Pages

Friday, October 04, 2019

Dear SI: Cancel My Subscription

The last straw. I am cancelling my Sports Illustrated subscription. Had it for almost 40 years. The Braves win two straight NL east division championships and for over two years SI hardly mentions them. SI’s own NL East picks were wrong both years. Then the very day of the Braves first playoff game the SI baseball postseason preview issue is delivered. Big article on the Astros. Then finally an article about Braves Country – about the move from downtown, contrasting the whites leaving the city for the suburbs versus Atlanta United setting attendance records downtown – in the stadium the City of Atlanta helped build, while ignoring repeated proposals from the Braves organization. THE STORY IS FIVE YEARS OLD! 
 
Some of the actual details of why the Braves moved were buried halfway into five page article. Many facts were glossed over. Cobb County is as diverse as Fulton and Dekalb. Hillary won a majority of Cobb voters in 2016. An Inman Park college professor was quoted saying “The Braves are dead to me.” As for me: Sports Illustrated is dead to me.
 
Little did I know that yesterday afternoon while I read the article, in NYC many SI employees were called into meetings. A large percentage of employees were laid off, including Paul Lukas of Uni Watch fame. Hate it when that happens to real people. The print magazine and newspaper industry has been in decline for over twenty years. A couple of years ago SI went from publishing weekly to twice a month. Many middle Americans will also blame SI’s decline on their increasingly liberal content. A person or organization can espouse whatever viewpoint they wish, but if the majority disagrees, it might not work as a business model.
 
No wonder the TBS announcer kept referring to SunTrust Park being in Cobb County. The broadcast was so full of erroneous content that I turned on the Braves radio announcers – a first for me. My Monday morning second guess nitpicking: Not the best of games. Pulled Keuchel too early, though it was over 100 degrees on the field. Acuna needs to run out the balls he hits. Keuchel’s bunt may have been a missed sign. Didn’t matter. Still got the two run homer. Snitker should’ve known that reliever was going to hurt himself warming up. And that the Cardinals and Goldschmidt, among the best in baseball, might rock them Braves relievers. Those two big Cardinal doubles just inside the baselines were killers. It truly is a game of inches.
 
Many many things could’ve gone the other way for the Braves. Acuna shouldn’t have tried to steal off Molina in the first. Had he not been thrown out Acuna would have later scored ahead of Albies, and Freddies homer in the 9th would’ve tied the game.
 
Will and Joel attended the game. Also Charles and Deborah Light (not together). Joel was back tonight.  I will work past five, then go for a haircut.           
Chipper threw out the first pitch, then later caught a foul ball. 

I have a Braves baseball on my desk. During the 2018 season when they slumped I would change the direction the ball faced in an effort to change the Braves luck. Finally the Braves got on a roll and won the division. Ever since then I’d left the ball facing the same way.
Lately I’d been thinking it was time to move the ball. Last night I thought about it more. Today when I was on the phone, outside salesman Jonathan came up to talk to me. While he was waiting he picked up the ball and started tossing it up and down. My coworkers were astonished – they knew better than to touch the ball themselves. We’ll see if the ball’s new direction will help out this weekend. 
 
Crazy busy at work. Trying to get adjusted to busy after a relatively not busy July and August. Going to be a busy October and November.

Tuesday: was going to get my hair cut then decided to wait a few days. Went home. Fixed chicken quesadillas. Fresh Off the Boat. Finally got going with my CPAP machine. Used it for the first two hours. It seemed to adjust itself, but the settings didn’t seem perfect. Will play with it more tonight. I didn’t wake up when Ceil came to bed, and seemed to sleep sounder. Ceil said I didn’t snore.
 
Wednesday night Ceil and I went to Pappasitos. I had Mellow Mushroom for lunch, and slammed down another piece of pizza at 5:15. Worked past six. Picked up Ceil and made the drive. Didn’t get our chicken fajitas until 8 pm but still I didn’t eat much. When we got home we watched New Amsterdam and Schooled.
 
Brought the leftovers today but I hear there will be sandwiches from Jason’s Deli. Tomorrow’s lunch meeting comes from Atlanta Bread Company. I ordered a Cuban sandwich.
 
Slept with the CPAP machine for 2-1/2 hours Wednesday night. According to my sleep app that’s when I did my best sleep. Gotta go the whole night but taking off the mask to go to the bathroom is a big production.  Man I wish my mask was attached by magnets. Thursday night my mask felt super tight so I loosened it. Big news: left it on the entire night. 11 pm to 6:30 am. Didn’t wake up early but did get up to go to the bathroom once (twice?). According to my sleep app it was the best night of sleep I’ve had since using the app back in July or August. I’ve slept long but never as much quality sleep 5 hours 15 minutes and deep slip 3 hours 3 minutes. Never had near that much of either. Now that I’m getting my sleep in order, I guess I’d better get back to exercising again.
 
Left work at noon yesterday for a 1 pm meeting. Went well but tough. Took off the rest of the afternoon. Watched almost all of the Braves game. I’m not crazy about playoff baseball. Afterwards we watched this week’s episodes of Chicago Med and Schooled. Anna made it home from a long day at work.
 
Mailed off another pair of Nikes that I’d sold. Also sold another pair of shoes, as well as one bobblehead for a whopping $130.00.
 
Cuban sandwich for my lunch meeting. Super busy again today.

No comments:

Post a Comment