Kevin's Ramblings…

I saw a job posted at work yesterday. The job indicated that it was based at our national office but I figured I’d ask if I could do it from Calgary since it didn’t look like there was any good reason for it to be based in Toronto.

No, I was told, it is in Toronto. Ok then.

So, I spoke with my boss about it anyway. I have not really given a lot of thought as to my career path but, if I eventually want to get into management, I would need to work out of our national office.

I don’t know how I fell, at this time, about moving back east. I have now been in Calgary for a little over three years and I truly do love it here. Ontario’s taxes are much higher than Alberta’s, if I was to return, my raise would have to be high enough that my take home pay wouldn’t decrease.

I also have commitments here that I can’t just drop. I am coaching baseball and although that is a volunteer position, I take it seriously. If I was offered the job, they’d have to be willing to wait until at least August before I could return.

If those conditions were met, I’d still really have to think about it and it would be a hard decision. I have no love for Toronto. After living here, I’ve decided that I do like big cities, but Toronto is something else. I am not sure if I’d want to live in Toronto or commute, say from Burlington. For the first while, I might even commute from St. Catharines, until I found the right place.

All,of this, of course, is way up in the air. I have not yet applied (I plan on it tomorrow) and I haven’t been offered it. Those are two steps, the first one easy, the second, yet to be seen.

What is even prompting me to consider this? I am not honestly sure. I feel no home sickness for Ontario, none at all. I do miss family and friends, and some of the things I used to do in Ontario, but Ontario itself, no, not really.

If I am offered the job and the conditions are met, it will be one of the hardest decisions of my life. Wish me some luck.

Well, last night was an interesting one.

First off, my AA Rockies made a nearly epic comeback against the AA Angels and won 14-10.  We were down 7-1 after the second inning, I pulled the started and the reliever was simply amazing.  Great control and excellent defense behind him.  Our offence was potent, hitting single after single and we had excellent base running to put runners in scoring position.  A few passed balls by the Angels catcher helped us score a few more runs.  It was the first win of the season, but the boys really needed it.  They had lost 2 games in the pre-season and were badly beaten in our first two outings.  It will be a great confidence booster for us, I am sure.  The AAA Rockies also played last night and I am told lost by a final score of 15-0.  I haven’t heard any details but that sounds pretty bad.

The Flames came back for a home victory, beating the Ducks 4-3 and getting a crucial win to bring the series to 2-1 in favour of the Ducks.  It is still an uphill battle for sure.  We (as in the Flames) have to still win out at home and win one on the road, something they have not done in an age.

In what I would describe as shocking, the 44 year Conservative dynasty was broken last night by an Orange wave of NDP.  I suppose that Alberta wanted a change, well, you’ve got it now, prepare to bow down to your new Orange Overlords.  In looking at the total votes cast, it was a split of the right (PC’s and Wildrose) that was the Conservative based downfall.  Perhaps the Alberta Conservatives need to regroup and merge back together.  I don’t know.  It will be an interesting four years, I am sure.

Yesterday was the Babe Ruth Calgary Opening Ceremonies for the 2015 season.  Fairly straightforward, teams show up, get free BBQ sausages and we line up around the infield and listen to opening remarks.

The President of Babe Ruth is a great guy, sometimes tends to talk for a bit.  I know this since I am also one of those people.  🙂  He was very brief, 30 seconds maybe?  I was surprised.  The League had one of the Calgary Stampeders throw out the first pitch.  Like many first pitches before it, and many more to come, it bounced but the catcher picked it out of the dirt.

Last years championship teams then play a game.  I stayed for part of that, but really, I see enough baseball of my own.  No idea on how that ended.

It is a busy week in baseball, only days off are today and Wednesday, otherwise lots of games and practices.  Two double headers this coming weekend, hopefully the weather will be a bit warmer than last weekend.

On Saturday, the Calgary Centre Conservative Riding Association had their AGM.  I was unable to attend as I had a triple header.  I sent in an email to the President with a quick biography of myself and a Conservative colleague from Ontario was nice enough to write a letter of reference for me.  I was elected to the Board of Directors.  Nice to be involved again.

Well, it is that time of the day already, work.  Gotta go.  Have a good week.

