The SoapBoxers

In 2001, I set off on a long, solo vacation.  This was the longest vacation of my life at that point, in terms of both distance and elapsed time.

I was really excited about the trip and got very little sleep the night before I was scheduled to leave.  Eventually, I just packed the car, ate a quick breakfast at Denny’s, and hit the road.  I wasn’t much of a morning person by then, but I was on the road by about 5 AM.  470 miles later, I pulled up to my hotel in Canton, Ohio.  I had made really good time on the trip.  In spite of it being an hour later in Ohio (different time zone), I managed to arrive at the hotel before my room was ready.  I was pretty tired from the road and didn’t do too much that night.

The next day, I went to the football Hall of Fame in Canton.  Honestly, I was not overly impressed.  If you’re a hard core NFL fan, it might be worth the effort to go.  If you’re a casual fan, I’m not sure.  I did pick up some nice Vikings socks in the gift shop.

That I drove to Akron to catch an Aeros (class AA) baseball game.  I had purchased tickets months in advance, which was good. It was bobblehead night (Sean Casey), and the place was absolutely packed. I had a seat right behind home plate (4-5 rows back, I think). The ticket cost maybe $15?  Nice stadium.

Early the next morning, I hit the road again.  That afternoon, I arrived in the hamlet of Cooperstown, New York – home of the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.  Earlier in the year, I had become a supporter of the Hall of Fame.  Once nice benefit was that the membership card gave me unlimited free entry to the Hall of Fame.  I made a cursory review that Sunday afternoon.  I spent two more days digesting the museum in greater detail.  I saw the contract that sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees, a priceless T-206 Honus Wagner card, Tigers GM Dave Dombrowski’s masters thesis (not a great writer, in my opinion –  at least not at that stage of his life), and countless artifacts of the game.  Unlike many halls of fame, the baseball hall of fame encompasses all aspects of the sport – not just Major League Baseball.

One of the things I really liked was the exhibit of awards.  There were quite a few MVP and Cy Young awards on display.  I could feel a connection to the award winning athlete, imagining how they felt when they won the award.  Two of  Tom Seaver’s Cy Youngs were on display.  Something that struck me as odd was that one was perfectly shiny while the silver on the other had become tarnished over time.  Was this the result of a different quality of metal being used in those two years?

On Wednesday, I checked out of the Hickory Grove Motor Inn (leaving behind an audio book for the friendly women behind the front desk).  Be forewarned – it is advisable to make hotel reservations far in advance of your trip.  Cooperstown is quite small (around 2000 people) and there aren’t too many large cities in the area.  Why this location?  Because of the since-descredited story that civil war general Abner Doubleday invented the game in a nearby cow pasture.

On the way back west, I saw a sign for Niagara Falls.  It was only about 15 miles out of the way, so I decided to go there.  I wasn’t really expecting very much.  After all, it’s just a bunch of water going over a hill, right?  Wow, I was very impressed.  If you go to Niagara Falls, make sure to go to the Canadian side.  You get a much better view from the Canadian side – you’re looking at the Falls from in front of them instead of a more awkward angle on the US side.  I could have spent more time there (and a few years later, did spend more time there with my wife), but I had a long drive to complete.

At the end of the day, I found myself back in Ohio – this time in Sandusky.  Sandusky is home to Cedar Point amusement park.  This was my first exposure to Cedar Point, and I was completely blown away (full review here).  Regardless of what type of roller coaster you like, they probably have it.  I was there on a Thursday and Friday, when crowds were pretty reasonable.

All good things eventually come to an end, and I hit the road on Friday afternoon and arrived back home in Illinois very late that night – just in time to attend my niece’s college graduation the next day.

I got to see a decent chunk of the country, and had a great time at every spot along the way.   I also gained a lot of appreciation for audio books during the trip.  Nelson DeMille’s The Lion’s Game (review here) was with me on this trip.  The unabridged edition is a hefty 25 hours!  The book has a great plot (I’ve listened to it about a half dozen time since) and made the time pass very quickly.

What about you?  Which solo trip did you enjoy the most?

Over the years, I have come to the realization that a lot of people are not familiar with the process of balancing a checkbook.  This is a life skill that can save you a lot of headaches, so today we’ll step through the process.

When your bank statement arrives, you see that the bank balance of your account is $318.42, compared to the balance of $308.52 in your check register.

The following facts apply:

– For simplicity, we’ll assume that this is a brand new account

– The bank charged you $4.52 in service fees

– Per your check register, there are 3 checks during the month

• Check 1001 for $142.13 (groceries)
• Check 1002 for $16.12 (greeting cards)
• Check 1003 for $714.88 (whoa – went overboard at the outlet mall)

– You also withdrew $100 in cash from the ATM

– You had two deposits during the month

• $1413.12 from your day job
• $800.34 from your night job

The first thing you do is deduct the bank service fee.  You enter this in your check register, resulting in a balance of $303.88

Next, we check the bank statement to see which checks, deposits, and ATM transactions have cleared the bank.  These are checks 1001, 1002, and the deposit for $1413.12.  Mark these off in your check register – there is typically a column specifically for this purpose.

