by Phyllis Miller
Just got done watching Nicholas Nickleby on hulu.com a few minutes ago. I was reluctant at first. I have sworn, for no good reason that I know of, to dislike Dickens. I mean, Chuck doesn't write the most uplifting stuff (yes I am aware that was part of his purpose). And the one Dickens novel that I did read, Hard Times--for my 19th century British novel course at BSU--did nothing to change my mind. I hated it and felt good about hating Dickens.
But I liked this movie. A lot. I daresay I will watch it again. It is definitely better than Pitch Black, Weird Science, 28 Days Later, or The Phantom the Opera, all of which I have watched (for the first time) in the last half-fortnight. (Yes, I never saw Weird Science when I was a kid. It seemed everyone else had, but I was able to avoid it somehow. What a pile of garbage! Honestly one of the stupidest movies ever, right?)
I almost feel like I need to read Nicholas Nickleby now, just to make sure it's nothing like the movie. But if your tastes in movies are anything like mine (here's how to tell: if you have seen or plan to see Wanted, you don't share my taste) watch this one. It is disturbing and funny at the same time. Oh yeah, and set in England in the 1800s. What more do you want? Here is a snippet:
I swear this is Christopher Plummer's best role since he was General Chang in Star Trek VI. Maybe even since he was Captain von Trapp.
Okay, did it seem like I was stretching it a bit when I used the word "best" right there? I did it on purpose. I get tired of hearing that word. I know the MLB all-star game is a fortnight past, but it has taken me that long to get over a few things. In the first place, Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia was voted as the starter. I try not to have an issue with that, since he is sent by fan voting, right? But please. I had to hear announcers rave about him, using words like "best."
And then, during a Yankees game on TV recently (since apparently Yankees and Red Sox games are the only ones fans want to see) I heard the announcers talking about Robinson Cano, the Yankees second baseman. Evidently, he's the best, also. Um, no. Not even close.
Now you think you know what is coming, but you're wrong. I am not going to claim that Brian Roberts in the best second baseman in the AL, but maybe a look at the numbers and a few other facts might help.
As of today:
Roberts: .286 average, 39 doubles, 8 triples, 7 HR, 35 RBI, 27 steals, 54 walks.
Pedroia: .315 average, 31 doubles, 1 triple, 9HR, 48 RBI, 11 steals, 28 walks.
Cano: .267 average, 23 doubles, 1 triple, 9 HR, 48 RBI, 1 steal, 17 walks.
Sure, Pedroia is hitting for a better average, but with the walks Roberts has a better on base percentage. And of his 116 hits, nearly half are for extra bases! Cano is not even close. Now consider the lineups that surround all three players. Mind you, I like the guys on my team: Markakis and Huff both have over 30 doubles, making it three Orioles in the top 5 of that category. But they don't have the names the Yankees and Red Sox do. Trust me, pitchers would rather face Markakis and Huff before Rodriguez, Jeter, Ramirez, Ortiz, no matter what the numbers say. So Pedroia is going to get some pitches to hit. Oh yeah, and he also has that wall ten feet past the infield that turns a can of corn into a double. What would Roberts do with that?
Besides, Ian Kinsler has better numbers that any of them. But he made the all-star team (only the announcers were a little less effusive with their praise). And I have soft spot in my heart for someone who has to play half his games in Dallas.
None of this helps, of course; the Orioles are last in their division. Another painful year of losing. There are promising moments, but we are soon smacked down once our hopes are up. Surely it can't keep going for much longer. I can't take the pain. The unfulfilled promises. The outlook is bleak. What can be done? Will it ever change? It's just too awful.
Okay, I need to stop. This is starting to feel like a Dickens novel.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Pulmonary Embolism
By Phyllis Miller
One of my favorite phrases was used on the radio again today. Erik Kuselias was in for Mike Tirico during the Tirico and Van Pelt show on ESPN radio. EK was working today notwithstanding suffering from "flu-like symptoms." Awesome. Not the flu, not a cold, not allergies--flu-like symptoms. I had only heard it before as the reason some athlete was missing his next game. "Kwame Brown will not play and is in street clothes tonight; he is suffering from flu-like symptoms." I am glad to see it has jumped from athletes to radio personalities. I plan to adopt this type of speaking myself in everyday parlance, you know, speech-like talking. So enjoy reading the rest of my blog-like ramblings.
