Close Dancing

Posted on June 12, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Series Previews

Astros @ Giants Series Preview

Your Houston Astros, 26-34 and 6.5 games back, visit the San Francisco Giants, 34-27 and 5 games back.

Beautiful beautiful
Girl from the north
You burned my heart
With a flickering torch
I had a dream that no one else could see
You gave me love for free

Candy, Candy , Candy I can’t let you go
All my life you’re haunting me
I loved you so

Be my Valentine

Jenny was the first person I met when I took my new job. Very professional, a good lawyer, she’s the one who gave me all the paperwork to fill out, the one who told me where to park, all the little things I needed to take care of before I got to my new desk. I liked her, she was funny, smart, pretty, and there was something more to her, some indeterminate whisper that fed the instinct to draw close without realizing it. Later on I would be more acquainted with this quality. I’m pretty sure Black Widows have it in spades.

I never really felt like I fit in at this job but the pay was great and I was flooded with accolades from my bosses. They made me feel like I’d brought them Fire, and compliments are a great salve. Especially early on, when you’re trying to get your feet. Jenny helped with that too – she knew more than she was going to tell me, but she’d guide me when I needed it. We became fast friends when I learned how to make her laugh. I discovered her impossibly black humor and how drawn she always was to the dark side of things. It wouldn’t surprise me if she made that her central conflict just for the sport of it, because she couldn’t function without a wave of challenge. Her special gift was giving in to her demons, embracing them completely and opening herself to them so that she could practice withdrawing from them when she decided to.

***

Tuesday, June 12, 7:15 PM PT, AT&T Park

Bud Norris (5-3, 4.65) vs. Madison Bumgarner (7-4, 3.26)

After winning his first four starts in May, Norris recorded a no-decision and two straight losses. He fanned a season-high 12 batters, but suffered the 4-3 loss on Wednesday against the Cardinals.

Bumgarner gave up a season high-tying four earned runs in six innings in his last outing, a 6-5 win against the Padres. His two starts last year against Houston are his only appearances against the Astros, and he went 1-1 with a 4.85 ERA.

Theriot hits .286 in 14 AB against Norris; Altuve and JD each have HRs on Bumgarner.

Wednesday, June 13, 7:15 PM PT, AT&T Park

J.A. Happ (4-6, 4.54) vs. Matt Cain (7-2, 2.41)

Happ lasted a season-low 4 2/3 innings in a 14-2 loss on Thursday to the Cardinals. He had four straight quality starts leading into the game, but has lost his last three decisions.

Cain has been credited with a win in six straight starts, and the Giants haven’t lost a game that Cain has pitched since May 1. His 2.41 ERA is the best in the Majors out of pitchers with at least 80 innings pitched.

Thursday, June 14, 12:45 PM PT, AT&T Park

Wandy Rodriguez (5-4, 3.27) vs. Barry Zito, (5-3, 3.24)

Rodriguez has allowed at least nine hits while throwing fewer than six innings in each of his last three starts. He stranded most of those runners Friday in an 8-3 win over the White Sox.

After back-to-back quality starts, Zito gave up four earned runs in six innings to a hard-hitting Rangers club his last time out in a 4-0 loss. He is 4-1 with a 2.43 ERA during day games this season, as opposed to 1-2 with a 3.92 ERA at night.

***

That is a very, very intoxicating and appealing quality. I know now what it means, but at the time all I knew was that I wanted to be with Jenny every second I possibly could. Nothing else was as fun, like trying to hold on to a motorcycle that was unexpectedly fast, flying past whatever barriers you knew on the way to others you had no concept of.

Take the fire in your hands
And place it at her feet
Walk upon the mountain
Then you’ll sail across the sea
Her eyes are taken from the stars above

Her voice is five hearts breaking

She began to make excuses to come by my office and visit. I’d go by hers two or three times a day and that turned into sharing breakfasts, going for coffee, lunch, then the platonic ventures in the early evening, maybe to a record store or a happy hour. We’d drive each other to office functions. All the while this coal is stoking my treacherous furnace, blinding me with its light and heat.

We’d work on projects together and I’d try to chip into her, find out more about her. She’d let me in a little, tell me a few things probably calculated in her way that I found fascinating.

“Insanity runs in my family.”
“In high school I was always the girl who had the great pot.”
“My goth friends had a big party last night. I hadn’t done that in a while.”
“You haven’t gone to that bondage club? I used to go there a lot.”