Next, add the outstanding deposit to your bank balance ($318.42 + $800.34 = $1118.76).  Hey, cool, you’re rich.

Whoa – not so fast.  Next, deduct the outstanding check (check 1003) and the outstanding ATM deposit.  $1118.72 – $714.88 – $100 = $303.88.  Great – that matches the balance in your check register – you’re done until next month.

What do you do if the numbers don’t match?

• Check your math.  In particular, it is quite easy to make a mistake in the check register
• Verify that the checks cleared for the amount you have recorded in your check register.  You may have written them down wrong, or your sloppy writing may have caused the bank to improperly process a check (not that this has ever happened to me)
• Make sure you you have excluded all cleared checks and deposits from the process, while also making sure that you have included all outstanding transactions.
• Did you forget to record a debit card transaction, automatic payment, or ATM transaction?  If so, record these in your check register and compare the new balance to the number your got during the reconciliation process (the process and adding and deducting outstanding transactions to the bank balance – $303.88 in our example).
• Make sure you recorded the bank service fee in your check register
• If you can’t figure it out, take a break and try later.  If you still can’t figure it out, ask a friend for help.

Next month, things change a bit.  When you start the reconciliation process, you will include the transactions that had not cleared this month (check 1003, the $100 ATM transaction, and the deposit of $800.34), as well as any new transactions.  Check off any cleared transactions in the check register, deduct the amount of the bank service fee from the check register, add outstanding deposits to the bank balance, substract outstanding checks from the bank balance and compare again.

 

Any questions?  I’ll be happy to go into more detail.

It was a dark and stormy night. This weather always made Casey think of Snoopy. How she envied that dog, with his vibrant imagination, always dreaming of aerial dogfights with The Red Baron or telling war stories with Bill Mauldin. When the bucket dropped down into the well of Snoopy’s creativity, it never came up dry.

The same could not be said for Casey. She looked down at the last two words she had typed – qwerty uiop. Hardly great fiction. She exhaled deeply, blowing tendrils of auburn hair away from her face. She abandoned the current story by closing the window. She opened a new window and began anew.

Twenty minutes later, she had managed just five sentences in the new story. The damned weather was distracting her. The flashes of lightning were constantly illuminating the sky, and the booms of thunder jolted her out of her seat every couple of minutes. It was completely impossible to concentrate. Casey needed a break. She decided to watch a bit of the idiot box before turning her attention back to her writing.

First, though, she needed something to quench her thirst. Casey crossed the room to the walk-in closet, pushed aside some dresses that she hadn’t worn in a decade, and removed a large, heavy box from the bottom shelf. Hidden behind the box – away from the prying eyes of friends who would be stunned by its presence – was a bottle of single malt scotch.

Casey grabbed one of the Styrofoam cups that sat next to the bottle. She poured a generous amount of scotch into the glass and chugged it quickly. She could immediately feel herself begin to relax. She replaced the box on the shelf.

Casey arranged a couple of pillows against the headboard of the bed and jumped up onto the pillow top mattress. She grabbed the remote and flipped the TV on. She was pleased to see that NCIS was on – and it was one that she hadn’t seen before.

Ducky was in the midst of explaining that the person had not died of natural causes, but was in fact the victim of a murder. This was not particularly surprising, since the show only focused on murders. Casey was interested in the real mystery – when were Dinozzo and Ziva going to get together? The suspense was killing her!

Finally, the NCIS team cracked the case and Gibbs got a confession from the bad guy. Casey noted that all good leisure must come to an end and got back to her writing.

Casey really needed to get her story done tonight. Her editor was a slave driver, and his deadlines were firm. If it wasn’t in his email inbox by midnight, it wouldn’t get into the next edition, and she wouldn’t get paid. Casey’s fridge was empty, her rent was due, and her bottle of scotch was dangerously low. She really needed a paycheck.

Since she hadn’t been productive in front of the computer, she decided to eschew her Macbook Air in favorite of pen and paper. She had a lot of flexibility – she could write anything, as long as it was fiction – but that was part of the problem. What sort of story should she write?

Casey grabbed her trusty Montblanc pen and a composition book. She decided to try her hand at a crime story. A half hour later, the story was dead. She had written just 250 words, and was completely uninterested in the plot.

Casey sighed, tore the page from the composition book, and wadded it up. She launched the paper ball across the room toward the waste basket. The long three point shot rimmed out – par for the course today.

She decided to switch directions one hundred eighty degrees and began work on a love story. Forty five minutes later, she realized that the main characters were only interested in each other as friends. Ugh.

Then the inspiration hit her. Of course – she would write a fictional account of a writer suffering from writer’s block.

Welcome to the second edition of my rant that appears here once a month on The Soap Boxers. My first post was on Christmas Eve and now this my second is on my 32nd birthday. So Happy Birthday to me and let us move on to the main topic of this months rant, The State of the Union.

