I'm living in the third world

So Friday I'm getting ready to go to the Reds game, right, and the most violent storm I've seen since Hurricane Isabelle passed through Washington DC (and spared my car the fate so many others shared, that being giant trees smashing through them). I mean, I swear I saw lightening come up from the ground, and it rained so hard I couldn't see the shrubbery under the windows. I laughed. There I was, standing in my Reds jersey and Reds cap, camera ready for some Bosox shots, when boom, boom, boom, BOOOOOOOOM. It slowed and then by some miracle stopped long enough not only to see the game, but to see the postgame fireworks display.

Well, I wanted to post those photos over the weekend, see, and some others from Tuesday's Joe Nuxhall night, but some genius put the phone lines underground, and apparently every time it rains really hard here, it disrupts the phone service. There was a new lake formed over the lines, and it was not until today when it was finally dry enough to be able to use this ancient dial up technology to check some email, etc., but the connection is so slow that I can't do much with it. Posting photos is out of the question.

When I was in Bulgaria, you could go to the smallest villages where people still used donkeys in their fields but you still had high speed internet access. Over there and the rest of Europe, utility companies exist to serve the people, not to make profits. Here, if the phone company's equipment breaks, you have to spend two hours on hold to get them to come out and say nothing can be done. Then they make you pay for it. It's really an embarrassment, if you ask me. How can a poverty stricken county be more up to date than the supposedly most powerful country on Earth?

The sad thing is, people just accept it. They let themselves be ruled by corporations. One day we're all gonna wake up and find that the world has passed America by. Our politicians are too busy bickering about what someone's wife said than actually serving the people. Then you've got a dinosaur saying "we have to change Washington and I'm the man to do it." Well, Senator, you've had how many decades to do it, and you've done nothing except lose your spine to a wannabe emperor.

Boy, am I in a foul mood. Ha, there's a baseball reference - foul! I used to like that chicken place they had in GAB(p) they called The Fowl Pole that was right behind the yellow pole. Now it's another team store. And they put a wall of televisions up where the import beer stand used to be. Although it's better now, because you can find good beer all over the stadium instead of just that one spot. I like having to only pay one more dollar for the same size beer as the chemical domestic stuff. It's about time those of us with taste buds stopped being punished for having said taste buds.

Go Reds? I've already given up on this season (though will reluctantly admit I still harbor some notion of hope when pressed), but it'd be nice to finish up with a winning record. And watching the young guys is fun. We should have Hoppinger back soon, so perhaps we can say goodbye to Snory Patterson. I'm waiting for them to call up Daryl Thompson to replace Homer in the rotation. And call up Roenicke to replace Mike Lincoln.