Five to Five

Quiet Weekend. Just the way I like it. Didn't have to yell, 'hey, you kids get off my lawn' once. Wait, I don't have a lawn. And I haven't ever yelled that. Maybe I'm just preparing for that eventual time when I, the one day curmudgeon shakes his finger at whipper-snappers. Have you ever even snapped a whip? I've played around with one a time or two. Got them to snap at just the right target, and then quit for another decade or so, only to try again. Starting to sound like my practice of the piano too. Saturday's game had a number of events preceding it. The photo here shows the end of the annual Hollywood stars charity game. Blue vs White. This year they tied five to five after a few innings of fun. The fences were also move back this year. In that last few years past, it was only about the one hundred and eighty foot mark or so. This year they pushed the crowd back nearly three hundred feet in the outfield to watch. Guess they didn't want any celebrities hitting a portable gate fence catching a near home run like last year. There were smiles all around as folk watched the pre-game game. After they cleared the field of the white gates, then a half a dozen teams of cheerleader camps performed cheers before the start of the game. Some of the players on both teams were trying to warm up and the girls were really in their way. There were about six hundred of them perform various tumbles and pyramids for about fifteen minutes before they got ushered away so Kevin and Bean of KROQ could throw out a ceremonial first pitch. For an alternative rock station, they sure play a lot of popular bands too. Whatever gets them ratings. It was a good pitch and a camera popped them on the big screen a time or two between innings of the game that followed. Derek Lowe pitched a great complete game for the third time this year, and lost for the third time. He just can't get the support from the Dodger bats like he should. I'm glad he's still pitching so well and not throwing a fit like some other players have. Losing one to nothing when your team had the bases loaded several times during the game, once with no outs, is not a happy way to lose. Sunday's game they scored a few runs, but the Blue Jays scored ten. Dropping from first to third in the standings in the tight national league west is not fun either. The Mets are in town Monday through Wednesday, and the Angels arrive Friday through Sunday before the team flys off to Toronto for a ten day road trip. Maybe I'll give away some tickets and get some poker in this week... nah.