This is Day 21 of our self-quarantine and Day 14 of KC’s Stay-At-Home order.
Skip Quimby tells me that for folks like us (i.e., over 70), it’s the new “aging in place.”
As for my intent to discontinue the day-by-day banter, I have failed. Blame Peggy Zilm. She likes it.
There are other reasons. I have some recurring items I am following and passing along. Joe Posnanski’s countdown on the Baseball 100 (every Monday, Wednesday and Friday). Vahe Gregorian’s daily theme songs for the Stay-At-Home order.
But I’ll try to be lighter on the repetitive parts. No repeats of TV shows we are watching. Yoga will continue, but no need to say so. Same on daily walks – unless we take some new trek or a good photo, such as…
After sending out the Hot Stove last Monday, Rita and I followed up on a tip from Ann Mesle for a walking route. We hiked over to the Kauffman Foundation to circle the lake and walk the nearby paths of the Anita B. Gorman Conservation Discovery Center. Photo op: Rita at a social distance from Muriel and Ewing Kauffman at the Kauffman Foundation entrance. It was good to be close to the original Royals family. And the current one – Royals owner John Sherman is the chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Kauffman Foundation.
Groundhog Day – The Movie: References about recurring day-by-day activities always makes me think of the 1993 movie Groundhog Day. One of my all-time favorites.
I am guessing most Hot Stove readers are familiar with the film, so just a few main plot points. Bill Murray plays TV weatherman Phil Connors who annually travels to Punxsutawney, PA, to cover Groundhog Day festivities. He hates the assignment and can’t wait to get back home. He clashes with his producer Rita Hanson (Andie MacDowell) who finds him boorish and unprofessional. She is right. They arrive in town on February 1. When Connors wakes up on the morning of February 2, the clock radio alarm is playing “I Got You Babe” by Sonny and Cher. The TV team covers the Punxsutawney Phil festivities, with Connors doing a half-hearted show. His hope for rushing out of town is thwarted by a snow storm.
Forced to stay overnight, he wakes up to Sonny and Cher again, and the news seems just like yesterday. It is. He is living February 2 over again. And again, etc. His attitude and interactions with others change from day to repeated day – mostly for the bad in the beginning and then gradually improving, especially with Rita (like that name). Click here for the trailer and here to see a series of his morning wakeup moments with Sonny and Cher.
[Bonus Info: Groundhog Day is currently streaming on Netflix.]
Groundhog Day – Life: And so it goes with COVID-19, a Groundhog Day experience that is sadly outlasting Bill Murray.
I was pretty sure I had written about the movie in Hot Stove, so I did a search of the Lonnie’s Jukebox website. I got seven hits, but only four were from Hot Stove. The other three were from the tag “Rita’s Cancer Journey.” And it all came back. Rita and I had lived this drill before. Déjà vu all over again, as Yogi Berra would say.
In June of 2012, Rita began her journey with breast cancer. After two surgeries, Rita moved on to chemo. That’s when our lifestyle closely matched what is happening with Stay-At-Home. Fearing infection, Rita did not go out much. We ate at home – the difference being that friends and a good caterer provided meals rather than Rita cooking (Lonnie’s mastering of kitchen appliances is limited to the toaster). So it was eat, sleep, read and TV.
As for the outside world, Rita informed several friends in a couple of emails, and then as word got out, her support village blossomed. To keep everyone up to date, I took over the message duties, but always with her expert editorial contributions. There were ultimately 21 emails in the process (they are collected in Lonnie’s Jukebox at this link). Here is an excerpt from December 13, 2012:
Cancer patients on a regular chemo schedule develop a personalized calendar – Gregorian and lunar calendars need not apply. Life for Rita is on the rhythm of a 3-week cycle with an overlay of the movie Groundhog Day where Bill Murray wakes up each morning and finds that he is in a time loop of repeating February 2 again and again. Rita’s version: Tuesday before chemo – take steroid pills – helps with side effects and is a proven feel-good buzz. Day of chemo (Wednesday) – get infusions and take more steroids. Thursday – more steroids. Friday – feeling fine with Thursday’s steroids still giving a buzz. Overnight Friday to Saturday – steroids have worn off and the low-grade fever begins (cue Little Willie John). This is the stage where Rita’s script gets a Groundhog Day rewrite each time as the fatigue varies from hour to hour and her fever moves up and down over an uncertain number of days. Then, the 3 weeks is up and the time loop starts again. Rita is looking forward to the day that the chemo is gone, just like Bill Murray’s bad traits go away in Groundhog Day and he is released to February 3 and gets the girl, Andie MacDowell. Rita is aware of my long-time special appreciation for actress/model Andie MacDowell, but in my defense, Andie’s character in the movie is named Rita. I’m not Bill Murray, but I got the right Rita.
