IT'S ALL GOODYEAR

Happy Opening Day Eve everybody! Your Humble Narrator only made it to one Cactus League game this year, to see the D-backs take on the Reds at Goodyear Ballpark...

I rooted for my beloved Snakes of course, but to no avail; they lost the hard-fought game 9-8. My only disloyalties that day were culinary; I enjoyed Skyline Chili Hot Dogs...

...as well as Handel's Ice Cream from Youngstown...

Quite a Buckeye State pig-out; indeed, the flavor on the bottom is called Buckeye, a mixture of peanut butter ice cream and Reese's-like peanut butter candy. It wasn't all Ohio, however; I also saw the Whataburger Man...

...and got one of the lamer imaginable selfies with him...

Anyway, Play Ball!

PAINT MANAGEMENT

May before last The Wife and I went to Chase Field for "Paint at the Park" Day...

...in which our seats in the roomy, comfortable "All You Can Eat" section beyond center field were supplied with an apron, a paper plate with various blobs of acrylic paint on it, a couple of brushes, a paper towel, a plastic cup of water for rinsing, and a small canvas. We were then given instruction in painting a serene desert landscape by night, with the moon as a baseball sailing overhead. This was my finished product...

...currently hanging in my garage.

It was quite fun, so yesterday we went again. This time, instead of a canvas, we were provided with a small wooden placard with letters outlined on it...

...and the instructor guided us through making the word HOME, decorated with Diamondbacks colors and motifs. I found it much more difficult than working with the canvas, but it was still fun. Here we see The Wife's crisply realized, gift shop worthy finished product...

And here's my masterpiece, which looks as though I painted it while wearing boxing gloves and riding over sand dunes in an off-road vehicle...

The game, against the Minnesota Twins, also left something to be desired. Starter Jordan Montgomery gave up six runs in the second inning, and his relievers Scott McGough and Bryce Jarvis did little better. The D-bax bats did entertainingly come to life a bit in the fourth inning against Twins starter David Besta, making his Major League debut, and Ketel Marte whacked his 17th homer of the year, but it was all way too little too late; the final was 13-6.

The Wife and I stayed to the bitter end, consoling ourselves with copious All-You-Can-Eat hotdogs and other goodies not good for us, and also with the knowledge that we were leaving the park having created art that transcended the disappointment on the scoreboard...

 

42 FOR THE SHOW

Last night The Wife and I betook ourselves to Chase Field...

...where, in the company of a gang from The Day Gig, we observed Jackie Robinson Night, the anniversary of Robinson's debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947.

Our beloved Diamondbacks were taking on the Chicago Cubs. It was a beautiful night for baseball, and it was great to see 42s on everybody's backs...

(Excuse the lousy cell phone pictures.)

Alas, what we didn't see was much offense from the hometown team. Despite a solid start from pitcher Merrill Kelly and some fine scoring opportunities, the Snakes lost, 2-3 in 10 innings. The Wife's long, discouraging streak as a jinx--the D-bax seem to contrive to lose whenever I talk her into going--annoyingly continues.

That's in the regular season, that is; they did manage to win the preseason game against the Cleveland Guardians to which she took me a couple of weeks ago on my birthday. But I think the last time she's seen a regular-season win was in 2017, when The Kid was with us, and we saw them defeat the Miami Marlins and clinch a playoff spot. The Kid, with me and with friends, has a much better win-lose record.

Anyway, hail Jackie Robinson!

LITTLE MORE THAN PUMPKIN, AND LESS THAN KIND

A safe and Happy Halloween to all from Less Hat, Moorhead!

The Wife gave me a Dracula PEZ and Frankenstein Peeps...

On another note: Recently I found this rather badass hornworm in the backyard...

As I escorted him into the alley behind the house, I was startled by how muscular his flexing against my thumb and finger was...

It made me sympathize with poor Ida Lupino, attacked by the giant hornworms in 1976's The Food of the Gods...

