Thursday, December 28, 2006

#@$%!

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Wednesday, December 20, 2006

THE CONTENTS OF BARRY ZITO’S IPOD

MetsGrrl.com’s undercover reporting staff on the West Coast has supplied us with the following intel!

We can exclusively reveal The Contents of Barry Zito’s iPod:

The Waiting - Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
Lone Star State of Mind - Nanci Griffith
New York City Serenade - Bruce Springsteen
California Sun - The Ramones
City of Blinding Lights - U2
That’s Right (You’re not from Texas) - Lyle Lovett
New York City - They Might Be Giants
Should I Stay Or Should I Go - The Clash
Twist and Shout - The Who (Live At Shea Stadium)
Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap - AC/DC
Give It Away - Red Hot Chili Peppers
Freedom of Choice - Devo
Livin’ On the Edge (of Houston) - Reverend Horton Heat
Given To Fly - Pearl Jam
Rockaway Beach - The Ramones
The Wait - The Pretenders
California Stars - Wilco
Within Your Reach - The Replacements
Money, Money, Money - ABBA
Rotten Apple - Alice In Chains
Check Your Head - Beastie Boys
No One Knows - Queens of the Stone Age
Decision or Collision - ZZ Top
I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For - U2
Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want - The Smiths

Add your own suggestions in the comments!

Monday, December 18, 2006

DW stalker alert

MG used to call the Lower East Side home, and was perplexed for some time that article after article would insist that #05 lived down there, because there was no way that would happen without someone knowing about it, writing about it, or blogging about it. (Of course, we would later find out that it was the Upper East Side.)

However, today we’re greeted with the news that Mr. Wright is moving to to the Flatiron neighborhood, a hop skip and a jump from Live Bait and the Shake Shack.

“Another fun feature is a very large pantry area,” [listing broker] Ms. Fenn said. “It’s twice the size of some bedrooms in New York.”

Yep. I’m sure D. Wright saw that large pantry area and thought: the chicks will *so* dig this.

take the train to the game

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Saturday, December 16, 2006

mets weekly, part 2

Yet more gratuitous self-promotion, but this time they used a little bit more commentary from yours truly, talking about the 8/22/06 game against the Cardinals.

I think I did pretty good.

No, strike that - I *was* good. No “think”. There.

And now, stopping to consider the situation, I am completely and totally dumbfounded. In one year, I have gone from knowing virtually nothing about baseball and not having gone to more than maybe a dozen or two games in my entire life, to having an account with the Mets ticket office, going to over 30 games in one year, multiple roadtrips, attending every home playoff game…

and now, being on television, talking about baseball and the Mets. 

It’s freaking SURREAL.

My literary agent read my blog a little while ago and thinks I should think about writing a book. She might not have the worst idea in the world. But, again, file under SURREAL.

[P.S. If anyone can run video off their DVR so I can get a VHS tape, or get a video file off their computer that I could burn to DVD, please drop a line. Some friends who do not live in the area would like to see this. Thank you.]

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Thursday, December 14, 2006

next year’s invoice

It arrived.

I know it’s been online for a little while, but I was not looking. I wanted the letter or better, the phone call. A long time ago, TBF told me about how, every year, he waits to get that phone call from the Mets ticket office, trying to entice him to “increase his involvement with the club” and to try to get him to buy a ticket plan. He actively looked forward to this call each year, and back when I first heard the story, told me with great relish how he couldn’t wait for the day that he could answer, “Well, yes, actually, I would like to move up to the next level this year.”

I kinda ruined that, I think.

But the invoice is here, and we are back in the exact.same.seats. But, I love those seats. And unless we found some more money hidden under the sofa cushions, we are back on the mezzanine, section 12, Tuesdays and Fridays, just like last year. Which suits me just fine.

So we will be paying that invoice very soon.

It makes me a little nervous that we don’t have the scratch to come up with a full season, because I worry what happens to us when Citi Field opens in 2009 (when we probably will have the scratch). This is the type of moment where TBF stares at me, shakes his head, and mutters something about not thinking ahead that far.

In the meantime, I think I’ve picked out our weekend to go down to Port St. Lucie in March. TBF gives me that blank stare whenever I start trying to talk about it, and makes noises about “saving our money for games that really count”. Which I am entirely ignoring, because I know exactly what will happen: we will go to Spring Training and he will love every minute of it.

Have you been to Spring Training? Got any advice? Tips? Suggestions? Leave ‘em in the comments.

