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Archive for the ‘sports’ Category

I read the news today, oh boy…

When I heard that Floyd Landis‘s 2006 Tour de France win was negated because of doping, I was incredulous.  The guy was raised Mennonite, which I thought meant he would have retained the values of that church and be above doping. Also, the details didn’t sound right (the test results showed he had elevated levels of testosterone, which would be something a doper would use during training, not necessarily during the middle of a multi-day race). And, in the long run, Landis fought the decision in court, so I my incredulity lasted. Even though he had lost in court, I still had some hope there was a mistake in the test.

Until I read in the news that he admitted doping. What a letdown.

Landis says that Lance Armstrong was doping, too, which is an allegation that has been around ever since Armstrong won the first of his 7 Tour de France victories, but which has never been proven. I’ll be really let down if someday Armstrong admits doping, or his old blood and urine samples are somehow shown to contain performance-enhancing drugs.

Feeling let down by a star in one of my favorite sports reminds me of other letdowns by public figures. Some are athletes (Barry Bonds, for example), some are politicians (former New York governor Eliot Spitzer, for example).

Eliot Spitzer was New York’s Attorney General before he was elected governor, and he showed a lot of promise as a governor. Here’s what a New York Times editorial says about him in 2006:

If voters elect Mr. Spitzer with the kind of mandate the polls are predicting, he will have the political influence to press for priorities he has been stressing throughout the campaign — improving access to health care, reforming Medicaid and expanding education financing. He must offer hope for more job creation upstate and spur development at ground zero and other sites in the city. He should make sure that the court system is finally revamped and consolidated, if necessary through a constitutional amendment.

After Spitzer resigned office when his affairs with prostitutes was revealed, we were stuck with (then-lieutenant governor) David Paterson, who immediately admitted having used drugs and cheated on his wife. And we’re left with New York’s legislature still un-reformed, still dysfunctional, and still unresponsive to the needs of their constituents. What a letdown.

Public letdowns are one thing, personal letdowns are another. I’ve been let down by friends and loved ones (but this is not a post about that–I’m not pointing anyone in particular out). And I’ve let people down, too. The scale of the disappointment a person feels is not diminished by the private nature of it. When I promised the boys I would take them fishing, and then found that I couldn’t, I disappointed them (even though I had no choice but to cancel those plans). It’s a terrible feeling. And it makes me want to never again make a promise that there’s a chance I can’t keep.

Both my kids have birthdays that fall close to the start of baseball season, so this year, I baked cupcakes for them and decorated them like baseballs.

We haven’t made it to a game yet, but I think that I’ll have a chance to take them to a game during the Bisons’ next home stand. I love watching Bisons games.

The cupcakes are made with yellow cake mix with vanilla frosting, and once I frosted them, I dipped them into a bowl of sweetened coconut flakes (which adhered to the frosting). Then I used a tube of red frosting to draw on the lacing so that they look like baseballs.

The trouble with all these cupcakes is that I like eating them. I gave up eating cheezborgors, but that’s easy to keep up, because there are no cheezborgors in my house, and I’ve got a half dozen leftover cupcakes sitting right there, kept fresh in their shiny zip-lock baggies…. Mmmm….

I’m hoping for a longer winter, because I’ve only had one chance to go skiing so far this season.

Instead of making resolutions, I’m writing down plans…well, not plans exactly, but stuff that I want to do.

I think most of these ideas are feasible. What do you think?

1. Finish the house we started in 2009. I’d like to incorporate green technology, but we’ll see.
2. Get back to running my favorite seasonal business, The Buffalo Bike Taxi Co.
3. Go to more pro baseball games than we did in 2009. I’d like to see my first major league game. In Toronto. I know what you’re saying…someone my age has never seen the MLB in person? Nope.
4. This one is related to #2 above. I will lose a little weight and continue to improve my cardiovascular health. Riding The Buffalo Bike Taxi Co, it would be nearly impossible to gain weight.
5. Do more writing, even if it just more-frequent posts on this blog. I do want to get back to real writing, though.
6. I’d like to learn to speak another language. I studied French in high school and college, so I remember some of that, but “Quiero aprender a hablar español de este año.” (Without having to use Google Translate.)
7. I have a bunch of audio cassettes that I want to convert into digital files, so that I can actually listen to that music. (Younger readers may want to ask their parents if they have any audio cassettes in the basement that they could look at.)
8. I say this every year, but this year is different (partly because of the divorce). I want to spend more time with old friends. I have not ever visited my friends Jesse, Rich, Craig, or Greg at their houses.
9. I’d like to buy an electric car. A Tesla Roadster would be nice, but I would “settle” for a a hybrid Fusion.
10. We live near a lot of water, so I’d like to make sure we get the canoe wet a lot this summer. The Buffalo River is a lot more scenic than you’d expect.
11. Another thing I’ve wanted to do for years, but somehow haven’t found the time to do, is ride my bicycle across New York State. The Erie Canal is a great way to go.
12. I want to take the boys camping, somewhere that they’ll never forget. I think the Adirondacks would be great.
13. We’ve been attending church more regularly, but this year, I would like to make it such a standard part of our life that the boys don’t resist going, when they are at my house on a Sunday. But here’s a problem I haven’t figured out how to resolve: I like three different churches, but I can’t go to all three on the same Sunday morning. Ultimately, I think it will be better if I am more actively involved with one of those three churches, doing things besides just attending morning church services.
14. Many of these things can be done, and some should be done, with family. Baseball, bicycling, and church, for example. This year, I would like to have time to visit my family members at their houses, but also to make the house we’re working on large enough for everyone to gather here for Thanksgiving or Christmas.

What about you? Will you be doing any of these activities?

Statistically speaking, the Buffalo Bisons are the worst team in the league right now. They have lost 47 of the 73 games they have played so far, which gives them an average of .356, which is 15.5 games behind the best team in the North division leader, the Scranton/Wilkes Barre Yankees.

I have a proposal for sports teams. Instead of charging fans the same price for admission to every game, modify it up or down, according to how far above or below .500 the team’s record is so far this season.

For example, at today’s home game, every ticket is $7.00, no matter where you sit. The team is .144 below .500, so the price of each ticket is reduced by a factor of .144. Tonight’s tickets would therefore be $5.99 each. Tomorrow night, the most expensive ticket in the ballpark is $11.00. (I know! Isn’t that a deal?!?) If their record doesn’t change tonight (for example, they get rained out again), the ticket price would be adjusted to $9.42.

If the Bisons had the S/WB Yankees’ record of .568, the ticket price would be adjusted up by a factor of .068 to $11.75.

This provides a financial incentive for teams to play better and win more, and gives fans more incentive to come see teams that stink.

Go Bisons! Boo Yankees!