Now I am not one for taking too much out of speeches like this and would rather just see the results of what is said happen, but last night’s address was a quite telling and interesting one. For one if one were just to glance upon it and not have any knowledge that the President was a Democrat, the tone of most of the speech was more conservative in nature. Remorse for deficit spending, praising cutting taxes, planned cuts in further taxes, and freezes in spending. Wow this is that socialism all the teabaggers have been all up in arms about? Anyways, let’s break down a few components addressed on the night.

Bank Bailouts:

I think this was a big populist piece of the speech that needed to be said and in the end really made the Republican party look by their reaction on the surface what they really are loud mouthed, hypocritical corporate tools. Bailouts were bad, needed to be done, most of the money has been returned and the rest is in the works to be returned through charging the banks a fee is the topic from the speech in a nutshell. It was the last part I am referring to that appeared on the surface to paint the Party of No for what they really are and not the populist voice they are trying to use.

The right side of the aisle sat in silenced with grumbling faces and muttering to each other as the President stated that the rest of the money would be returned through charging the banks a fee. It was one of many points on the evening where the President put the opposite party on notice on the night.

SCOTUS Decision:

The one almost “You Lie” moment of tonight’s speech came as the President addressed last week’s decision in the Supreme Court that allows Corporations no restrictions upon advertising for or against or donation to candidates for office.

When the President stated that this decision was wrong and opened the gates to corporate interests both domestic and foreign to control our electoral process, Justice Alito was seen shaking his head and mouthing that is not true. With all do respect to Justice Alito it is entirely true. The decision allows corporations to no loner have restrictions on the amount of money they can spend for a candidate for office and they are also allowed to run their own ads for or against a candidate any time they wish. Thus turning our elected officials into nothing more than corporate prostitutes.

Now I am not naive, corporate interests have dominated Washington and local elected offices as well for many many years and that was not going to end regardless. However this decision basically means corporations can basically buy their own candidates to run for office that will run solely on putting their interests first and the actual interests of their constituents last. Welcome to the Corporate States of America in 2010. Now the President did state that he wanted to see Congress address this, but honestly without a change in the makeup of the court I don’t see anything being able to stick with the wording of the majority opinion in this case.

“Politics as Usual”:

One moment I really enjoyed was when the President talked about even in light of recent election of the 41st no vote on everything the Democrats still had one of their highest majorities in congress in decades and basically told them to grow a pair and get things done for the American people. Then on the other hand told the Republicans if they want to sit there and block and delay ever single thing that comes before Congress then they need to own up to it themselves and they are the sole reason that nothing is getting done.

Bipartisanship is a two way street, not where one party completely stands their ground while the other makes every concession they can just to continue to have the other side say, well that is not good enough still. Should be interesting to see how this unfolds by the midterm elections. Will the Democrats actually gain the muster to just bear down and things done on their own? Hopefully so. Will the Republicans decide that their actions of doing nothing be seen in that light finally and decide to actually do the job of elected office and actually doing something? Probably not, but I can always hope.

Job Creation:

I would have liked to seen a more laid out point of job creation. It was a nice start in what was laid out, but the approximate 30 million jobs to be created is just a minor repair to the damage that has been done, but then again it is only the forecast for the upcoming year.  [Editor’s note: I’m verifying the 30 million figure with Angry Squirrel]

Student Loans:

Being a person paying off student loans it was a nice thing to hear about increasing Pell Grants, creating further tax credits and also the provision to forgive student loan debt after a certain period of time.

Don’t Ask Don’t Tell:

I wish it would have been done as promised in the first year in office, but better late than never guess. I’ll believe it when I actually see it, but the repeal of this insane and useless policy will be a great day when it comes. A recent report from NPR stating that 1/3 of women in the U.S. Military are raped while in the military is just one of the many more things threatening to the morale and discipline of the armed forces then the sexual preference of your fellow officer.

Well those are just a few of the points I will touch on from the speech, all in all it was a nice speech with some actual meat to it in proposals. Might not be entirely memorable down the line but for his first State of the Union address it was done well.

Now for a monthly tradition to start for my posts, The “Bad Nuts of the Month”. Our trained squirrels are busy each month figuring out the good ones from the bad, and the worst three nuts will be placed on display here before they go where where all the bad nuts go, down the garbage chute.

Bad Nut #1: Pat Robertson and Rush Limbaugh on the Haiti Earthquake

The evangelical christians’ equivalent to the Pope and El Rushbo the Cracker Drug Addict were really off base on the disaster in Haiti. Robertson stated that the Haitians got what they deserved and this was some sort of wrath for a deal they supposedly made with the devil to gain their independence from France long ago. Rush on the other hand stated that people should not give a dime or a minute of their time to help the Haitian people as it would only be playing into Obama’s hands in garnering respect form the light and dark skinned blacks in this country.

Then again nothing out of either of these two guys mouths really shocks me, but they are a couple of the worst nuts of the month. Rush would also make the list for his comments about Obama attacking Jews because he is going after the banks comments, but there is no need to list the same person more than once on the list.