Sunday, December 10, 2006

mets weekly

It would figure that the weekend I was engaged with houseguests and Christmas parties in Philadelphia… I would get an email message from Zoe saying “Great soundbyte, hon!” and for me to realize the DVR no longer automatically tapes Mets Weekly.

But we were home in time to catch tonight’s 6:30pm rerun and if you managed to watch (or catch one of the gazillion repeats), I am the one in black (wearing my trademark necklace, as seen in the logo - Hey, I had to come from work) talking about Willie leaving John Maine in the game.

TBF is ecstatic. I am mildly pleased.

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

cliff ‘em all

What, you thought I’d forgotten or something?!

I sat down Thanksgiving week to write about Cliff Floyd and what his presence on the Mets meant to me, and hit complete and total writer’s block. Everything I wrote seemed stupid or pointless, and didn’t come anywhere near capturing why and how #30 became my favorite player on the Mets the first year I rooted for them.

He wasn’t the obvious choice, after all, for a girl who started rooting for the Mets for real in 2006. And don’t get me wrong, I love DW and when TBF and I bought each other jerseys at the end of 2005, although I wanted a Floyd jersey, I knew it was a better investment to opt for the one with WRIGHT on the back.

(And I had no spiritual conflict with buying it or wearing it - although this year I am happy I also own #7, but that’s mostly vanity, so I don’t look like That Girl [the one with the pink hat who doesn’t know who anyone else on the team is].)

So before I understood those rows of numbers, I judged by how they hit and how they ran and if they hustled, and their dancing prowess in the dugout, how sportswriters talked about them, and how their teammates talked about them. In 2005, we got a window into Cliff Floyd via David Wright (and vice versa - but the media was giving us enough about DW at that point). Add to the mix that Mike Cameron, whose spirit I admired when he was playing for Seattle, counted Mr. Floyd as a good friend.

But I think it was the online chat that sealed the deal. Who wouldn’t love a guy with these kind of answers:

31yonkers5: What does it feel like to see a fan in the stands wearing your jersey?
Floyd: It feels awesome, it feels great! You should head out to the store and buy one, too!

Floyd’s answers were professional, but they weren’t patented MLB spin. He poked a little bit of fun at the dumb questions but he still answered them.

metsandsox: How could the voters snub you out of the Gold Glove last year? I’ve never seen a left fielder play like that!
Floyd: How could they? I asked myself that, too.

and the ultimate:
illflavored: What do you spend more time working on, hitting or defense?
Floyd: Hitting.
Anthony_Cocuzza: Cliff, what kind of car do you drive?
Floyd: I have an S500, a Flying Spur Bentley, SL500, Range Rover, Dodge Magnum, Cadillac EXT and Phantom Rolls Royce. And that’s why I work so hard on the hitting.

As Greg from Faith and Fear In Flushing so succinctly stated, “Cliff Floyd’s wallet is the one that says Bad Motherfucker on it.” And it was true, but there was heart and soul in there too, or he’d just be an arrogant jackass. He wasn’t.

So today, as Deanna from Marinerds so kindly reminded me that it was Cliff’s birthday, I thought I would try to sit down and write about him and thank him and say goodbye and wish him well.

I’ll leave you with the saddest part of the online chat:
Paul_Mastrola: Are the Mets the favorite team you’ve played on out of the four teams?
Floyd: Of course they are!
CESAR_VALVERDE: Are the Mets a World Series team?
Floyd: Yes, don’t you think so?

I will applaud Cliff Floyd for the rest of his career, and thank him forever for being one of the big reasons I fell in love with baseball.

Saturday, December 02, 2006

tommy can you hear me?

THANK MR. MET AND OTHER ASSORTED DEITIES THAT THIS DRAMA HAS COME TO AN END.

I started to get irked at the whole back and forth thing, until I decided:

If we didn’t have the internet, we wouldn’t have known every time Glavine decided to cut his toenails and every time Omar sneezed and no one would have been standing outside Turner Field reporting, “Today, the guy who changes the toner in the copier at the Braves organization office got a flat tire” just because there had to be SOME news to report.

All kidding aside, I am not sure that 100% of the angst was caused by Tommy. Or even 50% of the angst.

In any event, welcome back to Flushing Meadows, Tom Glavine.

Monday, November 27, 2006

MG.COM POLL

MG reader Katie L. helpfully submits from today’s NY Post:

“WHICH New York Met was so appreciative of a stunning blond stripper at Headquarters that he walked her out to his car, pulled a baseball jersey out of his trunk and gave it to her? The stripper, obviously not a sports fan, sold the uniform to one of her other customers later that night . . .”