This is about looking forward to next year’s minor league games.  I just bought tickets to 17 games for 2010, with more on the way.

First of all, we renewed our Sunday mini-plan for the New Hampshire Fisher Cats.  We were able to get the same great seats that we had for the past two years.  We love these particular seats for several reasons…great view, on the aisle, and no row behind us so that kids can’t kick at the backs of our seats.  Also, very close to the restrooms and my favorite beer stand!

T0day, single-game tickets for the Portland Sea Dogs went on sale.   We bought tickets to six games, three for the weekend of May 21-23, and three for September 3-5.  We’ll be staying up in Portland for both of those weekends, at the Inn at St. John, which is a quick and easy walk to the ballpark.

The PawSox tickets don’t go on sale until December, and I’ll be buying some right away.  Last year, we had good seats, except for some seriously annoying seat-kickers.  I am hoping to be able to get seats on the aisle, in the last row of the green section.  There is a big wide walkway between the back of the green section and the front of the red section, therefor, seat-kicking is impossible.

If you want to see which games I have tickets to so far, check the list in the left sidebar.  It will be added to as more tickets are bought.

I am getting sick of hearing people whining about their FOX shows not being on due to the World Series.  I get mad when they say that all sports should be on cable.  Well, not everyone has cable, a lot of people can’t even afford it.  As sucky as the FOX coverage of baseball is, at least it’s still on free TV.

Well, I’m not much interested in football, but it often pre-empts shows I want to watch.  But that is what DVDs are for, when there’s nothing good on TV, just pop one in and enjoy!

But pretty soon, regular DVDs will become extinct, in favor of Blu-Ray.  Right now, we can get new releases in both DVD and Blu-Ray, just like we used to be able to get either VHS or DVD.  VHS is now gone, and DVD is headed that way, too.

We’ve been putting off on buying a Blu-Ray player, as we know that the longer any new technology is out, the lower the prices get.  But now I seeing that they are coming down.  I found a Memorex Blu-Ray player, on sale, for under $200, plus free shipping.This player is fully HD-compatible…even though we do not yet own an HD TV, we will one day.  And, unlike our VHS tapes, there’ll be no need to replace our vast DVD collection with Blu-Ray movies, ad this machine is backwards-compatible.  This means that  we’d still be able to watch any of the DVDs we already have.

Perhaps I’ll buy this for a family Christmas gift!

Oh, and GOOOOO PHILLIES!  Can they come back and win the next three games?  We can always hope!

It’s times like this that I wish we had a better TV to watch it on.  We have the old, analog, non-HDTVs with the digital converter boxes.  It would be cool to have a big-screen HDTV, such as this 37″ widescreen LG HDTV.

It’s on sale this week at Buy.com, at an amazingly low price for a TV of such good quality.  And there is a free shipping option, as well!

The Hilton Garden Inn in Manchester, NH, where we stay when we go for a weekend of Fisher Cats games, has LG HDTVs in the guest rooms, as well as in the patio bar.  The ones in the rooms aren’t quite as big as this one, but they are still wicked nice.  The ones in the bar are this size, and are even nicer.

We’re not quite ready for new TVs yet, but when we are, we’re definitely going to be looking at the LG brand.

The only feature that this TV is missing is a function that would mute out Tim McCarver, but nothing else.  Joe Buck I can sort of stand, but McCarver will always annoy the crap out of me!

GOOOOOO PHILLIES!

Although the game was on FOX, and cable-less us could have watched it at home, we decided to go out to the local TGI Friday’s to watch it.  I just felt like getting out of the house, having a few Shipyard Pumpkinhead Ales and a meal, and hanging with fellow Y*****-haters.

It was a nice time, and good thing the game went the way I wanted it to…I didn’t want to have to run into the ladies room and gack in the stone sink there!

We’ll be staying home tonight, though…most places get crowded on Thursday nights, and many have football and other sports on, instead.  So we’ll watch Pedro kick some Y***** ass at home!

GOOOOOO PHILLIES!!!!!!!

Mike and I had decided to go this this bar called the Sports Depot to watch this epic match.  We could have watched at home, but wanted to be among fans for this.  Just in case the place was mobbed and we could not get in, I put a blank tape in the VCR and set it to record the game.

We did get there in plenty of time, got the last two seats at the bar…good thing, because at the time, if you sat at a table, you could only stay for two hours.  Kinda dumb for a place that bills itself as a sports bar, what game only goes for two hours?

So we did see the infamous “Where is Roger…In the shower!” game, and we also have it on tape, to keep forever.  But, until we find a more affordable and easier way to transfer it to DVD, we still need a VCR to play it back on.  The old VCR had long since died, we’ve long since started buying DVDs…but we still have tons of VHS tapes, like this one.

