Notes from the Flatlands...

Today I had the pleasure of meeting with Lucia Sedgwick, who I went to high school.  I don't remember the last time I was with Lucia, although I have followed here posts on the website for alumna.   Lucia and I met on King Street in Old Alexandria and had some tea and bagel before walking down to the Old Torpedo Factory.

It was wonderful to reconnect with Lucia and learn about the twists and turns her life has taken.  She currently works at the Confucius Center at George Mason University.
















While Lucia and I were walking around, I heard a "Mr. Rice?" voice.  Who should I walk into, but Donovan Ennevor from Breck.  He is here in DC visiting his grandmother.  His mom, is there in the background.  Great fun!

 So this Holiday break starts with 17" of snow in Minneapolis.  Here it is snowing pretty well during the middle of the day.  This storm provided lots of quality time with the old snow blower.











Here is my loyal steed, Moonie, in front of our frozen frasier fur.  Moonie is being polite and posing for the picture, but she would much prefer we leave the house so she can sneak some more from the chocolate-covered potato chip container.














Finally, here is Erik, Shiho, and Winston celebrating Christmas in Washington.  Erik is just getting over having been sick for several days before flying out.  Shiho is examining her five-bunny wash rag (somewhat disturbing).  Winston is looking thoughtful, as per usual.

 So this Holiday break starts with 17" of snow in Minneapolis.  Here it is snowing pretty well during the middle of the day.  This storm provided lots of quality time with the old snow blower.











Here is my loyal steed, Moonie, in front of our frozen frasier fur.  Moonie is being polite and posing for the picture, but she would much prefer we leave the house so she can sneak some more from the chocolate-covered potato chip container.














Finally, here is Erik, Shiho, and Winston celebrating Christmas in Washington.  Erik is just getting over having been sick for several days before flying out.  Shiho is examining her five-bunny wash rag (somewhat disturbing).  Winston is looking thoughtful, as per usual.

 So this Holiday break starts with 17" of snow in Minneapolis.  Here it is snowing pretty well during the middle of the day.  This storm provided lots of quality time with the old snow blower.

Here is my loyal steed, Moonie, in front of our frozen frasier fur.  Moonie is being polite and posing for the picture, but she would much prefer we leave the house so she can sneak some more from the chocolate-covered potato chip container.



Finally, here is Erik, Shiho, and Winston celebrating Christmas in Washington.  Erik is just getting over having been sick for several days before flying out.  Shiho is examining her five-bunny wash rag (somewhat disturbing).  Winston is looking thoughtful, as per usual.

I picked up this read on the recommendation of a number of students.  Several gave me the report that this was a very good read, and I have to say that it did have an exciting ending.

A lot of closed schools this morning, but not us.  Richfield schools are open, but Minneapolis is not.  Fortunately, the schools around us are all open - Benilde, Blake, etc...

Kids are always grumpy when this happens.  I have to remind them that teachers don't make these kinds of decisions....

Onward through the fog....

This is a poor shot, but it gives you an idea of what happened to our Metrodome.  In normally looks more like a cupcake with white frosting, and as you can see, the 17" of snow we got on Friday night and Saturday collapsed the top of the dome.  Apparently, three of the panels tore and then the air rushed out and that is all she wrote.

I guess they use steam and hot water to clear the snow off the top.  Given it was minus six this morning, that is not a job that I would want.  Fortunately, the Dome people pulled the workers off the top in advance of the collapse so that, to the best of my knowledge, no one was hurt.

No football here today, tomorrow, or maybe even next Monday versus the Bears.

Cheers.

Unfortunately, if you are Forty-Niner fan, all the highlights from this trip took place off the field.

First, we were snowed in on Friday night and not able to get our usual 5:30 departure.

Saturday night was capped off when Randy Fondow received a well deserved "All State" award from last year's Minnesota State Track meet.  Randy had been emailing with Dave Kust, and helping our 4 x 100 team win the state finals.  Dave, who had a great trip, put together a great ceremony.

