Entry 303: Hurricane Joaquin (Andujar)

The good news is Hurricane Joaquin is almost certainly not going to hit Washington D.C. -- or anyway else is the mainland United States.  The bad news is that its residual storms are here right now.  It has been raining since Thursday morning with nothing but rain through the weekend.  I feel like I've been living on Venus for the past few days.  (That's a reference to Ray Bradbury's excellent short story "All Summer In a Day", but of course, you already knew that.)  I've been trying to come up with a good pun to described how wet it is here, and I've come up with three candidates.

1. It's not raining cats and dogs; it's raining cattle and dogies.  (Eh ... kinda weak.)
2. I guess that's why they call it WASHington.  (Not much better.)
3. We haven't had a reign this bad, for this long, since George Bush was in the White House!  (Get it -- reign/rain?  It works better verbally when there is no difference between the two, but it's not terrible written.) 

I like the name Joaquin for a hurricane, because it reminds me of Joaquin Andujar, a pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals in the '80s, who frequently resembled a hurricane on the mound because he had such a bad temper.  One of my earliest baseball memories is of him going ballistic in Game 7 of the 1985 World Series and having to be physically restrained by his teammates to keep from throttling umpire Don Denkinger.  Andjuar was a hothead and undoubtedly upset that his team was about to lose the World Series (they lost Game 7 11-0), so some of it was just his own shit.  But also the entire Cardinals team was anti-Denkinger for a notoriously awful (and crucial) call he made the game before.  In fact, it is not out of the question that Cardinals manager Whitey Herzog put the temperamental Andujar in the game (already a blowout) for the express purpose of needling Denkinger.

But enough about rain and baseball...

In other news, my kids are a pain in my neck.  Literally.  I woke up this morning with some sort of funky neck strain.  It's quite uncomfortable -- to the point "painful" might be a more apt adjective -- and I think it can be attributed to my kids.  Lil' S1 jumps on my back and climbs on me every chance he gets, and Lil' S2 is so fussy these days that the only way I can get him to calm down is to hold him and walk around, which after like 20 twenty minutes, starts to put a strain on my body.  Last night was the worse.  I had him from 8 p.m. to 1 a.m., and I think he slept a total of a half hour during that time.  He kept doing that thing babies do where they fall asleep in your arms, and then the second you set them down they snap awake and start crying inconsolably.  So then you are left in the no-win situation of either letting them cry it out, which is incredibly stressful (what's worse than a wailing baby?), or picking them back up and starting the cycle anew.  And it would be one thing if they just let you hold them and sit on the couch, but Lil' S2 does not go for that.  He wants you carrying him and walking around while you do it.  Somehow the position that is most comfortable for you is inversely proportional to the position that is most comfortable for him.

Well, if there is any consolation, it is that I get to listen to a lot of podcasts.  The podcast is, in my opinion, the greatest innovation of the "smartphone era."  I listen to several hours of podcasts everyday.  I don't know how I did mundane activities before them.  Seriously, how did I get any chores done pre-2010?  Was I just bored all the time?  The newest one I started listening to is called You Must Remember This.  The podcast is about early Hollywood, a subject I don't know if I would be generally interested in, but there is a 12-episode series on Charlie Manson that is just riveting.  It's the most intriguing podcast I've heard since Serial, and it might even be better than Serial, because it's more of an "experience."  Sarah Koenig narrates the events of Serial in a very Ira-Glass-esque, half-reporter, half-understated-storyteller type of way, which makes sense (she used to be a reporter and Ira Glass is her boss), and it works for her, but that style is honestly a bit played out.  I think because This American Life is so successful, too many budding podcasters have copied its format and style, so now, through no fault of its own, it's kinda tired.  (Though I still very much enjoy it.)  It's like when a really good song gets played on the radio too much, you get sick of it, even though it is still a really good song.  (Hey ya ... Hey ya ... Shake it ... shake it ... shake it like a Polaroid picture ...)

You Must Remember This, on the other hand, is much more -- I don't know what the right adjective is -- edgy?  gritty?  spooky?   Whatever it is, I love listening to it.  Karina Longworth, the narrator and creator, does a fantastic job with it.  It helps, of course, that the Manson story is so fucked up and intriguing on its own, it doesn't really matter who is telling it, but Longworth's vibe and storytelling definitely add to the experience.  One thing I didn't know about the Manson story is how involved Candice Bergen was in the whole thing -- indirectly, through her ex-boyfriend Terry Melcher -- but still...  It's weird to hear all this stuff about Bergen, as I don't have any recollection of her pre-1988, so the whole time I'm listening to it all and thinking: "Murphy Brown?"

OK, baby is awake.  Gotta go.

Until next time ...