Jenny was quite possibly the smartest person I’ve ever known. I’m not used to being in any kind of relationship with people who are that bright, always several steps ahead with contingencies always ready. I’m not an idiot, and I think of myself as hypersensitive when reading people, but Jenny could be completely opaque when she wanted to. Very Machiavellian and she loved to play. This was another very attractive quality, because I don’t get to play on this level very often. In some ways, we took on a Dangerous Liaisons quality with parries and counterattacks but we always spared each other, holding the blade to the throat, careful never to draw it across.

***

Injuries

SF –
Melky Cabrera, day to day with right hamstring tightness
Dan Runzler, 15 day DL with left lat strain
Freddy Sanchez, 15 day DL with sore back
Brian Wilson, out for season with TJS

Houston –
Abad, 15 day DL with right intercostal strain
Travis Buck, 15 day DL with achilles tendinitis
Escalona out for the season with ligament tear
Marwin Gonzalez due late June, heel bruise
Carlos Lee due mid June, hamstring strain
FeMart due mid June, concussion-like symptoms
Jordan Schafer, day to day with pinkeye
Kyle Weiland, possibly after All Star break with right shoulder infection

***

You can’t dance this close without touching, certainly not for the length of the song we danced to. We were all but inseparable at work and most evenings we found reasons to spend more time together. Any excuse I could create would lead to quick meetings that rumpled and pulled at the veil of innocence.

Louise, she’s all right, she’s just near
She’s delicate and seems like the mirror
But she just makes it all too concise and too clear
That Johanna’s not here
The ghost of ’lectricity howls in the bones of her face
Where these visions of Johanna have now taken my place

This went on for months, this dance, this veil that became so thin it was nearly transparent yet the spider’s threads still formed a lace that we wouldn’t remove.

“Hey. Whatcha doing?”
“Not much. Waiting for you to call.”
“Oh? You just wait for me to call?”
“Yep. You know I’m wrapped around your finger.”
“Yes. That’s how I like my men.”

“Did you miss me?”
“Every single second of every single day.”
“I like that.”

“A friend? Is that all I am to you?”
“Of course not. You don’t want me to tell you what you already know. You don’t want me to say it.”
“I might. I might not.”

I was consumed with the fire. I know now what her gift means, but at the time all I could see was her face, her flawless skin pure and white like pressed luck.

Soft white hand placed on top of mine. Warm, soft, like the breath of an angel. Drawn away with a gentle caress of her thumb, then a fingernail trace across my arm. Almond eyes twinkling as she spun away from my desk, my world spinning as though I were swirling down a drain.

“You want to come over after work?”
“Yes.”

She opened the door, still wearing her work clothes. After pouring me a glass of wine she showed me her place and left me in the living room while she went to change. She came back barefoot, with a flowing mid-length skirt and blousy top, lighting a one-hit pipe. My brain was screaming, the thunder of my pulse making it hard to hear, hard to think. I looked at her feet, her ankles, commented on her skirt while I fought inside, trying to decide when I was going to kiss her despite all the things that could go wrong.

I followed her around her house as she showed me more. Her cats. Books. CDs. Her computer, which needed to be cleaned of malware. My head was pounding, Kodo Drummers thundering so hard and so fast there is no time for echo. I can feel the thick blood running through my temples.

She put the pipe down and bent to get a coaster for her glass. My hand traced her shoulder blade and I waited for her to straighten.

My phone rang.

Pick up in the Game Zone.

Astros Win A Series On The Road!

Posted on June 11, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Game Recaps

Astros 11, White Sox 9

W: Harrell (6-4)
L: Humber (2-4)

They say that memory is like a train, it gets smaller as it pulls away. Philip Humber knows this, as the focus of his perfect game fades into a neverending funhouse mirror where neat lines and straight edges used to be.

The AL Central-leading White Sox were the weeping clown for today’s Astros as the Good Guys took the series for their first one on the road this year. The rain of tears was led by four Astro home runs, one each from JD Martinez, Maxwell, Wallace and Altuve.

Maxwell’s 461-foot-shot to the second deck towering over left field represented the sixth earned run Humber surrendered, and called for the hook. Relief was elusive and tempestuous though, while the backslaps and high fives among the visitors grew into wails of south side despair.

On a day where the bullpen was missing components they’d almost certainly need, Harrell went into the seventh inning against his former team and worked hard to save the day. The back end of the bullpen was just strong enough to hold off the final charge from the Sox – Lopez gave up one run and Rodriguez three more before Myers shut it down while picking up his 15th save.

They’ll get a much-needed day off Monday before taking on the Giants for a three-game set, to be followed by another interleague craptacular in Arlington. Once they get far enough away, they’ll be on their way back home.

