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With Clipper Magazine Stadium just a 5-minute walk from my apartment, and the extremely low cost of field-level box seats, I’ve been going to a lot of Lancaster Barnstormers baseball games. I’m especially fond of the Tuesday night games.

Tuesday night is free t-shirt night for the first 1000 fans. I think they only have about 1000 fans, so, basically, everyone gets a free t-shirt. Tuesday night is also Dollar Dog Night. Hot dogs for a buck all night long. So, I don’t cook on Tuesday nights anymore. Plus, they have $2 draft beers between 6:30 and 7:30. You can only buy two at a time, but the seats all have cup holders, and since there are plenty of empty seats, there are also plenty of empty cup holders.

Debbie and I had a plan. We would each get 2 beers at 6:30, 2 more at 7:00, and 2 more right before 7:30. That would be 6 beers apiece. That should get us through a 9-inning ballgame. The other 9 seats in our row were empty, so we had enough cup holders for 11 beers. Plenty.

The four beers we got at 6:30 were gone well before 7:00, so we headed for the beer stand. “They’re only allowed to sell 2 beers at a time,” I said, “so let’s both go up and get 2 more beers.” I gave her money for the beers and she got on line behind me.

I was served my two beers and I started to walk away, when I heard from behind me, “One.”

“One???” Was that the umpire I heard, or did my beer-guzzling partner already forget the plan.

“Are you sure you don’t want two,” I turned to say to her as I walked to my seat.

When she got back to the seat, she only had one half-empty beer in her hand, but in the other hand she had a handful of hot dogs, so, no harm no foul. I was willing to make a few extra beer runs for the team as long as she was making sure that we were well fed. So before 7:30 I made another hot dog run and 2 more beer runs. We were in very good shape, beer-wise, but I had missed most of the first two innings. It was the top of the third. The other team was up, and the kid behind me is suddenly screaming something at the top of his lungs. I can’t make out what he’s saying. A woman in the row in front of me turns to give the boy a “do you have to be so loud” look, but he keeps on chanting. The batter grounded out, and the stadium got quiet again.

Two-three innings later the kid is shouting again. I still can’t figure out what he’s saying. I asked the man in front of me if he knew what was going on. Maybe the kid is related to the batter. The man in front of me explained that the kid was chanting “Slushie.” The opposing batter at the plate was the “Designated Slushie.” If he struck out, the section that was cheering the loudest would get free Slushies.

I had consumed quite a few of the beers by this time, but I still had quite a few sitting in cup holders further down the row. I figured they were starting to get warm, and I might be able to McGiver some way to use the free Slushies to keep the beers cold. So, now, me and the kid behind me are both yelling “Slushie” at the top of our lungs. Several more kids joined in. Debbie joined in, and the woman in front of me quickly moved to a quieter section. If you can’t take the Slushie, get out of the kitchen. We were loud and proud.

The batter struck out, but nobody came around with Slushies for us. So, the next time the Designated Slushie came up we doubled our volume. He got a single that he stretched into a double. I think we awoke the sleeping giant inside the .217 hitter.

I think that we awoke security, too. Never before had they heard such cheering to win a simple Slushie. They brought out t-shirts, nurf balls, and rubber balls with the “Stormers” logo, and just started firing them at us to keep us quiet. I leapt for a t-shirt, but since you can’t slide a dime between my shoes and the ground when I jump my highest, I only tipped it and it bounced to a guy behind me. He immediately smiled and tossed it to me. I caught a rubber ball and in the same spirit of generosity tossed it to a young fan. A nurf ball bounced out of my hands into the seat in front of me. I grabbed it and tossed it to another little kid, who also dropped it, but his sister got the rebound and gave it to him. Our section was really having a good time and we still had beer left.

The Stormers went into the bottom of the ninth trailing by a run. They didn’t manage to score. So, they lost the game, but they did get enough men on base to give Debbie and me time to finish the rest of the beers. You’ve got to love them for that.

It took us about 45 minutes to make the 5 minute walk back to my place. Maybe instead of a Slushie they should offer a designated driver to the fans who are cheering the loudest.