Bad Nut #2: James O’Keefe and Friends

I guess the joke’s on James O’Keefe, the officials in Mary Landrieu’s offices were not gullible to believe he was actually a phone repairman as the idiots at the ACORN offices were to fall for him actually being a pimp. Now after entering the offices on Federal property under false pretenses to perform a felony O’Keefe and his buddies are now going to be facing some mandatory federal prison time.

Bad Nut #3: South Carolina Lt. Governor Andre Bauer.

One of the frontrunners for the Republican nomination in the next gubernatorial race in the state as well, Bauer stated that aid to the needy should be cut for some very interesting reasons. Me paraphrasing it does not do the idiocy of the man justice so I’ll just put the quotes from him on this issue in full context.

“My grandmother was not a highly educated woman but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed. You’re facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don’t think too much further than that. And so what you’ve got to do is you’ve got to curtail that type of behavior. They don’t know any better. You see, for the first time in the history of this country, we’ve got more people voting for a living than we do working for a living.”

He then goes on to rant about requiring parents to take drug tests and if they don’t pass then their children don’t deserve anything from the state at all because of that and that parents should be required to attend every PTO meeting or school event or you shouldn’t receive any benefits and that we should take away the huge monetary draw public assistance is (LMAO) by reducing benefits the more children you have.

I’ve been a sports fan nearly all my life.  Here are my favorite sports moments.  I’ve included an “embezzler’s dozen” – my 11 favorite moments.

1. Holliday Slides Into Playoffs – You seen the play a million times.  Matt Holliday slides toward home, Michael Barrett drops the ball.  The ump calls Holliday safe.  The one thing that you can definitely say is that Holliday was not out on the play – he was not tagged before being ruled safe.  Further, even if he had been called out, all would not have been lost.  The Rockies would have been tied 8-8 with two outs, Todd Helton on base, Brad Hawpe (.926 OPS that year) at the plate, and a very shaky Trevor Hoffman on the mound.  Then there’s the can of worms about Garrett Atkins’ “double” in the 7th inning.  If that is properly called a homer, the Rockies would have won the game 8-6 in 9 innings.

I was chatting online with Bob Inferapels during much of the game.  When the Padres scored twice in the top of the 13th to take an 8-6 lead (and ace closer Hoffman was on the way in from the pen) Bob offered his sympathy.  My response was (paraphrased) “Yeah, Hoffman’s good, so it will be hard to rally – but we do have the heart of the lineup coming up, so you never know.”  Indeed.

2. Kosmo Races Three Miles in One Day, Lives to Tell About It – During my final two years of high school, I was a member of the track team.  I ran the mile with a lot of heart, but not a great deal of skill.  At the final meet of my senior year, I asked my coach if I could also run the two mile.  We have a tiny track team, so he said “sure”.  Mind you, I had never trained for this distance.

How did I do?  Not very well – but I did finish the race, and I did beat one person.  Later in the meet, I ran the mile.  I was completely gassed from the two mile earlier in the meet, and ran one of the slowest miles in my career.  Nonetheless, it was a great feeling of accomplishment.  The kicker?  It was the only meet my parents were able to attend.

3. Helton’s Hat Trick – I have been to two Rockies games in my life.  The first was at Wrigley Field when I was living in Illinois.  The second was during a trip to Colorado with my girlfriend at the time (now my wife).  We had seats a half dozen rows back of third base.  Lovely seats (and pretty reasonably priced).

The game was on May 29, 2003.  The Rockies were playing their hated rivals, the LA Dodgers.

In the first inning, Todd Helton – my favorite Rockie at the time – hit a homer.  In the third inning, he picked up a single.  In the fourth, Helton homered again.  In the fifth, he made an out.  In the eight, he capped off the scoring with another homer.  Total damage for the day – 4 hits in 5 at bats, 3 homers, 4 runs scored, 4 runs batted in a 12-5 romp.  It was one of only two times in his career that Helton had three homers in a game.

4. Matsui’s Slam – Kaz Matsui hit 4 homers during the 2007 regular season.  So when he came to the plate in the 4th inning of game of game two of the 2007 NLDS with the bases loaded and the Rockies down 3-2, Kyle Lohse probably wasn’t particularly worried.  But Kaz Mat launched a grand slam that propelled the Rockies to a 10-5 win en route a sweep of the Phillies.

5. Blythe Beats Nebraska – My all-time favorite Iowa State football player is former wide receiver Todd Blythe.  On November 6, 2004, he lit up the Nebraska Cornhuskers for 188 yards on 8 catches – in the first half.  Unfortunately, he went into half time with an injury and was unable to pad his stats in the second half as the Cyclones held on fora 34-27 win.

6. Cyclones Beat Hawks, Cold – In 2001, I bought season tickets to Iowa State football (at a discount for recent alums) and sold off all but one ticket – holding on to the ticket to the September 15th game against in-state rival Iowa.  Then the September 11th attacks happened, and the game was delayed until November 24th.  It was cold.  The Cyclones took a 14-0 lead into half time and hung on for a 17-14 win.  This was the only time I’ve been in the crowd for a win against Iowa.  It was awesome.

