soapbox

Muppet diplomacy.

‘Nuff said!

Dammit all anyways! Here’s the crappy news, in case you’ve been spelunking or something and haven’t heard via TV/E-mail/text/smoke-signal/etc. I suppose Ortiz has always been suspect (especially to the haters), but I for one was hoping he’d be one of the good examples left when all the dust settles.

I just hope Papi proceeds along the high road from here: own up to it, explain yourself (like Pettitte did), and start earning your way back into good graces by upping the ante on his own unique brand of charitable efforts.

I’m so frustrated with all the doping mess in baseball that I’m thinking my general well-being would be better served by following a different sport. One where the money to love-of-the-game balance hasn’t tipped over to the profiteering-at-the-expense-of-sportsmanship line. I hear that pankration is making a comeback, and it would definitely appeal to the side of me that loves reading Sophocles, so that’s a bonus.

Well, summer seems to have produced a lull in the ever-exciting soapbox blogging, so I thought I would fill in the gap with a question. Does anyone know why the northeast region in good ol’ VT is called the Northeast Kingdom? The barn girls & friends had the opportunity to spend some time on beautiful Lake Willoughby and I couldn’t help but ponder over “the kingdom”. The only explanation I found was that a beloved VT senator exclaimed that area was so beautiful that it should be called the northeast kingdom. However, I feel like this explanation is a bit sketchy and certainly anticlimactic, so if anyone knows a better story or just wants to make up one, I’d be all ears.

Lake Willoughby: You should all spend time here if you can.

I’m going to steal Michael’s thunder a couple of days early (sorry, buddy!) and remind everybody to take some time out from good times and good company over this holiday weekend to reflect a little on the reason for Memorial Day. Regardless of our individual political dispositions or perspectives on armed conflict, acknowledging the sacrifices borne by our military and their families should be an essential part of our privileged duties as a citizens.

To facilitate things, allow me to direct you to some appropriate reading. Many of y’all are already familiar with McRae’s “In Flanders Fields” and the subsequent association of poppies with the day. I can still recite most of this one from memory, due to a 6th grade english class assignment.

In the end, I always find myself returning to Binyon’s “For the Fallen”, as it strikes the perfect tone. Particularly, the verses known as the “Ode of Remembrance”, which I will leave you with here:

They went with songs to the battle, they were young.
Straight of limb, true of eyes, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
They fell with their faces to the foe.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.

Does anybody in this small Dartmouth blogosphere know who the victim of the Illegal Aliens on top of Kitt Peak story is? I’m dying to hear the Dartmouth side of the story. I just heard the Ohio State side of the story, but apparently the person at the 2.4m was a male grad student from Dartmouth when stuff went down. Does anybody even know what I’m talking about?

I just wanted to be the first to send big props to Andrea for successfully defending her PhD dissertation this morning. You did a great job girl, way to go!

Via Deadspin – Apparently something funny is going on at the WWL.  Follow the instructions here.