A couple of other odds and ends:

I was very saddened to hear that Matthew Perry has passed on. He was possibly the funniest of the Friends, but I also loved him as White House Counsel Joe Quincy, one of the increasingly mythical-seeming "good Republicans" that The West Wing liked to optimistically depict. Nobody could deliver a line like "Sure, we'd never want to compromise the aesthetic integrity of the Steam Pipe Trunk Distribution Venue" with the effortless aplomb of Perry. A real loss.

RIP also to Richard Moll, best known as towering but sweet-natured bailiff Bull on Night Court. He was one of the first celebrities I ever interviewed, for the Erie Times-News back in the early '80s when he was in town for a convention or something. Very nice guy. In his MeTV obit, he's quoted saying that when he was auditioning for Night Court and they asked if he would shave his head for the part, he said "I would shave my legs for the part!" He told me the same story back in the day.

Here's a sample of the Halloween decor at Chez Moorhead...

And finally: Let's go D-backs!

BRUSH LEAGUE

Yesterday The Wife and I betook ourselves to Chase Field to see the Arizona Diamondbacks play the Washington Nationals. It was "Bark at the Park" day, so we saw many fabulous dogs...

...but it was also "Paint at the Park" day, so in our section, an area of tables and chairs beyond the outfield...

...each seat was supplied with an apron, a paper plate loaded with several blobs of acrylic paint, brushes and a small blank canvas...

So for the first time I can remember since finger-painting at the Church of the Covenant preschool when I was four, I tried to paint a picture.

This is what it was supposed to look like...

The moon as a baseball, sailing through the sky of a peaceful nighttime desertscape.

I love to look at paintings, and I'm a chronic doodler with pen or pencil--I can still knock out the frog from Ed Emberly's Drawing Book of Animals--but I was pretty sure that painting wouldn't be my medium. Still, I gave it the old college try, watching and listening carefully to the instructor a couple rows down as she did it right.

The Wife's finished product looks sharp and capable...

It's Louvre-worthy compared to my baseball/moon...

...which came out looking like a powdered jelly donut with two centipedes crawling over it.

Well at least I tried. And it was kind of fun. Truthfully, as bad as it is, it probably came out a smidge better than I thought it would.

Oh yeah, the game: The Diamondbacks led the Washington Nationals most of the afternoon, but some sloppy defensive play resulted in them blowing their lead, the game, and their chance at the first series sweep of the season. The final was 9-8; boo.

NO-NO, NOT YET

Last week our beloved Arizona Diamondbacks won back-to-back 7-inning games in a double header, shutting out the Atlanta Braves in both games. In game one Zac Gallen allowed only one hit; in the second game Madison Bumgarner pitched a "no hitter" (not recorded as such, because it wasn't a nine-inning game). As a result, the Snakes offered $14 tickets this Friday and Saturday, in honor of the 14 innings of shutout baseball.

I would have liked it even better had they offered $7 tickets for Bumgarner's seven no-hit innings, but I guess that's pushing my luck. In any case, The Wife and I decided to avail ourselves of the offer, and took our fully-vaccinated selves to Chase Field, for the first time in nearly two years, to enjoy some live baseball.

Here was the view from our third-base-side nosebleeders...

Not far from our seats was a display featuring the jerseys that Gallen and Bumgarner wore in their wins last week, and I was handed a sign asking MLB to "Make It Count" (Bumgarner's no-no, that is) and encouraged to pose with the jerseys; I did not shirk...

Superb as both pitchers were, I obviously can see the viewpoint that it isn't the same achievement as a nine-inning no-hitter. My own eagerly-sought opinion is that if seven inning double headers are going to become a regular thing, than the Seven-Inning No-Hitter should be officially established, and Bumgarner's should be recognized.

Alas, the game didn't go as well as those two last week. Starter Gallen did not, to put it mildly, have his best stuff against the Rockies last night, getting into much trouble with walks, etc. The bullpen fared even more miserably, especially poor Matt Peacock, who gave up seven runs, including a grand slam by Dom Nunez, in the 8th inning. The final was 14-6. Groan!

