Interrupting the Parade of Anniversaries with Non-Events....

[captainsblog]

I said I'd be observing three things this week, of which only one has crossed this page. We are still on schedule, for both occasions technically fall tomorrow. One will be observed then as it always is; the other happened the same day 40 years later, but it didn't really change all of our lives until we found out about it the following day, so Saturday it is for that.

It's over four months until our anniversary proper, but I was reminded of it today in a bittersweet way, as word came from our former home town about another swing by corporate America at the legacies of its cities.  We long ago gave up watching televised news. I couldn't name all  three current network nightly news anchors if my life depended on it- but in 1987, it was Rather, Brokaw and Jennings.  Before them, Cronkite, Chancellor and Reasoner were literally household names, on the set at 6:30 or 7 in almost every home in America. Just about everywhere I've lived, local news had similar legends doing the 6 and/or 11 newscasts:

Good evening, I'm Roger Grimsby, here now the news....

It's 11 o'clock, do you know where your children are?

and, for my longest stretch of active viewing:

From WOKR Rochester, this is News Source 13 at 11, with Don Alhart, meteorlogist Glenn Johnson, and Mike Catalana on sports.

Roger owned NYC tv news for most of the 70s and 80s. Buffalo's Irv Weinstein spent decades looking after Buffalo's late-roaming kids before scaring the ones at home with tales of "pistol packing punks."  But for the longest stretch from 1985 until we moved here a decade later, Don was the Rochester anchor, even today holding down hours on Channel 13 as the Guinness-verified longest serving local news anchor in the nation. Mike maintains his management of the sports desk. Glenn became the latest in succession to a series of meteorologists including the longtime Bill  Peterson and my onetime Cornell bud Kevin Williams.

And this has to do with our anniversary, what?

Word came from the kingdom to the east that Sinclair Broadcasting, the de facto if not actual licenseholder of the Rochester ABC affiliate, has given Glenn his final five-day forecast. 

"You may ask why I am leaving," Johnson wrote in a message on his social media accounts Tuesday morning. "Like other businesses, television has had a difficult time during the pandemic. As a result, my position has been eliminated due to workforce reduction.

Johnson started at the news station as an intern while still a full-time student at The College at Brockport in 1985, before becoming a part-time meteorologist for WHAM-TV (Channel 13) several months later. He said he will work his final shift on May 27.

After four years as a weekend meteorologist for the station, Johnson moved to weekday mornings. He became the station's chief meteorologist in 2001 when Bill Peterson, Johnson's mentor, retired from the post.

I always liked him, seeing him fill in for Kevin in the mornings and on his regular weekend gigs.. We were married in Rochester in 1987 and our out of town guests were at what was then known as the Holidome in Henrietta.  I went in to check the rezzies ahead of time and there he was on a Friday afternoon, working the front desk, that distinct voice and "Glenn" on his nametag. He was of course just coming up behind Kevin then in the WOKR13 weather department.  It's been ages since I've seen a tv broadcast there (or here, for that matter), but when I've been in town and heard his weather reports on the affiliated AM station, I've always smiled and remembered that moment.  Now, almost 34 years later, he gets far less from that stupid company than he deserves.  They still have plenty of money for Trump shills like Sebastian Gorka, who ship mandatory redneck propaganda that local trusted anchors like Don, and hundreds of their fellow hostages around the country, have been forced to read in must-carry segments.

At least he's getting a final air slot to say goodbye. I won't be there, but I know media friends will record it.

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Another Remembrance of a Thing Past will not be celebrated next month.

After two straight entries about my last baseball game, I will mention a few things about my first. It was July 20, 1967; I wouldn't know for almost 20 years that it was Eleanor's 11th birthday, but fates and baseball go arm-in-pitching arm around here.  The opponents were our beloved Mets' fellow expansion cousins from 1962, the Houston Astros nee Colt(45)'s. Houston had always outplayed us in their first five years, but Amazin'ly were behind us in the standings on that sultry July night by three games in the loss column.

By the end of the night, it was two games behind. Houston whupped us real good, 7-0. In my pre-internet memories, it was always an 8-0 loss, but the record has been fixed.  The losing pitcher was Dick Selma, the nominal ace of the Mets staff even then (Tom Seaver remained buried in the back of the revised yearbook even more than halfway through his very good rookie year). The winner was Astro hurler Don Wilson, who pitched a complete game two-hit shutout.  Selma would escape to San Diego just before the Mets got good; Wilson would die of suicide in his own garage in 1975 following his second straight subpar season.

For 1967 purposes, the 7-0 loss was as fitting as anything. Houston finished passing us in the standings by the end of August, and the Mets ended the year in their usual cellar dwellings- until Gil Hodges would arrive to manage Seaver and a better group beginning the following year.  I don't think I ever saw the Astros as an opponent after that one night; they moved to a separate division in 1969 and left the NL altogether when leagues realigned in 2013.  They've only really given us major trouble once, on our way to the 1986 World Series, when a Game Six against them in their Dome was almost as memorable as the one against the Red Sox at Shea a few weeks later.  Until they won the 2017 World Series amidst later-proven charges of sign-stealing, they were neither friend nor foe to me.  The cheating allegations came out toward the end of 2019, with three MLB managers losing their jobs over the alleged use of garbage can lids to pound out signals of upcoming pitches.  Ironically, one of the three was the man named to take the helm of the Mets in 2020, Carlos Beltran. He is the only manager in team history with an undefeated record of 0-0.  Opposing fans were looking forward to mocking the Astros out of every road ballpark they entered in 2020, but COVID game them the ultimate pass, as the season started late and short and no fans were allowed in to protest.

Now, though, the ballparks have reopened, and the Toronto Blue Jays have remained captive on US soil through at least the end of next month as the border has been COVID-closed. Today was the on-sale date for a limited number of tickets for their first set of games played at their home away from home in downtown Buffalo.  The first opponents included the Yankees, who I had no interest in seeing and couldn't have afforded anyway. But it was tempting to try for a cheaper seat to see the Jays take on Houston in the middle of June. Besides, I could smuggle in my little souvenir trash can from the other night and mock rando Astros banging on it.

Season ticket holders of the wandering Buffalo Bisons got a presale shot at most of the seats (and Bills and Sabres seasoners also got the same shot for some bizarre reason), but the rest went on sale at 10 this morning. By the time I tried, the Sunday afternoon Houston game was already down to single seats, but what seats! Two rows behind the dugout in the vaccinated section for around 60 bucks.  The Ticketmonster clock started ticking, and I was then asked for my MLB dot com login. Which, somehow, I'd forgotten I had! There it was, right in the browser with my email and password saved.  Unfortunately, MLB dot com had also forgotten. Either that, or the damn Mets didn't bother to pass the login information from its own ticket site back to the home office at 700 Park Avenue.  By the time I realized I didn't have a login and ordered up a new one, that seat, and indeed every seat for the entire homestand, was gone....  but StubHub would be more than happy to sell me a seat not nearly as good for twice the price!

No thanks, Astros.

Still, I have lived and learned.  I now have that login ready to roll when the next series of games goes on sale. In time, tickets to the Red Sox, the only team I'd want to see here in the absence of the Mets coming, will be put up. And I am asking around to season ticket holders of the three teams to see what the sekrit code is for the pre-sale. I've gotten emails disclosing from the Mets in the past, and they're usually really stupid things like BASEBALL.

With luck, friends will join me, and I can only hope it will be much a beautiful day for baseball as it was two nights ago. Unfortunately, hope will be all I have, because I can no longer stop at a hotel and ask the weatherman which way the wind's gonna blow.