This whole thing reminds me of the time I had blood-clot-in-the-lung-type symptoms. It took a while for the various doctors I saw to narrow it down (maybe on another occasion I can blog about my respect and admiration for these fine professionals, but a small taste can be found here). First I was told I had bronchitis-like symptoms; I knew that wasn't it. Next, I was told I had some strange form of asthma-like symptoms and got an albuterol inhaler. Finally, after I was feeling fine again (no more nights sitting in the bathroom crying and breathing in and out in as shallow a manner as I could, while feeling like a chinese star was loose inside my chest) an internist-like doctor sent me for a CT-like scan. And there it was: a clot-like formation in my lung.
The weirdest thing I learned in my week at St. Al's is that my blood clot has something to do with my testicles. It doesn't make sense to me, either, but of course, I'm not a doctor.
I say this because once in the emergency room-like area, the ER doc checked my prostate as I lay there nearly prostrate (prostate vs. prostrate and lay vs. lie in the same sentence!) and then he examined my man-parts. (Note: the ER doc's response to my obvious chagrin when he had informed me he would be performing the above-mentioned tasks was excellent: "Believe me, pal, it isn't the highlight of my day, either.")
I was checked in to the hospital and assigned a room. Since I was a healthy young man in his late twenties, doctors were at a loss to figure out why I should have this ailment. A urologist was consulted. He came to my room, asked me some questions, and told me to make an appointment to see him when I was out of the hospital. I said I would. Before he went, however, he did me the favor of performing another testicular exam. I would have preferred if he had consulted with the ER doc first.
The next day, a doctor entered and explained that she was on call for my vacationing internist. She asked almost the same set of questions I had answered in the ER, and then performed another check of my nether region! Come on! What is going on here? But as much as I was tired of these testes-tests, it was her comment after the few light squeezes that bothered me the most.
"Nothing remarkable."
One of my favorite phrases was used on the radio again today. Erik Kuselias was in for Mike Tirico during the Tirico and Van Pelt show on ESPN radio. EK was working today notwithstanding suffering from "flu-like symptoms." Awesome. Not the flu, not a cold, not allergies--flu-like symptoms. I had only heard it before as the reason some athlete was missing his next game. "Kwame Brown will not play and is in street clothes tonight; he is suffering from flu-like symptoms." I am glad to see it has jumped from athletes to radio personalities. I plan to adopt this type of speaking myself in everyday parlance, you know, speech-like talking. So enjoy reading the rest of my blog-like ramblings.
This whole thing reminds me of the time I had blood-clot-in-the-lung-type symptoms. It took a while for the various doctors I saw to narrow it down (maybe on another occasion I can blog about my respect and admiration for these fine professionals, but a small taste can be found here). First I was told I had bronchitis-like symptoms; I knew that wasn't it. Next, I was told I had some strange form of asthma-like symptoms and got an albuterol inhaler. Finally, after I was feeling fine again (no more nights sitting in the bathroom crying and breathing in and out in as shallow a manner as I could, while feeling like a chinese star was loose inside my chest) an internist-like doctor sent me for a CT-like scan. And there it was: a clot-like formation in my lung.
The weirdest thing I learned in my week at St. Al's is that my blood clot has something to do with my testicles. It doesn't make sense to me, either, but of course, I'm not a doctor.
I say this because once in the emergency room-like area, the ER doc checked my prostate as I lay there nearly prostrate (prostate vs. prostrate and lay vs. lie in the same sentence!) and then he examined my man-parts. (Note: the ER doc's response to my obvious chagrin when he had informed me he would be performing the above-mentioned tasks was excellent: "Believe me, pal, it isn't the highlight of my day, either.")