Go Stormers.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

 

 

I was doing some luxury shopping at the Dollar Store opposite the Barber School, and I figured I might as well get a haircut while I was in the vicinity. I didn’t really think I needed one, but Easter is this Sunday, and I’m going out with Debbie and her mother for Easter Dinner. I never met her mother before, so I figured that a fresh haircut might help make a good first impression.

There’s never a line at the Barber School. At $3 a haircut, they do draw a lot of customers, but they’ve got a couple dozen guys waiting around just to practice on somebody. So, there’s never a line, but I always have to wait a little bit, while a half dozen future black barbers figure out who needs the most practice on Caucasian hair.

For $3 you get the hair cut out of wherever it appears north of your neck, your head, your ears, your eyebrows – all included. Like I said, these guys want to practice, and I usually get the guy that needs the most. That’s cool, though. When the student is finished and turns me towards the instructor, the instructor fixes whatever they botched up, and schools them. So, I get two haircuts for $3, the rough cut by the student, and the finishing cut by the instructor.

Today, I got a guy who was in his second week of training.

“How do you want it cut?”

“Just a trim.”

I think he was cutting one or two hairs at a time. He didn’t talk as he concentrated on his work, but after 45 minutes, he relaxed a bit and talked to me. His arms were tired from holding them up in the air with the comb and scissors so long. I asked him if his feet hurt. I would think your feet would get tired of holding up your body, before your arms got tired of holding up a scissors. He said his feet didn’t bother him a bit. I was surprised.

I told him that I had been getting my haircut at the Barber’s School since January. I told him that I was new in town. He told me that he was too.

I asked him where he was from.

“Prison,” he said, and I was surprised again. Not that he just got out of prison, but because he was so open about it. We talked about it a bit and he continued to snip away. He was determined to turn his life around. Now, he wanted to be a barber, instead of being a hoodlum. I hoped he would make it. Especially since he now had access to both a straight razor and my neck.

“You gonna be done by 6?” the instructor asked him.

“Sure, Mr. G.”

Six o’clock came and went and he was still snipping away. Finally, around 6:10 he put down the scissors, picked up the clippers and asked me if I wanted it round or square in the back. Ten minutes later he was done. He called Mr. G. over to inspect his work.

There wasn’t much hair left for Mr. G to work with, but he evened out the rough spots, and pointed out ways that the young barber could improve.

The young man paid close attention, and I hoped that he would graduate from Barber School and someday have his own barbershop.

When the hand mirror came out I didn’t quite recognize myself. Only in Boot Camp was my hair ever shorter. Oh well, it’s only hair.  I figure I’m still just a six-pack shy of handsome, and maybe my hair will grow in a little bit by Easter.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

It seems like ever since I moved here it’s been one long party, and the sky just keeps throwing more confetti.  At least that’s my “glass half full” view of things.  Most people look forward to the first snowfall of the year, but very few are still awed by nature’s wonder, after they’ve seen the show a few times.  This winter most of us saw the snow show way too many times.  Finally, it’s starting to warm up, and it looks like Old Man Winter might be going to bed.  I’m glad I made it through my first winter in Pennsylvania.

Remember that Dickens story?  “It was the best of times.  It was the worst of times.”

I guess that sometimes it’s all in the way you look at things.  I found this video made by somebody else who moved to Pennsylvania this year, who found the glass not half empty, but constantly filling with snow.  I think you’ll find it amusing.  I dedicate it to all those who shoveled too much snow this year.

 

https://www.youtube.com/embed/5jswAsFtpDo

 

Peace and Love, and all of the above,

Earl

 

The Play is the Thing.

“Why don’t you write a play?” Marianne asked me.

“I like writing screenplays,” I said.

“Take one and turn it into a play.”

“Why?”

“To get a chance to see it performed.”

That was my “Ah-ha Moment.”   If I simply rewrite one of my screenplays as a stage show, I might actually get a chance to see it performed live.  I have three screenplays on the shelf, which may never be lucky enough to be turned into celluloid, but now, one of them, at least, has a chance of making it to a stage someplace.

We were in Jake’s bar, at a post-show party with Larry Kirwan, the playwright, and several members of the cast of Hard Times, a terrific musical which we had just seen at a theatre called The Cell, around the corner on 23^rd St.  Lilly, the barmaid, had just placed another pint of Jake’s Wild Ale and a plate of sliders in front of me, so I was having a good time.

