Hey:
Happy Cinco de Mayo!
For a stretch at the turn of the century, the first weekend in May, or Cinco de Mayo weekend was extremely fun and memorable, and they made for some awesome Weekly Mails.
In 1999, I was supposed to meet my former co-worker and still amazing friend Emily E. Cody at Culture Club downtown. We never met up, but a dance club that played nothing but 80's music and was showing all John Hughes movies on the TV's? I thought I died and went to heaven.
In 2000, I had given up drinking for Lent, and Easter was kind of late that year. Patti-Ann wanted to go to a place on 42nd Street named Ryan McFadden's. While waiting on the line to get in, I felt two hands tapping me on the shoulder. Paddy Tubz and Craig Leahy, ushered me in through a back entrance. I felt like a red-carpet celebrity. (and a few years later-on a random August night-the subject of Ryan McFadden's bar would come up in conversation, and the course of my life would change forever)
In 2001, I had my 10-year high school reunion. My plan was to drive to my old high school, catch up with the guys and call it an early night, as Krissy and Steve's rehearsal dinner was the next afternoon. Well, that didn't happen. I mean the rehearsal and dinner went on, and I made it to both, but not before heading into Manhattan from East Elmhurst in a limo full of my classmates from Rockaway, who plied me with Jack Daniels, followed by closing down Martell's on 2nd Avenue and having to take the Q53 back home from Rockaway Sunday morning. I'm having a hangover just thinking about that.
Fast forward a few years later, on May 5, 2006, a carriage horse got loose on 11th Avenue and 45th Street and got its leather reigns caught up in a car. The horse yanked the car on its side. The Post sent me over to interview witnesses, including the owner of the car who bartended near the area of the accident. (And was a County Kerry man, like myself) Across from that bar was the Penthouse Gentlemen's Club, and I wouldn't have been doing my due diligence as a reporter if I didn't go in and try to see if any of the, um, entertainers had seen anything on their way in to work. Best part? I got to put everything on my expense report. So the fact that I didn't get a byline on this story wasn't the worst thing in the world.
Good times. But these days are pretty awesome too.
Onto the week that was...
BASKETBALL: Knicks Survive and Advance
I have a confession to make.... I didn't watch Game 6 of the Knicks-Sixers series.
The game started at 9 PM EDT on Thursday. I once stayed up to watch two Mets-D'Backs playoff games that started at 11 PM EDT (8PM in Phoenix) I had to get up for work the next morning just like I had to get up for work this past Friday.
But I was 26 in 1999. I'm 50 now.
And I couldn't understand why the hell a playoff game being played on the east coast of the United States had to start at that ungodly hour. And I was convinced the game would go into OT, so I was sure we were looking at a 1:30 AM ending. I don't want to turn this post into a Phil Mushnick column, but that made no sense.
Not sure what time the game ended, but it did with the Knicks winning despite blowing a couple of big leads while also coming back from 10 points down. This game, and the series for that matter, wasn't for the faint of heart.
The Knicks were actually 28 seconds from wrapping this series up in a neat 5 games, but they fell apart at the end of Game 5 at the Garden. The normally unflappable Jalen Brunson missed a free throw and then making a bad pass to Mitchell Robinson.
Maybe there was a part of me that thought the Knicks let the Sixers back into the series and were going to pay for it down in Philly. One of the team's owners bought up 2,000 tickets to give to Philadelpha first responders and front-line healthcare workers, lest the arena be filled with Knicks fans who made the 2-hour trip from NY like it was at the end of Game 3 last Sunday. Honestly, I can dig that, rewarding those who serve your city while ensuring that it's your fans who are there supporting the team. You could also lower the ticket prices so that regular fans can afford to go to the games, I mean that's a novel idea, right? I can't stand it when athletes and sports talkies get on fanbases for not getting out there to support the team. (Mad Dog Russo is notorious for this. Another dude who gets paid big $$$ to tell you what you should do with your not quite as big $$$)
But the Knicks came through, even as Sixers management was able to pack Wells Fargo Center with Sixers fans. They got to see their team's season come to an end.
And now it's on to play the Indiana Pacers, who have given us Knicks fans some of our greatest victories and also handed us our most heartbreaking defeats. I think we are due for another great victory to get us to the Conference Finals. That's not a prediction, I'm just saying we are due.
