Tag: Arizona

Spring Training, Arizona

After being mostly housebound and sick for about 5 weeks, suffering in the coldest and wettest Bay Area winter in a long time, I have made it to Scottsdale, Arizona. I am staying with two wonderful friends that I met in Paris! The sun is out and the temperature is pure heaven: 70o Saturday, 71o yesterday, and 72o today. I cannot remember when I last saw those numbers on the weather app of my phone.

I flew Southwest Airlines from Oakland Airport Saturday morning. Somehow I’ve lost my TSA pre-flight status and had to stand in line for 45 minutes to get through security. When you are in a line for that long a time, you eventually start talking to people around you. No one could figure out why the long line on a Saturday morning. It seemed to me to be too early for Spring Break but who knows. People who fly SWA more than I do said it was unusual. People behind me were going to miss their flight and I urged them to walk ahead as if they knew what they were doing and get to their gate. They felt a bit bad. I asked ‘Would you let someone in your position through?’ They said ‘yes, of course.’ So off they went. At that point, I thought I had plenty of time. As it turned out I didn’t, and I also had to cut in front of some people to make it to the gate. Ah, the joys of flying.

I was with two baseball buddies that I have known from pre-Paris years when I was a season ticket holder for the Oakland Athletics. In those days, my ‘baseball family’, made up of people who sat in similar sections at the Ballpark, would go down to Phoenix for 4 days, a week, sometimes 2 weeks. We’d see baseball in the sunshine, meet many of the players, hike in the hills around Phoenix and Scottsdale, and have a glorious time. In 2015, the Oakland A’s moved from their Phoenix home at Papago Park to Hohokam park in Mesa. The Chicago Cubs had played there for years and been the most sold-out ballpark during Spring Training. They built themselves a beautiful new ballpark up the road still in Mesa.

Sara and Jeanni

My friends and I landed in Phoenix, picked up their rental car, and drove to Hohokam. My first Spring Training game in nine years. In those days, I would have brought many baseballs and baseball paraphenalia that I hoped to have autographed by the players. As I sat down in my seat, I looked over at the autograph seekers and couldn’t remember why the urgency to get the autographs. From my spot in section 107, it seemed too much energy to get up and fight my way to the front of a small crowd of people that included children, to get an autograph. Maybe I’d grown up a bit and was going to leave that stuff to the children. It was fun I must admit.

Stretching out at Spring Training

That game was my chance to watch the new rules that MLB has regulated for the majors so that the game will go faster, more runs will be scored, and the hope that it will bring fans back to Baseball. I’m not sure why it hasn’t occured to them to lower prices and that might bring fans back. My Spring Training ticket cost $35. For a family of four to go to a regular season game, it would cost $200 or more for good seats and that is without buying any food. Baseball used to be America’s pasttime. According to The SportingNews Blog:  The Most popular Sports in the United States 

  • American Football – 74.5% American football takes the crown when it comes to popularity, and this is the most-watched sport in the US. …
  • Basketball- 56.6% …
  • Baseball- 50.5% …
  • Boxing- 23.4% …
  • Ice Hockey- 22.1% …
  • Soccer- 21.6% …
  • Golf- 19.7%

So back to the new rules.  The time clock. Just as in basketball, baseball now has a digital clock that players and fans can see that counts down the seconds that the pitcher holds the ball. He has 15 seconds to throw the ball if the bases are empty, 20 seconds if a player is on base. If he goes over that number, the batter is given a ball. If the batter takes longer than 15 seconds to get himself ready, he gets a strike. The game did seem to go faster. The first three innings were over in thirty minutes. Then it slowed down.

No more shift. At all times, two players have to be on either side of second base. This is so the batting team has a chance for more runs.

Bases are bigger. From 15’“ across, they are now 18” and they are lower to the ground.

Pick offs. If a pitcher doesn’t pick off the player on first base (or any base) on his third try, the player is awarded an extra base. Pitchers used to attempt pick offs to stall the game for whatever reason. No more.

These games were clearly spring training for the umpires as well as the ballplayers. I saw an ump go up to a brand new pitcher and check his ball for substances. I asked my seatmate why he would do that at ST game. The answer was that the umps are doing everything they will need to do at a regular season game.

new seating area in the grassy area behind the outfield at Hohokam.

The game tied at 4-4 at the bottom of the ninth. Game over. Spring Training knows how to keep games shorter! What heaven sitting in sunshine for almost three hours. But being the first sun of the year for me, it was hard on my skin. I started itching and scratching. I had to wear a long sleeve blouse but still…..Sun and baseball!