About 30 years ago I started writing my first novel, Two Ships Passing…One Failing.  It grew to 600 pages and was still far from finished, when I decided to try it as a screenplay instead.  The standard screenplay is 120 pages long, so I already had 5 times what I needed.  I figured that editing what I had down to a mere 120 pages would help show me the heart of the story.  I read Screenwriting for Dummies to gain a little insight into screenwriting, and then I sat down to write.  It worked.  It actually worked.  The first draft of the screenplay practically wrote itself.  I was done in three weeks.  Plus, now, I knew where the heart of the story was.  I knew what to leave in and what to leave out of the novel.

Only thing is, I never went back to completing the novel.  Instead, I worked on another screenplay, Bless Me, Jack.  Then I wrote another, Miles to Go Before I Sleep.  Now, I’m working on sequels for all three of them.  I love writing screenplays.  The trouble is that nothing I have ever written has gone beyond the printed page, though.  I just print them out, put them in a binder, and find a place for them on my bookshelf.  So, I have almost no chance of ever seeing any of them performed.  Now, however, through Marianne, I have a very good connection to many Manhattan Theatres, and I just might have a fairly good shot to have a play performed there.  Of course, I just moved out of New York and into Lancaster.  Isn’t that how Murphy’s Law works?

Of course, I know that playwriting is a craft that requires a lot of study.  So, I just went to Amazon and ordered “Playwriting for Dummies,” hoping that would help me to become the playwright I want to be in a few short weeks.

I also tried to immerse myself in the art form by going to another show, Devil Dog Six, at a theatre on 36^th St.   The Play was about horse racing, and I loved it.  So, I was bitten by the theatre bug.  A playwright was born.

It helped that I was a little high.  I went to the show with my friend Maria, and we started the day with brunch.  We drank our official drink from the Vegas trip, Geralinis, which are simply Bellinis with more sparkling Prosecco wine, and less peach nectar, and we had bacon that looked like the slab of ribs in a Fred Flintstone cartoon.  It was so thick, we both needed steak knives for the bacon.

Suffice it to say that we were well greased by the time we got to the show, and we got caught up in it, right from the beginning.

That’s the amazing thing about a stage production.  This was off off off off, way off Broadway.  It was on the third floor of an office building on 36^th Street.  There were no sets.  Actors played the horses, and the same actors played people.  There were no car chases and nothing blew up.  To enjoy the play, you had to use your imagination, and I had another “Ah Ha moment.”  This was a two-way street between the audience and the stage.  The more we used our imagination the better the story got, and the better the story got, the more we got to use our imagination.

I think I learned the secret.  It isn’t to give the audience what they want, it’s to give the audience enough for them to get what they want by themselves.  So, give my regards to old Broadway…and tell them I should have something ready in about three weeks.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

BT & Me

This was a great weekend.  The centerpiece was Debra and Scott’s wedding.  When I got the invitation, I didn’t know Debra very well and I didn’t know Scott at all.  The bride is my cousin Patrick’s daughter, though.  So, we’re related.  That’s probably the reason why I was invited.  No matter.  It was a party, and I made the guest list, so, of course, I went.

I’m glad I did.  It was a fascinating weekend.  The hotel the wedding guests stayed at was in State College, Pennsylvania, the home of the famous and infamous Nittany Lions.  It was also the home of BT Schwier, one of my best friends from my old Navy days.  The day after the wedding, I actually wound up having brunch with him in the Nittany Lion Inn, a luxurious hotel and restaurant the college runs as part of their Hotel & Restaurant Degree Program.  It was an awesome meal, in an awesome place, with an awesome old friend.  There were four rooms of food choices, in addition to the mountain of desserts stacked in the main dining room.  There were so many good things to eat, and the conversation was so lively that I didn’t even notice that there weren’t any mimosas until I was on the bus back home.

Brother X and his wife were at the wedding.  I was glad of that.  Now that my dancing days are getting behind me, it was good to know that I would be sitting at the table with people I knew.  Plus, since it was a wedding, not a Family Thanksgiving Dinner, the conversation would be on the funny side, too.  There are a lot of fun things to talk about at weddings.  Usually, it’s every other guest.

