Baseball Stadiums I Have(n’t) Visited

(Alpha by “official” team location.)

• Arizona – Not Visited
• Atlanta – Not Visited
  
• Baltimore – Visited (1997 when I was moving to Boston supposedly)
• Boston – Visited (1987?)
• Chicago Cubs – Visited (twice, last time was 2008 maybe)
• Chicago White Sox – Not Visited
• Cincinnati – Not Visited
  
• Cleveland – Not Visited
  
• Colorado – Not Visited
• Detroit – Not Visited
  
• Houston – Not Visited
• Kansas City – Not Visited
  
• Los Angeles Angels – Visited (several times, last in 2009)
• Los Angeles Dodgers – Visited (three times, last in 2009)
• Miami – Not Visited
• Milwaukee – Not Visited
• Minnesota – Not Visited
• New York Mets – Not Visited
• New York Yankees – Not Visited
• Oakland – Not Visited
• Philadelphia – Not Visited
• Pittsburgh – Visited (many times, last was May 2012)
• San Diego – Not Visited (for a game — somehow I got to visit for a Little League assistant coach “training event”; it was colder than expected).
• San Francisco – Not Visited
• St. Louis – Not Visited
• Seattle – Visited (several times, last was 2009)
• Tampa Bay – Not Visited
• Texas – Not Visited
• Toronto – Not Visited
• Washington – Not Visited

So something to work on then. Could still hit the Bucs in NY and Cincinnati this year and the Mariners still have road trips to NY and Toronto. Maybe.

Defunct Stadiums Visited (alpha by stadium name):

• Astrodome (Houston) (1986ish)
• Candlestick Park (San Francisco) (Latter-day Sports days, back when Jeff Kent hated me by name — 1998 or 9?)
• Kingdome (Seattle) (several times, but last time maybe in 1996)
• Qualcomm/Jack Murphy (San Diego) (several times — last time was probably 2000 or so)
• Yankee Stadium, Old (New York) (The last year it was open — 2008?)

Things That Are No Longer Interesting

This is  a sub-set.

1. Zombies. Their day in the sun should have ended with Shaun of the Dead, which came out in 2004. The zombies’ 15 minutes are up. Adding the word “apocalypse” does not grant the zombie idea any new freshness.
2. “Bacon” as a topic of discussion. Eating bacon is still fine. It’s also no longer interesting to put bacon in places where it doesn’t belong, e.g., in milk shakes or other dessert foods.
3. The word “awkward” as a punchline. If you’re not sure whether your firm is hooked up with a competent advertising agency, any pitches that include TV spots where “awkward” is used as a laugh-line are a  give-away.
4. Hipster music. In particular, hipster music used in TV ads.
5. Google Doodle commemorations. The commemoration on June 6, 2012 was the 79th anniversary of the drive-in theater. Most days it is okay to have a plain Google logo on your search engine.
6. Corporate April Fool’s Day jokes. These are no longer cute or unexpected. In order for it to be interesting at this point it would have to end up not actually being a hoax. Your Web site promotion for a printer that “prints live kittens” is only still entertaining if your company actually makes and sells a printer that prints live kittens.
7. Snarky-turned-violently-indignant online opinion articles. Writing does not come off as fresh and edgy just by its using the f-word frequently; it’s played out.
8. The phrase “I see what you did there”.
9. Any image overlaid with words in white Impact font (with black outline). Changing the typeface doesn’t give it new life.

I worry that we have become not only technologically stagnant, but also culturally.

Updates as events warrant.

bkd

Bkdunn.com Top Posts of 2010

Here were the ten most popular posts on bkdunn.com in the year 2010, which thereby richly deserve recognition. I’m omitting the counting numbers because it makes the whole blog seem pathetic.

