Withdrawal

Well folks, I've been bad. There's no other way to put it. Not the cool Michael Jackson (circa 1987) "Bad." I mean the good-golly-miss-Molly I've been too busy to get down a post in far too long. I can offer a brief recap of my life over the last few months, so as to provide a half-assed explanation as to my absence.

First, I spent two months interning in Congress before the elections. This was tremendously interesting and provided me a chance to see the Nats play at RFK. The game itself was one of the last home games of the year, and the Phillies were in town and still in the playoff hunt. The game became tremendously once I realized that the Nationals pitchers had no interest whatsoever in helping Ryan Howard pad his stats, and walked him intentionally several times in extra innings. It was the first time in recent memory that I left a game before it concluded, but the Metro was shutting down, and RFK Stadium is not in the safest part of Washington DC.

Following this, I returned for some aggressive campaigning before Election Day, and we did very, very well. Nationally, I was thrilled, although locally there were a few (huge) disappointments. To all of the rest of you in the United States, Michele Bachmann is in no way representative of Minnesota. Usually I'd be the first to rip this frigid state (I'm a California native), but it is a very nice place and that woman is seven different kinds of crazy.

After the elections wound down, I went job searching, which lasted until the Friday before Christmas. Since then, I've been at my new job and very busy.

So, in a nutshell, DC - Elections - Job stuff - sorry.

Now, on to other things. While logically, the worst day for baseball fans should fall in the week after the World Series, for me, it's right about now. The NFL fanfare is finally finished, and we're still too damn far away from full spring training for my tastes. We won't see squad games for another month at the earliest. This is a doldrums of sporting interest, with nothing but the NHL and NBA to hold my interest. All the winter meeting deals are done, and there really won't be anything new in baseball for a month, or maybe two.

I'll admit, I'm a baseball junkie. I need a good six month fix to survive the rest of the year. I personally can't wait for the days when ESPN will start televising the Caribbean Series, and I think that the WBC should be held every two. But the point is, I need baseball, and I cannot wait for the season to get here.

Pitchers and catchers in 6 days, though. A little ray of hope for us all.