7. Wallace Goes Long Distance for TD – In a 2002 game against Texas Tech, Cyclone quarterback Seneca Wallace scored on a 12 yard run.  Well, officially a 12 yard run.  Wallace actually ran about 120 yards on the play, traversing the field as he tried to find a clear route to pay dirt.  The win against Texas Tech pushed Iowa State’s record to 6-1 (the only loss being a controversial one to Florida State in the first game on the season).  Iowa State was in the top 10 (for the first time EVER) and  Wallace was routinely receiving this sort of praise.  The ‘Clones would unfortunately lose 6 of the final 7 games (not helped by games against four teams in the top 15 during that span, all on the road).  But it was a lot of fun while it lasted.

8. Sanderson Caps off a Perfect Career – Cael Sanderson put the entire sports of wrestling on the map during his unblemished college career.  In the 2002 finals, he beat Jon Trenge of Lehigh 12-4 to finish his career 159-0 with 4 national titles.  Trenge was no slouch – although he never won an NCAA title, he finished in the top three on three occasions.

Fittingly, as I listened to Cael’s final bout on the radio, I was pulling into Ames for a visit (see next item).

9. Kosmo on ESPN – In the late 90s and early 00s, I was a regular at women’s NCAA tournaments.  Ames (home to my alma mater, Iowa State) often hosted games.  Tickets were relatively cheap, the games were entertaining, and it was a good excuse to go back and visit Ames.  On March 25, 2002, I was in the stands to see Tennessee knock off Vanderbilt in the regional final.

During the game, some of the lower seats became vacant.  I was at the game with The Crunchy Conservative‘s brother, and we decided to sneak down into the good seats.  We scored some serious camera time on ESPN (cross “be featured on ESPN” off the bucket list), including this shot which makes it appear as if I am coaching Vanderbilt (in actuality, their coach is stooped over, out of sight of the camera).  That’s me between #21 and #13 and Crunchy’s brother in the white hat to my left.

10. Hawks Beat Michigan – For the first part of my life, I was actually a fan of the Iowa Hawkeyes.  My wife jokingly (??) calls me a traitor for changing to Iowa State, even though I’ve been an Iowa State fan for more than 17 years now.

The defining football moment of my youth was on October 19, 1985.  As the rest of the family was going into the house to get ready for church, I was standing atop a five gallon bucket in the barn (the only place where I could hear the radio very well).  With two seconds remaining in the game, #2 Michigan held a 10-9 lead over #1 Iowa.  Iowa kicker Rob Houghtlin lined up for a 35 yard field goal – and drilled it!

Alas, the Hawkeyes would not finish the season undefeated, suffering a defeat to Ohio State in Columbus two weeks later (and then a dismantling by UCLA in the Rose Bowl).  If you’re wondering why I hate Ohio State, look no further.

11. Karlis Kicks Vikes to Victory – This one is a favorite just because it is so quirky.  On the surface, a 23-21 football game doesn’t seem out of the ordinary.  But this game, on November 5, 1989 between the Vikings and Rams (then still in LA) was not ordinary.  At the end of regulation, the score was 21-21.  The Rams had scored on a Jim Everett touchdown pass and two short runs by Greg Bell.

Rich Karlis had provided all of the fireworks for the Vikings.

Rich Karlis was the kicker.  He had belted a record-tying 7 field goals in the game (including 5 of fewer than 30 yards).

Think it couldn’t get any crazier?  The Vikings won the game when Mike Merriweather blocked a punt out of the end zone for a safety.  Merriweather obviously didn’t understand the rule about punts being blocked out of the end zone (I guess he thought it would be a touchback and go back to the Rams on the 20?) as he was visibly distraught after the play.

 

Those are my favorite sports moments – what are yours?

It doesn’t take much effort or courage to second guess a player’s contract.  However, every once in a while, a deal is so awful that nearly everyone correctly pans it immediately after it was signed.  Today, we’ll look at three awful deals.

Barry Zito

Zito was a former Cy Young award winner and a lefty to boot.  After the 2006 season, the San Francisco Giants signed the free agent pitcher to a seven year contract worth $126 million.  So, what’s wrong with that?

Well, since that Cy Young year in 2002 (23-5 with a 2.75 ERA), he had been pretty mediocre, going 55-46 with a 3.83 ERA.  His numbers, across the board, were slipping.  He was giving up more hits, more walks, more homers, and was striking out fewer batters (strikeouts aren’t a panacea, but it you stop striking out people without compensating in another area, it’s going to hurt you).

In essence, a pitcher who began his career with aspirations of the Hall of Fame (47-17, 3.04 ERA in his first three seasons) appeared to now be just average, or maybe slightly above.  Unfortunately, the Giants were paying him ace money.

What happened?  Despite moving to the allegedly weaker National League, Zito’s numbers got even worse.  He went 11-13 with 4.53 ERA in 2007 and slid further to 10-17, 5.15 in 2008.  He was an utter laughingstock.  Zito bounced back a bit in 2009, posting a 4.03 ERA (along with a 10-13 record) while putting up improved numbers in other areas.  Three years into the deal, the pundits have been proven correct.  Zito will have to put up dominant numbers for the rest of the years in the contract in order for the Giants’ money to be well spent.