So, what we did was purchase a DVD/VCR combo, much like this one.  I bought it as a family Christmas gift a couple of years ago, so now we can easily watch both DVDs and VHS tapes, without having to hook up two different machines.

I don’t know how much longer these will be available, with everything being on DVD now, and the eventual switchover to Blu-Ray.  So if you have a big collection of DVDs and tapes, grab this while you can.  It’s on sale now for under $40, with a free shipping option…you can’t beat that!

Last night, as I watched the Angels nearly snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, I decided to change my Twitter and Facebook profile pics to that of the Phillie Phanatic, as seen above.  This was in protest over the fact that the hated Y*****s were about to go to the World Series.

Well, like magic, no sooner did I make the change, than the Angels came back and won the game!  Now there is still hope for a Y*****-free World Series after all.

Even so, even if the Angels can come back and win, I’m probably still going to root for the Phillies.  I do loves me some Pedro, even though he’s not been with the Red Sox for years now.  I’d love to see him get another World Series ring before he retires.

And if Y***** fans don’t like it, they can go and find the best colon cleanse and…well, you know!

We are going away this weekend, but we’ll still be able to keep up with all of the baseball news, thanks to my Asus netbook.  I bought one of these a couple of months ago, and I absolutely LOVE it!  Before, when we traveled, I was stuck with Mike’s work laptop.  Sometimes, the hotel free WiFi worked, sometimes it didn’t…it’s not OUR computer, and the IT people installed a lot of crap in it that I DO NOT WANT.  Also, having my own laptop means that I can put my own bookmarks on it, and not worry about Mike’s work people seeing stuph they shouldn’t, such as my bitching about his boss being an asshole and all!

This one, the Eee PC 1008HA is similar to the one I have, but has more features, such as a webcam and Bluetooth capability.  Therefore, it is a bit more expensive than mine was, but it’s still at a good price, on sale this week, with free shipping and a bonus $25 Visa gift card!

As I said, I own an Asus netbook, and can vouch for how good these are.  They are small, but not too small, and weigh next to nothing, so you can indeed carry them anywhere.  Mine does a much better job of picking up wireless signals than Mike’s work laptop ever did.

I don’t know how I ever survived without it!  If you are out and about a lot, this is an excellent, lower-cost alternative to a full-sized, full-priced laptop!

Oh…and GOOOOOO ANGELS!  Y*****s SUCK!

So right now I am rooting for the Angels to come back and kick some Y***** ass.  But on the National League side, I’m rooting the the Pedros over the Mannys.  As in, I want the Phillies to win!

I want the Phillies to take the whole enchilada again this year.  GOOOO PHILLIES!

Well, here’s a solution:  Boston Red Sox-2004 World Series Collectors Edition.  This is a fabulous set that not only contains all four games of the historic 2004 World Series, but all seven ALCS games vs. the Y*****s.  And lots of bonus stuff, too!

What’s even better is that it can be yours for an unbeatable sale price…as of this writing, it’s just under $75.00, for 12 DVDs!  And Buy.com also offers a free shipping option, to boot!

If you have a bit more money to spend, Buy.com has a deluxe Boston Red Sox DVD set.  This includes the 2004 World Series set described above, as well as the 2007 Collector’s Edition Set, and another DVD set called Essential Games at Fenway Park.  The cost for this set is a little over $150.00, and once again, Buy.com offers a free shipping option.

The 2007 box set is not quite as comprehensive as the 2004 one, being that MLB rushed it out about two minutes the World Series was over.  Still, it’s well worth owning.

Now, wouldn’t this be a wonderful Christmas gift?

Surely, all of this will keep you in baseball until Spring Training starts up again!

Okay, as if this unfortunate turn of events was not enough, fate chose to give me yet another kick in the pants.  Yesterday, our beloved Dusty-cat passed away.  She had been rapidly losing weight, and seemed to be in some pain over the past day or so.  I knew she didn’t have much time left in this world.  We did our best to make her comfortable, and yesterday, she went and hid in the kitty condo, and passed on peacefully.

Dusty was 16 years old, which is pretty old for a cat.  She had been with us since she was a little baby kitten, although she used to insist that she never was a kitten, that she was born mature.

So, fate…haven’t I suffered enough?  Or are you going to kick me when I’m down yet again, and allow the Evil Empire to be World Champions?  Please, Angels – if you want to live up to your name, you will dispose of the Y*****s ASAP.

It won’t bring back my Dusty-cat, but it will help heal my pain somewhat.