I thought, perhaps, that my AA home opener might have been one of the low points of the season. Then, we played Saturday. 

It was cold and windy, at times, I am sure the windchill was below zero. The sun was hiding behind thick, gray clouds. 

Pitching was suspect. Lack of control a major issue. My one lefty is going to be good, unfortunately,  he can’t pitch every inning of every game… We don’t have any outfield defence, not that I can see anyway. Infield isn’t too bad, base running is mediocre. All in all, work is needed. On paper, they are an excellent team. On grass, well, some might think they were using grass before the game.

Anyway, two games, two blowouts. This one was a 23-5 beating. That sounds more like a football score than a baseball score. It was, from what I can recall, the low point in my coaching career. I don’t think I’ve ever had a team give up that many runs. This may go without needing to be said, but we gave up those 23 runs in 5 innings.

For the second game of the day, I covered the Managerial duties for the AAA team. I started one of the top pitchers in the league and he cruised through 6 innings before giving up a 3 run homer to right field, it bounced off of the light post and back onto the playing field. A quick chat from one of the coaches settled him and he got the next 6 outs for a complete game 5-3 win.

The second half of the double header saw us facing a great hitting Giants team. They clubbed us for 12 runs while their starter threw a 5 inning no hitter. The final was 12-0. Still, might have been a better game than the AA game from the morning…

So, works has to be done, on both teams. It was known that pitching would be suspect at the AAA level. AA is always an unknown entity anyway.

Today is an off day, Babe Ruth has their opening ceremonies and BBQ sausages which are some of the best you’d ever have. Action on the diamon continues for both teams Tuesday night. 

April 30 is the end of the tax season.  Since I work for an Accounting firm, today marks the end of the accountants madness.

I like to tell them, yet fear for my safety when I do, that during their busy season, it is quite slow for those of us in IT.  The accountants only report issues if it stops them from being able to do taxes and what not.  Minor issues don’t get reported.  Not until after today.

Tomorrow, a lot of staff will be off.  A lot of staff also take next week off.  Then, the following week, typically anyway, IT becomes insane again with issues being reported that have been simmering for the last two months.  I look forward to being a little busier, the days go by more quickly.

So, tonight we have the end of tax season party.  We are going to a close by hotel for dinner followed by a casino night.  Should be fun.

So, wish me luck in the casino, maybe I will win enough to get some decent prizes.  A buffet for dinner is always good so it will be a good night regardless.

We had our season opener for the AA Rockies last evening. It was a bit of a stinker.

Pitching was pretty solid. The defence, in general, behind that pitching was not. I ended up using 4 pitchers in a lop-sided 15-4, 5 inning loss, a mercy loss at that. And believe me, by not playing the last two innings, it was a mercy…

The u lire behind the plate appeared to be squeezing the strike zone on us a bit. This was the same umpire that tossed me at the end of the previous season. I’d hate to think that he was still angry at me or something… When several pitches, in a row come in and the catcher is setup on the middle of the plate and doesn’t move his glove and it is a ball, one has to question it. Getting tossed again in a blowout game doesn’t make sense, so I behaved myself. 

We really haven’t practiced on the field as a team as yet. We’ve had a lot of indoor workouts, but it isn’t the same. We aren’t actually scheduled to have a practice until May 7 and it is an indoor practice to boot. So, we play Saturday at 11am and I have asked the boys to be there for 9am for a full 1.5 hour practice session. We have a lot of little things to cover. 

One of the biggest issues last night seemed to be that the guys were being lazy. Outfield balls allowed to drop in front of them. Base runners giving up and slowing down because they think they are going to be called out. 

Anyway, it is only one game and the issues should be easy to correct.  Lots of ball left. Go Rockies !!!

We have our final pre-season coaches meeting tonight.  I will be able to pick up uniforms for both the AA and AAA teams.  We didn’t have uniforms for the new players on the weekend for the exhibition games but it was too cold anyway, they had many, many layers on.

The Umpires Association, of which I am a member, are apparently doing some sort of presentation tonight.  The presenter is an interesting gent.  He’s one of the more arrogant, condescending people I have ever had the privilege to meet.  Oh well, I will survive.