As we are all doing now with COVID-19, some things just had to be missed. A big one for us back in January of 2013 was missing President Obama’s second Inaugural. We had been to the first, and it was quite special. We still celebrated the second via TV and Rita wore her hat from the first Inaugural:
As Rita’s journey ended, Groundhog Day was again noted. From February 13, 2013:
If the 3-week chemo rhythm cycle was still in place, Rita and I would be spending most of today at the KU Cancer Center. Instead, she started this morning with yoga and is at the moment celebrating with her yoga buddies at a coffee shop (photo below). Fittingly, Groundhog Day was in this past 3-week period and, like Bill Murray in the movie, she has escaped that nagging repeating loop. The side effects from the final chemo treatment were unremarkable and Rita quickly trended up to almost full-time yoga and took walks on the treadmill and in Loose Park during that good weather. Attended book club last night.
If you take a look at the emails, you will find that they were a precursor to Hot Stove. I write and Rita edits. They get longer over time, needing to be broken down into sections. Photos get added. A lot of music is played.
One more thing carried over – the mailing list grows as the village gets bigger. It’s one of the most satisfying results. Rita, in her own words, stated it this way in one of our emails:
To say I have “survived and thrived” during this journey would be true. With love, thanks, and kudos to so many for making that the case. I have a bulletin board filled with your cards. And an email inbox brimming with well wishes. And to my husband, who has walked every step of the way with me. I have often said, “if I wasn’t me, I’d want to be me.” It is truer now than ever. Today my hope is to be a resource for those who follow me along the same journey. Just as I was guided by cancer survivors, so I want to be a help to others. Please feel free to share my phone or email.
Not long after our Groundhog Day existence ended, we celebrated with a trip to DC to see the cherry blossoms and to New York for Broadway shows, the Daily Show with Jon Stewart and the special treat of Leonard Cohen at Radio City Music Hall.
My reason for telling you all of this? Be patient, and know that the current Groundhog Day lifestyle will end. You will be back to Kauffman Stadium, First Friday or whatever makes you smile. And it will be grand.
Groundhog Day – The Chiefs: Remember the very different vibe we were feeling just two months ago on Groundhog Day. It was 02/02/2020 (love the palindrome date). The Chiefs won the Super Bowl. At the Power and Light District and at Union Station, we witnessed the antithesis of social-distancing. The good old days.
Day 15, Tuesday (March 31): I’ll back up to catch Monday’s post from Joe Posnanski. He has worked his way from #100 to #7 in the Baseball 100.
Baseball 100 – Walter Johnson (#7): In 1936, five players were named to the first class to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. Three hitters – Honus Wagner, Ty Cobb and Babe Ruth. Two pitchers – Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson. At the time, the consensus was that Johnson was the best pitcher in baseball history. Under Joe Posnanski’s ratings, that remains true in 2020. Johnson will be Joe’s highest ranked pitcher – the remaining six slots will be hitters.
Joe’s essays in this series are heavily researched, and he comes up with some great quotes. On Johnson, known for his blazing fastball: “The thing just hissed with danger,” Ty Cobb said. “When you see the arm starting forward,” Birdie McCree said, “swing.” “He’s got a gun concealed about his person,” Ring Lardner wrote, “and he shoots them.”
Johnson played his entire 21-year career with the Washington Senators (1907-1927). He “won 417 games, far and away the most in modern baseball…He threw 110 shutouts, far and away the most.” He won two MVP awards, one of them in 1924 when he led the Senators to their only World Series win in Washington (franchise moved to Minnesota in 1961).
[DC Baseball Trivia: The first DC World Series victory since 1924 was last year when the Nationals beat the Astros. Remember the baby shark craze with the team and its fans last fall? Well, baby shark is back with a hand-washing video for the current day. Very cute. Click here.]
Forced March: Not really forced, but certainly long. Rita and I walked to Brookside via the trolley trail. The trail is wide enough to provide good social distancing from those you pass. We returned to Brookside by taking the straight line down Wornall to the Plaza. Almost five miles – our longest so far. The added bonus was that we called Jim and Kathy Polsinelli as we passed their condo on the trail. While I talked and waved to Jim, Kathy came down and talked across the fence with Rita. Good to see friendly faces, even at a social distance.
