Woo-Socking

I had a spur of the moment inspiration strike earlier in the week when I realized I hadn’t been to a WooSox game all year and the season was winding down. I reached out to Keene Friend and the Cantankerous Friend who were only to happy to accompany me to overcome this scheduling tragedy. I wasn’t sure about the Favorite Panamanian as her knee has been extremely painful for the past week. She is a died in the wool baseball fan though, so she was on board. An added benefit, the top three prospects in the Red Sox farm system were called up to Worcester this past weekend. My buddies showed up around 5:30 last evening and off we went. My Favorite Panamanian immediately started complaining about the five-minute walk from the parking lot to the ballpark but she rectified this by waving down one of the courtesy golf carts the team runs between the parking lots and the gates. I was surprised when we sat down to see that a huge new building had arisen from a vacant lot beyond right field. It really had been too long between games.

The Gang at the Game Last Night

The seats had been carefully chosen to be near the best concessions so, after getting the requisite dinner of Coney Island dogs (a Worcester mainstay), we settled in for the game. I don’t think there are any bad seats at Polar Park and the weather was absolutely perfect. The game didn’t offer much in the way of excitement. Only two of the big three played and neither did anything. The supposed stud, Tristan Casas, on a rehab assignment from the big club looked disinterested, striking out three times and nearly costing them the game with a late inning error. The Sox won the game 2-1 but the real joy came from spending time with two of my oldest friends, both baseball fans. The fan I’m married to spent most of the game scrolling through the internet on her phone. I reminded her a couple times we were at a baseball game, only to receive the death stare (long married guys understand that look). She did emerge from the electromagnetic spectrum long enough to bogart about half of my ice cream but that was kind of fun. A great night out. I really appreciated my friends making the journey from Keene to join me for the game.

View From Our Seats with That New Building in Right Field

On Tuesday date night the wife and I went to see Borderlands. I don’t understand why this movie is getting so much hate thrown at it. That’s probably because I’ve never played the game the film was based upon so I had no expectations. I really liked it as it offered a smart sci-fi action comedy with a stalwart crew of actors. Cate Blanchette in a true endeavor outside her usual fare is awesome as a bounty hunter hired to find a lost daughter of the villain. She makes her way to her dystopian home planet where she teams up with a motley gang including Kevin Hart, Jamie Lee Curtis, and a very funny robot voiced by Jack Black. There is also a huge masked, mostly silent character who’s around the physically crush anybody threatening the young girl who is also extremely funny. Again, I don’t get the hate because this is a very good, big, summer action flick. Loved it.

Six movies fell in the A-Z watch, all keepers: The Last Starfighter, one of my favorite movies of all time, one of first ever films with CGI effects which are rudimentary at best but with a great story; Last Vegas, silly but very fun romp with four legends carving up the screen; The Last Witch Hunter, much better than you might have heard, a perfect role for Diesel; L.A. Story, have always hated pretention of L.A. but Martin can melt your heart, very funny take off of his home town; Law Abiding Citizen, great crime revenge drama with Butler and Foxx dueling; and Laura Croft, Tomb Raider, Jolie is very good in this, before she became a caricature of herself.

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RECURRING CHARACTERS:                                

ABFA – Amazing Best Family Athlete - my daughter in law; BR3 – Blog Reader #3 – granddaughter #3; BRS - Blog Reader the Sequel - second granddaughter; Cantankerous Friend – friend since grade school who likes to argue about everything, poses as radical leftist to attract women; CRC - Connecticut Riverboat Captain – another close friend from high school, renowned sailor of the big river; Curbside Girls – close friends of my daughter acquired during him her single days in Brooklyn; Deckzilla – our backyard deck which grew to monstrous dimensions once my wife got involved in planning; Favorite Panamanian - the wife (of course); FBR - First Blog Reader - first granddaughter; First Friday – celebrations to mark the First Friday of the Week; Great Aunt - my elder sister; Keene Friends 1 & 2 – friends since high school from my home town of Keene, NH; Kindergarten Friend – friend since kindergarten whom I reunited with after many years; Maine and Virginia Musqueteras – two close friends of my wife – her US sisters, my wife is the 3^rd Musquetera (musketeer); Namesake Nephew – son of Great Aunt and Soxfather named after me; Neighborhood Mafioso - wife's close friend and Panamanian mafia member; PanaGals – female relatives /friends of my wife from Panama; Panamanian/Latin Mafia – inevitable group of Latino friends my wife accumulates wherever we have lived & their spouses; PCR - Pittsburgh College Roommate – high school friend, also a “Minor Celebrity” in Pittsburgh; PCR+1 - Pittsburgh College Roommate’s wife; Riggins - also known as the Grandpuppy, son's dog; Seis Amigos - two couples from our condo complex and my wife and I; Soxfather – my brother in law; Tia Loca – wife’s younger sister; Wingman – my son in law; Wingmom – Wingman’s mom, of course