Trapped Underground

Today, I got on the Orange line train at East Falls Church and headed toward New Carrolton.  At the next stop, Ballston, the train was offloaded.  I had to wait for the next train.  The train was packed.  It caused me to be 20 minutes late to work.  I ended up staying 20 minutes late at work to make up for it which really caused me to get home late. 

On the way from work to the train station, I stopped at CVS to get an antacid and a drink to wash it down.  I got to Eastern Market station a little after 5.  As I came into the station I saw a Blue Line train sitting there with its doors open.  After a few minutes it left and there were announcements that someone had been struck at Clarendon and that there would be delays.  I texted Jana and told her I wouldn't be home for a while.  She offered to pick me up, but I was woried about her coming into DC as I had read that the occupy DC protesters were blocking streets.  I told her that maybe she could pick me up in Rosslyn (first stop in Virginia).  The Orange line train finally approached. We slowly made our way through stations and I began to monitor Twitter.  I kept reading stories from Rosslyn that the escalators had broken and that it was packed.  People then were saying that the trains were stopping at Rosslyn and a shuttle bus was required to get to Ballston.  By this time I was pulling away from Foggy Bottom (the last stop in DC) so I had not other options than to go to Rosslyn.  I texted Jana to see if she could pick me up.  There was no communication from the train operator until we were almost to Rosslyn, which left anyone not monitoring Twitter little time to make alternate plans. 

It was an unbelievable seen when I got off the train.  There were people everywhere and we were barely moving.  The people were jammed up against the end of the platform where the trains were still coming and dropping people off.

When I finally got to the escalators they were all shut off.  The escalators at Rosslyn are some of the steepest and longest I have been on.  I wasn't worried about making it to the top, but I was worried about the people who weren't healthy or older not being able to make it up.  Walking up those escalators appeared to be their only option. 

The first time I saw a Metro employee was when I finally reached the top of the escalators.  He was barking at people to keep moving.  Thanks guy.  My long trek home was not even close to over at this point.  I along with hundreds others poured out of the station to the side street where the shuttle buses were supposed to be.  Luckily Jana was picking me up because I didn't see any.  There were so many people there that the people were standing out in the street.  Jana had told me that she couldn't get anywhere close to the station so I started walking up the hill out of Rosslyn.  As I was walking I saw firetrucks and ambulances go by.  My first thought was that someone had had a heart attack or panic attack in the station or someone had been trampled.  I finally met up with Jana and we were on our way.  The traffic was terrible and barely moved on Wilson.  It was again due to the person who had attempted suicide because the firetrucks and ambulances at that station were blocking one of the two lanes on Wilson Street a few miles in front of us.  I left my house at 5:58 AM and arrived at home at 7:30 PM.  What a miserable horrible experience.

The thing that worries me the most is that Metro seems unprepared by a crisis situation.  What if this was a bomb at Clarendon? 

Buying a car in Virginia

When we found out my wife was going to be working again this fall we decided it was time to buy a second car.  My daughter would be going to preschool and there would be days that I would need to pick her up or just be available if she were to get sick. 

I started looking on craigslist mostly at older Honda Civics.  I wanted a cheap reliable ride that gets good gas mileage (don't we all).  I found a 2000 Honda Civic EX coupe with 140,000 miles on it for $3,300.  It had a manual transmission.  The only problem was that it was 33 miles away.  I decided that it was a good enough value, if I could talk him down to $3,000, for me to make the trip.  I got out there and started looking at the car.  The first thing I noticed was that it was covered in rust around the engine.  The rear bumper would need to be replaced, there was rust underneath the car, and the driver's side door and front fender had been repainted.  I drove the car anyway and it drove pretty good, but the rust scared me off.  I made the long trip home without a new (to me) car. 

