I Don't Believe What I Just Saw

I saw the start of tonight's Cardinals / Rangers game six of the World Series before we left for dinner and was gratified to see that Garcia got out of a nasty jam giving up only one run. By the time we got back to the car, the Cardinals were still (and again) trailing by one run.

We got home and I watched the Cardinals tie it up 4-4, leaving runners all over the base paths. There are sabermetric studies that say that clutch hitting is mostly a matter of luck. Sadly, the Cardinals had been having a shortage of hitting of any kind since game three and absolutely no clutch hitting in game five or game six, it seemed.

Lance Lynn promptly cacked up back-to-back gopher balls in the top of the seventh to the first two hitters. I was disgusted. The Rangers scored another run before the inning was over. When the Cards failed to score in the bottom of the seventh, I decided that it was a good time to clean out the corrosion in the battery compartment of my guitar that had shut down the pickup at OVFF in the middle of the Pegasus Nominees Concert. I got daisy_knotwise to toss the cotton balls down from upstairs, where she'd taken Katie and Julie for a bath, I grabbed the tweezers and the isopropanol from the basement studio, and then went to work swabbing blue-green crud out of the compartment with wetted cotton balls and alcohol.

About a dozen cotton balls later, I was done. Allen Craig hit a solo home run in the bottom of the eighth to cut the Rangers' lead to two runs, but Feliz was coming in to pitch the ninth, so nothing good was likely to happen.

In the meantime, I grabbed the amplifier, plugged in the guitar, got a tremendous peal of feedback that caused Julie to sit straight up from being almost asleep ("What was that?!"), and then adjusted things and verified that the guitar was now working properly. I sat back in the chair, noodling on the unplugged guitar, shifting between C9 and Asus2.

As I said above, nothing good was likely to happen. Until it did. Pujols doubled off the wall with one out, Berkman walked, Craig was retired for the second out, and then David Freese improbably tripled off the right field wall with two strikes on him to tie the game.

And then Molina made the third out and we headed off to the tenth inning, where Motte gave up a two-run dinger to Josh Hamilton. Ack! Here we were again.

Off to the bottom of the tenth. Descalso singled off Darren Oliver. Jay blooped a single to left that reminded me of the Texas ninth in game two, where the Cardinals lost in an inning that including a similar unreachable single. Out of position players, La Russa had to send up Lohse to bunt the runners over, which he did. Then Theriot grounded out, scoring Descalso from third, but leaving Jay on second with two outs. Pujols was walked intentionally, because not putting the winning run on base apparently doesn't apply when pitching to him. :) And then Berkman singled home the tying run with two strikes on him as the Cardinals came back from a two-run deficit for the second inning in a row. Craig grounded out and we headed to the eleventh.

And in came Jake Westbrook. Buck and McCarver announced that when Westbrook was pitching well, he would get a lot of ground balls. Fly out, single, fly out, ground out. Yeah, not pitching all that well, but well enough so that the Cardinals weren't facing another deficit going to the bottom of the eleventh.

I played more C9 and Asus2.

And then David Freese came up to lead off the bottom of the eleventh. And he hit the ball past the center field fence for the game winning home run.

And there was much rejoicing in St. Louis. The Cardinals had won, 10-9, and were the first team in World Series history to come back twice from two-run deficits in the ninth inning or later and the first to score in the eighth, ninth, tenth, and eleventh innings.

And we get to play game seven tomorrow.

Who'da thunk it?

I may watch the entire game with my guitar in my lap, playing C9 and Asus2. :)

I Don't Believe What I Just Saw

I saw the start of tonight's Cardinals / Rangers game six of the World Series before we left for dinner and was gratified to see that Garcia got out of a nasty jam giving up only one run. By the time we got back to the car, the Cardinals were still (and again) trailing by one run.

We got home and I watched the Cardinals tie it up 4-4, leaving runners all over the base paths. There are sabermetric studies that say that clutch hitting is mostly a matter of luck. Sadly, the Cardinals had been having a shortage of hitting of any kind since game three and absolutely no clutch hitting in game five or game six, it seemed.

Lance Lynn promptly cacked up back-to-back gopher balls in the top of the seventh to the first two hitters. I was disgusted. The Rangers scored another run before the inning was over. When the Cards failed to score in the bottom of the seventh, I decided that it was a good time to clean out the corrosion in the battery compartment of my guitar that had shut down the pickup at OVFF in the middle of the Pegasus Nominees Concert. I got daisy_knotwise to toss the cotton balls down from upstairs, where she'd taken Katie and Julie for a bath, I grabbed the tweezers and the isopropanol from the basement studio, and then went to work swabbing blue-green crud out of the compartment with wetted cotton balls and alcohol.

About a dozen cotton balls later, I was done. Allen Craig hit a solo home run in the bottom of the eighth to cut the Rangers' lead to two runs, but Feliz was coming in to pitch the ninth, so nothing good was likely to happen.

In the meantime, I grabbed the amplifier, plugged in the guitar, got a tremendous peal of feedback that caused Julie to sit straight up from being almost asleep ("What was that?!"), and then adjusted things and verified that the guitar was now working properly. I sat back in the chair, noodling on the unplugged guitar, shifting between C9 and Asus2.

