The Least About Baseball Ever

OK, so the Jays had no business winning that game, because they got a ridiculous gift from Broussard in the bottom of the 8th. Any hope they had of winning was pretty much gravy, and while it's definitely frustrating that they couldn't put it together, such is life. There is absolutely no need to shit on Burnett or Gibbons or anyone else over this (though the only reasonable examples I can think of are Burnett and Gibbons).

But let's not stray too far from the important things here. What is this, a baseball blog? Let's give the people what they really want...

Late Beginnings
OK, so I was pretty late leaving the office tonight, but I still went down to the park, even knowing that I had to leave early (again). But a funny thing happened on the way to the ballpark. And by a "funny" thing, I mean a fucking crazy thing.

One of Toronto's most recognizable homeless people is Kevin Clarke, who has an extensive Wikipedia page chronicling his exploits and frequently runs for mayor. So I get onto the subway at Yonge today, heading late to the game, and there he is, shouting about how he's going to be the next mayor of Toronto, how David Miller was too scared to debate him, and how school closings-- which the front page story in today's Toronto Star says are being considered-- are not a solution to the city's education problems.

Fair enough. And maybe this strangely robed dude was being a little loud, but... he was hardly the craziest subway person I've seen. In fact, he seemed really harmless and caring and well meaning. Just... crazy.

But then, like so many politicians before him, he got a little too focused on a young girl. She had come on with her father, and he started incorporating them into his ramblings. First it was generally positive, as he spun the school closing story onto the girl, saying that this child was "our master" and is the one we should be, as a society, looking out for. But things got weirder...

At this point Kevin was sitting directly behind me-- we were back-to-back-- so I couldn't really have looked at him much if I wanted to. Honestly, I was about twelve pages away from the end of The Sound And The Fury and just wanted to fucking finish it, but things started to get a little more interesting.

Turns out the girl and her father were eating pizza, and at one point I hear Kevin say, relatively quietly, "Don't fart in the streetcar! I'm trying to eat my pizza and I don't want to smell no farts."

Um... OK. Except he wasn't eating pizza. He continued on, louder this time, "All I want to do at the end of the day is take a good shit. That's why I'm eating pizza."

Awesome! No? To be completely honest, I figured that was pretty harmless and hilarious, as far as subway crazies go. But the next thing I know I'm getting tapped on the shoulder, and I look up and a cop is telling me I'd better switch seats, and I see that everybody else has moved but me and him, and that two more cops are approaching him, about to throw him off the train for causing a disturbance.

Well... if he hadn't been causing a disturbance before, he sure as fuck started to now. And with good reason... kind of. I know they were just doing their jobs, but frankly it was kind of bullshit how they treated him. But at least he kept his sense of humour (or bat shit crazy) during his ejection, trying to solicit votes to people on the platform while the cops were dragging him off the train. "Hi, I'm Kevin Clarke! I'm your next mayor. Call me at the office, my number is...".

At the Ballpark
Some random observations from the 20 or so minutes I actually spent at Rogers Centre:

- Until tonight I hadn't seen the problem with having Jays games broadcast on AM 610 on nights when there is a conflict with the Raptors. Now... not so sure. That's because there was a ridiculous fucking delay on the radio compared to the game action. Granted, this was my first solo game this year (all 20 minutes of it) with my Wilner radio, so maybe it's been like that all along regardless of station, but that's total bullshit. And it certainly wasn't like that last year-- or any other year-- when the games were on the flagship. My signal was even behind the sound coming out of the speakers that ring the stadium. Maybe there's something I just don't quite understand about the physics of radio waves, but I'm pretty sure this is just bullshit.

- I know it's completely inconsequential in a 14 inning game, but what the hell were the Jays doing letting a runner take second on defensive indifference while they were only down two in the sixth? And why the hell was it Jason Frasor who came in to preserve that slim margin? It didn't kill them, obviously, but I sure didn't understand those decisions.

- For the first time I noticed a sign in the bathroom telling fans not to give alcohol to minors. Oh shit! I was totally going to do that until I saw the sign!

- Well played, right field ramp security dude, letting those three little cutlets walk down past you from the 500s while I was on my way out between the 6th and 7th. And that's absolutely not sarcasm. I frequently get irate about shit like that, but that was some talent. No qualms.

Somewhere Between the Ballpark and Almost Getting Killed
So... I was supposed to play some music again tonight, and again somebody bailed, so we did fuck all. For a little while. Then we decided to go up to a friend's place in Northern Ontario (slightly past St. Clair) and get shitfaced. Which we did brilliantly.