A week or so later we had Hurricane Irene.  I drove our van right after the hurricane and it was not running correctly.  It had very little power and when I finally got to about 25 mph it shut off.  This got me worried enough that I rented a car for the next week so my wife would have a way to get to work.  Later that day I got into the van and it drove great again.  It was almost as if it had to dry out after the hurricane.  I had already paid for the rental car so I figured we'd take advantage of it.  I had Monday off and looked for more cars on craigslist.  I found a 1999 Honda Accord EX sedan with 139,000 miles for $3,500.  The ad on CL said that it was a supernice (one word) car.  I emailed the guy and he told me that it was really clean and nice and that the car had no problems.  I made an appointment with him for that day around 5:30.  He too was located far away from my house in Gainesville, VA (29 miles away).  The drive out there required me to drive on I66, one of the busiest freeways at rush hour.  I left at 4 to make sure I got there in time.  It was stop and go the whole way.  One time when I stopped the car behind me didn't.  I was rear ended by a college age girl with Vermont plates.  I was in the rental car.  I parked the car in the middle lane and got out to inspect the damage.  There is no shoulder on this freeway.  There didn't appear to be any damage to either car even though I felt like we got hit hard.  Luckily my daughter was OK too.  I got her information in case something came up as cars whizzed by us and was back on my way to look at the Accord.  I met the guy in front of a Dick's Sporting Goods.  Immediately, I could see this car was not as clean as advertised.  There was visible rust bubbling up through the paint in many places.  There was a ton of rust under the hood.  The interior was filthy and stained.  I couldn't believe this guy wasted my time.  I decided to drive it anyway.  I got out on the highway and the check engine light came on.  I breaked at a stop light and the front breaks shuttered badly.  The car was a POS.  I think my daughter was more disappointed than me.  She really wanted a new car.

I decided after the first two experiences that I might want to increase the amount of money I was going to spend to like 6,000 to 7,000.  I emailed 4 people I was interested in their cars and got no response.  Again none of the cars that I liked on CL were remotely close to my house.  I still haven't found a car and am going to keep looking.  Hopefully, I have better luck than the first two that I looked at.

Strasburg Mania!

I got a tip from someone and was able to buy tickets for yesterday's Nats Dodgers game long before it was announced that Stephen Strasburg was going to pitch that day.  This allowed me to get great seats for only $5.50 plus fees from Stubhub.

Earlier in the day, the weather people predicted a 100% chance of rain and that there would be thunder and lightning.  It was not looking good that I'd get to see him pitch.  The reports that I was reading said that if the game was rained out he would pitch during the day of a day night doubleheader the next day.  There's no way I'd be able to make that.  The other thing to worry about was that if there was any rain delay he was not going to pitch either.

We got to the game about an hour early and took our seat.  The tarp was still on the field, but it wasn't raining so there was hope.  Around 6:35 Strasburg made the slow walk to rightfield to the delight of the 3,000 or so fans that were there.  As he came out to warm up the tarp was also removed.  We had good seats to watch him warm up.  We were right on the fence in front of the fair pole on the first base side of the field.  The bullpen was just behind the right field wall.  A lot of people came over to try and get pictures of Strasburg and there was a palpable sense of excitement around us.  He looked good and confident warming up.  I'm sure he had to be nervous, but it didn't show at all.

Here are a few other photos I took of him warming up:

Here are some pics of Strasburg walking from the bullpen to the mound:



Strasburg walking in with Wilson Ramos

Strasburg looked nearly as good as he did before the injury.  The Dodgers were swinging early and often trying to make contact with his fastball and hope that it found a hole.  Dee Brown found one in the outfield and made it to second on his speed.  The other "hit" he gave up was when a ball found a hole in Ian Desmond's glove.  Ian Desmond easily had three errors in the game tonight and was not credited for one.  I think this game is example 1A for why FIP and xFIP are better indicators of pitcher performance than ERA since the subjectivity of the official scorer can make an ERA much worse than it should be.  Anyway, Strasburg was throwing hard.  Most of his fastballs were 96 or 97.  I saw a few 99's on the board.  It seemed like the Dodgers were laying off of his curve and change, but I could be wrong.  He finished with 4 strikeouts on only 56 pitches.  It only rained a little while he was pitching and didn't start raining hard until the 7th inning or so which gave me a perfect excuse to leave early on a work night.  Overall, it was a great experience and I'm glad that the weather cooperated.

