Did a long trip yesterday in the Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River. Was planning on a 3-day trip starting Saturday, but, last evening's Thunderstorms made us rethink the journey.
Day 1 - 14 miles (then tents up and massive rainfall)
Day 2 - 22.3 miles ( a new record for us all) and heavy rainfall/thunderstorms after we had finished.
Saw many bald eagles (and a large immature), osprey, turkey vultures, blue herons, kingfishers, Baltimore Oriole, bank swallows, Canada Goose, Common Merganser, Hooded Mergansers (with as many as 20 chicks), Mallards, Ravens, and a large unidentified hawk (white bellied, large wing-span, smallish head).
A lot of class 1-2 rapids on the paddle, somewhat more difficult in a fully-loaded kayak, but I also felt I was able to keep course better against a lot of the churn. Each one was an adventure from when you first see the line of the broken water to when you pull out safely at the tail of the rapids. I took in a fair amount of water. One of the other guys wore a skirt, but I think I would rather not have one extra thing to deal with should the kayak spill on a rock. Also I was using a paddle tether, but wondered if that could also be a source of peril should you spill.
Interestingly, the chad were spawning and we saw thousands of them heading upstream, working the surface of the river. Many had already died and were floating in the river. A sign I read at the put-in said their numbers were up significantly since the pollution of the 70's had been reversed.
The area had been purchased by the gubmint in the 50's with the idea of making a large dam. They had cleared out the people and most of the structures before the project petered out and the land was turned over to the National Park service. Now you only see an occasional concrete structure along the river indicating what had once been there.
Sounds like a pretty damn good use of taxpayer dollars to me. There are too many places in Minnesota alone that I have yet to visit, but your site sounds amazing. Hope the rough weather didn't leave a bad taste.
From your description, it sounds like a Red-tailed Hawk or Osprey.
Surprised that Common Mergansers are found that far south in the Summer. In MN, they winter on whatever open water they find and then head north once it melts. Now I checked the map and they breed across the arrowhead and as far south as St. Cloud and Sherburne County. Nevermind.
Probably Osprey, then. The head was too small for a Red-tailed and I'm very familiar with that bird.
I saw a few Commons, but a lot of Hooded's. Many of the Hooded sightings were an adult with a large brood of chicks, ranging from 8-20. I also often saw pairs of Hooded's just standing on rocks along the river. Or singles flying by.
I don't recall seeing either in CT.
Retraction: after further review, the only mergansers I saw were common. There were no hooded. My bad.
Small flock of these outside my office window right now, bouncing around on clumps of small trees, eating berries. Though I recognize the name, I don't know if I've ever seen them before.
Race to the bottom: Through fifty-six games, the Twins are 16-40. Through fifty-six games, the 1962 Mets were also 16-40.
The Mets would go on to lose their next five games, so in theory the Twins have a chance to gain some ground on them.
Oh goodness, we're comparing to the 62 Mets now?
On the plus side, tickets for Thursday's game are like $7 dollars.
That's the one positive of this season, it probably isn't going to cost much when I get a chance to go watch a game. Have to think if tickets are $7 now then they'll be even cheaper outside the stadium that night.
Yeah, thankfully the Sox are starting to tank too, so hoping those late season games will be a cheap and sparsely populated affair.
sparsely populated affair
I gotta say, I sure don't mind being able to move about freely to food an restrooms and such. I didn't even lose a kid on Saturday.
it probably isn't going to cost much when I get a chance to go watch a game
Hey, anyone else want to do a ballgame outing with kids this year? The jalapeno has broken my heart by declaring he has no interest in baseball (he's obsessed with soccer), but I'd like to get the peperoncino to a game. I'm not seeing a nap-friendly late-afternoon weekend game like there was last year, but I think he could skip the nap. So . . . maybe the 1:10 game on July 17 or July 31?
Theoretically interested.
Hypothetically interested. The youngest is on the whenever nap schedule.
I'll potentially email both of you to discuss further.
I'd be interested too
Sheenie and I have stopped sitting in the seats on our tickets. Instead, we just wander around until we see an inattentive usher, and then end up a few rows from the field.
Yup, I've gotten these seats 3 different games at the Cell. Never paid more than $10/ticket.
(Sano is reeaallllly big in person)
The Braves are also 16-40. It's nice to have company
I keep checking on them in the hopes we're not last last.
I'm more rooting for the Reds to have the worst ERA+ in baseball history
Whole lotta schadenfreude this season
to be fair I'm also rooting for the Cubs to win 120
Only to lose out miserably in the first round; I'm with you there.
