Portland: Day 2

There is nothing a good shopping spree at IKEA can not solve. A new sofa bed, table, a few chairs and drapes, and viola.

I am sure I will be struck hard with doubt and loneliness again, but hey, I am due for a haircut anyways. :)

Now if all these boxes would just unpack themselves...

Portland: Day 1

Have you ever been so petrified with fear that you have stood staring out at nothing, in one hand holding a beer that is now warm and in the other holding a cigarette like Sigourney Weaver in Aliens?

I just did.

There are a few differences between Sigourney Weaver and I - well besides the fact that I am not hiding from some alien super species with a bad ass level of infinite (yeah fuck you Preditor) - I chose to be here knowing that it was going to be hell.

I just keep thinking over and over, "What have you done? WHAT have you done?" Even now, while typing this, I get wide eyed and nauseous just punching the letters to spell 'alone'. I keep looking around my new apartment. It seems huge - almost like I can barely see the other side - even though it is only 550 square feet. It looks empty - almost desolate - although there is furniture and boxes filling up almost every inch of floor space. I swear the air is stifling and so thick in here you can see it.

What have I done?

It is going to be a long baseball season.

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- Don't tell Bruce Bochy that the Giants' 23-5 exhibition loss Saturday to the Oakland A's was meaningless. It was too embarrassing not to have some significance.

Uh, Duh.

San Francisco (1-3) allowed 29 hits, beginning with seven by Barry Zito in the first inning as Oakland scored eight runs. The A's proceeded to score multiple runs in six separate innings, including each of the first four.

"It's been a long time since I've seen one played quite this bad -- pitching and our defense," Bochy said. "That's as ugly as it gets right there. It's hard to do, really, what we did."

HARD! It is HARD to lose that bad??? Are you fucking kidding me?

No. It is HARD to watch your team play worse than you kid brother's little league team. It is HARD to listen to your same soulless and monotone "pep" talks every game. It is HARD to listen to your rival's snickers and jabs and have nothing to counter with but sticking out your tongue. The only thing that was hard for you and the team this game was the benches you parked your asses on while watching it.

Bochy hopes that sheer repetition will help cure the Giants' ills.

Oh absolutely fucking great. That was his theory last year and we all know how that went. :-/

"That's why you have Spring Training," he said. "I know we're going to have days like this, especially with younger players."

I thought he just said that he has not seen a game like this in a long time, but now he says that he knows we are going to have days like this... again. Absolutely fucking great.

Additionally, the pitchers who yielded Oakland's 15 runs after Zito departed -- Osiris Matos, Kevin Gryboski, Victor Santos, Brian Anderson and Billy Sadler -- are unlikely to make the season-opening staff.

You better fucking believe it they are not going to make it to the roster. Dear lord, demote them to the crew who will have to clean up all the trash thrown onto the field by all the disgruntled Giants fans at the end of each game. Better yet, make them do it with their teeth. We would not want them to over work their fragile "throwing" arms.

Still, Bochy said, "that's not acceptable to have a game like that. I don't care if it is Spring Training. ... We want to get some consistency here, and our game's going to have to be pitching and defense. That's the only way it's going to work, and certainly none of it was there today."

This is of course because we have NO offense!

Zito remained upbeat despite beginning his Cactus League season with a 108.00 ERA. Then again, his Opening Day start at Dodger Stadium was still 30 days away.

How on God's green Earth do you remain upbeat when you ERA is higher than your fucking batting average?!?!

Zito focused on his physical condition, not his statistics, as pitchers tend to do at this time.

If your stats are shit then how the fuck is your physical condition doing well? He is not sore? Who gives a fuck, he only pitched 2/3 an inning. Was he not ill? It would have been nice because then he would have at least had an excuse. So explain to me how he physically was doing well? What, were his balls hanging in his cup just right that day?

"If I felt terrible and the results were better, it wouldn't have been a win in my book," said Zito, who lasted two-thirds of an inning. "Right now, it's about having the body feel good and getting the pitch count up. Obviously you don't want to give up runs, but this is Spring Training."

I don't care if you are on ecstasy and having your cock sucked or so fucking depressed that you are on round the clock suicide watch, fucking pitch, and pitch to win! I don't give a fucking rat's ass how you FEEL. You are not paid (way too much) to FEEL! You are paid to fucking throw the ball past the batters and into the catchers glove, not FEEL. You can tell me how you feel after you win the World Series and then, and only then, will I give a fucking damn about how you FEEL. Asshat.

Zito took solace in his fastball, which he said he threw "downhill," and from his perception that most of Oakland's hits off him came on low pitches.

"I want to start missing below the glove this year," Zito said. "If I'm throwing balls, I want to be down."

Correct me if I am missing something here, but if you have the perception that most of the hits came off your low pitches, then why in God's name would you want to throw low? And why are you taking solace in the pitch that everyone and their frail 90 year grandmas hit? Again, asshat.

Luck also conspired against Zito. With one out, a run in and the bases loaded, Zito fooled Donnie Murphy, who hit a swinging bunt between the pitcher's mound and first base. Neither Zito nor first baseman Dan Ortmeier had a play on the ball, which went for a single. Four more singles in a row followed.

One out. One run in. Bases loaded. A dinky infield hit that should have, but wasn't fielded by the pitcher or the first basemen. Four singles in a row.

Luck? The only luck I see in that is the one out.

"You can't really assign blame on those. Those are just 'tweeners," Zito said.

Tweeners? Really? Tweeners? I am going to go along with Bochy's philosophy of repetition here.

Asshat.