Gary Matthews Jr.

In 2006, Gary Matthews put up by far the best season of his career, hitting .313 with 19 homers and 79 RBI.  He was selected to the All-Star game and finished 30^th in the MVP balloting.

His reward was a five year deal from the Anaheim Angels worth $50 million.  The baseball world was stunned.  Even with his 2006 season, Matthews had been a below average offensive player during the course of his career (posting a career OPS+ of 97, with 100 equating to an average player).

If Matthews had been a bit younger, the deal would have made more sense.  It could have been argued that Matthews was having a breakout year in 2006 – with more of the same on the horizon.  Matthews was 32 at the end of the 2006 season, though.  There’s a special term for “breakout” seasons that happen at that age.  Fluke.

After three lackluster seasons with the Angels which saw him as a part time player toward the end, Matthews was traded to the Mets with two years and $23.5 million remaining on his contract.  Also traded to the Mets in the deal was $21 million in cold, hard cash to offset Matthews’ contract.

Tom Glavine

Tom Glavine is, without argument, a future Hall of Fame pitcher and one of the best left handed pitchers of this era.  What’s he doing on this list?

After the 2007 season, Glavine was signed to a one year, $8 million deal by the Atlanta Braves, for whom he pitched during most of his career.  Although several of Glavine’s secondary statistics seemed to indicate that he was in decline (common for a pitcher of his age), the $8 million salary was not the problem.

The problem was that Glavine was a type A free agent.  The team losing Glavine would get the Braves’ 2008 first round draft pick (#18 overall) and well as a sandwich pick between the first and second round (which would end up being the #33 overall pick).  That meant that the team losing Glavine would get two potential building blocks for the future.

That all sounds pretty bad, huh?  Well, to make it even worse, the team losing Glavine (and gaining those picks) was the Braves’ bitter division rival, the New York Mets.  As someone who is quite familiar with the free agency compensation system, I very nearly spit Pepsi onto my monitor when I saw the Braves inflict this sort of damage upon themselves.

So, what happened?

Minor league expert John Sickels has the player picked at #18 (Ike Davis) as the #4 prospect in the Mets system and the player picked at #33 (Bradley Holt) as the 9th best Mets prospects in his 2010 Mets Prospects list.

As for Glavine?  Well, there really wasn’t much chance of significant upside for the Braves.  A 42 year old pitcher is always working on borrowed time.  But even I expected more than a 2-4 record and 5.54 ERA in 13 starts during his final stint with the Braves.

So, what were the Braves thinking?  It seems that they were blinded by sentimentality.  Glavine was a huge part of their success in the 90s, and it felt good to bring him back.  A front office with as much experience as the Braves should have made this decision with their head instead of their heart.

Writing is capturing ideas. Your mind can be amazing. As you search for topics to write on, do not reject any ideas. Some ideas may not be appropriate for you chosen style of writing, or for all audiences. Still, jot down everything. You never know what will be an important piece of a future work.

Ideas can come from any direction. Most of us have some story from our past that can at least be a seed for a new effort. Be careful not to put in too much personal detail, we don’t want an aunt writing us out of the will after all. Here is an example; my sister works at IKEA for a second job and recently was given the opportunity to move into loss prevention. This is the group of people who try to limit the shoplifting and other forms of theft that impact the business. In her interview, she asked if she could have a taser. The team leader refused based on his belief that she would use it. The idea of a loss prevention person having and using a taser in a large box store like IKEA could be a great comedy. Who knows, that could be my next effort.

Current events or even seasonal events can be good fodder as well. Politics, natural disasters, crimes and scandals are available everyday. You can start with real life events and insert your characters, or slightly change the event to see where the story leads compared to real life. Just in the last few weeks, we have a world famous athlete caught in multiple extra-marital affairs, an earthquake in a third world country, back room dealings on major legislation, an aggressive nation testing long range rockets and active combat in Afghanistan. Any of these headlines provides fodder for short stories, poems, even novels. Even if these events are not part of your story, they can provide colorful backdrops and depth.

Seasonal events, like Professional and collegiate sports, provide a never ending cycle to grab your creative efforts. Today, Professional football is in the post season, College football is in the post bowl glow, basketball and hockey are in full swing and the winter Olympics are just around the corner. Stories with the point of view of athletes, spectators, officials, or even organizers can be outstanding platforms for your message. I remember reading as a child a story about going to a baseball game. The story was a young boy’s vision of waiting for his father, traveling in the New York Subway, standing in line to get his ticket, even getting to his seat. The story ended just as they stood for the national anthem. It was an incredible expression of personal wonderment focusing on a baseball game that was never described.

As I have written before, almost as a theme for my ramblings, capture all of your ideas. If you do not need it for your current project, it could be useful later or even be a starting point for a new effort.

–KEEP WRITING–

What’s ahead in the year ahead?  Kosmo takes his best guess.