Sometimes the Bottom Gets To Be the Top

Posted on June 3, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Game Recaps

Astros 5, Reds 3
W: Lyles (1-1)
L: Arroyo (2-4)

It took them the better part of two weeks, but the Astros finally put together a game that was enjoyable to watch on their way to snapping an eight-game losing streak. Lyles, inserted into the rotation at least for the near future, wasn’t dominant but flashed some good pitches and better tenacity on the mound, limiting the Dickities to two runs on five hits while striking out three. The big blow for the Skyline Bunch was the two-run homer launched into the Crawford Boxes by Cozart in the third inning.

The Astros battled back to take the lead in the fourth and put it out of reach in the seventh with Maxwell’s third pinch-hit home run of the season, a blast over the train tracks that made it 5-2.

Lopez scuffled through the eighth, careening through one near-disaster after another, and when he got Votto to hit a 400′ sac fly to Schafer, the deal was sealed.

The top four in the home order went 1 for 15 today, with four strikeouts. It was the bottom of the lineup, more specifically #6-9, that carried the day. Wallace, up from OKC while Lee is on the DL, was 2 for 3 with a run scored; Castro was 2 for 3, scored once and drove one in; Marwin Gonzalez was a clutch 2 for 4 with one run scored and one driven in.

Take a trip down Memory Lane with us in the Game Zone if you’d like to relive it in more detail. It’s Christmas tomorrow, and maybe the Front Office won’t shoot their eye out. Tune in at 6 CT for the opening of the presents.

The reeling Jakes limp into town Tuesday, stinking of leftover pallets of Coconut Penis and Sex Panther cologne. Follow along in the GZ to see the real stars come out.

FTC @ Astros Series Preview May 21-23

Posted on May 21, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Series Previews

I hate the Cubs.

I should clarify that. I hate what the Cubs represent, the personification of the culture that celebrates losing. You can see the result anytime you scan the stands of a Cub home game – the men, bald, flabby, weak, most of them drunk and boorishly stupid; their women are ugly, demihuman breeding stock for a legion of ineffectual fools whose purpose in life is to throw all their available money at a towering god who eternally mewls and coughs for more sacrifice with no hope of reward.

I hate the Cubs, and their insipid fans. The people who aren’t strong enough to want to win, who have abandoned all hope and entered the domain of Suck for Suck’s sake. Those who applaud at the barest hint of mediocrity, who celebrate the nearness of victory but would spit out its sweetness at first taste for the familiar bitterness of Loss and the comforting blanket of darkness it provides.

Projected Starters:

Monday: Norris (4-1, 3.58) vs. Matt who the hell cares.

I mean, who really cares? If Cub fans don’t care about winning, then why care about the rest of it? What does it matter?

“Oh, the Lovable Losers.” Ridiculous.

“Wait ’til next year!” Nauseating. It’s a vile poison to celebrate loss, to cultivate this acceptance of unwillingness to Fight Back, to attempt to Gain Control of something and then use that Control to build on with some Goal in mind. Cub fans would rather switch than fight, would welcome Castro into Havana, wish that Kennedy had backed down in October 1962.

It’s so very…French.

“Oh, Gaston, nous sommes les adorables perdants!”

“Mais oui, Jacques! Mais oui!”

I hate the Cubs. A belief system like theirs reduces them to culls, in the hope that the infectious weakness they carry can be removed from the herd before it spreads even further. They are garbage, animatronic garbage with excement jammed into crevices for hearts and souls.

I hate the Cubs.

Follow along in the Game Zone, if you dare.

You’re Never Alone With A Schizophrenic

Posted on May 20, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Game Recaps

WP: C. Lewis (4-3)
LP: J. Lyles (0-1)

It just goes to show you that if you can’t hit and you can’t pitch, you can’t win.

Jordan Lyles had zero command today, giving up five runs in the first inning en route to a 6-1 Ranger win. The surprise is that he lasted for 117 pitches and that he only gave up five in the first, because the only place he could throw his pitches with any regularity was right over the middle of the plate.

“The first inning, I didn’t have a clue where it was going for the most part,” said Lyles after the game. “My mistakes were over the plate. No one to blame but myself. I didn’t do a good job of minimizing my mistakes and sticking to giving up that one run instead of five.”

No doy.

Five hits and one walk were all the Astro bats could muster against Lewis and Ross. The only one that counted was Lowrie’s sixth home run in the ninth, and it counted as little as a solo home run possibly can.

Losing all the air from Saturday night’s big win was just another cold slap in the face for the fans. After the first inning, both teams were on cruise control, taking the highway to the postgame buffet – steak on one side, shitburgers on the other.

The sorry excuse for a ballclub from Chicago steams into town tomorrow. Let’s hope they get the buttkicking they deserve from the Mr. Hyde version of the Home Nine, and not some Loser’s Tonic from Dr. Jekyll.