I was checked in to the hospital and assigned a room. Since I was a healthy young man in his late twenties, doctors were at a loss to figure out why I should have this ailment. A urologist was consulted. He came to my room, asked me some questions, and told me to make an appointment to see him when I was out of the hospital. I said I would. Before he went, however, he did me the favor of performing another testicular exam. I would have preferred if he had consulted with the ER doc first.
The next day, a doctor entered and explained that she was on call for my vacationing internist. She asked almost the same set of questions I had answered in the ER, and then performed another check of my nether region! Come on! What is going on here? But as much as I was tired of these testes-tests, it was her comment after the few light squeezes that bothered me the most.
"Nothing remarkable."
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Sue Modray
I have a friend I have asked to contribute to this blog, so here are a few words of introduction.
I met Sue Modray when I returned to BSU to get my English degree. She was in one of the first classes I took, and after chatting a bit, we realized how startlingly similar we were. We could not help but become soul mates. She is very nearly my mirror image.
Look at the similarities:
Sue had never finished college when she got married, started a family, and started working on getting old. After a few kids, she settled in to a nice little career quite by accident. Sue had recently moved with her family to Idaho from Alaska when she got a temporary job through one of those staffing service companies. What started out as a little data entry to make a few bucks turned into a career. Her data entry job was at a company that designed websites, and after a few years grinding up the ranks from temporary data entry clerk to secretary to website contributor, she soon was designing websites herself. She had managed to get this (fairly decent paying) job not from experience or schooling; she simply rubbed shoulders with others doing it.
She parlayed this experience into another job with the state department of education--a totally sweet job. No supervisor breathing down her neck, freedom to come and go as she pleased, and good pay. Sue soon realized she was at liberty to return to school and get the degree she never got. An English degree.
Like me, Sue had not originally studied English at college, but had found an author she loved (Austen, as it turns out; there are precious few who revere Maugham the Master) and wanted to study more literature. So there she was at BSU starting to do it in 2004. And I was there, too. We followed a similar path toward our degrees and saw each other in many classes. Her literary tastes are nearly identical to my own.
We had many discussions about the education we received in the English department at BSU, and we share many of the same ideas. I have asked her, as her first contribution to the blog, to talk about her journey. Hopefully you find it entertaining. If not, stay tuned, and Phyllis will post again soon.
[I have asked Sue when she posts to leave her name at the beginning of the post, so readers can know right away without scrolling to the bottom of the post who is writing. I will also try to do the same. But I might not; it is my blog, after all.]
I met Sue Modray when I returned to BSU to get my English degree. She was in one of the first classes I took, and after chatting a bit, we realized how startlingly similar we were. We could not help but become soul mates. She is very nearly my mirror image.
Look at the similarities:
Sue had never finished college when she got married, started a family, and started working on getting old. After a few kids, she settled in to a nice little career quite by accident. Sue had recently moved with her family to Idaho from Alaska when she got a temporary job through one of those staffing service companies. What started out as a little data entry to make a few bucks turned into a career. Her data entry job was at a company that designed websites, and after a few years grinding up the ranks from temporary data entry clerk to secretary to website contributor, she soon was designing websites herself. She had managed to get this (fairly decent paying) job not from experience or schooling; she simply rubbed shoulders with others doing it.
She parlayed this experience into another job with the state department of education--a totally sweet job. No supervisor breathing down her neck, freedom to come and go as she pleased, and good pay. Sue soon realized she was at liberty to return to school and get the degree she never got. An English degree.
Like me, Sue had not originally studied English at college, but had found an author she loved (Austen, as it turns out; there are precious few who revere Maugham the Master) and wanted to study more literature. So there she was at BSU starting to do it in 2004. And I was there, too. We followed a similar path toward our degrees and saw each other in many classes. Her literary tastes are nearly identical to my own.
We had many discussions about the education we received in the English department at BSU, and we share many of the same ideas. I have asked her, as her first contribution to the blog, to talk about her journey. Hopefully you find it entertaining. If not, stay tuned, and Phyllis will post again soon.
[I have asked Sue when she posts to leave her name at the beginning of the post, so readers can know right away without scrolling to the bottom of the post who is writing. I will also try to do the same. But I might not; it is my blog, after all.]
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