each day while it is happening. Thats why I put the flower at the top, I suppose to symbolize my growth, or blooming if you will, towards this state of mind. So yeah, that got a tad bit melodramatic haha but there you go :) Wow, I wish that I was so self-aware and thoughtful. Nice job Grace!

I am interested in getting a mountain bike with 29 inch tires (the norm is 26"). Yesterday I found this ad in Craigslist and I responded. The guy sent me an email back, and then I said that I was interested in the frame and could he tell me about its "history". I haven't heard a word from the guy since. Shit....

Some possibilities:

1) The frame is stolen and the "history" comment spooked the guy.

2) The guy didn't like me or my email and that is why he hasn't responded.

3) Someone else bought the frame and this guy is too lazy to take the ad down off Craigslist.

Sigh. I don't know whether to send an email from another account, or just accept reality that this "too good to be true" deal isn't going to happen.

***********

Last night after work I asked our new neighbor if he would help me yank a cement post out of the ground. One of his buddies jumped up and came over to help, and we got the final cement post out quickly. It had still been buried about eight inches in the dirt, which explains why I couldn't pull it out with Maura's help earlier in the day.

Tonight after the baseball game I got the post-hole digger out and I scooped out more dirt. I hit clay at the bottom and so I may need to go rent an auger to get down the last 12-14 inches. But the project moves on, however slowly.