David Von Drehle: As discussed in Hot Stove #124, KC-based Washington Post reporter David Von Drehle is recuperating at home from COVID-19. After a couple of columns on his personal experience, he added a new one on March 31 that gave a good lesson on “pandemic math” – both how the numbers go up and then thankfully down. Another came on April 3 on the CDC. David’s columns can be found here (maybe paywall). David also makes news later in this post for his contributions to the Baseball 100 and Lonnie’s Jukebox.
Day 16, Wednesday (April 1): March Madness has ended. April Madness begins.
I started my day by sending out a Hot Stove Short on Sidd Finch.
Joe Posnanski started the day by sending out his latest pick, Teddy Baseball. Or Splendid Splinter. Or The Kid. Or Thumper. All names for…
Baseball 100 – Ted Williams (#6): Maybe the best hitter of all. The blend of baseball art and science is captured in this passage from Joe’s essay: “This is not to say he was a natural hitter – though Reds star Joey Votto has marveled ‘It was like he was carved out of stone for hitting; he was made like David just for this particular endeavor’ – but instead to say that like Bobby Fischer with chess or Larry Bird with basketball or Charlie Parker with the saxophone, he simply pushed all boundaries of obsession.” As I read Joe’s essay, my thought was that Ted was a composite of both Michelangelo and the David.
When I sent out my April 1 piece on Sidd Finch, I reported that Ted Williams had just been named #6 by Joe. David Von Drehle sent a note, “You give Ted back his war years and I think he’s right there with Babe battling for #1.” Indeed. Williams missed almost five years for two wars, three in WW II and two for Korea. What would his numbers have been if he’d played those five prime years? Presumably better than his five seasons after Korea when he hit .345, .356, .345, .388 and .328, averaging 29 homers a year (while aging from 35 to 39). Awesome hitter.
One of Williams’ finest moments off the field was in 1966 during his Hall of Fame induction speech: “I hope that someday the names of Satchel Paige and Josh Gibson in some way could be added as a symbol of the great Negro players that are not here only because they were not given the chance.” Williams nudge was a factor in the Hall of Fame doing exactly that a few years later. The two Ted specifically mentioned are in Joe’s Baseball 100 – Josh at #15 and Satch at #10. Spoiler – there will be another Negro Leaguer when we reach #5.
Day 17, Thursday (April 2): Fifty years ago today from Charles Schulz:
The first email I receive every morning (M-F) is KCUR’s “Early Bird” (not to be confused with Woodstock in the cartoon above). It’s a brief post about the big items of the day with emphasis on local news. You can sign up here.
The second email I got this morning was from my law partner Tim Sear: “Lonnie – what a column! I read it holding my baseball autographed by Quiz (and Phil Niekro) – and now I’m crying.”
Tim was talking about Joe Posnanski’s column. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, Joe takes a break from his Baseball 100 to cover favorite players. Today it was Dan Quisenberry. I read it. My eyes got misty.
I will link the column (click here) for those who subscribe to The Athletic. If you do not, I have two new reasons you should: (i) to read this poignant piece about Quiz, and (ii) to make sure this quality sports journalism website survives the pandemic. The playoffs for the NBA and NHL and the starting of baseball season would no doubt have brought in new subscribers. Tough times for sportswriters, so I’m nudging again. Of course you would also then get the entire Baseball 100, which I think will be deemed to be the best in sports writing this year.
As for Tim and his autographed ball, here’s his story…
I can remember this like it was yesterday—I’m standing at the right field railing as Quiz is walking to the bullpen prior to the game.
Quiz is flipping a ball into the air as he walks.
I yell—“Hey Quiz—how about an autograph?”
Quiz says—“Got a pen?”
I tossed Quiz a pen—he signed and tossed me the ball–and smiled and stuck the pen in his back pocket.
Royals Home Opener: Today was to be the Royals home opener. David Matson was coming in from Portland and we were going to the game with Jeb Bayer. Around noon today, Jeb emailed “We should all be at Bryant’s about now, but alas!”
Cardinals Home Opener: The Cards were also set for their home opener on April 2. Paul Klug of our firm’s St. Louis office had emailed me last week when he saw the Hot Stove piece on Stan Musial. He said that the fondness for Musial had carried over to this day. “Every kid growing up in St. Louis or attending games from surrounding states had met his or her group ‘at the Stan Musial statue’ before going into the park.”