1. Do-It-Yourself TV Stand and/or Entertainment Center Part 1: Plans and Stuff to By – It’s a crappy entertainment center, but that title is such tasty search engine bait. How could Google resist? How could someone looking for “diy entertainment center” resist? (I’m omitting parts 2-4 from this list; they’d occupy spots 2-4 if I included them. Because it’s kind of a crappy entertainment center. It’s falling apart even as I type. It probably didn’t deserve to make the move.)
2. US War Deaths by Day by Conflict (War, Battle) and How Iraq Compares – More good SEO-bait in the title, but at least this time it’s sort of a worthwhile article. Gives some perspective and all. Korea was way worse than anyone gives it credit for.
3. More B-52 Photos, By Request (Plus a Couple Pics of AMARG) – SEO-centric title, yep. And, fwiw, the post delivers as promised. The photos look warm.
4. My First Red Egg and Ginger Party – Turns out other non-Chinese people also don’t know what gift is appropriate at one of these (money in a red envelope is the right answer).
5. Getting Closer: My Do-It-Yourself Kitchen Table Project So Far – The title was not written to impress you, it was written to impress an algorithm. Algorithms have no soul (I don’t think). And right now the table is in the garage holding up my compound miter saw.
6. Spooky Gulch, Peek-a-Boo Gulch, and Dry Fork Hike – Yeah, it’s probably a hike everyone should go on in their lifetime (unless they’re claustrophobic or exceptionally wide-hipped).
7. Elwha Valley, Humes Ranch Loop, and Goblin Gate (A Six-Mile Hike) – I’ve posted less-read articles about much more interesting hikes. Goblins Gate is cool, but the rest is a tree prison. Hopefully those that read the post last year now understand as much.
8. Trip to Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park(s?) – The follow-on post about General Sherman and General Grant was immediately below this one in the rankings, but it’s sort of the same post, so not included. Big trees, much snow, many photos. Well — a *few* photos.
9. Planes of Fame Air Show 2009: Old Planes in the 909 – I went to this air show. It’s a lot better than you’d expect an air show in Chino to be. Many WWII-vintage planes in the air.
10. Gantt Chart for My Home Renovation Project (in Pittsburgh) – Yeah, so I didn’t really keep to the schedule, unfortunately. If I had — just, wow.

And for what it’s worth, here were the top five images viewed. These only count if they were viewed as a separate page, which probably only usually happened if they were found through Google or Bing image search.

1. Ford Tri-Motor Interior – It’s a photo of the interior of a Ford Tri-Motor (passenger) airplane located at the Evergreen Aerospace Museum. It’s a nice photo. I’d want to look at it.
2. Gantt Chart – It’s the Gantt Chart from above. Not very photographic, but it gives the appearance of having planned.
3. P-40 Warhawk Flying Tiger – From the same collection as the tri-motor above, only this one has a drip pan!
4. Trigger Finger Splints (1) – Way better than Trigger Finger Splints (2). It shows off my trigger finger splints.
5. Forbes Field Outfield Wall – And now I see this wall *every* *single* *day* (unless I don’t go to school, in which case I don’t see the wall).

So now you know and, assuming that knowing remains half the battle, that makes this useful.

bkd

IMDB Top 100 Movies and Me

About 3.5 years ago, I sort of reviewed the American Film Institute’s Top 100 Movies of All Time or whatever, which, I was later informed, constituted a crime against humanity. Such power. With that in mind, I’ve kind of been thinking I ought to do the same thing with the IMDB list since, you know, it’s all crowd-sourced and all. Plus, IMHO, there just aren’t enough movie panning-related crimes against humanity on the Internet nowadays. Turns out I like the crowd’s unmitigated wisdom a lot better than the AFI’s. FWIW. And I’ve seen a lot more of these. (This IMDB Top 100 is as of January 16, 2011 at 10:18 PM Eastern.)

1. Shawshank Redemption – Loved it; in my personal top 10. Speaks to the idea of hope without feeling cloying; the characters deserve the ends they get.
2. The Godfather – I just don’t care about gangsters. That said, it’s a very compelling, interesting movie and I have a hard time arguing with its belovedness.
3. The Godfather II – Ibid.
4. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly – I liked it. It’s not my fourth-favorite movie or anything and the Italian extras trying to play civil war soldiers are, IMHO, unintentionally funny. But I liked it a lot. Eli Wallach ftw.
5. Pulp Fiction – A lot of fun and violence. I should probably watch it again and see if there’s anything more to it than that, but, you know, fun and violence are good either way.
6. Schindler’s List – Overrated, under-interesting. Any PBS or History Channel program on the holocaust is more moving (if perhaps only due to lack of editorial). Little plot, no surprise, and the black-and-white is, I think, just an attempt to make the masses think they’ve watched and comprehended something “arty”. Life Is Beautiful was way better, frex. It had a plot and some emotional resonance.
7. Inception – Haven’t seen.
8. 12 Angry Men – Kind of cool. It’s sort of a small movie, but it’s a good lesson about how a group of people who are foolish in the first place can easily get brow-beaten by Henry Fonda. Wait — that *was* the message, right?
9. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest – Kind of boring. Not much happened. Didn’t see any reason to care about any of the characters. Now what?
10. The Dark Knight – There was a fantastic 90-minute brainless action movie in here just trying to get out. Alas. [My earlier review.]
11. The Empire Strikes Back – Given its iconic status and that I loved it as an eight-year-old, calling it “still watchable” should probably serve as high praise. (more…)

