Wine tasting fundraisers ftw ...

With my son about to start high school football in wine country in Woodinville I attended my first wine tasting and fundraiser at a local winery.

I am really hoping that this is not the only one I attend over the next three years and is in fact merely the first of many.

HS football fundraisers ftw ...

Shots overhead

Sometimes I get to do something called "Hot Loading", where I stay in the trap house and keep the machines loaded while shooters continue to shoot.

Really, that is the job.

Eclipse view from Picnic Point

Went outside hoping to see the annular eclipse on Sunday evening, May 20 and this is all we got here in Picnic Point.

Eclipse Fail.

Think Spinal Tap Dimensions

On stage prop of The Davanos from The Little Red Hen on May 13, 2012.

Not 4 feet, more like 4 inches.

My new team

A gift from colleague returning from Istanbul.


I need to wear it to a Sounders game this Summer and pretend to not understand English.

A different kind of rodeo

Mobile Food Rodeo
Seattle, WA - 5-6-12

It should not be possible for PB&J to work on a burger, and yet it does ... There really is no point to go to an event like this and not try something new.

Two things about this pic are that I wore a sombrero and that I actually owned one in the first place. Sometimes you have to be a bit ridiculous to be taken seriously.

Yep. Sing us a song, you're Sombrero Man ...

If you are pushing a Honey Bucket down a street and there are cars, the cars stay out of your way and yield.

One pound sixty embedded in the road.   

Largest tip jar ever.  Very optimistic.

Nom. Seriously, bacon makes everything better.

One half of the street and crowd at mid-day. Thousands and thousands of people. Mostly, people were really cool since it was a suddenly sunny and beautiful day after several days of rain.  The lines were mellow, I think in part because foodies were happy to just be out in the sun.

The beer garden with The Disco Cowboys playing on the stage. I need to see more of this group as opposed to the occasional number I caught as I was working the street.

The headset makes the sombrero. Wearing the headset also proved my "headset right of way in a large crowd" theory from ECCC.

I had to take off the wristbands at one point and today I have odd little tan lines on my arms.

Set up the night before ... this was a lot of work Sat eve and all day Sunday, but it was another chance to work with a group of ECCC Minions and some new folks.  Starting to get a real work history with a number of these people and that is simply not underrated. 

Best baseball moments

I recently attended a game between the Seattle Mariners and the Chicago White Sox where the Chisox pitcher made a pick off move to first base with runners at first and second.  The first baseman was not holding on the runner and was in fact up near the infield grass and focusing on the batter when the ball sailed well past him, allowing both runners to score.  This is one of my favorite baseball moments I have ever witnessed in person at the dozens of games I have attended.  After this, I started thinking about the other more noteworthy moments and immediately made a list, because that is what I do.

10 - 1993 Opening Night first pitch -  I attended Opening Night in the Kingdome in both 1993 and 1994, but seeing my first one was pretty cool.

9 - back to back to back home runs - In September 2011 at Safeco Field I watched the back to back to back home runs of the Texas Rangers.  It is number 9 on the list because it is the opposition, but still noteworthy.

8 - first road game - In June of 1994 I attended my first ever MLB game not in the Kingdome between the Ms and the Angels.

7 - bleacher seats home run at Yankee Stadium - In June 2004 I watched Alfonso Soriano smack a home run on his first at bat in his return to Yankee Stadium.  Yankee fans briefly applauded and then he was the enemy.

6 - inside the park home run - The 1977 Yankees visited the Kingdome during the expansion season and Rupert Jones rounded the bases while Reggie sort of strolled after the ball.

5 - two runners score on errant pick off move - 2012, see above.

4 - final pitch of a legend - Nolan Ryan came to the Kingdome in late 1993 for what proved to be his final start as a major league pitcher, even though it wasn't supposed to be as he got injured and faced only 6 batters and failed to make his final two scheduled home starts.

3 - striking out to end the game - In 2006 Ms closer J.J. Putz stuck out Barry Bonds to end the game.  The previous sentence was awesome to type.

2 - over the fence catch in deep center - The first week of the 2000 season the Ms new center fielder Mike Cameron not only robbed a home run, he robbed a home run from Derek Jeter.

1 - walk off grand slam - 2010 Spring Training Ken Griffey, Jr. smacked a walk off home run against the Reds.  Yes, it was Spring Training, but it turned out to be the final HR by Junior.

Hit hard, shake hands, share a brew ...

I have always played contact sports.

Currently, I am involved heavily in the martial arts.  I hit and kick people.  They hit and kick me. We are not hurting each other, we are challenging each others skills.

Games I play are generally played hard.  I do not mind contact, when it is about the game, but when it seems gratuitous, not so much.  Do not substitute aggression for skill. I grew up playing goalkeeper, catcher, etc ... and that meant contact and impacts.  I played a little high school football and got my ass handed to me.  Any injuries I suffered was due to incidental contact, never because someone was trying to injure me. I never intentionally injured any one.

That brings me to the New Orleans Saints.  Intentionally going after another athlete with the intent to injure and to reward that is not sport. It is not football.  Sports like football, hockey, or rugby require that athletes play the games hard, but with a respect for the contact.  The New Orleans Saints rewarded and chose injury over competition. Intentional ... that is Rollerball.

Suspensions, fines, and public scorn is but the tip of the ice berg.  The lawsuits, they are a coming.  Brett Favre or Kurt Warner, I hope you sue and end up owning the Saints.

Catching Up With Dave Sim

At one point I was reviewing things pretty regularly on this blog, but like all things it has evolved.

In an effort to catch up with previous work I am posting an update and collective review of materials from Dave Sim. The last entry was on April 6 of 2009 for glamourpuss #6. A lot of material to cover then.

There have been 17 new issues of glamourpuss (#'s 7-23) and 17 issues of Cerebus Archive, plus one new issue of Following Cerebus (#12). I could include Cerebus TV, but I have to admit only seeing bits and pieces of it while hoping for an eventual DVD release.

Let's start with glamourpuss. Over the course of reading this series, the narrative about photo-realism and the like has evolved.  There is a story being told.  I find the ongoing breakdown of the rivalries and personalities of the past to be interesting.  The professional culture of the time and the egos involved is a soap opera of the interesting kind. However, the ad parodies and the like all essentially are the same joke.

Looking at Cerebus Archive, the changes in the comic industry in the 1970s that led to the direct market and creator owned projects is being told through the lens of Dave's career.  There is a lot here as Dave goes over his early career.  Not sure how long this will run, but it is interesting to read stuff I would never possibly have read without this series. From an art stand point I find the growth of him as an artist, especially the inking, to be interesting to note and look at as I read his more current works too.

Following Cerebus #12 looks at more than one Dave.  As a long time fan of DFW his death was unsettling and clearly tragic for both human and creative reasons. I read the issue at about the same point I finally got around to reading The Pale King.