On the one hand, once they win the WS, they're just a regular team. On the other, I hate that the 2001 Mariners are relegated to also-rans. They're one of the best regular season teams in history, and they're rarely talked about. That's one thing I like about the EPL
Speaking of which, in my sons' Little League, the Farm level (ages 7-8) had neither of its first two teams make the championship game today. The first-place team went 14-2-3 but lost its only playoff game. Farm is the only level that has playoffs. Lower levels don't keep score and upper levels send the first-place team to a Tournament of Champions to determine a district champion, which is what Trey will be participating in at the Majors level (10-12). After the Farm championship game (played by 2 teams that had losing records during the season), Trey and Junior will find out if they make All-Stars. We're quite hopeful both will make it.
Well, Junior made All-Stars but Trey did not and we're not too happy about that. I try really hard not to be "those" kind of parents but it's hard when you see the kid you love so much getting screwed over. We're upset based on the players that made it ahead of him that he's played with in past years and based on the history of the All-Stars the last few years. Although, I should be most upset with his manager and coaches, who basically told us at the beginning of the year that they don't let 10-year-olds pitch or play in the infield and Trey's biggest strength is pitching and fielding. Fortunately, Trey is taking it well, so that lessens the sting of having to comfort an upset child, so I'll probably stew on this for a while tonight and (hopefully) let it go after that.
I really dislike arbitrary rules like that. If he's good enough to pitch, let him pitch. That sounds like a rule made to keep some parents from complaining.
Yeah, and this manager was the only one that had that rule. Trey and his teammate were the only 10-year-olds that played in the majors and didn't make 9-10 All-Stars.
That was what I wanted, but then my nephew died, and he and his dad are Cubs fans, so... I figure I can deal with them winning.
The 2003 Tigers were also 16-40 through 56 games. They only won 43 games that year.
Due to a warp in time (yesterday's thunderstorm), I'm cooking for lunch today instead of eating out of a bag that you pour water into and praying that the pasta will soften before it gets too cool to eat. NBBW is on a work trip so I get to experiment.
Stuffed Squid over Curried Applesauce
4 squid tubes
1.5 shallots in their skins
1/4 sm. onion (chopped)
1 apple (tart, like Pink Lady)
some garden cilantro
some ginger
curry powder
dry white wine
Toss the squid tubes in olive oil/salt, then in a small saucepan with a lid, heat olive oil to med-high, cook the squids 1 minute on each side, then set aside (this will open them up like balloons).
Add more olive oil, then cook the shallots (in their skins!) for about 10 mins on med heat, then set aside (save the olive oil for later use cause now it has a great shallot flavor).
Slice an apple thinly, then chop it into fine pieces with a chopper (or use technology, but for just one serving you lose too much product with food processors IMHO). Finely chop some ginger, and some onion.
With some of your shallot oil, toast the onion, then add the apple, ginger, some curry, and cilantro. Cook till mushy, then add some dry white wine and cook it down to applesauce.
Heat oven to 300F. Remove the shallot paper-skins, then slice them thinly lengthwise. Stuff the shallots into the squids, then cook them for about 10 min on a cookie sheet with a little more dusting of sea-salt.
Serve the stuffed squids over your warm, curry applesauce. Awesome!
.... and here I'm having left-over pizza.
We got fried octopus as a tapa in Granada. I should probably just make an Appetite post about all the food I ate over there. I think I honestly put on some weight, which I've never been able to say before.
I'd read that.
Draft is saved. It's just pictures at this point. I'll flesh it out in the next few days as I have time. It currently is at 13 different dishes.
It's the least you can do for us, Magoo.
Kevin Jepsen's current Win Probability Added of -1.4 is the worst by a Twins reliever through 56 games of a season since Ron Davis in 1986.
And Play-Index has it. Here's the overall listing, starters and relievers. That Davis season ranked 12th but was not the worst Davis season as a Twin. He was traded* in 1986 though so there's still hope!
* Adding in his results with the Cubs doesn't top his other season. He would end up at sixth on the overall list.
He's incredibly close to 2009 Crainwreck in less than half the innings. Yikes.
Of that list, I have no idea/recall of Dave Johnson or George Maranda
You're really dating yourself if you remember Maranda. There are 2 relievers from 1987's World Champs on this list. I'm betting the vast majority of that came on the road.
There was no baseball card made of Maranda, unlike his other contemporaries, who I do recognize by their cards.
I guess now we know why there was no card made of him.
Maranda holds the distinction of being the only major league player named "Georges". Born in Levis, Quebec, he is a member of the Quebec Baseball Hall of Fame.
