Yay! Rain!

I'm pretty certain I heard my lawn sigh.

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The Red Sox are in a world of hurt right now and no one can explain why. I keep saying that it's time to take a long hard look at Farrell and his managerial skills but I also want to bring up young Mr. Cherington.

He has put together a team that no one really understands.

I'll never understand why Hanley Ramirez, a third baseman, is playing left field. They keep saying, "he's a work in progress" but they are 50 games into a 162 game season and he hasn't shown much progress in becoming an outfielder.

Why are they paying a kid with little or no major league experience $11 million a year? Castillo has trouble catching fly balls fer cripes sake. When I coached fifth and sixth graders, they could at least catch pop flies.

As for David Ortiz, he has one job on that team and he isn't doing it. He took a few days off and last night he announced that he discovered he was "pulling off his back foot to soon". What the hell kind of bullshit is that?

Farrell and Cherington keep saying that things will click, the offense will come alive, the pitchers will get back their "stuff" and the defense will become a wall but if it doesn't happen soon, they can pretty much write the season off as a "rebuilding season" and figure out what to do about 2016.

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Here's a couple of links:

• Maybe it was a "Show and Tell" session...



• Key entry from our favorite police log: "3:20 p.m. A Columbia Falls man called in with hypothetical questions regarding the use of pepper spray in a bar."

Time for a puppy update.

She has grown a bit but not a lot. It is my suspicion that this critter, when full grown, will not exceed 15 pounds. She has long legs but tiny paws which means she is pretty close to her maximum size.

Oh, and she still likes to fall asleep next to me when I'm sitting on my couch.

This happens only when my daughter is not around.

When my daughter is around, the pup sticks with her like, well, a puppy.

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So let me see if I got this straight -

Two girls come up with a great idea for their senior prank, which is to put alarm clocks into some empty lockers. They spend a lot of time setting it up and even tell their parents about it.

Once the clocks are in place, some paranoid little coward hears a ticking sound, throws his hands up in the air and runs around the hallways screaming like a little girl. The administration decides that the only thing that makes a ticking sound is a bomb and they alert the authorities.

The authorities agree with the administration that the only thing that can possibly make a ticking sound is a bomb so they evacuate the school and terrorize everyone with tales of bombs and explosives

At some point, they decided that the two girls, who are the only ones in this entire story that have not used the word "bomb", are guilty of perpetrating a hoax by means of a false bomb and they lock them up.

What the hell is wrong with us? Why do we react this way? When did we lose our collective balls and our sense of humor?

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You might like these links:

• Key entry from our favorite police log: 11:26 a.m. Numerous chickens lost their lives to a homicidal dog on Wolf Creek Drive.



• Key phrase in this story: "This is art."



• Key phrase in this story: "...felt the need to use the back seat of our patrol car as a bathroom."

It was a shitty start to the day

Seems that my septic tank has shifted somehow and the pipe from the house to the tank has separated from the tank. Some dirt and rocks found there way into the gap and plugged it up just enough to cause a backup.

My wife, who is my hero, said to me, "Go to work. I got this."

And got it she did.

The tank has been pumped and evaluated. A makeshift connection is in place and on Monday, some guys who know what they are doing will show up at my house and hopefully fix things permanently.

I can't wait to see what this is going to cost us.

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Here are today's links:

• Only in Florida.



• "No, really. It was an accident! I swear!"



• Watch the video.

Busy day.

Besides work, there was a retirement gig for a friend and then a meet-up with Pat.

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On the upside, my lawn got some much-needed rain yesterday and it looks like it might get some tonight.

Yay!

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Here are some links:

• Poo, Moo and Wah are slinging lugnuts.



• Only in Germany.



• Key phrase in this story: "He then forgot about the gun."



• Yes, nitrous oxide was involved.



• Only in Florida.

Not watching them play baseball did not help.

They still lost.

Twice.

They lost last night and again this afternoon.

Basically, they suck when I watch and they suck when I don't watch.

I might as well watch them.

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My friends are going through the most difficult thing I can imagine and I wish I knew what to do for them. They are in a courtroom in Boston listening to the evidence the BPD Homicide detectives accumulated in the investigation into their daughters murder.

Mom actually was called to testify yesterday and she did it with more dignity and grace tham I could have ever shown.

The monster that took her little girls life sat a mere 10 feet away from her but all she ever did was look at her husband and answer the questions.

As for dad, he told me he is struggling with not saying anything at all. He knows that if he says or does anything, there will be a mistrial and the trial process will have to start all over again. I told him that they spoke volumes about themselves and their family when they wrote a letter to the South Boston community days after her murder.

These folks are some of the best neighbors we have and they don't deserve this. They are kind people with an air of great dignity who have never done anything to hurt or disparage anyone.

The monster that is Edwin Alemany is nothing more than pure evil and he should die for what he did.

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Try these links:

• They take their barbecue very seriously in Indiana.



• Our federal government in action.



• Only in Massachusetts.