Confirming what Paul said, Derrick Goold, beat writer (and “lapsed cartoonist”) for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch posted this cartoon, doing what he could to put “home in the home opener.”
Fact of the day: The last year there were no MLB games played in April was 1883. Not a typo.
Day 18, Friday (April 3): Cold outside. No walk. But it’s Friday and that means a new pick from Joe Posnanski.
Baseball 100 – Oscar Charleston (#5): Joe knows he will get some pushback listing Charleston so high, saying “I want you to feel the fury of this ranking, feel it down deep. I want you to think, ‘Look, I’m sure he was terrific but there’s no possible way that Oscar Charleston, who played in a struggling league 100 years ago, could possibly be the fifth greatest player of all time’…should be No. 1…pure romanticism…infuriating tragedy that we as a nation never got to see the greatest player…never even heard of this guy.”
Charleston was a five-tool player who played a dream center field. But he never played in the major leagues. There are some good anecdotes of people praising him (Honus Wagner, John McGraw, Dizzy Dean, Jimmy Foxx, etc.). Buck O’Neil said that Willie Mays was the greatest major leaguer he ever saw, but Charleston was the best player he ever saw.
But so many have “never even heard of this guy.” That of course is Joe’s point. “Yes, I want you to feel rage about this ranking. Because there are only two possibilities. One is that I’m over-ranking Charleston, perhaps out of raw sentimentality. The other is that this is about right, that he was one of the greatest – maybe even the greatest – baseball player who ever lived and most of America ignored him. And that’s where the rage part comes in – we’ll never know for sure.”
But we know for sure that many great players came out of the Negro Leagues. Two will be in Joe’s top four. Willie Mays of the Birmingham Black Barons (1948-50) and Hank Aaron of the Indianapolis Clowns (1952).
In the inaugural post of Hot Stove in November of 2015, my grandson Ian (then 10) and I started picking an all-time lineup. This was spread out over a couple of years and was limited to MLB players. But there was discussion of the players from the Negro Leagues. At catcher, the big three names are Josh Gibson, Yogi Berra and Johnny Bench. I vacillated between Bench and Berra for the MLB best, but I knew that Josh Gibson from the Negro Leagues was the number one choice from some baseball historians, including stats guru Bill James. This drew a comment from David Von Drehle (from Hot Stove #53):
“Lonnie…You have set yourself a very tough challenge here. I think Berra-Bench or Bench-Berra is the right answer for all-time MLB catcher. But I come down with Bill James on this one. The testimony of authoritative figures is so strong. You quote some of it. For Bill Veeck to say that Gibson was worth two Yogi Berras is pretty persuasive stuff, even after you discount for Veeck’s beloved hyperbole. It’s a disgrace, of course, that we have no way of comparing them except anecdotally.”
Bill James ranked the “Greatest 100 Players” in his 2001 Baseball Abstract. The top three for catcher: Gibson (#9), Berra (#41) and Bench (#44).
In Posnanski’s Baseball 100: Gibson (#15), Bench (#30) and Berra (#43).
James had Oscar Charleston at #4 overall.
Day 19, Saturday (April 4): And today I rested. Well, did some Hot Stove writing. Too cold (for us) to walk.
I’ll use this space for a TV recommendation. HBO is streaming all seasons of its best shows for FREE in April. No need to subscribe, just go to HBO Now or HBO Go. Details here. We have only seen the last season of The Wire, but hear all seasons are great. We saw all seasons of the following four shows when they originally ran, and any would be good for binging in April.
The Sopranos: In my top-five of all-time. As close as you can get to the TV equivalent of the first two Godfather movies.
Veep: Julia Louis-Dreyfus is riotously funny as the VP of the United States. She is vain and totally clueless on policy and history. Her charge to her staff of sycophants is to make her look good, no matter the facts. It’s satire.
[The polar opposite of Veep is The West Wing, another of my top-five shows. It’s a drama featuring an experienced and compassionate president with a sense of history. He is surrounded by a staff devoted to public service. In my fantasy political scenario, it’s like Senator Tom Eagleton became president and his talented staff occupied the West Wing. The show streams on Netflix.]
Succession: The patriarch of a family empire has three sons and a daughter, all born on third base and think they hit a triple. One son wants to run for president. The other two sons and the daughter want to succeed daddy, but each is badly flawed. There is also a conniving son-in-law who wants the job. Awful people, but a guilty pleasure to watch.
