AK Melting? Say It Ain't So, Pedro!
For the first day in April in Alaska, nowhere in the whole territory is known to have had a high temperature below 0° F (about -18 C.)
Looks like Spring has sprung.
Here the snow and ice is melting away. SHORTS weather, baby! I did a lot of sleeping yesterday (to be well-rested to work the night shift) but when I was awake -- SHORTS, baby! So sweet. Temps were well into the 40's and as high as 50 (about 10 Celsius) for a little while.
The bad news is everything's melting ... and then freezing into a fun layer of ice at night when the temp drops below freezing again. When this happens it makes for an extra Motor Vehicle Accident or two everyday. This morning I worked two crashes involving people rushing on their way to work, people who didn't see the ice when they were driving too fast. To be fair, when ice is involved, sometimes it doesn't take going over the speed limit for an accident to happen ... they just happen and are often quite unavoidable unless you just stay home and don't drive anywhere... but in general every dillhole speeds and interestingly, that's when most crashes occur. Hmmm..... less speeding = less accidents and less deaths in motor vehicle collisions?!? Really?!? (Yet people keep speeding... oh, and then there's the cell phone factor... joyyy.)
Anyway... I had my first overnight shift in quite awhile. Not starting work until 9 p.m. (or 1 o'clock in the morning Eastern Time) gave me the perfect opportunity last night before work to watch the Mets game with the Free Preview of MLB Extra Innings ... but whoop-di-freakin'-do...
Mets suck.
| They went from this... |  | to this... |  |
Not good. Pretty darn nice outing for Johan Santana on Opening Day. But then the day after Pedro was (very) shaky to start, had a nice 1-2-3 inning in the 3rd, retired the 1st batter in the 4th on a groundout but left the game after only 3 and a third innings pitched -- injured.
Mets bats had a nice 4th inning but they blew it in the end. The worst part is they blew it to the crappiest team there is.
2 games done and in the books ... 160 to go. How long will Martinez be out? Couple months? Perhaps Grandpa Pedro should just retire? Not looking good for the Mets. Very difficult to not worry. Every single freakin' game this season has been like a battle to make it to the Playoffs -- and there've only been two games so far!!! UGH!!!! I can't take this.
But I did get a run in this morning. About an hour ago, right after my shift was over at 9, I changed and headed straight to the Rec Center at the University and hit the track for the 1st time in April... I got 'er done (it must be said with a Larry The Cable Guy kinda sound or else it just doesn't have the right effect.)
Now I've got the whole day free! Unfortunately that means a whole bunch of sleep -- going to night shifts for a couple weeks, I don't know why I agreed to that. Won't mess with my runs but it's gonna mess with my sleep schedule, that's for sure. Ahh well, just so long as I'm awake this afternoon to watch the Mets lose again. (Just have no faith in them. Gonna take a LOT to have it restored.)
| And double unfortunately... |  ...at...  |
 | Champions League Quarterfinal Liverpool at Arsenal This is gonna be a good game, excuse me, a good match. |
Plus, thanks to the free preview on MLB Extra Innings, the Cubs are on... plus Tigers and the Red Sox in a little while.
Man, I hate to spend so much time planted inside watching television but lotsa good stuff to watch!
| Wednesday Morning Run: 18 minutes 47 seconds | +4 sec · indoors · |
|
Running in April is underway!
Goal: MUST surpass March's total running time!!!
(Hopefully by at least a half hour.)
Nothing much to say. Just 'cause it's a new month, not much is really that different. Picked up right where I left off a few days ago.
I've got a feeling that so many of these runs at roughly the very same time, they're allowing myself to build better stamina? Ummm... well, what's happening is for many runs now it's been fairly easy for me. Unfortunately it's not easy like walking to the garage ... but no major difficulty lately. I'll take that as a good thing!
Running tunes from
the album of the day...
The Rolling StonesBlack And Blue
recorded mostly throughout 1975;
released in April 1976
320 kbps mp3 download
Hot Stuff
Hand of Fate
Cherry Oh Baby
Memory Motel
Hey Negrita
Melody
Fool To Cry
Crazy Mama
I don't often listen to the Stones but maybe I oughta little more often. This album's got some pretty cool material on it.
My guess was Hot Stuff would have been the first single that would have gone up the charts at the time but nope. Fool To Cry made it to #10 in America. The album itself hit #1 and stayed there for a bunch of weeks. Now, charts and awards, they mean basically jack-diddly-squat to me, but they can help tell the story of commercial success and so sometimes I mention that crap. My favorite tune on here is an example of why this album was apparently criticized because there seems to be an emphasis on jamming.
Why in the hell is that a bad thing?!?! Above all the other songs, even Memory Motel which clocks in at 7 plus minutes, Hey Negrita has a really cool jamming feel to it. The Grateful Dead could've definitely done this as a 12 minute 1st Set closer. So sweet that woulda been!! The way two guitars work in tandem with each other -- so perfectly Jerry and Bobby!!! I wonder if this woulda been cool for Vince to sing... or at least awesome for him or Brent to wail away a time or two on keys. Maybe better for Bobby on vocals with spots for him to do his classic screamage. And Mickey & Billy just doin' whatever they'd like on drums to fill in such a great sound. Ahhhh....
Anyway, Billy Preston adds piano here (as well as on Hand of Fate and Melody) and Ronnie Wood is on lead guitar ... which is funny 'cause I always thought Keith Richards was a lead guitarist. The song gets goin' so nicely and all I want is for it to keep jamming longer than 5 measly minutes but it quickly comes to an end. Too bad.
There's a true Grateful Dead connection with this album, sort of -- musician Nicky Hopkins, who played with the Jerry Garcia Band over the last 5 months of 1975, he lays down piano and organ on two tracks.
A couple other tunes worth mentioning -- Cherry Oh Baby... reggae... eh, I'm not too big on that sound for the Stones. Hot Stuff on the other hand -- pretty cool stuff. This one features Harvey Mandel on guitar. There's a rhythm to it that's almost insanely repetitive but the guitar layering is sweet and gives it a mildly jammy feel here. And Crazy Mama to finish the album, along with Hand Of Fate, both perhaps two of the better songs here, well, that's what methinks.
Some minor gems but overall not a classic album in the sense that, you know, Michael Jackson's Thriller is, or anything by Hall & Oates ... but a groovy mid-70's Stones listen, that's for sure.
(And I think I'm gonna be givin' me Hey Negrita another listen!)
filed under...
: music,
# running,
^ The Rolling Stones,
Alaska,
New York Mets
4 comments:
Black & Blue- one of my fave Stones records- Memory Motel is the song that turned me into a rabid Stones fan.
the Mets will be okay...I think..I hope ?
Lighten up Francis, the Metskie's will be fine. The over/under on Pedro's starts was 7 for the year. They still have the best team in the division by far... the geriatric Braves pitching staff isn't gonna do crap and the Phillies have NO pitching at all.
And what's with the soccer mention... are you some sorta comm-u-nist?
I'll burn one for you at the Ratdog show Friday nite- peakin at the Beacon!
So slowing down and paying attention when you drive causes less accidents?
I thought that was just an urban myth.
Yeah, tis amazing how many lives are saved if people would just drive the speed limit!
And soccer bites! Football on the other hand -- most popular sport in the world, man. Every self-respecting punk anarchist has their favorite football team. American football players might be huge and powerful but many European football players, they'll head butt you and be back to their pint o' Guinness before you even hit the floor.
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