Is this for Québécois only, or people who played for the Expos as well? Because if the latter, Vlad should definitely be in it.
The rules for induction into the Quebec Baseball Hall of Fame can be found here. It's in French, but Google's translator seems to work fairly well.
So the Twins have the only Georges and the only Kennys play for them. Interesting.
And Ludovicus. So what?
I'm impressed Smokestack made the list since he normally entered as a Groundskeeper.
About -.8 of that came in 2 outings at the beginning of the year. Both times came in with a 1-run lead and left with the Twins trailing, although they ended up winning both games. He was at -.645 on the year before making 3 starts at the end of the year, so really wouldn't make the list exclusively as a reliever.
He crossed the 80% relief appearances threshold so good enough for me.
I understand. It's just that half of his -1.2 came from those few starts. He really didn't fit the typical profile of most of these guys being a late-inning reliever that failed a lot in those situations. Too bad there's not a way to look at just their relief WPA numbers.
RIP, William Schallert. You might remember his face from "The Trouble with Tribbles" episode of TOS. Or his voicing of Milton the Toaster.
How has Kellogg's never made a savory pop tart for lunch/dinner consumption? You'd only need one kitchen appliance! (Two if they needed refrigeration.)
All pop tarts are for lunch/dinner consumption.
But wouldn't you like a cheesy quiche pop tart? Or a pop tart with empanada fillings?
unfrosted cherry FTW*
*although bacon sounds good...
unfrosted cherry FTW*
unfrosted
🙁
you can just take your frosted ones and walk away, momma's boy!
I enjoy any kind of pop tart, but I haven't had one in many months; Clif bars now.
I love pop tarts, but usually eat NutraGrain bars. When the kid is a bit older, that might end up being a perk.
I remember some egg, cheese, and meat affair back in the day. So healthy...
Pillsbury made (makes?) a savory Toaster Strudel-like thing. I thought it seemed completely unappetizing despite eating plenty of Hot Pockets and Pizza Rolls in my day.
Honestly, I just really, really miss the blueberry & cream cheese Toaster Strudels. The regular blueberry and strawberry/cream cheese are good, but blueberry/cream cheese were perfect.
I remember those. My teeth hurt just thinking about it.
Did a long trip yesterday in the Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River. Was planning on a 3-day trip starting Saturday, but, last evening's Thunderstorms made us rethink the journey.
Day 1 - 14 miles (then tents up and massive rainfall)
Day 2 - 22.3 miles ( a new record for us all) and heavy rainfall/thunderstorms after we had finished.
Saw many bald eagles (and a large immature), osprey, turkey vultures, blue herons, kingfishers, Baltimore Oriole, bank swallows, Canada Goose, Common Merganser, Hooded Mergansers (with as many as 20 chicks), Mallards, Ravens, and a large unidentified hawk (white bellied, large wing-span, smallish head).
A lot of class 1-2 rapids on the paddle, somewhat more difficult in a fully-loaded kayak, but I also felt I was able to keep course better against a lot of the churn. Each one was an adventure from when you first see the line of the broken water to when you pull out safely at the tail of the rapids. I took in a fair amount of water. One of the other guys wore a skirt, but I think I would rather not have one extra thing to deal with should the kayak spill on a rock. Also I was using a paddle tether, but wondered if that could also be a source of peril should you spill.
Interestingly, the chad were spawning and we saw thousands of them heading upstream, working the surface of the river. Many had already died and were floating in the river. A sign I read at the put-in said their numbers were up significantly since the pollution of the 70's had been reversed.
The area had been purchased by the gubmint in the 50's with the idea of making a large dam. They had cleared out the people and most of the structures before the project petered out and the land was turned over to the National Park service. Now you only see an occasional concrete structure along the river indicating what had once been there.
Sounds like a pretty damn good use of taxpayer dollars to me. There are too many places in Minnesota alone that I have yet to visit, but your site sounds amazing. Hope the rough weather didn't leave a bad taste.
From your description, it sounds like a Red-tailed Hawk or Osprey.
Surprised that Common Mergansers are found that far south in the Summer. In MN, they winter on whatever open water they find and then head north once it melts. Now I checked the map and they breed across the arrowhead and as far south as St. Cloud and Sherburne County. Nevermind.
Probably Osprey, then. The head was too small for a Red-tailed and I'm very familiar with that bird.
I saw a few Commons, but a lot of Hooded's. Many of the Hooded sightings were an adult with a large brood of chicks, ranging from 8-20. I also often saw pairs of Hooded's just standing on rocks along the river. Or singles flying by.