Sports

• The Big 10 finally expands to 12 teams, allowing it to have a conference title game.  The new school, Sarah Lawrence College, is the trendy pick to claim the conference’s automatic BCS bid.
• The Cubs will fail to win the World Series.
• Notre Dame will fail to win the BCS National Championship.
• USC will be penalized by the NCAA because of athletes receiving improper benefits.
• The St. Louis Rams will double their win total from 2009.
• Brett Favre retires.  And then unretires.  And then retires again.  Lather, rinse, repeat.
• John Madden will blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah and if you can score more points than the other team, you have a good chance of winning the game.
• Jimmie Johnson’s run at a fifth consecutive NASCAR title comes to an abrupt end when pranksters release a “little bit” of air from his tires before the season ending race at Homestead.  Jeff Burton denies all responsibility.
• Joe Buck will be fired for incompetence when he repeatedly refers to Matt Holliday as “Pat Hentgen”.

Business

• The tobacco industry fights for approval to have their warning label changed.  The new label reads: “Cigarette smoking is hazardous to your health – but not nearly as bad for you as drop-rail cribs.”
• People finally stop buying stock in the old GM when Smokey Bear echoes the words of the US Government and the SEC by proclaiming that the stock will be completely worthless.
• AIG pays back all the money they owe the government.
• Google buys Twitter, Microsoft, Disney, Apple, Wikipedia, Dole, Berkshire Hathaway – and in a move that stuns everyone, attempts to buy itself via a hostile takeover.  The hostile takeover is foiled by renegade executives who launch a denial of service attack against the buyers.
• The postal services will raise postal rates.

News & Politics

• In November, California voters pass a ballot initiative that legalizes gay marriage.
• On the same November ballot, California voters pass a ballot initiative that reaffirms the current ban on gay marriage.
• In mid-December, California slides into the Pacific Ocean.
• A celebrity will die at a very young age.  The world will be shocked.
• Sarah Palin mobilizes a run for president.  Palin/Palin 2010 gains immediate support from the conservative base.  When Palin is informed that there is not a presidential election is 2010, she replies “I can see death panels from my front porch!”

Art, Entertainment, & Literature

• Danielle Steele releases eight new books.
• The art world is excited about a mysterious new piece of art.  Many art experts are unemployed eight days later when the “organic brown pigment on white paper” is discovered to be a coffee stain left on a napkin by a visitor.
• Michael Jackson’s estate earns eleventy trillion dollars from album sales, movie royalties, t-shirts, coasters, and revenue from the Neverland Hotel and Casino.
• On March 18, the Mickey Mouse gang is stunned to discover that the Mystery Mousketool will not fix the problem.  Much sadness.
• Conan O’Brien, blackballed by the major networks, lands a deal with PBS.  O’Brien hosts a children’s show that focuses on literacy.  The show, Conan the Librarian, is a complete flop.

Sitting as a wall flower in a meeting with high level managers allows the mind to wander. Facing a wall of windows on a winter day in the mid-west provides a playground of ideas and observations.

Morning and the flags are hanging so sadly draped against the poles. Sad but still providing the only color on this grey day. The heavy freezing fog grows hoar frost on the branches of the black bark oak trees. Black and white background, browns by the sides of the roads, parking lots and drives. Even the cars have a ghost white coating of road salt and ice. Everyone is moving slowly, carefully. People walking in from their cars shuffle step like elderly residents of a nursing home, frightened of falling, yet hurrying to get in from the cold. The warmth of the room and the drone of the speakers makes it hard to stay awake. If only I had some part, something to add to the discussion to keep myself focused.

The wind picks up slightly, the flags crack off their icy coatings to ripple fitfully, still hugging the poles. No one is walking outside. Cars drive slowly by. The hoar frost flakes and falls almost like snow. The trees move, shaking and creaking in the breeze. Just enough wind to move the fog. Relief from the monotony, but a harbinger of bad things to come. A change of weather can only bring danger. Temperatures just at freezing with lots of humidity will result in precipitation; we can only hope it is snow. The schools have already closed from the dire predictions of the weather men. Now I have something to watch, something to keep my attention. So many people in one room, so warm, darkened for the projector, and still the droning speakers.

It has started to rain, the ice is visibly building up on the cars. It is getting bad quickly. An ambulance drives by, lights flashing, yet creeping slowly along the street. Safety over speed, this is not the time to have an emergency. Others are looking out the window, even the current speaker. Time for a break, bathroom and weather watch. Someone calls up the local weather radar on a laptop computer. This is only the beginning. We can’t even identify some of the colors on the screen. Someone announces that he just talked to his wife, it is sleeting ten miles to the west, almost could be called hail. The weatherman calls it ice pellets. Suddenly, the scene turns white. Large wet flakes of snow. This is good, it will be messy, but there will be traction; for walking and driving. It isn’t even noon yet.

Visitors from out of town start checking the airport. Why did they ever come north in January? They are desperate to get back to their homes and warmth. They groan aloud as the scene outside changes again to sleet and rain. The speaker waits for all for all to pay attention again. We can get through everything if we just focus. The out of town people can get out, surly it will get better. Someone check the radar again, yes it should get better.