There weren't many highlights for D-backs fans, although Andy Young hit a homer off the bench, and Josh Rojas belted one out in the ninth, to keep his streak going. Best of all, when the Rockies pulled away, the D-backs sent position players out to pitch: that terrific old warhorse Asdrubal Cabrera in the eighth inning, and young Wyatt Mathisen in the ninth. Some of their pitches registered less than 50 miles per hour, but they didn't really do any worse than the bullpen: they each gave up a hit, but got their men out.

I should also note there were personal highlights for us: Early on the roof was opened, and it was lovely to enjoy the pleasant breeze of a spring night downtown. Also, while I was away for a ridiculous amount of time, standing in a long line to buy pop, a nice young couple down the row sweetly gave the poor abandoned Wife a churro, which she shared with me when I got back. Yummy!

And, nice to see Baxter masked up and looking out for us...

FOUR DIAGONAL CORNERS

Hope everybody had a great 4th of July weekend. The three-game sweep of the Colorado Rockies by the Arizona Diamondbacks this past weekend put me a good mood, baseball-wise.

In that same midsummer spirit, check out my "Four Corners" column, in the July issue of Phoenix Magazine...

...this month exploring the culinary options at four corners of Chase Field.

PRIDE SHARE

This past Friday The Wife, The Kid and Your Humble Narrator betook ourselves to Chase Field for Pride Night...

...and to watch the D-bax take on San Francisco. The game was pretty wretched; the final score was Giants 11, D-bax 5. But the atmosphere at the park was fun and festive, and it was followed by an excellent fireworks display with lots of rainbow colors, accompanied by a trying-too-hard soundtrack full of Elton John, Boy George and the Village People.

Outside the park, by the gates at the west end, were the inevitable street preachers decrying the celebration of "pride" through bullhorns, and a peek at some of the skin-crawly comments on the team's Facebook page, including repeated whiny iterations of "when is straight pride night?" was similarly dispiriting, as was the almost complete lack of acknowledgement of the event on the TV broadcast. But it was still a terrific evening.

RANDY AND MAD

These identical Randy Johnson figurines...

...were the giveaway loot The Kid and I obtained when we betook ourselves to Chase Field Saturday night to see the Diamondbacks take on San Francisco. It was the decade-and-a-half anniversary of Johnson's perfect game back in 2004, so The Big Unit was there to throw out the first pitch, and his catcher for that game, Robby Hammock, was there to catch it.

The game that followed, alas, wasn't so perfect. Poor Zac Godley had another rough night on the mound for the Snakes, while Madison Bumgarner was at his maddening best for San Fran. It felt like the D-bax were still in the game until the Panda himself, Pablo Sandoval, seemed to stick a fork in them with pinch-hit homer off Matt Andriese in the 8th.

The final was 8-5. Disappointing, but The Kid and I had blast stuffing ourselves with outrageously-priced ballpark food. And we heard a lovely, thrilling a capella performance of the National Anthem by members of the Musical Theatre of, well, Anthem.

DODGER DOG, STRAY DOG

Happy Opening Day everybody!

Last week The Wife, The Kid and I played hooky and ventured into enemy territory, aka Glendale Ranch, to watch our beloved Diamondbacks BEAT LA, 10-4, in Cactus League Spring Training action. A bit disconcerting to be surrounded by all that Dodger Blue, but an excellent game; we got to see some fine hitting by new D-bax acquisition Adam Jones, and we saw poor Steven Souza play before his season-ending injury earlier this week.

I even ate a Dodger Dog. And I liked it.

(Of course, in this photo taken by The Kid, it looks as if I swallowed the hot dog vendor.)

Then about 10:30 Saturday night, this little dude...

...showed up in front of our house, obviously lost, no collar, running from front door to front door and back in the neighborhood. I sat in the driveway for about 40 minutes before he got close enough for me to get a hold of him. He spent the night in the garage, away from our maniac Chihuahuas, and Sunday morning I very reluctantly took him to the Maricopa County Animal Shelter on Rio Salado. It turned out he had a chip, with a Sacramento, CA address, but the staffers there got no answers from the phone numbers. I would love to have kept him; he's a sweet, docile, friendly, quiet little guy. I just checked with the Animal Shelter; he's being held for his owners until tomorrow, March 29, after which he'll be available for adoption. If you're looking for a great dog, get down there.