Yes, yes, the game happened, and the Jays had some great efforts and some shit efforts, and should have won about four times, and should have lost about four times, and then eventually threw in Burnett and it all came apart. But I just can't hang this one on Burnett. It was a coin flip.

We watched that. But mostly drank.

Do Not Try This At Home
Anyway, it was our host's birthday and we-- like I say-- got shitfaced. He specifically wanted me to mention him in the blog, but after the story I'm about to tell, I figure being slightly vague about who I'm actually referring to is probably best. He also wanted to mention that he called Parkes four times and can't get an answer from him, and that he's sick of all of Parkes's books and clothes still being at his house. But for now that's neither here nor there...

After the game we went to Wise Guys, which is a shithole of a bar (where Eddie van Halen hangs out!... or, at least a guy who totally looks like him. Who's to say?) on St. Clair, but as far as shitholes go, it's pretty awesome. It could totally be another Bagel if it weren't twenty miles beyond where any reasonable city-dweller would venture most nights.

Things were cool at the bar. More beers. More whatever. Who the fuck knows?

Anyway... the last of us are leaving, and hopping in a cab back to civilization. Our shitfaced host-- who's place is only a five minute walk away-- jumps in with us at the last second and tells the cabbie (the earnest Muslim cabbie) that he just wants a lift to the corner by his place. There are a couple of miscommunications along the way, and we end up going in sort of the opposite direction of where we intended to go, but this guy gave us booze, it's his birthday, we figure we'll just let him do whatever-- including saying some strange kind of shit to the cabbie that I don't quite remember but I really wish I did.

We get to his stop and he's being a little drunk and curt and he says something like, "OK, OK, here's good let me out here. Stop here," and is a little belligerent. And being a drunk asshole, him and the cabbie have an awkward, somewhat angry, "good riddance" sort of exchange, with the cabbie ending up telling him, "You go!" He does, and the rest of us kind of breathe a sigh of relief, then prepare to move on and journey home.

Suddenly, our friend-- who had been sitting in the front seat-- opens up the passenger door again and, because he thinks it's funny to be a dick (FYI, usually it is... usually), pointedly says to the cabbie (again, the earnest Muslim cabbie), "I'm going to go have sex with your daughter!"

Now... I don't know if you've ever said this to an earnest Muslim cab driver before, but... um.... it's not good. It's not good.

The cabbie lets this sink in for a moment and then starts to get really fucking upset. Like... really upset. "You know what we do when you say this?" he says. "We kill you! We kill you!"

Our friend pathetically tries to backpedal. "No, no I meant Stoeten's daughter. I meant Stoeten's daughter," he says, as though the cabbie would know which one of us I am, and if he did, would actually believe that a handsome young buck like myself would tie himself down with a child. Meanwhile, the rest of us are (for the moment, at least) trying like hell not to piss ourselves laughing at what's going on.

The cabbie, however, is really, really fucking far from amused.

"No," he says. "No. No!" And then before we know it he's opened his door, locked ours (which made no sense because they were really easy to unlock), popped the trunk and started heading back to grab whatever the fuck he's got in there.

Oh shit! "Oh shit!" we're saying. Get out! Get out! Go! Go!

We don't know if he's got a fucking shotgun, a crowbar, some sort of Ali Baba sword, or what the fuck he's going for in the trunk, but he just said with absolute deadly seriousness that he'd kill a person for saying something like that, so we waste no time getting the fuck out of there... only our ignorant, loudmouth friend is too drunk to know what's happening and has hardly moved since he first left the cab.

We yelled at him to run and then watched in horror as the cabbie pulled his instrument from the trunk, then proceeded to comically start wailing on him with an ice scraper/brush thing.

Too funny! But oh man, he was pissed. "Your mother sleeps with dogs!" he says. "How you like that? Go sleep with your mother!"

"Um... OK," I tell him. "See ya." Hoping he will drive off.

We start to walk away, but by now the cabbie has noticed our friend has crossed the road and started going up his own street, so the guy throws his car into gear and peals off, looked almost exactly like he's going to run our friend down in a blind rage. We all sprinted towards the scene, and fortunately our friend was sober enough-- at least momentarily-- to dart down an alley and not be fucking killed.

We got another few "Go lie down with the dogs and your mother!" thrown our way, and then he was gone... like an fucking insane, wronged cab driver in the night.

Happy birthday dude. There. I mentioned you. Do you remember any of it?