Here is a video of the President's Race.  Teddy almost won.

NFC West Prediction

Wow, everyone on ESPN is picking Seattle to finish 4th this year. While I'm not excited about TJack I don't think that the Seahawks will finish last. This is a terrible division. The 49ers for one have lost most of their defense this offseason and did not replace any of them. They have good weapons on offense, but I don't think Alex Smith is much better than TJack. Gore is better than Lynch, but Seattle has better receivers and I would call the Tight ends a wash with maybe a slight advantage to SF. San Fran is my 4th place team. I think the Cardinals are going to be third this year. They traded their best DB for an unproven QB. What's the difference between Kolb, TJack, and Smith? The difference is that everyone already knows that TJack and Smith are bad. We will find out soon enough that Kolb is too. He will be an upgrade over what they had last year which was pathetic so I think they will be slightly improved. Losing Ryan Williams after trading Hightower though will leave them thin at runningback. The division will be a battle between the Rams and the Hawks. Bradford is far and away the best QB in the division and I think that he is the difference maker to put that team on top. The rest of their talent, imo, is no better (probably worse) than the Seahawks.

Here is my prediction:

Rams 9-7
Hawks 7-9
Cards 6-10
4whiners 4-12 (Hopefully we see some Colin Caepernick. I enjoyed watching him in college)

It's time for Ichiro to move down in the Mariners batting order

Ichiro has been the best leadoff hitter in all of baseball over the last 10 years, but this year he has been one of the worst.  He is hurting his team by batting at the top of the lineup.  His on base percentage is only .311.  For his career he's been a .372 on base percentage.  His OBP is being pulled down by his un-Ichiro-like batting average of .269.  He's a career .327 hitter.  It would be better for the team if he was batting 8 or 9 in the lineup and have a guy like Dustin Ackley or maybe even Trayvon Robinson batting leadoff.  Obviously 2 games of Trayvon is too small a sample, but he has shown an ability to take walks and get on base in the minors.  He's also fast enough to steal a base. 

It is sad to witness the end of a great career, but smart franchises don't let what someone has done for the team in the past dictate what course they take in the future.  Baseball is about winning games and if Ichiro batting leadoff hurts a team then he should be taken out of that spot. 

3 days in Craigslist hell

Last Friday I emailed a few people offering the low ball amount of $60 for their Apple tvs that they were advertising on Craigslist.  Most of them were asking between $70 and $80.  I figured if I got one person to bite I would go for it, otherwise I would wait.  My main purpose in getting the Apple tv was so that I could stream baseball games from mlb.tv and to stream video from Netflix and Hulu plus.  I was very excited about these possibilities as I have been watching baseball on my computer monitor and netflix through the Wii, which is not HD and not a great picture.  I finally got a bite on Friday afternoon, but the girl said that she would be out of town until Sunday.  She said I could pick it up then.  On Sunday, I had family in town and we went to dinner.  I asked her if I could pick it up on Monday instead and she said that was fine.  I took Jana to her tutoring job on Monday and patiently waited by the phone for the Apple tv.  I got the call at 3:50 and headed out the door around 4 to go pick it up.  I set the navigation and headed to Oakton, VA which did not look to be very far on the navigation.  It said it would take about 20 minutes.  I had to pick up Jana at 5 so I figured I would have plenty of time to pick it up and then pick her up.  Then I got into the middle of the worst traffic in the country.  I sat on the 50 forever.  It took me over an hour to get to this girl's house and by the time I got there I was hot and frustrated as I had a very tired Clara in the back seat complaining about every single song on the radio.  When the girl opened the door I could see that it probably was not the Apple tv that I wanted.  I had wanted the 2nd generation which is small and black.  The one she handed me was large and white.  I was frustrated, but I told myself the only difference was the size and color so I took it anyway.  At this point it was 5:15 and Jana had been off work for 15 minutes.  I had texted her and asked her to walk down the street to the Wendy's and wait for me there.  I knew she would be upset with me for making her wait and it made me mad that I had let her down.  I was also worried because she was not in the best part of town.  I rushed back and luckily this time I was going the opposite direction of traffic.  It was nearly 6 when I finally picked her up.  On the drive to pick up Jana, Clara decided to complain about being hungry and thirsty along with music selection.  I couldn't help her out.  I hadn't planned on being gone so long so I didn't bring any snacks or drinks.  I went in and grabbed Clara some nuggets at Wendy's and asked Jana about her day.  She was in a very good mood considering how long she had to wait for me.  I told her that I think I may have bought the wrong one and her mood turned slightly sour (as it should have), but she was very understanding and loving which I greatly appreciated as frustrated as I was. 

