I don’t know about you guys, but this has been a heck of an entertaining World Series so far. Here we are with the Rangers and Cardinals tied up at two games apiece. The ratings for this showdown have been dreadful, and if you’re like most people, then you haven’t seen any of the games and you probably don’t really care; however, if you’re like that, then you probably aren’t reading this article for any other reason than I just typed “Brad and Angelina separated” and you Googled that and wound up here.
We have seen just about everything you could ever want to see: nail-biting close games and football-score blowouts, surprisingly stellar and stunningly awful pitching, explosive and implosive batting. And the real highlight of this baseball smorgasbord has been the two managers of the teams. Ron Washington and Tony La Russa have been going back and forth trying to outsmart and outdumb each other.
We should get these guys top hats to wear, because it’s been a circus out there with bizarre choices in almost every aspect of the game — like both managers want to make it just as difficult as they possibly can to win the championship because an easily won championship is not really worth anything and so let’s try this crazy thing here and see what happens. It’s totally nuts, but I love it.
As usual, the umpires have gotten into the act — as most clowns do at a circus — and we’ve seen some of the worst calls in World Series history. But, it’s okay, because it’s only the championship of the entire sport, and why would it matter if they bother to get all of the calls right when getting most of them right should be plenty good and Bud Selig is too busy with other pressing matters like the unneeded playoffs changes for next year and picking a fight with Frank McCourt and refusing to permit the robot domination that will surely follow from adding instant replay.
The announcers have been horrible in the series. I haven’t actually listened to them while watching the games, but I do know they are still using Joe Buck and Tim McCarver, so, yeah, horrible. Actually as I struggled to find the “mute” button, I did hear a bit of Sunday’s game — I lasted a full eight seconds — kind of like a bull rider at a rodeo, except with the more profane definition of “bull.”
My one regret these last four games is that I missed the big ninth-inning rally by the Rangers in game two to take the lead and then win the game. That’s the kind of thing that watching baseball is all about. I did watch most of the game, and I thoroughly enjoyed the great pitching. But I had to run to the store in the eighth inning as part of my domestic responsibilities.
When I got back home, I got into a bit of a squabble with one of my neighbors. But I’m telling you, this 50-year-old Asian lady was asking for it. I’m not mentioning that she’s Asian as any sort of racist thing, it’s just that she’s Asian and that is a simple way to differentiate her from my other neighbors – who are not Asian. And it’s not like Asian is a derogatory term, right?
Anyway, as my wife and I were arriving at the elevator, our Asian neighbor was just coming into the building with her two dogs and a semi-full yellow doggy bag in her hand. Oh wait, I should probably tell you some of the back-story here. For the past few months, someone has been putting open doggy bags full of dog poop in the lobby trashcan. It is almost incomprehensibly gross that a human being would be okay with doing this. And it’s become a bit of an obsession of mine to find the culprit and bring them to justice — or just get them to stop so I can get on with the rest of my life without having to pass by a trashcan reeking of dog crap every day.
A couple weeks ago I had it narrowed down to two possibilities: the Asian lady on the first floor and the Hungarian couple on the second floor. The Hungarian (again, not derogatory) couple were new to the building and they had a dog that they took for walks — and it seemed like leaving an open bag of dog excrement would be something a foreigner would do. Maybe, to them, we were lucky they didn’t just leave it on the ground like they do back in the old country. The Asian lady has two dogs that she takes for walks and she isn’t very nice to anyone ever. But she made the final list when I saw her come in the building one day from walking her dogs and I didn’t see a doggy bag, but I swear she made a quick move to the lobby trashcan.
The building doesn’t really have a manager because it’s all condos and we aren’t allowed to post signs like “Hey, stupid, please stop dumping your dog’s toxic feces in the public trash, what are you some kind of barbarian?” So it was up to me to solve these crimes. And the only real clue I had was the doggy bags themselves — yellow (and filled with poop of course).
My big break came a week ago. I was parked outside my building and the front door opened. Out came my Asian neighbor with her two dogs, and then, and I swear this part was actually in slow-motion, she reached into her pocket and pulled out a yellow doggy bag. Guilty!
So on the night of game two, while Jason Motte was blowing the save and the Rangers were taking the lead, my wife and I were waiting at the elevator and the Asian lady walked in with her two dogs and her yellow doggy bag. I told my wife, “I think I left something in the car.” She saw the look in my eyes and knew what was coming next and while she completely agreed, she didn’t want to have anything to do with it.
I walked in the direction of my car and then turned around and waited around the corner to see if the Asian lady was going to drop her doggy bag in the trash. I stood there frozen in mid-stride to make it look like I wasn’t just waiting to catch her. And when she came around the corner, I started walking and then she did it. She actually dropped an open bag of dog poop into the lobby trashcan like it wasn’t even the most disgusting thing in the world she could do.
“You shouldn’t put that there,” I said politely. She was surprised at first — maybe because I’ve never really talked to her — and then she got tough.
“Where am I supposed to put it?” I had to stay pleasant or this was going to escalate into something ugly. “The dumpster is just inside the garage there.” This was maybe the craziest idea she had ever heard.
“What’s the difference?” I like this building and I don’t want any enemies here, so I continued to reason with her. “The dumpster is where garbage goes and the trashcan is open to everyone.”
“The dumpster is open, too.” She was right; the dumpster isn’t covered, but … “The dumpster is behind two thick doors, so it’s kind of covered and this trashcan isn’t covered at all.” She wasn’t interested in any of my logic.
“You can’t tell me what to do!” And then things escalated into something rather ugly. I don’t want to detail the entire conversation (because my Editor told me I can’t) but I can say that it was quite a verbal donnybrook. This is why my wife scooted out of there as fast as she could. She’s not into heavy confrontations … but I am.
This all could have gone so much easier if she just said that she hadn’t really thought of the effects of her actions and she wouldn’t do it anymore. Admittedly, I probably didn’t need to swear as much as I did. After I ran out of things to yell, she said as spitefully as she could that she was going to move the poop to the dumpster. I immediately stopped being furious, smiled and said, “Thanks.” She was just as stunned as when I was yelling. She took another couple steps and just as she walked out of view she said, “And you’re a fat a**shole.”
Ouch, that really hurt. I’ve only been called that for the last 30 years. I may be a fat a**hole, but at least I’m not an awful human being who tries to poison her neighbors with her dog’s waste products.
[Editor’s note: Jed, did you just spend an entire column venting about some petty grievance between you and your neighbor?] [Note to editor: Not the entire column.] [Editor’s note: Let’s just get back to the baseball stuff, pal.] [Note to editor: The people have a right to know!] [Editor’s note: I think we’ve had enough complaints about you.] [Note to editor: That was a misunderstanding.] [Editor’s note: Misunderstandings – you left the s off the end.] [Note to editor: Well played, sir.]I hope the rest of the World Series is as entertaining as these first four games between Circus Vargas and Ringling Brothers … I mean the Rangers and Cardinals.
