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There’s a buzz in the air on opening day

Posted on April 10th, 2007 by GregPC.
Categories: local, Baseball.

And it’s coming from the no fewer than five planes pulling banners and two helicopters loitering over Kenmore Square and Fenway.  (No doubt there’ll be a blimp on hand before too long as well.)

Opening Day is a big deal here in Boston.  When I lived in SF (back in the Candlestick era) I don’t remember nearly the same hype, buzz or anticipation as we have here.  Here in the office, we’re having a late lunch brought in and we’ll be tuning in on big screens in the various conference rooms.

At my last company, we took the day off and spent it at a bar - having lunch, drinking and watching the game.  It was pretty good.

I’ve only been to Fenway for Opening Day once - back in 1997.  The guys from CNET invited me to join them.  We met at the Rat over in Kenmore (gone now) in the morning for drinks before heading to the game.  (We also stopped at a couple of other places en route and more post game if I recall correctly.)

I wish I could say that I remember the game but I don’t.  With the exception of the very first interleague game at Fenway - against the Phillys, which was won on a rainy night when Troy O’Leary was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded - most games tend to blur into a relaxing procession of innings.

Like most people here in Boston, I have perennially high hopes for the season - every season.  Opening Day is here, that means Spring is near and Summer just around the corner.

I can’t wait.

Technorati Tags: Boston, Red Sox, Opening Day, Baseball, Spring, Fenway Park

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Robert Fagles translation of the Aeneid

Posted on April 2nd, 2007 by GregPC.
Categories: Reading, Poems, Books.

I’m reading Robert Fagles translation of the Aeneid and can’t help wanting to tell people how great it is.  Whenever I do though, people raise an eyebrow and nod politely.  “Yes,” they seem to say, “I’m sure it is - if you’re in school.”  This is too bad because it’s a really good story and Fagles makes it easy and exciting to read.

People seem to forget that the classics got to be classics because they’ve been read and enjoyed by people for hundreds - or in this case, thousands - of years.  Unfortunately, what we’re usually presented with are outdated translations that make the texts not only inaccessible but also, in some cases, laughable.

Here’s a passage - the opening of Book Two - from the Aeneid taken from MIT’s Internet Classics Archive, as translated by John Dryden:

All were attentive to the godlike man,

When from his lofty couch he thus began:

“Great queen, what you command me to relate

Renews the sad remembrance of our fate:

An empire from its old foundations rent,

And ev’ry woe the Trojans underwent;

A peopled city made a desart place;

All that I saw, and part of which I was:

Not ev’n the hardest of our foes could hear,

Nor stern Ulysses tell without a tear.

And now the latter watch of wasting night,

And setting stars, to kindly rest invite;

But, since you take such int’rest in our woe,

And Troy’s disastrous end desire to know,

I will restrain my tears, and briefly tell

What in our last and fatal night befell.

The Internet Classics Archive | The Aeneid by Virgil

Now here’s the same passage from the Fagles translation:

Silence, All fell hushed, their eyes fixed on Aeneas now

as the founder of his people, high on a seat of honor,

set out on his story: “Sorrow, unspeakable sorrow,

my queen, you ask me to bring to life once more,

how the Greeks uprooted Troy in all her powers,

our kingdom mourned forever.  What horrors I saw,

a tragedy where I played a leading role myself.

Who could tell such things - not even a Myrmidon,

a Dolopian, or a comrade of iron-hearted Ulysses -

and still refrain from tears? And now, too

the dank night is sweeping down from the sky

and the setting stars incline our heads to sleep.

But if you long so deeply to know what we went through,

to hear, in brief, the last great agony of Troy,

much as I shudder at the memory of it all -

I shrank back in grief - I’ll try to tell it now . . .

The pace and prose of the Fagles version draws me in.  I’m constantly amazed by the story - its twists, its strength, its excitement.  What a pity it is that more people aren’t reading it.  Part of the problem, of course, is that sub par versions are forced on kids when they are young.  This can act as a vaccine, immunizing people against the wonder of these stories.

Do your self a favor and get a copy of this translation of the Aeneid.  At least sit in a bookstore and read Book Two (The Last Hours of Troy) and see if you don’t find yourself wanting to read more.

Technorati Tags: Robert Fagles, Aeneid, classics

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Little things mean a lot

Posted on April 2nd, 2007 by GregPC.
Categories: Brewing, Beer.

Yesterday I kegged a batch of smoked scotch ale I made a couple of weeks ago. My plan was to use two five gallon Corny kegs and a little three gallon one. I’d been having trouble with a connector on one of my five gallon kegs so I was planning on buying a new valve if need be. As it happened, the two fives worked just fine but the three gallon just wouldn’t hold its seal. I was at Barleycorn and Dan and I took the thing apart and put it together more times than I can count. Nothing worked. Finally I looked at the o-ring at the top of the poppet valve. It was all dried and cracked - that was the problem: a tiny rubber ring less than the diameter of a pencil. There was nothing that could be done about it is I ended up bottled a couple of gallons instead (which was fine with me). I’ll need to go to Home Depot or something to see if I can’t find a little washer that will fit the bill.

The beer, by the way, turned out great.

Technorati Tags: beer, homebrewing, keg, o-ring, barleycorn, seal

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