My fun weekend actually started on Thursday, though.  Way back during the football playoffs, my friend Dwayne and I went to the Alley Kat for some pizza and beer to go.  We had a beer while we waited for our order.  We couldn’t get a seat at the bar, but we were close.  The couple sitting at the bar in front of us, had come from a holiday party, and they were having a lot of fun.  She turned to me and said, “Where are you from?”

“Well, right now, I’m from around the corner, but I used to live on Long Island.”

“I thought so.  You sound just like my friend, Debbie.  How tall are you?”

“Five-eleven and a half.”

“Take off your hat.”

I did as directed.

“You’ve got hair.  You should lose the hat.”

“But it’s cold out.”

“I’m Denise.  This is Mike.  What’s your phone number?”

I looked over at the guy, whose thighs were in her hands, and wondered what was going on.

“What’s your phone number?” she repeated.  “You’d be perfect for my friend, Debbie.  She’s in California now, but I’ll tell her about you when she gets back.”

I gave her my number, and several weeks later Debbie actually did call me.  She was interested in meeting me, but she wanted to know more about me than just that I was five eleven and a half and had hair.  She wanted to know specific details, like if I was out on bail.  That kind of stuff.

During the course of the Q & A phone call, she asked me about my religion.  I told her I was an Agnostic, and she volunteered that she was a Mennonite.”  I thought that my Agnosticism would be a deal-breaker, but I must have given enough correct answers to the other questions, and so, last Thursday we went out for an early dinner.

During the evening, she commented that she didn’t wear the little bonnets that most Mennonite women wore.

“Mennonite?” I said in mock surprise.  “I thought you said you were looking for a “man-a-night.”  That’s why I said to pencil me in for Thursday.”

She actually laughed.  That’s my kind of Mennonite.

Anyway, back to the wedding.  I was talking to Brother X, and I told him about the telephone “interview” before my blind date with Debbie.

“It’s strange when someone asks you to describe yourself in one word,” I said.  “What one word would you use to describe me?”

“Douchebag.”

“I think that’s two words.”

“See what I mean.  You’re a douchebag.”

“Well, I don’t think that would have been a good answer.  I went with, ‘Fun-loving’.”

“Douchebag would have been more accurate,” he said.  “I can even smell the vinegar on your breath.”

“I think that’s just the house dressing from the salad.”

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

After this past weekend’s football games, the contenders for this year’s Super Bowl are now narrowed down to 4 teams – The San Francisco Forty-niners, The Seattle Seahawks, The Denver Broncos, and some other team.  I forgot who the last team is.  Honestly.  I guess that shows how little interest I have in this year’s Super Bowl.

 

I don’t think many people really care about the Super Bowl.  When our favorite team isn’t in the game, we really don’t care who wins.  We only care about the score of the game, and how close we are to winning the football pool, you know, that big grid with 100 boxes and 10 numbers across the top and 10 numbers down the side.  We only care that the box with our name in it is the winner.

 

Well, that’s not exactly true.  We also care about the Super Bowl Party.  That’s one of the biggest and best parties of the year.

 

As far as the betting is concerned, even though you may only have 1 chance in a 100 of winning the Super Bowl pool, there are two things that are sure bets every year at Super Bowl time.  There will always be the same two stories on the TV news.  One will be about a bookie that got busted taking Super Bowl bets.  The other story you can bet on is that there will be a nationwide shortage of chicken wings.  The rest of the year the breast meat may be the most popular part of the chicken, but on Super Bowl Sunday everyone wants wings.

 

There is one other anomaly on Super Bowl Sunday.  Everyone pays attention to the television commercials.  All year we try to fast forward past the commercials.  On Super Bowl Sunday we pay very close attention to the commercials. How weird is that?

 

Super Bowl Buzz – The two states that legalized recreational pot this year, Colorado and Washington, both have teams in the final four for the Super Bowl.  Since they don’t play against each other in the League Championship games, it is quite possible that they will be the two teams in the Super Bowl.  If that happens, I think this could bring Super Bowl parties to a new all-time high, literally, and chicken wings won’t be the only thing in short supply.

 

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl