Category: Thinking

Hurricane Irene Made for a Hectic Weekend

Here’s how I fought Hur­ri­cane Irene last week­end in Philadel­phia, PA:

  • Drove wife and son to be with fam­i­ly in north­ern Va as they pre­pared to vaca­tion in, gulp, Corol­la, NC this week.
  • Watched news at moth­er-in-law’s house. Won­dered if Out­er Banks would still exist.
  • Slept.
  • Drove home to Philly at 6 AM. Caught in traf­fic twice behind ter­ri­ble acci­dents. Won­dered if I’d be stuck in traf­fic for hours both times.
  • Upon arriv­ing home, made per­func­to­ry ges­tures at shoring up base­ment storage.
  • Ate hot dog lunch in a light rain at Mem­phis Tap­room Beer Garden.
  • Ratch­eted up pan­ic by watch­ing nation­al and local news outlets.
  • Did­n’t eat din­ner. Drank a pitch­er of daiquiris instead while watch­ing Bourne Suprema­cy with friends.
  • Hid in bath­room, then base­ment dur­ing tor­na­do watch.
  • Fell asleep around midnight.
  • Awoke to howl­ing rain at 2:43 am.
  • Checked base­ment and ceil­ings. Found no leaks.
  • Tried falling asleep. Couldn’t.
  • Stayed awake until dawn when storm relented.
  • Walked over to friend’s house for coffee.
I still can’t believe that my house made it through rel­a­tive­ly unscathed. Watch­ing Twit­ter and Face­book I read a litany of things going wrong at friends’ homes through­out the region and I just could­n’t believe my house — which has leaked repeat­ed­ly — would be spared. (Here’s where I take a moment to praise Reit­er Roof­ing, as well as Port Fish­ing­ton’s rel­a­tive high ground for a river­ward community.)
I slept like the dead last night. I still feel com­plete­ly exhaust­ed. Helen and Char­lie will be in the Out­er Banks tomor­row morn­ing. I can’t wait to join them on Friday.
Posted on by J T. Ramsay 0

The 2011 Phillies at the Trade Deadline

Hunter Pence. It’s going to take the rest of the sea­son for me to decide how he improves this team. I know peo­ple are excit­ed, but I think there are oth­er issues, notably the pres­ences of Wil­son Valdez and Ben Fran­cis­co, who have late­ly become sur­plus to require­ments. Remov­ing Dom Brown from the every­day line­up does­n’t improve the Phillies chances come post­sea­son play.

I still think the Phillies match up well against any team they could face in the play­offs, but I hate to think that banged up vet­er­ans like Polan­co or Ibanez could come up short when it mat­ters most.

Posted on by J T. Ramsay 0

Charlie Turned Two!

What a won­der­ful par­ty in the park! Feels like it was only yes­ter­day that he turned one: the But­ter­cream cup­cake truck; a pro­fes­sion­al pho­tog­ra­ph­er; tons of friends and fam­i­ly and a hot day on Lemon Hill for a very excit­ed (and sleepy) one-year-old boy. Now he’s two and the changes are so dra­mat­ic it’s hard to keep up. He’s pick­ing up more lan­guage every day, express­ing him­self more ver­bal­ly than phys­i­cal­ly, which is a relief for all per­sons in his vicin­i­ty, espe­cial­ly house pets.

It was so great to see Mark and Erin out with Ele­na at almost two weeks and to see Arman­do and Rebec­ca with Lily when they were just hours from being par­ents again. Wel­come Rio! Char­lie was thrilled as ever to see his aunt Eileen and her pup­py Jax as well as his “Damma” and Grand­pa, not to men­tion my mom, who man­aged not to get too lost in Straw­ber­ry Man­sion before find­ing us on Lemon Hill. GPS is a won­der except in some urban envi­ron­ments apparently.

It was so nice to encamp on Lemon Hill for a love­ly June after­noon spent with friends and fam­i­ly and food. Bit­ter­sweet that we say good­bye yet again to our friends Tony and Katie as they embark on a cross-coun­try trip to Seat­tle for a few years. Can’t wait to vis­it! I’ve seen a few episodes of “The Killing” so I just know it’s going to be a beau­ti­ful place to live and work.

We’ve man­aged to sur­vive two years of very lit­tle sleep to raise a beau­ti­ful lit­tle boy and I can hon­est­ly say I’ve loved every minute, even when I’m awake at 4 am watch­ing reruns of “Gold­en Girls” on the couch.

Posted on by J T. Ramsay 0

Checking in on Your 2011 Philadelphia Phillies

Can I just say that being a base­ball fan in this town would be much eas­i­er if peo­ple did­n’t pan­ic every time their first place team slumped? Slumps end. Appre­ci­ate the pitch­ing that you’re see­ing every night out there. Home runs are fun, but what we’re wit­ness­ing is down­right mag­i­cal. Soak it in. Lux­u­ri­ate in it. It won’t be long before we’re bitch­ing and moan­ing about this team in earnest. I ful­ly expect my son to grow up an Indi­ans fan just like his dad.

(Con­fes­sion: I decid­ed to love a team that was even worse than the Phillies. In Penn­syl­va­nia. True story.)

That said, it’s a much eas­i­er to team to watch when the worst bats in the line­up could still dri­ve a ball into the left field seats. Stay gold, J‑Berry!

Posted on by J T. Ramsay 0

The New Desert Island Disc Dilemma

I’ve been par­ing down my CD col­lec­tion in recent weeks and it’s giv­en me occa­sion to reflect on my behav­ior in rough­ly a decade or so of heavy music consumption.

What have I learned? Who was that guy? I remem­ber spend­ing many a night at Mon­do Kim’s or AKA or pret­ty much any record store, fiend­ing in the used bin for any­thing note­wor­thy. Now I’m reap­ing the whirlwind.

There are discs that I’ve owned for ages that remain unopened, yet they still have sen­ti­men­tal val­ue sim­ply because I can remem­ber buy­ing them and then car­ry­ing them from dorm to apart­ment to dorm to apart­ment to house. Yet I can’t part with them.

I’ve come to the decid­ed­ly rock­ist con­clu­sion that the endgame of this purge is to select those artists whose work has ongo­ing mean­ing in my life and hold them fast and shake the rest out. Anoth­er way of say­ing this is that I’m apply­ing the auteur the­o­ry in the most vul­gar man­ner pos­si­ble to reduce the num­ber of total CDs in my col­lec­tion, those that I won’t just rip and for­get for all eternity.

For those of us cling­ing to phys­i­cal media in a dig­i­tal media world, it’s a game of “desert island discs” renewed, with a twist. What CDs would you keep to avoid your favorite tunes van­ish­ing into the ether after your hard­drive crashed?

Posted on by J T. Ramsay 2