Checked Swings in the Rain

Posted on May 14, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Game Recaps

A couple of months ago I came home from a morning TV shift. My daughters were sitting on the couch, my wife on a loveseat next to it. For some reason, my oldest daughter seemed to be in some sort of awkward position. I couldn’t make out why but nothing appeared to be…ok.

“Daddy, I did something. I hope you aren’t going to be mad.”

This is a difficult opening gambit. My wife wasn’t crying, so it couldn’t have been catastrophic. I just saw the cars outside, and they hadn’t been wrecked. My oldest daughter rides horses almost every day, and sometimes she gets hurt. Couple that with a tendency nearing hypochondria and there are a lot of health-related tropes that fly around Chez Brand. Her skewed posture on the couch clicked in my brain and I knew she’d hurt herself. The question was how bad, and what would have to be done to fix whatever it was.

“We got a dog.” It was in her lap.

We’ve already got two dogs. The male, somewhere around a year old, is about 100 pounds of thick-chested beast. He is convinced that he is a tiny puppy, with a brain to match but he has the body of a killing machine directed by a very needy cerebrum. The female, some four months older, is mostly black lab and is about 55 pounds of feral cunning and abject loyal love. We rescued her from the side of the road as a sick and filthy puppy a year ago.

I’d just lost my cat a couple of months before. Our remaining cat was getting old and I’d been wrestling with the question of getting another one or waiting until Yayo was gone to get two kitties, like we’d done before. I’d decided to keep her stress level low and not add another cat to the mix, and here they come with a new dog, a six week old puppy. A mix of blue heeler and either border collie or lab, they didn’t know which. Blue eyes.

The Devil Child

He’s really cute. Really, really cute. And mischevous as hell.

It’s not like I could be the bad dad, put my foot down and tell them to take him back. He was a rescue from a kill shelter, so he was ours all right, ours just like the rest of them were.

He has only recently gotten to the point where he is not the devil incarnate when he isn’t sleeping. He chews everything he can – the ends of our coffee table, all magazines, anything my daughters carelessly leave within 36 inches or so of the ground. Shoes, makeup detritus, pencils, pens, remote controls, whatever. The devil.

He’s really cute. Twinkly blue eyes.

He is constantly playfighting with the female, at least when he isn’t chewing up things. He’ll pounce on her and they’ll roll all around the living room, chewing and nipping at each other’s faces, ears, legs, tails. When they’re outside, she’ll be focused on chasing a ball with the male dog and Cooper (the puppy) will wait, low in the grass, for his chance to run full-out in that clumsy big-feet-everywhere full-out gallop that puppies do, racing to leap on Aly and start gnawing at her so they can roll around in the grass. At this point, they’re not so far off being a match for each other in size, he’s grown roughly three times as large as he was at six weeks.

Cooper, for all his rambunctiousness, knows to leave the big dog alone. Boone wants to play with him, but he’s serious about his toys and loses himself in that blind focus. If Cooper challenges him the wrong way, Boone won’t back off and Cooper has learned this the hard way. Mostly, Cooper just leaves him alone and spends his time with Aly since she’s smaller and less threatening.

It’s interesting watching puppies grow up. The house is a shambles. We haven’t had the time to train him much yet which means there are pee pads around, ones he usually hits. Learning to go outside to relive himself is still a work in progress and that adds to the shreds of paper, bits of rubber toys, scarred household items, etc. I think my wife wants to use this as an opportunity for my oldest daughter to learn to train him, since the plan is that she’ll take him with her when she moves back for college next fall.

After an attack where he tries to get the food off of the plate you’re holding, or sneak a drink from the cup you have, he may calm down or go in search of something else to destroy. It’s generally about that time when he decides to leap onto the couch and lick all over your face in a clear expression of affection. He’s a nice dog. He means well and he’s a handful. He needs a lot of training. He is a cyclonic dervish of doggyness, racing in circles around the furniture, leaping on all sorts of things or bounding over them.

Sometimes he is very rewarding, especially when he snuggles against a body part and takes a nap, or when he looks at you with those eyes, not really concealing the playful fiendishness behind them. It’s going to take some time for him to settle down and learn how to be a dog though. He’s a work in progress.

—————————–

Astros lost, 3-2 in 12. Cold, wet, pink bats silent. Young players taking one step forward and two steps back. Manager making decisions on a knife edge, sharpened to a point of win or lose on which way you turn because there’s no margin. Horrible umpiring calls. Wandy dominant, dominant Myers robbed on another bad call and then the rut carved by best plans fills with water and turns to slop.

Back home for a weird set of a homestand, leading to what might be a particularly nasty interleague period. It’s a work in progress.

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