National Parks List — Mostly Visited

National Parks List — Mostly Unvisited

So yeah, I sort of have this idea that I should see every US National Park before I die. Although I’m not sure I should have to count the one in American Samoa. I got a long way to go (alpha by park):

1. Acadia: not visited.
2. American Samoa National Park: not visited.
3. Arches: visited! A few times, back in Utah days. Very pretty. I like Canyonlands better, though. There can be only one.
4. Badlands: not visited.
5. Big Bend: not visited.
6. Biscayne: not visited.
7. Black Canyon of the Gunnison: not visited.
8. Bryce Canyon: visited! Very photogenic and pretty small for a western-US park.
9. Canyonlands: visited! Way prettier than I expected and seemingly less crowded than the other Southern Utah parks.
10. Capital Reef: not visited.
11. Carlsbad Caverns: not visited.
12. Channel Islands: not visited.
13. Congaree: not visited.
14. Crater Lake: not visited.
15. Cuyahoga: not visited.
16. Death Valley: visited! Went last November and took photos. Y’know, I didn’t think it was all that amazing when I was there, but some of those pictures make it look dang pretty.
17. Denali: not visited.
18. Dry Tortugas: not visited.
19. Everglades: not visited.
20. Gates of the Arctic: not visited.
21. Glacier: not visited.
22. Glacier Bay: not visited.
23. Grand Canyon: visited! And I’ve always meant to go back to hike and see what there is to see on the northern rim. Some day, some day. For that matter, some day I’m going to buy a scanner and scan all my conventional photos from pre-digital days. Just not today.
24. Grand Teton: visited! Another one I should probably go back to in order to actually explore. The family reunion we had there didn’t involve much of the park.
25. Great Basin: not visited.
26. Great Sand Dunes: not visited. (Seriously? “Great” Sand Dunes…? I should probably visit just to confirm/refute my skepticism.)
27. Great Smoky Mountains: not visited.
28. Guadalupe Mountains: not visited.
29. Haleakala: not visited. Next Hawaii trip though. Maybe.
30. Hawaii Volcanoes: not visited. Ibid.
31. Hot Springs: not visited.
32. Isle Royale: not visited.
33. Joshua Tree: visited! Was interesting enough the first time, but the second time, well — I kind of figure that my second trip to Mars will also reveal the destination to be a desolate, ultimately uninteresting landscape.
34. Katmai: not visited.
35. Kenai Fjords: not visited.
36. Kings Canyon: visited! (So they are separate parks!)
37. Kobuk Valley: not visited.
38. Lake Clark: not visited. Is there any part of Alaska that’s not a national park? And I sort of get the sense that they have all these parks because there was no one who wanted to live there anyway.
39. Lassen Volcanic: not visited.
40. Mammoth Cave: not visited.
41. Mesa Verde: visited! I remember being hot and very, very sleepy — but a fun trip with Fresh Goat and ErinJ and at least one of the goatlings. I think JA was on that trip too.
42. Mt. Rainier: visited! Many times, but most recently evidenced here.
43. North Cascades: visited!
44. Olympic: visited! Some day I want to go when it isn’t fogged over, though. And I should probably go to the beach and rain forest side of it one of these days.
45. Petrified Forest: not visited.
46. Redwood: not visited.
47. Rocky Mountain: not visited.
48. Saguaro: not visited. I don’t think — although this photo was taken really, really close to the park entrance.
49. Sequoia: visited! Big trees. Big trees.
50. Shenandoah: not visited.
51. Theodore Roosevelt: not visited.
52. Virgin Islands: not visited.
53. Voyageurs: not visited.
54. Wind Cave: not visited.
55. Wrangell-St. Elias: not visited.
56. Yellowstone: visited! I was a kid, though, so mostly I remember the smell of sulfur and a geyser.
57. Yosemite: not visited.
58. Zion: visited! And the Virgin River Narrows was the best hike ever.

If I ever get around to the 48-state trip, I should be able to knock a bunch of these off the list. And then I’ll have to do that driving trip up to and through Alaska. Then I can die. I mean, eventually.

bkd