Change in the Fantasy Baseball team

Well, for those of you paying attention to these things...the Amoskeag Millers have a new name. The new team name is the Amoskeag Anthrax.

I know...it sounds like a silly name for a baseball team but if you recall, I wanted a name that was historically Manchester. Believe it or not, anthrax is a part of Manchester's history. Come to find out, we had an anthrax outbreak here in 1957. It's true! I swear! Check out the article...

http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/bioter/anthraxoutbreakNHmill.html

My brother was horrified that I didn't know about it already. I guess for years, the building was boarded up and fenced off. When they decided to finally tear it down, there was a lot of hoopla about where they should put the bricks. Guess they wound up buried in the landfill.

Anyway, that's the scoop...the Amoskeag Millers are now the Amoskeag Anthrax...they're a killer team! ;)

Well it's about freakin' time!

Finally! After years of teasing me, Lucas and Spielberg are finally going to come thru. Well, supposedly, anyway. Yep...after all this time, the 4th movie in the Indiana Jones franchise is set to go into production this year and due for release next year! FINALLY!

http://www.spielbergfilms.com/indy4news022006.html

I'm trying not to get my hopes up. Spielberg and Lucas got together years ago...in a secret meeting...and decided to see how crazy they could drive me. I'm serious! It's the only logical explanation for torturing me for the past 17 years.

Personally, I think Harrison Ford is still hot. Yeah, I know, he's gonna be 64 this year. I know he's old enough to be my father. I don't care. He could be 90 years old, bald, drooling and in a wheelchair and I'd still be ready to jump his bones. (Side note: If I was Calista Flockhart, I'd make him wear his Indy costume on a fairly regular basis ;) )

Where was I? Oh yeah - personally, I think he's still hot, but if they wait much longer...well, let's just say the stuff Indy does requires a certain amount of youth. So for the love of God, Steve & George...quit teasing me. Give me my Indiana Jones!

Spring is on the way!

You know how I know? Because according to Redsox.com, pitchers and catchers report to Spring training at noon on Saturday!! Woohoo! I can taste the Cracker Jacks already!

Fantasy baseball will be starting soon, too. There are a couple games I could sign up for now, but I'm not paying to play fantasy ball. Fantasies are meant to be free, yanno what I mean?

Anyway, I called my brother today and said "Hey..fantasy baseball is gonna be starting. We need to think of a name for my team!" Al is good with that. He helped me with the name for my fantasy hockey team. The Amoskeag River Rats. (We're in 3rd place in our league, btw. GO RATS!)

I wanted a name that really spoke of the history of Manchester. We're the largest city in Northern New England and have a lot of great history here, including a lot of Native American influence. Because of that, I wanted to keep "Amoskeag" in my team's name. Amoskeag means "place of many fish." And at one time, the Merrimack river was just that, I guess. It's said that the salmon were so thick, you could almost cross the river by walking on their backs.

Anyway, as expected, Big Brother came thru with some kinda cool names...The Amoskeag Anthrax...Amoskeag Millers...Rebels...Canucks...Abenaki...Penacooks (they're the tribe that lived on the banks of the Merrimack). He came up with a whole bunch. "You know, Barby," he said, "Canucks may be offensive to some people." "Yeah, I know," I said. "That's why it's on the keeper list." heheheh Hey, I'm part Canuck...

I think I'll go with The Amoskeag Millers. Manchester was a great mill city back in the day. It used to be called Derryfield, until 1810 when it was renamed in honor of Manchester, England, in hopes of our Manchester also becoming a great industrial city. The Amoskeag Manufacturing Company opened and eventually became the largest cotton milling operation in the world.

So there it is...The 411 on Manchester and my soon to be fantasy baseball team. And no, Damon won't be drafted to the Amoskeag Millers, just in case you were wondering.

Things that make me go "hmmmmm..."

• So where was I when they decided to shrink half gallons of ice cream? Seriously...have you bought a half gallon of ice cream lately? They aren't half gallons anymore. They are 1.75 quarts now. WTF is up with that???

• The web site for our local ABC affilliate has a section called "Irresistable Headlines." And they're right. For the most part, I can't resist them. I found a rather interesting one today. Check this out...

http://www.thewmurchannel.com/news/7043931/detail.htm

Yes...you read it correctly - detectives having sex with prostitutes in order to

help win convictions.

• Have you been watching the Olympics at all? Is it just me or is curling a kinda funky little sport. Is sport even the right word? Or is "activity" more accurate? Does it really require athleticism? And for the love of God...WHO thinks to combine brooms and ice???

• Speaking of the Olymics...the announcers at one point referred to skier Bode Miller as the "non-conformist from New Hampshire." Someone from NH a non-conformist? Is that supposed to be shocking somehow?

• And the pairs figure skating short program the other night...the Chinese pair that skated to Kashmir by Led Zeppelin?? Don't get me wrong, I was psyched to hear Led Zep at the games. I just had no idea they were allowed to listen to it in Communist China.

United we stand! 

Some people are just soooooo touchy!

Before I even start, let me make one thing clear - I respect Islam. I don't think Muslims, as a whole, are bad people. However, I do think that extremists of any faith are dangerous people.

Having said that, I gotta say that all this uproar about the cartoons with Mohammed depicted in them is totally out of control. OK, so it offended some people. Get a freakin' grip! I get offended by stuff all the time and I don't go out and start riots.

To show that I'm not completely unreasonable, I'll give you that perhaps they were in bad taste. But hey, if bad taste was something to kill people over, Teri Hatcher would have been killed after people saw the outfit she wore to the Grammys.

You gotta understand something...my mother escaped from East Germany hours before the borders were closed. Literally hours. Her boss had a friend that was a Russian officer that had spilled the beans about the border closing and he was kind enough to give my mom a heads up about it. She tossed some stuff in a back pack and swam across a river in the dead of night to make it to West Germany. Because of where and when she grew up, I was taught to take the Constitution very seriously and to value the rights granted in the Constitution. So yeah, my attitude is GET A GRIP!

Sure, Denmark is not protected by the US Constitution, but that doesn't matter. The riots are a blow to free countries everywhere.

Maybe you don't agree with me. But like I've said before...this is MY blog and what I think is what is relevant here.

Rock on Denmark!