I don't recall seeing either in CT.
Retraction: after further review, the only mergansers I saw were common. There were no hooded. My bad.
Small flock of these outside my office window right now, bouncing around on clumps of small trees, eating berries. Though I recognize the name, I don't know if I've ever seen them before.
Race to the bottom: Through fifty-six games, the Twins are 16-40. Through fifty-six games, the 1962 Mets were also 16-40.
The Mets would go on to lose their next five games, so in theory the Twins have a chance to gain some ground on them.
Oh goodness, we're comparing to the 62 Mets now?
On the plus side, tickets for Thursday's game are like $7 dollars.
That's the one positive of this season, it probably isn't going to cost much when I get a chance to go watch a game. Have to think if tickets are $7 now then they'll be even cheaper outside the stadium that night.
Yeah, thankfully the Sox are starting to tank too, so hoping those late season games will be a cheap and sparsely populated affair.
I gotta say, I sure don't mind being able to move about freely to food an restrooms and such. I didn't even lose a kid on Saturday.
it probably isn't going to cost much when I get a chance to go watch a game
Hey, anyone else want to do a ballgame outing with kids this year? The jalapeno has broken my heart by declaring he has no interest in baseball (he's obsessed with soccer), but I'd like to get the peperoncino to a game. I'm not seeing a nap-friendly late-afternoon weekend game like there was last year, but I think he could skip the nap. So . . . maybe the 1:10 game on July 17 or July 31?
Theoretically interested.
Hypothetically interested. The youngest is on the whenever nap schedule.
I'll potentially email both of you to discuss further.
I'd be interested too
Sheenie and I have stopped sitting in the seats on our tickets. Instead, we just wander around until we see an inattentive usher, and then end up a few rows from the field.
Yup, I've gotten these seats 3 different games at the Cell. Never paid more than $10/ticket.
(Sano is reeaallllly big in person)
The Braves are also 16-40. It's nice to have company
I keep checking on them in the hopes we're not last last.
I'm more rooting for the Reds to have the worst ERA+ in baseball history
Whole lotta schadenfreude this season
to be fair I'm also rooting for the Cubs to win 120
Only to lose out miserably in the first round; I'm with you there.
On the one hand, once they win the WS, they're just a regular team. On the other, I hate that the 2001 Mariners are relegated to also-rans. They're one of the best regular season teams in history, and they're rarely talked about. That's one thing I like about the EPL
Speaking of which, in my sons' Little League, the Farm level (ages 7-8) had neither of its first two teams make the championship game today. The first-place team went 14-2-3 but lost its only playoff game. Farm is the only level that has playoffs. Lower levels don't keep score and upper levels send the first-place team to a Tournament of Champions to determine a district champion, which is what Trey will be participating in at the Majors level (10-12). After the Farm championship game (played by 2 teams that had losing records during the season), Trey and Junior will find out if they make All-Stars. We're quite hopeful both will make it.
Well, Junior made All-Stars but Trey did not and we're not too happy about that. I try really hard not to be "those" kind of parents but it's hard when you see the kid you love so much getting screwed over. We're upset based on the players that made it ahead of him that he's played with in past years and based on the history of the All-Stars the last few years. Although, I should be most upset with his manager and coaches, who basically told us at the beginning of the year that they don't let 10-year-olds pitch or play in the infield and Trey's biggest strength is pitching and fielding. Fortunately, Trey is taking it well, so that lessens the sting of having to comfort an upset child, so I'll probably stew on this for a while tonight and (hopefully) let it go after that.
I really dislike arbitrary rules like that. If he's good enough to pitch, let him pitch. That sounds like a rule made to keep some parents from complaining.
Yeah, and this manager was the only one that had that rule. Trey and his teammate were the only 10-year-olds that played in the majors and didn't make 9-10 All-Stars.
That was what I wanted, but then my nephew died, and he and his dad are Cubs fans, so... I figure I can deal with them winning.
The 2003 Tigers were also 16-40 through 56 games. They only won 43 games that year.
A nice little photographic farewell to Nye's.
Due to a warp in time (yesterday's thunderstorm), I'm cooking for lunch today instead of eating out of a bag that you pour water into and praying that the pasta will soften before it gets too cool to eat. NBBW is on a work trip so I get to experiment.
Stuffed Squid over Curried Applesauce
4 squid tubes
1.5 shallots in their skins
1/4 sm. onion (chopped)
1 apple (tart, like Pink Lady)
some garden cilantro
some ginger
curry powder
dry white wine
Toss the squid tubes in olive oil/salt, then in a small saucepan with a lid, heat olive oil to med-high, cook the squids 1 minute on each side, then set aside (this will open them up like balloons).
