what about the plastic animals?

Bread and Football

It was such a nice day today.  I went down to the New Amsterdam Market and bought bread (walnut raisin in the foreground) and cheese.  Then I sat down on a bench near the Brooklyn Bridge to read the paper.  Looking at the sports section I see the crazy score highlighted above.  It's true!  West Liberty, of West Virginia, beat Edinboro, of Pennsylvania, 84 to 63.  There was a Division II record 1394 yards on offense.  That must have been an exhausting game to watch.

Football Country

Driving into St. Clairsville it was clear I was getting close to the center of the football universe.  The Red Devils had an okay season this year, finishing 6-4 overall but only 2-3 in league play, a far cry from their outstanding 12-1 season two years ago.

While there were plenty of football jerseys and cheerleader megaphones on Main Street there weren't any people.  The buildings were well-kept and attractive but all I remember seeing open were a couple of pizza places and maybe a bar.  It was a Sunday afternoon but it seemed odd that every single downtown retail place was closed.

Shaq's Size 23 Shoe

On the drive home last week I stopped at the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield.  I toured the Hall of Fame several years ago, when it was in the old building, but had yet to stop in at the new building.  The new building is much bigger, there's a full-size court in the center, and better organized than the old one.  You can play on the court if you have appropriate footwear and there's interactive displays throughout the exhibits. 

One thing I couldn't find was any mention of the 1951 college point shaving scandal.  In fact, I don't recall seeing anything about the Len Bias tragedy or Bobby Knight's bad behavior.  The whitewashing of history is irritating but much of the rest of the Hall is fun.  Basketball is enjoyed by millions across the world.  Being honest and mentioning the bad parts of the sport's history isn't going to turn anyone off of the game.

There are lots of old sneakers in the exhibits.  The largest belongs to Shaquille O'Neal.  He wears a size 23.  The shoes of several male and female players were outlined on the floor of the Hall's entrance.  A size 23 shoe is really large.

Happy New Year, everybody!

Soccer Weekend

Emma, with hood, advancing up the field.

Zoe, in red, guarding against a throw in.  Emma in background.

This past weekend I got to see my sometimes camera shy nieces play soccer.  Emma's match was Saturday morning as the cold and windy remains of Hurricane Noel arrived.  Luckily it didn't really start raining until after the match.  The skies had cleared by the time Zoe's game took place Sunday afternoon. 

After Zoe's match we, along with unofficial niece of the day Eliza (barely visible behind the crowd in the bottom photo), went apple picking.  We picked Red Delicious, Macouns, Baldwins, Winter Banana (quickly renamed banapples), Stayman Winesaps, Cox's Orange Pippins, Rhode Island Greenings and Mutsu apples.

Baseballs

Look who's back!  After a year's absence Mr. Met returns.  And he's got a Dr. Who-like aura about him this week. 

Mr. Met knows his fans have been concerned about his well-being.  Although he can't reply to everyone personally,--his lack of an opposable thumb, or fingers, come to think of it, makes writing and typing almost impossible, he appreciates all the email and letters he has received during his absence.  About his absence Mr. Met would only say he was tired of "only being the 'face' of the Mets with no involvement beyond that..." then, as often happens, he lost concentration and started mumbling to himself.

Punkin Chunkin 2005, Part 3

Apart from the chunkin competition there was a midway and stage to keep people entertained.  It is good to get away from New York every once in a while if only as a reminder that the rest of the country is not like here.  I can't imagine anyone in the city would ever sincerely rename french fries freedom fries. 

If you didn't want freedom fries or other standard midway fare you could eat pumpkin waffles, pumpkin funnel cake and pumpkin pie (Mrs. Smith - very disappointing).  There was also a pumpkin cooking contest.  Samples could be had of pumpkin donuts, delicious pumpkin bourbon cake, pumpkin apple muffins, spicy pumpkin cake, pumpkin puffs, baked pumpkin, pumpkin danish, pumpkin bars, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin brownies, pumpkin ravioli, and several varieties of pumpkin chili.  These could be washed down with homemade pumpkin ale and apple-pumpkin sparkling wine.

Punkin Chunkin, Part 2: Yankee Siege

The Yankee Siege trebuchet was the most visually striking of all the chunking machines.  A trebuchet uses gravity as its source of energy.  The big box thing is cranked up by hand.  When the weight drops it whips around the throwing arm holding the pumpkin.  Yankee Siege won last year with a chunk of 1394 feet.  The toss I saw on Saturday traveled 1340 feet or so (see the action sequence on Flickr).

Punkin Chunkin 2005, Part 1

The route is clearly marked.

Dawn Thompson performing the Punkin Chunkin Anthem.

A small, apparently not-too-successful, trebuchet.

Inmate grounds crew with air powered cannons and centrifuges in background.

White punkin being chunked from a catapult.

This past weekend was the 20th annual World Championship Punkin Chunkin in rural southern Delaware.  With a competitor from England, this year's contest actually was a world championship.  Teams compete in adult and children's divisions with human- or machine-powered chunkin devices like catapults, trebuchets, centrifuges, and compressed air cannons.   The human-powered machines are more interesting because you can see the pumpkins fly. 

The air cannons shoot the 8-10 pound pumpkins, not pumpkins, so fast and so far that you're lucky to see them hit the ground more than half-a-mile away.  Unless, of course, the punkins explode upon leaving the cannons, a condition known as  "punkin pie in the sky", or fly backwards, as they occasionally do with the centrifuges and the less-tested devices.  For safety only the crews are allowed near the machine-powered devices and a raised dump truck is used as a backstop.

Each team gets one chunk per day.  Each machine takes a few minutes to set-up so there is plenty of waiting during the day.  For entertainment there's a midway, bands, and, although alcohol is not sold on the grounds, plenty of drinking starting about nine in the morning.

Marathon 2005

Women's leaders, Susan Chepkemei (left) and Derartu Tulu (right) mile 22

Men's leaders, mile 22

A few scenes from mile 22 of the marathon this morning. 

For the first time since I've lived here we had live music.  They were rappers proudly from "the 631".

All's Quiet on the Upper West Side

I'm guessing I took this picture during the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl. The sidewalk in front of Fairway is never this empty. Temple oranges were 4 for a dollar. Is that a good deal?