As I said above, nothing good was likely to happen. Until it did. Pujols doubled off the wall with one out, Berkman walked, Craig was retired for the second out, and then David Freese improbably tripled off the right field wall with two strikes on him to tie the game.

And then Molina made the third out and we headed off to the tenth inning, where Motte gave up a two-run dinger to Josh Hamilton. Ack! Here we were again.

Off to the bottom of the tenth. Descalso singled off Darren Oliver. Jay blooped a single to left that reminded me of the Texas ninth in game two, where the Cardinals lost in an inning that including a similar unreachable single. Out of position players, La Russa had to send up Lohse to bunt the runners over, which he did. Then Theriot grounded out, scoring Descalso from third, but leaving Jay on second with two outs. Pujols was walked intentionally, because not putting the winning run on base apparently doesn't apply when pitching to him. :) And then Berkman singled home the tying run with two strikes on him as the Cardinals came back from a two-run deficit for the second inning in a row. Craig grounded out and we headed to the eleventh.

And in came Jake Westbrook. Buck and McCarver announced that when Westbrook was pitching well, he would get a lot of ground balls. Fly out, single, fly out, ground out. Yeah, not pitching all that well, but well enough so that the Cardinals weren't facing another deficit going to the bottom of the eleventh.

I played more C9 and Asus2.

And then David Freese came up to lead off the bottom of the eleventh. And he hit the ball past the center field fence for the game winning home run.

And there was much rejoicing in St. Louis. The Cardinals had won, 10-9, and were the first team in World Series history to come back twice from two-run deficits in the ninth inning or later and the first to score in the eighth, ninth, tenth, and eleventh innings.

And we get to play game seven tomorrow.

Who'da thunk it?

I may watch the entire game with my guitar in my lap, playing C9 and Asus2. :)

Julie's Paradox

We went to the local Chinese buffet for dinner, because I have been dreaming of pot stickers since late Sunday night at OVFF. As it happened to sort out, I acquired my dessert before Katie and Julie did and was working my way through it while the girls were anxiously waiting for me to accompany them to the soft-serve ice cream machine to produce "swirl" from the center spigot. daisy_knotwise had promised them that I would go as soon as I finished my dessert, which by this point consisted of a brownie that I'd eaten half of.

I carefully cut the brownie in half with my fork and ate one half. I then cut the remaining half in half again and ate that half.

Gretchen, with whom I'd discussed Zeno's Paradox on the way home from OVFF, was not amused.

"Cut that out! Finish the brownie and go get dessert for Katie and Julie."

Julie, standing next to the table and watching me intently, said, "Cut it in half again, Daddy."

So I did. And ate it.

And then I finally ate the last bite.

But I am very impressed that my younger daughter recognized that I was cutting the brownie in half and eating half with each bite, as we had nowhere in our conversation mentioned that.

Julie's Paradox

We went to the local Chinese buffet for dinner, because I have been dreaming of pot stickers since late Sunday night at OVFF. As it happened to sort out, I acquired my dessert before Katie and Julie did and was working my way through it while the girls were anxiously waiting for me to accompany them to the soft-serve ice cream machine to produce "swirl" from the center spigot. daisy_knotwise had promised them that I would go as soon as I finished my dessert, which by this point consisted of a brownie that I'd eaten half of.

I carefully cut the brownie in half with my fork and ate one half. I then cut the remaining half in half again and ate that half.

Gretchen, with whom I'd discussed Zeno's Paradox on the way home from OVFF, was not amused.

"Cut that out! Finish the brownie and go get dessert for Katie and Julie."

Julie, standing next to the table and watching me intently, said, "Cut it in half again, Daddy."

So I did. And ate it.

And then I finally ate the last bite.

But I am very impressed that my younger daughter recognized that I was cutting the brownie in half and eating half with each bite, as we had nowhere in our conversation mentioned that.

Mission: Improbable (Completed)

I was so ready to give up on the Cardinals this year after they were swept by the Dodgers.

Fortunately, they didn't. Beneficiaries of a great playoff run and a collapse by the Braves, they snuck into the playoffs on the last day of the regular season.

Then they beat the Phillies.

Then they beat the Brewers.

Last night, they beat the Rangers to stay alive in what pundits are saying was one of the greatest games in World Series history.

Tonight, Katie went upstairs and changed into her Cardinals All-Star Game t-shirt and a pair of red pants, as she settled in to watch at least some of game seven with Daddy.

And tonight, the Cardinals won game seven to become the World Champs.

Wow!

Never give up, never surrender. :)

Mission: Improbable (Completed)

I was so ready to give up on the Cardinals this year after they were swept by the Dodgers.

Fortunately, they didn't. Beneficiaries of a great playoff run and a collapse by the Braves, they snuck into the playoffs on the last day of the regular season.

Then they beat the Phillies.

Then they beat the Brewers.

Last night, they beat the Rangers to stay alive in what pundits are saying was one of the greatest games in World Series history.

Tonight, Katie went upstairs and changed into her Cardinals All-Star Game t-shirt and a pair of red pants, as she settled in to watch at least some of game seven with Daddy.

And tonight, the Cardinals won game seven to become the World Champs.

Wow!

Never give up, never surrender. :)