didionville

Jason Giambi showed up to spring training looking slim and fit. (No steroids and some time in the gym will do a body good.) And his play on opening day tonight further substantiates hard work pays off. Leaping to catch line drives, holding runners at third, performing some smart base running to stay out of a double play. He was 0 for 3 (with one walk), but we are not concerned about his offense at this time. As discussed before, if Giambi can stay in the lineup at first, the Yankees have a lot of very dangerous options and will score a lot of runs.

And speaking of looking good … Leslie is looking HOT with her new haircut. No performance enhancing drugs needed.

We are watching tonight’s basketball game (WVU vs. Xavier — now in OT), and we just saw a new Mercedes commercial: “300 horsepower is fast; 400 horsepower will take your breath away ….” My immediate thought in response — 100 horsepower will get you where you need to go with decent gas mileage and help keep Antarctica from melting into nothingness. (More here. And here.)

Ummmm, surprise, people: Inflation does NOT affect your engine-power needs.

My 1976 BMW 2002 had 100 horsepower and was considered a fast, sporty car 30+ years ago. Now we have more crowded roads, higher gas prices, and conclusive evidence of human-caused global warming, and still we need 451 hp?

Think about this: If all of the manpower, intelligence, ingenuity, and desire that has gone into designing higher powered engines had actually gone into designing AND MARKETING higher fuel efficiency, think about what a better place we would be in not just environmentally, but also geopolitically … Osama bin Laden, anyone? 9/11, anyone? Dick Cheney, anyone? Iraq, anyone?

The federal No Child Left Behind act is based on the Texas version, so Rice University (w00t! go Owls!) studied the “success” of the Texas program. Extrapolate what you will. Here are a few excerpts (Of course, you might as well read the whole thing, as much as I have excerpted):

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“No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), directly contributes to lower graduation rates.”

“60 percent of African-American students, 75 percent of Latino students and 80 percent of ESL students did not graduate within five years.”

“The study shows as schools came under the accountability system, which uses student test scores to rate schools and reward or discipline principals, massive numbers of students left the school system. The exit of low-achieving students created the appearance of rising test scores and of a narrowing of the achievement gap between white and minority students, thus increasing the schools’ ratings.”

“The higher the stakes and the longer such an accountability system governs schools, the more school personnel view students not as children to educate but as potential liabilities or assets for their school’s performance indicators, their own careers or their school’s funding.”

“The study shows a strong relationship between the increasing number of dropouts and school’s rising accountability ratings.”

“The discrepancy between the official dropout rates, in the 2 to 3 percent range, and the actual rates can be attributed to the state’s method of counting, which does not include students who drop out of school for reasons such as pregnancy or incarceration or declare intent to take the GED sometime in the future.”

***

Wow. Kind of speaks for itself. Taking this to absurd conclusions, the goal of NCLB might as well be “one high-performing white kid per school with the rest of the ’students’ at home prepping for the GED.”

(Recently, the White House agreed to lessen some of the punitive measures of NCLB. Who knows to what end.)

The bracket has been announced. I think we have hit upon the winning strategy this year. We will print the bracket out, feed Didion some peas and let him blow them out across the paper. The winners should be clearly marked in green.

More later.

Last night, we all watched UCLA play USC in the semifinals of the Pac 10 tournament. We were going to go bed after the first half, but we decided to stick it through and were rewarded with an exciting game. (Though, Didion did excuse himself at the half.)

Unlike the last week’s pre-conference-tournament games, UCLA did not need extreme luck and help from the officials to win. The teamwork was much better; Kevin Love was lights out for about five minutes during the key opening minutes of the 2nd half, and UCLA played effective and deliberate defense. There were examples of the poor play that matched what we saw last week. (For instance, Collison’s 2nd-half “play,” running the shot clock down while standing around, then driving into the lane, leaving his feet with no place to go and dumping the ball to Love for a desperation 25 footer.) Thankfully, such poor judgment was rare. UCLA built a solid lead thanks to Love’s outburst at the start of the 2nd half, but then USC’s OJ Mayo — scoreless during the first 12 minutes of the 2nd half — put on a run to match Kevin Love’s. The game got a little too close for our comfort. In the end, Mayo missed a game-tying shot and we could relatively relax.

