Shuffle #86 (June 4, 2016)

And When I Die – Blood, Sweat & Tears

Believe In Humanity – Carole King

Amsterdam – Guster

Pretty Fly (For A White Guy) – The Offspring

The Rebel Jesus – Jackson Browne

Don’t You Wish It Was True – John Fogerty

Cars And Girls – Prefab Sprout

Sweet & Sour – Firefall

Good Intentions – Lyle Lovett

May 29, 2016 – Nationals 10, Cardinals 2 – Nationals Park

http://m.nationals.mlb.com/news/article/180926614/strasburg-moves-to-9-0-as-nats-rout-cards

 

Attendance: 38,898

Game Time: 3:12

Weather: 84 degrees, cloudy

Wind: 6 mph

Umpires: Home Plate - Jeff Kellogg, First Base - John Tumpane, Second Base - Alan Porter, Third Base - Mark Carlson

Seventh-inning stretch song: The Sweet Escape – Gwen Stefani

 

Highlights – Strasburg went to 9-0 with 6 innings of one-run ball … after Brandon Moss briefly gave the Cards the lead with a homer in the top of the 4^th, the Nats struck back with 3 in the bottom half, keyed by a two-out, two-run single by Wilson Ramos … the Cards made things closer in the top of the 7^th by eking out a run (could have been much worse), only to see the Nats put things away with a 5-spot after the stretch (leadoff homer by Rendon, followed 5 batters later by a Jayson Werth pinch grand slam) … Ramos capped his perfect day with a two-run shot the next inning

 

Other – not the hottest day at the park ever, but the humidity was through the roof, making it feel like sitting in a sauna for most of the game … a little rain finally showed up near the end of the game, so we decided to leave our (uncovered) seats and watch the final 3 outs from the concourse … took about an hour to get there despite leaving at 10:30, as traffic taking the ramp to Arlington Memorial Cemetery slowed traffic on the GW Parkway … return trip started inauspiciously when “Highway To Hell” was the first song that came up on the radio, but after the first few blocks things were pretty smooth (55 minutes total), although the backup on the Parkway to get onto the Legion Bridge was much longer than usual … made first visits to both The Bullpen (across from the Metro station) and the Budweiser Brew House (formerly the Red Porch Restaurant)

Shuffle #85 (May 28, 2016)

Night Fever – The Bee Gees

Happy Boy – The Beat Farmers

Baltimore – Randy Newman

Love Her Madly – The Doors

Pain Lies On The Riverside – Live

Wall Of Death – Richard & Linda Thompson

Let Her Dance – The Bobby Fuller Four

Fly Like An Eagle – Steve Miller Band

Susan – The Buckinghams

How Can I Be Sure – The Rascals

May 23, 2016 – Mets 7, Nationals 1 – Nationals Park

http://m.nationals.mlb.com/news/article/179840442/mets-hit-three-home-runs-to-defeat-nationals

 

Attendance: 31,264

Game Time: 2:33 (start was delayed 1 hour and 10 minutes due to rain)

Weather: 61 degrees, cloudy

Wind: 1 mph

Umpires: Home Plate - Bill Welke, First Base - Vic Carapazza, Second Base - D.J. Reyburn, Third Base - John Hirschbeck

 

Section 409, Row F, Seats 3-4 – upper level, looking down the right field line (sort of the mirror image of our old section 416, but just to the third base side of the press box)

 

Highlights – smooth trip down on Metro … arrived in plenty of time to snag the “Max Scherzer No-Hitter Bobblehead (piece #1 of 2)” … weather wasn’t bad once the game started, with none of the predicted thunderstorms … Nats jumped out to a quick lead on first-inning singles by Werth, Murphy, and Zimmerman

 

Other – tarp was on when we arrived, with rain starting shortly thereafter (our seats were under the overhang, but wind managed to blow the rain in anyway) … Mets struck for 5 in the third, on a 3-run David Wright homer followed by 3 straight singles and a sac fly … added 2 more in the fifth on back-to-back homers by Cespedes and Walker … headed out in the top of the 7^th to have plenty of time for Metro trip back … missed Red Line train by about 30 seconds, so had to wait 22 minutes for the next one … almost didn’t get out of the Shady Grove parking lot since the machine didn’t want to react to either of our Smart Trip cards (fortunately my Visa card worked)

Comic of the Day #1 – May 19, 2016

Dilbert – Wally The Thought Leader

http://dilbert.com/strip/2016-05-19

Serendipity #60

Out Of My League – Fitz & The Tantrums

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4mbxaa3XL8

 

Heard 5/20/2016 around 12:20, at Wegman’s (Germantown)

Shuffle #84 (May 20, 2016)

You’re The Best Thing – The Style Council

American Music – The Blasters

Believe In Humanity – Carole King

Island Girl – Elton John

People Are Strange – The Doors

No Particular Place To Go – Chuck Berry

Wendy – The Beach Boys

Train In Vain – The Clash

Canadian Idiot – “Weird Al” Yankovic

Against The Wind – Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band

I’ve Been Loving You Too Long – Otis Redding

#119 Love’s In Need Of Love Today – Stevie Wonder (1976)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9k3pYwFlr_I

 

I’m really sorry this one fell through the cracks when I was putting together my original list of 100 favorite songs, as it probably would have made the top 25 at least. It was a great song when it came out, and I did hear it a few times, but it wasn’t on the 4-disk Stevie Wonder box set I picked up at one point, and I didn’t buy the Songs In The Key Of Life album until a month or two before I went to his concert at Verizon Center in November 2014.