Six Feet Under: Two brothers run a funeral home. Hard to explain, but it’s good TV. Wait, it’s not TV. It’s HBO.
Day 20, Sunday (April 5): The cool thing on Sunday was a family birthday celebration via Zoom. We ended up with nine camera locations to accommodate children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Rita baked a cake and we sang happy birthday (twice) to the two with March birthdays. The cake now goes to the freezer to be shared when we reach the other side of this.
Lonnie’s Jukebox – Gregorian Chants (Week 2): I am again following sportswriter Vahe Gregorian through his daily tweets of Stay-At-Home theme songs. In some cases, I’ll add bonus picks. Click on the song titles to listen to the music.
Day Eight (March 31) of the Stay-At-Home Order: “Anticipation” by Carly Simon. COVID-19 is “keepin’ me waitin’.”
After I saw Vahe’s tweet on this, I sent him one of the Heinz Ketchup videos that made the song more famous than when it went to #13 in 1971. He admitted that “I’m of the generation (or at least an upbringing) that knew the song first from the ketchup commercial!” Click here for a sample of the ads for Heinz Ketchup that ran in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
This was one of a string of hits by Simon in the 1970’s. If you would like to listen to more Carly, try “You’re So Vain,” “Mockingbird” (with then-husband James Taylor) and “Nobody Does It Better” (for the Roger Moore as James Bond film The Spy Who Loves Me).
Music was in the air. I had two other deejay-like reports that same morning. The first was a David Von Drehle tribute to Joe Diffie, a 61-year-old country singer who died of COVID-19. I had heard the name, but admit I’m not up on country music. David linked several songs, and the one that caught my eye was “Bigger Than the Beatles”. This is definitely worth watching (all the way to the end for Beatles fans). It’s not unusual for a country song to have great lines, and this fits the bill. A Holiday Inn waitress loves the guitar player in the lounge (“he looks like Elvis”). A sample:
They got a love bigger then the Beatles
Wild and free like a Rollin’ Stone
They got a love takes ’em higher than the Eagles
Ain’t life such a sweet, sweet song
Also checking in on Tuesday morning was Jim Fitzpatrick who usually delivers us news in his JimmyCsays blog. Today though, he had some music to share, including “It’s Not Unusual” by Tom Jones. Jim says that when Jones was in the studio recording the song, the piano player went missing. They went to a nearby coffee house frequented by musicians and recruited keyboard man Reginald Dwight (who later became known as Elton John). Click here for Jim’s picks and also to sign up for his blog.
Day Nine: “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” by the Rolling Stones. Toilet paper. Purell. Anything at Costco – oh the lines.
Day 10: “Turn, Turn, Turn” by The Byrds. I had added this as a bonus selection in my last post, and Vahe picked up on it. Gave a nice shout-out in his tweet.
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Day 11: “Better Things” by the Kinks. “I know that better things are on the way…”.
Day 12: “Lean On Me” by Bill Withers. The linked clip on Vahe’s tweet is a nice tribute by John Legend and Stevie Wonder at Withers’ 2015 induction at the R&R Hall of Fame. Click here for the original #1 hit from 1972 and here for a fun video of Withers inspiring the USC football team with the song.
Bill Withers died last week at age 81. His entry into music is a good story. After high school, Withers was in the navy for nine years. After he got out, he was working in a factory in California. He went out one night to a club where Lou Rawls was playing. Rawls was late, and Withers overheard the manager say “I’m paying this guy $2,000 a week and he can’t show up on time.” Withers told Rolling Stone that “I was making $3 an hour, looking for friendly women, and nobody found me interesting. Then Rawls walked in, and these women are talking to him.” He absorbed that lesson, bought a cheap guitar, wrote some songs, did some demo tapes and ended up in the studio with producer Booker T. Jones who with the MGs recorded Withers’ first album. A single off the album became his first big hit (#3), “Ain’t No Sunshine” (when baseball is gone).
Day 13: “I’m Alright” by Kenny Loggins. The clip is from the soundtrack of the 1980 film Caddyshack. As in Groundhog Day, Bill Murray shares the screen with a rodent, this time a golf-course-tunneling gopher.
Day 14 (April 6): “Going the Distance” and “The Final Bell” by Bill Conti. From the Rocky soundtrack. From Vahe: “Great as “Gonna Fly Now” is, these are the ones that make me think most about fighting on.”