When we got home (after a stop at Chipotle because no one was in the mood to cook dinner) I tested out my new toy.  It did lots of cool things.  It synced up with my computer and my iTouch.  It had access to youtube.  It was in HD.  It did not, however, have netflix or mlb.tv or Hulu plus.  I decided I had better try to sell it on Craigslist.  So I created an ad that night offering it for $60 and explaining what it was and why I was selling it. 

The next day I got an email from someone asking me how low I would go.  I told her to make me an offer.  She offered $40.  After some thought, I decided I would be willing to take $50 and take a $10 loss to get rid of my mistake.  She accepted my counteroffer.  She asked me to deliver it to her in Vienna which is almost as far from my house as Oakton was.  I told her that I did not have a car for a few days (Jana had gone on a trip to see her sister), but that I could meet her at the Vienna train station.  She asked me if we could meet the next day.  I said that was fine.  The next day she told me that she would be working and asked if I could meet her at her work.  I looked it up and determined I could take two buses to get to her work that would take me about an hour.  I thought that would be ok as I needed the time to study.  At 3:06 I get an email from her that says:

"Never mind. I had someone write back to me about a 2nd generation and I would rather do that one.  So thanks but no thanks."

We had agreed on a price and a meeting place and exchanged about 8 or 9 emails.  I spent most of my lunch mapping out the bus route to her work.  Needless to say I was pretty upset. 

I have bought and sold many things on Craigslist and for the most part have had very good luck.  The last few days dealing with this crap makes me wish I would have just bought a brand new Apple tv 2nd generation for the price of $100.  If you can put a price on time I'm pretty sure I've spent at least that much money on my 1st generation Apple tv especially if you add in the gas from the car trip from hell last Monday.  I am still going to sell things on Craigslist, but in the future it's going to be more on my terms and I'm going to have a better idea of what I'm buying.

Entertainment before lunch today (warning gross)

Today, I went to lunch at the Banana Cafe and decided to eat on the outdoor patio.  While deciding what to get and enjoying some delicious chips and salsa I noticed a man walking by having a very hard time walking in a straight path.  This guy was clearly having trouble even standing up.  It was 11:30 in the morning on a Thursday and this guy was nearly blackout drunk.  He slowly wobbled by and then attempted to cross E St.  About halfway across E Street he decided he was going to cross 8th street too taking a diagonal path across both streets.  Meanwhile cars in all directions had to stop and wait.  He finally made it across and zig zagged his way to the front of 711 where he leaned his head on a large metal trash can.  He rested there for a few minutes then walked a few more feet.  He looked toward the street and projectile vomited.  He then sat down on the side of the street and appeared to pass out.  I felt bad for him, but what in the heck was he thinking.  Who gets that drunk that early in the day and then takes a walk down a busy street when it's that hot out? 

I drew a picture.