Add more olive oil, then cook the shallots (in their skins!) for about 10 mins on med heat, then set aside (save the olive oil for later use cause now it has a great shallot flavor).
Slice an apple thinly, then chop it into fine pieces with a chopper (or use technology, but for just one serving you lose too much product with food processors IMHO). Finely chop some ginger, and some onion.
With some of your shallot oil, toast the onion, then add the apple, ginger, some curry, and cilantro. Cook till mushy, then add some dry white wine and cook it down to applesauce.
Heat oven to 300F. Remove the shallot paper-skins, then slice them thinly lengthwise. Stuff the shallots into the squids, then cook them for about 10 min on a cookie sheet with a little more dusting of sea-salt.
Serve the stuffed squids over your warm, curry applesauce. Awesome!
.... and here I'm having left-over pizza.
We got fried octopus as a tapa in Granada. I should probably just make an Appetite post about all the food I ate over there. I think I honestly put on some weight, which I've never been able to say before.
I'd read that.
Draft is saved. It's just pictures at this point. I'll flesh it out in the next few days as I have time. It currently is at 13 different dishes.
It's the least you can do for us, Magoo.
Beat me to it!
Now I want to know the worst for a whole season.
And Play-Index has it. Here's the overall listing, starters and relievers. That Davis season ranked 12th but was not the worst Davis season as a Twin. He was traded* in 1986 though so there's still hope!
For relievers, here's the top 25 with some stats.
* Adding in his results with the Cubs doesn't top his other season. He would end up at sixth on the overall list.
He's incredibly close to 2009 Crainwreck in less than half the innings. Yikes.
Of that list, I have no idea/recall of Dave Johnson or George Maranda
You're really dating yourself if you remember Maranda. There are 2 relievers from 1987's World Champs on this list. I'm betting the vast majority of that came on the road.
There was no baseball card made of Maranda, unlike his other contemporaries, who I do recognize by their cards.
I guess now we know why there was no card made of him.
Maranda holds the distinction of being the only major league player named "Georges". Born in Levis, Quebec, he is a member of the Quebec Baseball Hall of Fame.
Is this for Québécois only, or people who played for the Expos as well? Because if the latter, Vlad should definitely be in it.
The rules for induction into the Quebec Baseball Hall of Fame can be found here. It's in French, but Google's translator seems to work fairly well.
So the Twins have the only Georges and the only Kennys play for them. Interesting.
And Ludovicus. So what?
I'm impressed Smokestack made the list since he normally entered as a Groundskeeper.
About -.8 of that came in 2 outings at the beginning of the year. Both times came in with a 1-run lead and left with the Twins trailing, although they ended up winning both games. He was at -.645 on the year before making 3 starts at the end of the year, so really wouldn't make the list exclusively as a reliever.
He crossed the 80% relief appearances threshold so good enough for me.
I understand. It's just that half of his -1.2 came from those few starts. He really didn't fit the typical profile of most of these guys being a late-inning reliever that failed a lot in those situations. Too bad there's not a way to look at just their relief WPA numbers.
I learned "oliva" means "olive" while I was in Spain. Probably should have seen that one coming.
Goes well with "knoblauch"
I can make some room for Tony, but 6/6 remains D-Day in my book.
Jose Berrios with 3 shutout innings thus far. 5 Ks, 0 BBs, 1 hit allowed.
RIP, William Schallert. You might remember his face from "The Trouble with Tribbles" episode of TOS. Or his voicing of Milton the Toaster.
How has Kellogg's never made a savory pop tart for lunch/dinner consumption? You'd only need one kitchen appliance! (Two if they needed refrigeration.)
All pop tarts are for lunch/dinner consumption.
But wouldn't you like a cheesy quiche pop tart? Or a pop tart with empanada fillings?
unfrosted cherry FTW*
*although bacon sounds good...
🙁
you can just take your frosted ones and walk away, momma's boy!
I love pop tarts, but usually eat NutraGrain bars. When the kid is a bit older, that might end up being a perk.
I remember some egg, cheese, and meat affair back in the day. So healthy...
Pillsbury made (makes?) a savory Toaster Strudel-like thing. I thought it seemed completely unappetizing despite eating plenty of Hot Pockets and Pizza Rolls in my day.
Honestly, I just really, really miss the blueberry & cream cheese Toaster Strudels. The regular blueberry and strawberry/cream cheese are good, but blueberry/cream cheese were perfect.
I remember those. My teeth hurt just thinking about it.