HOCKEY: Rangers-Hurricanes
Game One ws a nail biter today, as I suspect all the games in the series will be. There were plenty of good signs. Igor Shesterkin looked great making a couple of nice saves, and of the 3 goals he allowed, only the second one was one I thought he should have stopped. The first one took a couple of flukey bounces and the the third one there were three Hurricanies jamming the net.
The Rangers special teams was outstanding today.
Some people made kind of a big deal that the Rangers are actually slight underdogs according to the betting lines. I think this is as even a matchup as there is. Carolina is really good, that was a solid Islanders team they beat in the first round. As I said this series is going to be a war. Since the NHL decided to go to a bracket playoff format rather than re-seed after every round like they used to, the two best teams in the conference play in the second round as opposed to the conference finals. I'm not sure that's the best way to do things, but what do I know.
It looks like either the Knicks or the Rangers will be playing every night this week. Should be quite a ride.
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THE GREAT ESCAPE-Send in the Clowns!
Four Zebras that were being transported from suburban Seattle to a Montana zoo escaped when their owner pulled over to secure the trailer they were in.
Photo Credit:USA Today
Three of the zebras were caught almost right away, and my favorite part of the story is that amongst the people given credit for helping to corral the wayward zebras was a rodeo clown.
David Danton, who according to the Times, worked as a rodeo clown and rodeo bullfighter for 15 years, and his wife happened to be in the area where the zebra's escaped.
Julie Danton believed it was "divine intervention" that she and her husband were there at that time, since "we had the knowledge" (of corralling animals) According to the Times article....
Mr. Danton said he built some makeshift gates out of rope, metal panels and a garden hose, and got two of the zebras to run into a pen on a horse farm. Then, he said, he helped build an “alleyway” out of metal panels to usher the zebras safely into a large trailer.
“It worked out as well as it possibly could have,” Mr. Danton said. “It’s just about being quiet, working them gentle and not getting excited.”
Still, he said, “Nobody trains you for wrangling zebras.”
Yeah, I would imagine they didn't teach that at rodeo clown school.
Amazingly, the fourth zebra managed to stay on the lam for almost an entire week before it too was recaptured. How a zebra could go unspotted for a week anywhere here in the US kind of blows my mind, but this one managed to stay on the run till Friday evening.
There was some concern, because trail camera that picked up images of the zebra also captured pictures of cougars in the area. No not the Demi Moore/Cher cougars who date half their age. Real cougars,, who eat zebras.
Thankfully the last zebra was caught before he became someone else dinner. All 4 are now en-route to Montana. What they should have done was get him to Churchill Downs and run him in the Kentucky Derby. When I worked at OTB, one of my co-workers always said the horse that gives you the hardest time getting in the gate is the one that's going to win the race. It's not really true, but it was a good theory.
Here's another funny animal story....
THE BUZZ- Bee's delay baseball game
Last Tuesday's Dodgers-D'Backs game at Chase Field was delayed almost two hours because thousands of bees decided to use the net behind home plate as a nest.
Fortunately, the D'Backs placed a call to one Matt Hilton, a Phoenix area beekeeper. They brought him to home plate in the bullpen cart (for real) and put him up on a scissor lift, where he sprayed the bees and then vacuumed them up to be relocated to a bee farm.
For his efforts, the D'Backs let Hilton throw out the first pitch. He told Arizona Sports.com he was happy to do it but "felt bad for the guy" who was supposed to throw the first pitch.
It was a good thing he was there too, or else this could have turned into an Irwin Allen horror movie.
As he said to the Bickley and Marotta radio show....
“The reality is most times when they’re swarming like this, they’re pretty docile. Their main focus is just covering that queen bee and protecting her. But if they do get riled up — let’s say a ball had hit the net and it disturbed them — then they can get agitated and that’s when it can start turning south,”
One foul ball that hit that net and we'd have a re-make of The Swarm.
The attitude towards bees have changed over the course of my lifetime, or maybe I'm just imagining that. I really believe that 30 or 40 years ago, those bees would have been captured and destroyed. But now in addition to producing honey, bees are now being credited with several more contributions to the environment, hence their being relocated.
In any event, with apologies to David Muir and the rest of ABC World News Tonight, here's to our persons of the week. Beekeeper Matt Hilton and Rodeo Clown David Danton and his wife Julie.
Once again, the link to donate to Running for Rebecca, May 16, 2024 @ 5 PM.
https://www2.heart.org/site/TR/HeartWalk/FDA-FoundersAffiliate?px=17407286&pg=personal&fr_id=9845
Stay Safe
and Have a Great Week
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