By noon, there are no cars on the road. The trees have gone from white frosted to glazed with ice. They are eerily beautiful. An animated discussion grabs everyone’s attention for a while, but then back to the droning. We have all read the slides before the event. We have all given our criticisms. No arguments allowed in front of the customer. Authority overrules intelligence, not often, but still annoying. The skies seem to be getting lighter. The rain is slowing. Just a few more hours then head home. There will be scraping of ice and a careful drive. What? I’m sorry, can you repeat the question. Oh yes, I can deal with that still today. Yes, I can get that to California tonight. They will wait. If we finish here by five o’clock, I can get it done by seven our time. No staying late isn’t a problem.

They are finally done. It is dark. Scraping the car will have to wait. Call the wife and let her know I will be late. No, don’t save any dinner, I had plenty of bad food all day. The group goes by discussing where to eat, others are rushing for the airport. At least I don’t have to travel tonight. I will get to sleep in my own bed. The kids may be asleep by the time I get home, but I will be at home.

Finally done, the data is sent. The ice isn’t so bad on the car. The drive home is slow. The roads are ice covered. Most people are already home, so the roads are mostly empty. The weatherman on the radio suggests that there will be more nasty weather overnight. If it is bad enough, I can work from home, home with my children and my wife. An ice storm is not such a bad thing after all.

KEEP WRITING

Although the idea for this story was quite obviously ripped from the headlines, this story is intended to be politically neutral.  You will notice that no party affiliations are mentioned, nor is the subject matter of the bill detailed.

One of the preeminent power brokers in Washington was chewing on a number two pencil with the severity of a hungry beaver, carving deep incisions into the wood.  Jeffrey Warner had a serious problem.  Even worse, it was a problem without an easy answer.

Warner knew that he had the support of fifty nine senators to vote for cloture and end the filibuster on the bill.  Not fifty eight, not sixty.  Precisely fifty nine.  Unless Warner could pick up another vote, the most important bill of a generation was going to die on the floor.

Warner snapped the weakened pencil in half and launched the pieces at the waste basket twenty feet away.  The stress of the situation was making him tired, exacerbating the lethargy that routinely took hold of his aging body at the end of a nineteen hour work day.  It was only eleven at night, but Senate majority leader Jeffrey Warner needed a nap.

When Warner awoke from his respite thirty four minutes later, the solution to his problem was fully formed.  He called a page and instructed him to track down Senator Byron Cooper.  A short while later, the long term senator stood before him.

“Byron,” began the leader, “I’d like your support on Senate Bill 1975.”

Cooper laughed in response.  “You know I can’t support that bill.  It goes against all my principles.”

“I could give you a hundred million dollars.”

“While my state could use those funds, it would be political suicide,” responded Cooper.

“We could have you killed, “ continued Warner, oblivious to the interruption.

Cooper jumped out of his chair in anger.  “We’ve had disagreements before, Warner, but threats of violence is a bridge too far!”

“Violence,” echoed Warner.  “I’m not talking about violence.  Sit down and let’s discuss this like gentlemen.”

A thoroughly confused and somewhat wary Byron Cooper returned to his seat.  He listened as Jeffrey Warner laid out a brilliant plan.

Byron Cooper was in a tough spot.  He was in a loveless marriage and had turned to booze and gambling to bring pleasure into his life.  Not surprisingly, he owed a fortune to gamblers.  The only thing that prevented him from having his legs broken by goons was the power that he held as a US Senator.  He wasn’t particularly fond of the job, but fought to hang on as if his life depended on it – because it probably did.

“This is your golden parachute, Byron,”  said Warner, as they parted ways an hour later.

Three days later, the Washington Post had a front page story about the car bombing that claimed the life of Senator Byron Cooper.  He was eulogized by his powerful friends in the Washington elite.  Days later, his mourning widow burst into tears as his casket was lowered into the ground at Arlington National Cemetery.

When it came time for the governor to appoint someone to fill Byron Cooper’s spot in the senate, he chose a man who was very nearly the ideological opposite of Cooper.  This stirred up controversy, but the governor didn’t give a damn.  The new Senator mirrored his own beliefs, and that’s all that really mattered.

Six days later, the Senate voted for cloture.  Sixty senators – including the newly minted replacement senator – voted for cloture, and the filibuster was broken.  The bill passed the up-or-down vote with the exact same number of votes.  The president signed the bill into law on a cold day in late March.

The morning that the President signed the bill, Jeffrey Warner poured himself a generous amount of cognac from a bottle with a yellowed label.  Thirty four years after being elected to the Senate, Warner had finally seen the passage of his life’s work.

At the same time, an ocean away, another man was also enjoying a drink.  It was six hours later in the city of Nice, France.  The man formerly known as Byron Cooper had finished swimming a few laps in his heated indoor pool.  Cooper relaxed in the comfort of his sun room, basking in the warmth of an unseasonably warm day.  He stroked the beard on his surgically reconstructed chin and decided that he needed a drink.  He rang a small bell, and his butler raced into the room, carrying another piña colada.