Greetings from partly sunny Ann Arbor! We had a great day yesterday! Found a divey Curry/Pizza joint in Ypsilanti for a takeout chicken tikka masala pizza that was delish with my cold Stone IPA in our room. So filling we forgot to have our Trader Joe salad. And earlier we very much enjoyed Edward Norton, Penny Cruz, et al in The Invite. It’s sort of a funny, but still serious too, Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?
Wait. Phil? Weren’t there four of them?
Okay, thanks Buddy! Hi Olivia!
The only flaw to Monday was a painful Gnats loss to the Torontons, 3-2, marred by a seemingly endless series of squandered opportunities. We were able to watch (with gnashed teeth) in our room since I figured out how to set up the ROKU stick for our MLB subscription.
We started Tuesday off in Annie Arbor’s public library where I gained access to last Sunday’s NYT Spelling Bee from the magazine section (not available online). We spent a pleasant hour there after finding a brilliant parking spot, or so I thought. We went next to the UMMA (UMich Museum of Art) where we spent another pleasant hour. Here are a couple of their Picassos.
Lunch was an excellent Wreck (on multigrain) at the campus Potbelly’s — highly recommended over Subway and Jersey Mike’s. Not even close. Then we returned to the car and missed getting ticketed by about two minutes — the car three behind us was getting tagged. I misread the signs! — the whole row of us was in violation. Michigan has the most confusing parking signs. I got nailed in Lansing a long time ago and it still eats at me. I mailed in a long explanation in my defense showing how my confusion was reasonable: count yourself fortunate that I forget the details. It was returned stamped Rejected and I had to fork over I-forget-how-much.
According to historian Heather Cox Richardson’s newsletter, the Trump-appointed judges of the Presidential 1776 Award competition, emceed by Education Secretary Linda McMahon, rigged the competition to cut out a 17-year-old Indian immigrant in favor of a homeschooled blonde girl from Wyoming, a Michigan boy who attended a private Catholic school, and a girl from Washington who told CNN she supported Trump and wanted to see “everyone walking away from the competition knowing this is the greatest country of the world.”
This seemingly minor racist act is Nazi stuff, ladies and gents. Any positive accomplishment of the Jews was systematically erased by the regime. Just sayin’.
When Dr. Anthea M. Hartig, director of the National Museum of American History, testified before the House, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) claimed she strives “to represent queer pedophiles, indoctrination, and grooming of kids at an American history museum,” and demanded: “Do you know how many kids get raped by adults every year in this country?” Lauren Boebert (R-CO) repeatedly demanded of Hartig where the exhibitions honoring “50 million aborted babies” are. Eric Burlison (R-MO) demanded: “Do you love America?”
The morons are running loose folks. Take cover.
Following her testimony, Dr. Hartig was removed from the premises. Here she is, handcuffed to a parking meter. She was later released after an aide came up with change for a five in quarters.
Once in a while the puzzle’s theme is so ridiculous, you just have to love it. On Tuesday, the theme was IT’S NOTHING TO SNEEZE AT” and the theme answers were all words that sounded like sneezing. Yes, folks, this is the New York Times at play. The four sneezy answers were: MASSACHUSETTS; CATCH YOU LATER; PATCHOULI; and STATUETTE. So the idea is you can imagine the following exchange:
What’s that unusual scent?
Patchouli.
Gezundheit.
The clue for MASSACHUSETTS was interesting: “Home of the lowest town-level ZIP code in the continental U.S. (01001).”
Commenter kitshef astutely noted: Did you notice all those qualifiers in the clue for Massachusetts? The “town-level” qualifier was needed to eliminate 00501 and 00544, which are zip codes for the IRS in New York. Also lower are all zip codes from Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, so we needed the “continental U.S.” qualifier.
Can you come up with a popular song that has PATCHOULI in it? Commenter Son Volt did.
If you’re like me, God forbid, you’ve heard of enclaves, but aren’t really sure what they are, and you never heard of exclaves. Here was the clue for EXCLAVE: “Part of a country located entirely within another country.”
An enclave is a territory completely surrounded by another country, while an exclave is a portion of a country separated from the main part by foreign territory. Vatican City is an enclave; Alaska is an EXCLAVE.
Here’s the fun I had with some of the answers Tuesday:
Lolita and her mom: HAZES
Instructions for the repair of a leaking OULI: PATCHOULI
They precede swine: PEARLS
Former kname: KNEE
Former clave: EXCLAVE
Digitized emperor: ENERO
An answer today was BRETT. Have you heard of Brett Dennen? Again, courtesy of Son Volt.
We took grandson Morris to his first ballgame today along with mom and dad: he’ll be five in November, kinehora. He was excited about it, but didn’t really seem to enjoy it much. Too young. I think I was around seven when I started. Anyway, who cares? The game was incredible.
The Tigers were hosting the Orioles and we were rooting for the birds. The great Tiger arm Tarik Skubal was on the mound, perhaps for his last game for Detroit. His strikeout of the leadoff batter was his 1,000th and he got a good ovation. He also got quite an ovation when he exited in the seventh with Detroit leading 7-1. The O’s were happy to be rid of him and pounced on the Tiger pen for four more, making it a game at 7-5 going into the eighth. Then, goodness!, the Tigers were unable to “hold the mayo” as Coby Mayo tripled home the tying runs. The birds flew all the way back from seven runs down to tie it! It still looked like Detroit would take it in overtime, however, when they put men on first and third with one out in the tenth. Not so fast — a double play took us all to the eleventh. Then it was the O’s turn to look like winners as they plated two to go up 9-7. But again no! Torkelson popped a two-run blast into the left field seats to tie it at nine!
Morris was long out of patience by then, but Linda and I were riveted. A two-out hit into the pastures of centerfield by Colton Cowser (moooooo!) put the O’s up 10-9, but Detroit put men on second and third with two out in their half. It all came down Detroit’s DH, Eduardo Valencia. A hit and Detroit wins; an out and it’s the O’s. Baltimore brought in Andrew Kittredge for the job, their seventh pitcher. (Detroit had also used seven.) His fourth pitch induced a game-ending ground out to short.
Good show, Baltimore! Never in doubt.
Here’s Kittredge. The beard’s even longer now. It’s downright rabbinical.
We’ve got a day trip to Grand Rapids planned for tomorrow with, oh no!, another ballgame at night! Too much? We’ll see.
Let’s go out with a laugh. An answer in the puzzle today was PARTY CRASHER, which led commenter Gary to note: If I am ever at a party it’ll be because I’m crashing. For obvious reasons, people just don’t invite me to things as they fear I’ll spend the night talking to them.
Thanks for dropping in.
The Wellington Files 