We were not only impressed with Kevin Love’s play, but also with his statesmanship. As usual, he did a great job in the post-game interview. He was gracious and diplomatic and complimentary towards USC, especially when talking about fellow freshman phenom OJ Mayo. He also praised his teammates (avoiding — refreshingly — the ubiquitous props to Jesus). His father, Stan Love, a former NBA player, obviously prepared him well for being in the public eye. Interestingly, Stan Love is the brother of the Beach Boys’ Mike Love and cousin of the Wilsons, explaining (according to Leslie) where Kevin’s good looks come from.

Seven hours from now, UCLA meets Stanford in the conference championship game. UCLA was able to make the adjustments necessary to summarily beat Cal on Thursday. Have they made the appropriate adjustments and do they have the lessons from their last meeting with Stanford in focus? We certainly hope so.

…..rich and funny probably doesn’t hurt either.

Billy Crystal signed a one-day contract with the Yankees. He has been working out with the team and taking batting practice, but today was his big day. He was the DH and led off the game for the Yankees. Ultimately, he struck out, but he managed to get to a full count and even made solid contact with the second pitch. The pitcher was looking pretty nervous when the count got to 3-1. A moral victory in my book, and even more impressive considering he is 35 years older than the pitcher and hasn’t played organized baseball since high school.

So now Didion has two paths to playing for the Yankees.

Didion and I were watching the Yankees last night* and Joe Girardi took part in a long interview. He was interesting, engaging, entertaining. Most of all, he really inspired hope, confidence and excitement about the upcoming season. It sure reminded us of another product of Illinois — Barack Obama. Could Joe Girardi be the Barack of baseball? Young, fresh, inspirational and ready to lead us out of a long drought. Notably, the Yankees’ last World Series title was in 2000, the same year as W’s “election.”

Calling Joe Girardi the Barack Obama of baseball might be unfair to Joe Torre. (Comparing Joe Torre to W is certainly unfair and isn’t what I want to do.) Joe T. was an unquestionably great manager, but his time with the Yankees had passed. I cannot even remotely be as complimentary about the man Barack hopes to replace. Barack replacing W is like leaving the Dark Ages and going straight to the Age of Enlightenment. The Yankees’ transition is a quite a bit more moderate, but welcome nonetheless.

And we got a hint of how Joe Girardi will perform under pressure. He kept his cool during today’s skirmish, just like Barack would do if the red phone rang at 3AM.

Here’s to looking forward to two upcoming, great late-fall events — the election of Barack and the Yankees’ 27th World Championship.

*It was the encore presentation. Being a true fan, Didion had, of course, watched it live during the day, but was nice enough to watch it again with me later.

Didion and I watched the UCLA-Cal basketball game yesterday. I like to point out good play to him –unselfish, solid team play, like making the extra pass — unfortunately, the game had few good lessons for Didion. UCLA got another undeserved win, thanks to poor officiating and luck, not team work or smart play. Living so far from Westwood, we have seen very few UCLA games this season; I hope these recent games were the exception and they can soon revert to the quality basketball that (we assume) led to a number 3 ranking. Individual talent and the aforementioned luck will not be enough for a deep tournament run.

Later last night, we caught some of the UNC-Duke game. UNC looked good; it is going to be tough to pick against them in my bracket.

C-USA tournament begins next Wednesday. Go Owls!

“his daddy should be wildly disappointed that his son’s first baseball game is not a yankees game.”

I was a little bit disappointed that Didion’s first baseball exposure was not a Yankees game. But on further reflection, I think it is o.k. to start him out slow. We don’t want to overwhelm him too quickly with the majesty of the Yankees.

We watched the late innings of a Yankee Spring Training game today and most of the starters had already left the game, but we did catch Giambi’s last at-bat. He is looking lean and mean, and his first inning home run is a great sign that he might return to his glory days. Though, hopefully this time he can do it without chemical assistance. If he can play first base, as well as hit like his old self, the Yankees will be very dangerous.

Even though we missed seeing Jeter and ARod and Melky play, it was a good opportunity to introduce Didion to a couple of Yankee greats in the dugout — Gator and Yogi Berra. Tomorrow, I will tell him about Ruth, Gehrig, Mantle, Maris and Scooter. Then Reggie, Munson and Mattingly. Next, I’ll bring him up to date with tales of Bernie and Mo and Jeter. Then he can fully appreciate the team of today.

I feel the need to follow up on a couple of recent posts. The fabulousness coming out of our kitchen lately is only hinted at in Didion’s post regarding the steak dinner and Leslie’s Indian food post. Leslie has really risen to new heights of culinary power, and this is without relying on some of her staples — bacon, bacon grease, heavy cream, bacon, sticks of butter. Did i mention bacon? Something delicious every night. Impressive.