On Sunday morning we received an text and photo from the Beck girls, Rachel and Sarah.  Out of this world....I can't figure out how to embed the audio file.  But the girls ask if we would please take their dad to Lambeau because he has been sitting outside for three hours thinking he is at a football game.  Their voices and choice of language ("dumb ass") make the audio message one for the ages.  Great stuff.

Now, if the 49er's could just learn not to jump offsides....

This morning we are waking up to nineteen degrees and six inches of snow already on the ground.  We are supposed to get snow throughout the morning with increasing winds for the day.  Hence, the "B" word - if the winds were to hit 35 mph then we would officially be in a blizzard.  As it is, I think we will get over a foot of snow and have it blow around all day.

Karyl has a concert tonight in St. Paul.  Let's hope someone with some brain cells cancels the event so that she would try and drive there.

I think it is time to go shovel off the back step so that we can continue to open the back door.  It is a good day to grade papers and read books.

Cheers.

This week Elizabeth Edwards died from breast cancer.  I was wandering through the comics in the New York Times this morning and I found this cartoon by Steve Benson.  In the comment selection below the comic someone had written, "How was she any more brave than my neighbor who had cancer?"  Fortunately many other thoughtful and talented writers had responded to this irksome comment.  But after reading all the comments I am struck with how many of us have an Elizabeth Edwards in our lives.  Certainly most of the women we know were betrayed by their dumb-butt husbands on the national stage, but all too many women seem to die from breast cancer.

Elizabeth, I am sorry we didn't do better...on so many levels...

Yesterday the U.S. Senate voted down DADT, which I find incredibly depressing.  The information below makes the situation seem less dire and more like orchestrated steps in a political dance.  Here is what Andrew Sullivan had on his "Daily Dish":

After what seemed like a reckless decision by Harry Reid to put DADT repeal to a vote before reaching an agreement with Collins to allow enough time for debate, it failed. Now, Collins and Lieberman say they will bring a DADT repeal vote to the floor as a stand-alone measure, which would require House action one more time. I have no idea whether this is viable as a way to save repeal. But one does note that repeal has passed the House, is supported by the military chiefs and defense secretary, has the backing of two-thirds of the American public, and has a 57 - 40 majority in the Senate.

I don't even see how it can be legal to deny people the opportunity to participate in the military.  There must be some Congressional dictate that is a work-around from the protections of the Constitution.

So the sports page tells me that we (the Minnesota Twins) traded J.J. Hardy to Baltimore for a couple pitchers who throw hard.  Okay.  Interesting.  Here is the backstory.  Frank tells me that Aaron Gleeman ranked Hardy as one of the best defensive shortstops last year.  So we traded a top-flight shortstop who has a little bop, for a couple of flame throwers.  Our plan is to have Alexi Casilla play short stop, and to sign this phenom from Japan to play second base.  For sure, Alexi and the phenom are going to be faster than Hardy and Hudson, but Alexi is not the hitter JJ was.  I don't know what the phenom will bring with the bat, but we seem to have down graded in the middle infield.

Here is part of what Gleeman wrote in advance of this trade:

Hardy is certainly not without flaws and some of them are prominent, but a deeper look at his performance clearly shows an above-average shortstop the Twins could have retained without having to make a multi-year commitment. He hit .268/.320/.394, which may not look like much but is actually better than the MLB average for shortstops of .262/.319/.371. And after coming back from the wrist injury Hardy hit .302/.356/.436 in 64 games.

Among the 28 shortstops to play at least 100 games this season Hardy ranked 11th in batting average, 13th in on-base percentage, 10th in slugging percentage, and 11th in OPS, making him above average for the position offensively no matter how you slice it. Toss in outstanding defense that Ultimate Zone Rating pegged as MLB's best at 12.8 runs above average per 150 games and Hardy was one of the top 12 shortstops in baseball even while missing 60 games.

The bigger question is what to do about our outfield defense, which is below average.  Frank's thought was to give Casilla a shot in center field - hoping to use his speed to track down more baseballs.

I don't get the sense that the Twins leadership pours over secondary numbers before they make moves.  This is disturbing.