Tales from the Rain Delay 1, Monday night

Running on cigarettes, coffee, massive salad and chicken fingers for the whole day working against six hours of sleep and a day that began at 7:30, Here we are...baseball.

It's 9:11 PM and they're calling the opening lineups.  Jordan Zimmermann's making his (relatively) greatly anticipated major league start, up against the terrific Buttlanta Braves and Derek Lowe, who's no slouch*.

I met Jeff Francoeur this morning.  Had to run to the visiting clubhouse to get their lineup, and there he was, sticking about half a pound of chaw in his jaw.  He said "what's up."

I said, "wow."  We're best friends.

First inning. Zimmerman with two flyouts and one ground out.  So far, so good.

Saw a stat this morning that peeved me like hell. The Nats' one-two in the lineup have the highest average in baseball.  We're 1-9.  What the hell is this?

Oh, as for the ballpark, there are a good thousand people here at best.  Even some of the lights didn't show up.  I mean, DC's just so alive as it is on a Monday night, I can't imagine why we even have a thousand here.

*His walkout song should be "The Ballad of Curtis Lowe" if only for the lyric, "Curtis was a black man." It would be hysterical.  Ok, maybe it wouldn't but I should curse or disparage too many aspects of this game and what not if I want to keep working here.  Sigh.