The AA team opens the regular season tomorrow evening.  We go from playing Saturday night in near zero degree weather to what is supposed to be in the mid 20’s tomorrow.  I can go for that all season.

Saturday, the AA’s play again and then the AAA team has a double header.  The AAA staff are currently away so I will be doing a triple header on Saturday.  It will be like the old days with tournaments.

Have a great season Rockies !!!

Both my AAA and AA teams played exhibition games yesterday. It was a cold day in late April. The temperature at noon was around 6C. For the later game, it had dropped and by the end of the game, it was hovering around zero. Just a bit cold to baseball.

Both teams ended up losing the games but played well. The AAA club played first and ended up on the losing end, 13-9 I think the final was. We had a few errors, not too bad. The pitching was solid as was the hitting. 

The AA team had some very solid pitching. It is very encouraging. The hitting was a little lacklustre but it’ll come around. 

The AA’s play again today at noon. It is supposed to be a little warmer, that’s a good thing, we nearly froze last night.

We follow with our home opener on Tuesday night and temps are supposed to be in the mid 20’s. Looking forward to an awesome summer of baseball.

Today is the Babe Ruth Calgary Jamboree Opening Tournament at Optimist Athletic Park. It is going to be a cold one, the expected high is around 8C. Not the perfect weather for baseball, that’s for sure.

I don’t think I’ve looked forward to my first game of the season this much since my first year coaching all star baseball way back in the 90’s with St. Catharines Minor Baseball.

Last year, this tournament was snowed out. This year, Mother Nature is partially cooperating. 

Last year, I wasn’t excited about the beginning of the season. I wasn’t happy to be coaching again. I wasn’t sure why at the time. With a year to reflect, I think I know why. 

Back in Ontario, I coached some higher level all star and elite clubs. We may not have achieved all of our goals, but we generally had pretty successful seasons. When I decided to coach with Babe Ruth, I think I had to get my head around the fact that this isn’t high performance baseball. 

I’m ok with that. In fact, I am really enjoying it. As opposed to running a team one year and then the next year running a different team, I am now the club manager for two teams and I have to plans and draft players for multiple years. This adds something that I haven’t had before.

I have also taken a much more active role this year, a role I should have taken last year. I am 100% into it, as I should be, I do feel like I let the team down a bit last year. Not now, i am pumped for a great season of Rockies baseball. Let’s get ’em… 🙂

Although I am only 43, sometimes I feel much older than that. 

I decided to walk to the Best Buy yesterday. From my place, it is approximately 2km. I did my shopping, no problem. I decided to continue onto the office to harass some co-workers since I am off and they aren’t. 

I received a phone call on my way and decided to sit on a concrete wall while talking. I sat for about 5 minutes and when I got up, there was a dull pain in my right-lower back. I had a bit of a walk to the office and it got progressively worse. I took a bus home since there was no way I was walking back.

So, how exactly does one hurt themselves just sitting on a wall? That’s insane. 

While I was at the office, my co-worker said that he hurt his neck in the morning simply by turning his head. He is 2 months younger than I am…

I have a back massager that I have been using pretty steady since last night. It is helping. So are the extra strength Tylenol. 

This morning, I decided to call my doctor to see if I could get in. I called around 930 and got an appointment for 1130. Not bad. 

I arrived at 1125 and was told it would be a minute and to have a seat. After waiting for 20 minutes, I heard the receptionist say to another patient that the doctor was about 20 minutes behind, turns out that was optimistic of her. At the 40 minute mark, I asked how long it would be. I wasn’t told how long, but was told I was next. Next to likely sit in an examination room for who knows how long. 

After still not being seen 45 minutes after my appointment time, I told them I was leaving. They did apologize and seemed shocked that I would leave. Although I am off work, I do have better things to do than sit in a waiting room for hours on end. One would think I was in the emergency room at a hospital. 

I don’t plan on returning to this doctor. I have only seen him once since coming to Calgary. I signed up for a doctor before I moved from the east end to the west. It is now a 25 minute drive. So, I applied for a new doctor, closer to home. 

For now, I wil tend to my back myself. I should be ok I a day or two. I’ll survive until then…