 

It was still a great song in 2001, when Stevie performed it with Take 6 as the second song in the America: A Tribute To Heroes benefit concert, which aired live on all of the major broadcast and cable networks 10 days after 9/11. It ranks as one of the two high points of the show, along with Bruce Springsteen’s transcendent performance of “My City Of Ruins”, which opened the concert.

 

And given the state of the world in 2016, it remains equally great and unsettlingly relevant today. One can only hope that it becomes an important theme in the remainder of this year’s Presidential campaign.

May 15, 2016 – Marlins 5, Nationals 1 – Nationals Park

http://m.nationals.mlb.com/news/article/178279854/stanton-fernandez-marlins-beat-nationals

 

Attendance: 36,786

Game Time: 3:03

Weather: 59 degrees, partly cloudy

Wind: 21 mph

Umpires: Home Plate - Alfonso Marquez, First Base - Chris Guccione, Second Base - David Rackley, Third Base - Larry Vanover

Seventh-inning stretch song: What I Like About You – The Romantics

 

Highlights – sun was out (!) … not as cold and windy as expected (at least not in our section) … less traffic than usual going down the GW Parkway (probably because I left at 10:45) … ran into the senior member of the Schroeder clan while walking around the concourse … Nats did score a run on Ryan Zimmerman’s inside-the-park homer (Ozuna and Stanton tripped each other up trying for the catch, but fortunately both stayed in the game)

 

Other – Marlins got one more run than they needed in the third, when Stephen Drew lost a routine two-out popup in the sun … added 3 more in the sixth on a solo homer by Stanton and a bases-loaded single by Jose Fernandez (who fanned 11 in his 7 innings of work) … Nats threatened off the Miami bullpen in the 8^th and 9^th but failed to score

May 11, 2016 – Nationals 3, Tigers 2 – Nationals Park

http://m.nationals.mlb.com/news/article/177612626/max-scherzer-ties-mark-with-20-strikeouts

 

Attendance: 35,695

Game Time 2:38

Weather: 61 degrees, cloudy

Wind: 4 mph

Umpires: Home Plate - Bill Miller, First Base - Pat Hoberg, Second Base - Brian Knight, Third Base - Todd Tichenor

Seventh-inning stretch song: Let’s Dance – David Bowie

 

KK KKK KKK    K KK KK    KK KKK KK

 

With a big weeknight crowd on hand, this one was billed as a classic pitcher’s duel between former Nat Jordan Zimmermann and former Tiger Max Scherzer, who weren’t exactly traded for each other but changed teams via free agency in successive off-seasons. While Zimmermann pitched well, the night clearly belonged to Max, who tied the all-time major league record for strikeouts in a 9-inning game with 20.

 

The game was close throughout. The Nats struck first in the bottom of the first on a Rendon double followed by Harper and Murphy singles. Detroit tied it when Jose Iglesias led off the top of the third with a home run – one of only 3 of the first 12 Detroit batters who did not strike out. Murphy drove in Rendon again in the bottom of the sixth to restore the Nats’ one-run lead, by which point Scherzer had fanned 13.

 

Detroit finally got Max into some hot water in the top of the seventh, getting runners into scoring position for the first time in the game on a one-out Victor Martinez single and Justin Upton double. Scherzer responded by striking out McCann and Gose to maintain the Nats lead. After the stretch, Espinosa homered for the Nats to provide an insurance run.

 

With the crowd roaring, Max retired all 3 Detroit batters in the 8^th on called third strikes, bringing his total for the game to 18. Dusty had Papelbon warming up in the bottom of the inning, but avoided a crowd mutiny by sending Scherzer out for the ninth. Things got interesting when J.D. Martinez led off with a homer to cut the lead to one, and (following a strikeout of Miguel Cabrera) Victor Martinez singled to put the tying run on base. Max finished things off by fanning Justin Upton to tie the record, then recording the final out on a ground ball to notch the win.

 

Getting there, however, was definitely not half the fun. We left Westat shortly after 4:30 and encountered our worst traffic ever on the GW Parkway, not getting parked and to the game until shortly before the opening pitch. We thus missed out on the Bryce Harper MVP Bobblehead giveaway, but the historic ballgame (and the relatively warm and surprisingly rain-free evening) more than made up for it.