A bientôt,

Sara

Thinking about the midterms from Paris

At 10 pm CET, Tuesday night, Voting Day in the USA, I was ready to go to bed. I’ve been sick and too tired to be anxious. I checked my e-mail from my sister who has worked her butt off for MI Elections: Her last e-mail reported: “We’re all going crazy with worry today–for Michigan and for the country.  I’m having a small election “party” but we all fear it’s going to be a wake…” This last e-mail I received was sent one hour later and read:`’Most of the people I invited aren’t coming because they are so depressed and just don’t want to face it. So it’s going to be weird.” She followed with “Not much is going to be known for MI even by tomorrow (my tomorrow). And if the D’s win anything, they’ll call it fraud, so it’s all a big mess.” 

I woke up Wednesday morning to two wins in MI, Governor Whitmer has retained her seat and a house member has also won. According to CNN, the Dems were very happy and relieved. I wanted to call my sister and wake her up but thought better of it. 

from Frank Bruni’s Op Ed piece in NYTIMES.

People have had a rainbow of reactions. I wondered about my own lack of anxiety. Perhaps it was because I’ve been sick for over a week and didn’t have the energy. Maybe I’m just too far away living here in Paris or maybe I’ve started to integrate that it’s useless to worry without enough information. I did pray- before I went to bed—I think it was a heartfelt prayer to whatever Higher Power watches over us. I prayed for kindness to the US. The papers were predicting a blood bath for the Democrats, and, naive me, just could not fathom that the God of my misunderstanding would send that kind of facism to the US. Unless it was to teach us a lesson. That particular god sent Hitler and the Holocaust. If there was a lesson there, it certainly wasn’t learned. With the arrival of Trump and all the ugliness out from under the rug, there is clearly as much antisemitism and white supremacy as ever.

I’ve been watching the Lincoln Dilemna on Apple TV+ and, it seems to my untrained historical mind, that things were worse back then. Worse to the point that eleven states ceceded from the Union and were willing to go to war for their beliefs. And though the South lost the war, they’ve never really given up or given in. Then there was Woodrow Wilson….”Wilson defended segregation on “scientific” grounds in private, and (scholars) describe him as a man who “loved to tell racist ‘darky‘ jokes about black Americans.” – Wikipedia. I’ve never seen statistics but I’d be interested to know how many Americans sided with Germany during WWII.

People say there will be another Civil War. I’ve said that I didn’t see massive change without violence—as if there wasn’t enough violence now. With the US’s hands in so many other wars, where would there be people willing to fight in a full-out war. The question people over here in Europe are asking is how could so much money be spent on these elections? 9.3 billion dollars. Can that be right? And now more millions will be thrown at Georgia between now and Dec. 6th. I had some naive hope that all the bullying and demanding e-mails for money might stop but no. I’ve received at least 100 in my Spam since the run-off was announced. 

There is great relief that there was no red wave. Biden called it a victory. My Letters from an American, Heather Cox Richardson, says Democracy won. There are still outstanding contests to be called. This morning I learned that Mark Kelly has been declared the winner of the Arizona senate seat. Forty-nine to forty-nine. So it could be that nothing has changed—the Senate divided fifty/fifty. The Times says the big change is Trump. He had 330 personally hand-picked people running. Very few won. 

Is there anyone who hasn’t seen this? 

Trump disgustingly threatened De Santos if he ran against him for President in 2024. Two men with god complexes running against each other. If it wasn’t so sad, it would be fascinating. The media view, one which I agree with, is that the Republican party is moving away from Trump—but towards what? A more eloquent white supremacist or someone else? 

There is still so much to learn from these elections, especially the two Senate seats in Nevada and Georgia. As of this writing, the two contenders in Nevada are neck and neck with a large percentage of mail-in ballots still to be counted. We won’t know Georgia’s outcome for at least a month. And now I learn that Nevada finished counting and has a Democratic Senator. A close call. Fifty/Forty-Nine.

Here in France, the midterms have been in the News. But my french friends say people are tired of us and these shenanigans (my word). Nobody understands what is happening to a great country like the USA. How could so much blatant hatred be tolerated? Of course, we have Marine Le Pen and her far-right but somehow to this American, it isn’t the same.

These are all thoughts. The next two years will be very interesting.

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A bientôt,

Sara

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