As I write this (at about 5:45 AM), the area where I live is under a Tropical Storm Warning. It is currently raining here although the winds have not yet increased. We are supposed to have seven or eight hours of winds with at least tropical storm force (>39 MPH) gusts.
As I have written before, we live in a neighborhood with many tall trees, including such trees on our lot, that make weather like this most nerve-wracking. I am imagining a worst-case scenario in which we suffer damage that forces us to put the attempt to sell our house on hold. Hey, I am a child of Holocaust survivors and I expect the worst to happen.
“Mother Nature” seems most cruel at present. “The virus” seems unstoppable and although most people who become infected survive, as age increases so does the mortality rate from it. I am not a young person. I believe that until safe and effective vaccines are widely available, we are all going to have to stay in “virus mode.” People who want to go back to normal now are simply clueless.
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Today is Roger Clemens’ birthday. If you don’t know–or even if you do–he is one of the most accomplished players in major league baseball history. Clemens won the Cy Young Award as the best pitcher in his league seven times, more than any other pitcher in history.
He was credited with 354 wins in his career; any number 300 or higher is rare and significant. He is the only pitcher in history with 350+ wins and 4,500+ strikeouts. What is also significant is that Clemens is the only pitcher with 300+ career wins who is not a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Clemens has been dogged by accusations that he used steroids during his career. He was also indicted on charges, including perjury and contempt of Congress, stemming from testimony he gave to Congress about his use of such substances. His first trial ended in a mistrial and he was acquitted on all charges in his second trial.
The principle that people are innocent until proven guilty does not apply in the court of public opinion. To the extent that I have an opinion, I think it’s absurd that Clemens is not in the Hall of Fame. Even if he used steroids, those substances cannot turn an ordinary player into a Hall of Fame player.
I don’t know anything about the Basketball or Hockey Halls of Fame, but I think both the Baseball and Football Halls are tainted, primarily by the inclusion of players who don’t belong. However, I think the Baseball Hall of Fame is also tainted by the sanctimonious behavior of many of its voters.
From a Pinterest page, a picture of Roger Clemens:
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I am currently re-reading Packard: A History of the Motor Car and the Company edited by the late, great Beverly Rae Kimes. She was known as the “First Lady of Automotive History.” The book was awarded the prestigious Cugnot prize for automotive writing.
The book is quite thorough and for someone like me with ADD tendencies it is virtually impossible for me to completely read it word for word. (The book is 828 pages long.) I am also overwhelmed by the desire to re-write history, for Packard to have merged with Nash (or maybe with Nash and Hudson) instead of with Studebaker and at least surviving until Chrysler’s purchase of American Motors in 1987.
I think it is human nature to form an alternate history scenario that ends much more pleasantly than real life. “What If?” is a common question. From the Packard forum (Hey, site moderators. Why doesn’t the Packard forum have a secure URL beginning with https?) a picture of a 1933 Dietrich-bodied V-12 convertible:
From Streetside Classics a picture of a 1956 Packard Executive:
Maybe some day…
#TropicalStormTuesday
#RogerClemens
#Packard
#BeverlyRaeKimes
#somanycarsjustonelife
#disaffectedmusings
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Update: I’m posting from my phone at 1:10 PM Eastern Time. We lost power at 12:30. In anticipation of such an event I surrounded the milk in the fridge with ice packs. Modern refrigerators are not designed to keep food cold very long without power.
I hope power outages are far less common in the desert. In any event we are going to have some type of backup power system.
Disaffected Musings 
I had an opportunity to view the 1954 Packard Panther at Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale, It is a concept car, one of only four built, and one of two featuring a supercharged engine. That rarest of rare cars sold in 2013 for $825,000 USD. Maybe someday… but I doubt it. >grin<
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Thanks for sharing, sir. For a company with a (deserved) reputation for being unwilling to change, Packard produced a fair number of concept cars.
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On one vacation trip to Disneyland and Southern California, I took the family to see the then Anaheim Angels play the Boston Red Sox and also to see Roger Clemens as the starting pitcher for the Red Sox. A memorable game for my baseball loving son, Matthew, about age 9 at the time.
Stay safe in the storm. When storms like this are active, we usually have the Weather Channel on during the day to follow along what is happening. It also gives us a break from the political nonsense on the “news” channels. Ever since that day of September 11, 2001 we generally have the news on to stay informed.
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Thanks for sharing your story, Philip. You have now joined photobyjohnbo and Dirty Dingus McGee in having 100+ published comments out of the last 1,000. I appreciate your active participation in my little blog.
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This morning after a very intense dream, I woke up at 3:30 am to a steady rain and decided to listen to a jazz station on Pandora. Three hours later, I took out the trash in a slight drizzle. Unfortunately, sitting on the couch earlier I developed a spasm in my neck. So now I’m in bed with a heating pad, with the window open listening to the wind going through the trees.
This is in contrast to 1972 when Agnes hit Maryland, and we had to go to school because it was graduation day. The park next to my house was flooded, but fortunately the park was in a valley so there was no threat to our house.
Then there was Emily. We were vacationing with our two year old on the Outer Banks when the television woke up the house with the EBS warning to evacuate. The four families backed up the house and drove three hours inland to stay overnight at a hotel. Luckily there was little damage to the beach house, and we resumed our vacation.
During Isabel, I was living with my cousin after just separating from my first wife. We batten down the hatches and had a hurricane party.
I’ll get up now and bring in the trash can before it gets blown down the street.
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Yes, I remember elementary school graduation during Agnes. My foot was in a cast although I was no longer on crutches. I had specific instructions to keep the cast dry. Good luck with that during a tropical system.
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Re; the Kung Flu
I think “normal” these days is what you are willing to do for yourself. It varies by the individual, the store, the state, the country. As for a vaccine, I don’t know. From some articles I’ve read, the virus has already mutated several times, which would likely render a vaccine only partly successful. I also wonder about some of the hype, as it seems 98% of people recover. I know that for some the survival is touch and go, a friend in New York had it and spent a month in the hospital and nearly died. He was a pretty healthy person, doesn’t smoke, light drinker, works out 3-4 times a week, eats basically healthy, but still got it even taking precautions. I know others who drink, smoke, don’t work out, live on junk food, don’t wear a mask and are still doing fine.
Myself, I take precautions, but still have to be around people for my work. I can’t live in a bubble, but I can take some reasonable precautions. I’ll be heading out of town soon for a couple weeks on business, to a known “hot spot”, Florida. We will see what awaits us when we get there.
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Thanks for commenting, DDM. Sorry I’m slow to respond, but it’s the best I can do under the circumstances.
It is the unpredictability of the virus that mandates it must be respected. Any extra ability to fight it off provided by a vaccine is a good thing.
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Being a Blue Jays fan, I saw quite a lot of Rocket Roger over his career. Interesting he won his only 2 triple crowns in Toronto, overshadowed by the fact the team missed the playoffs each time. No denying his on-field accomplishments. But of course the BBWAA are well known for their collective ability to collude if they wish to keep someone out of Cooperstown. I guess some see it as their duty to mete our the punishment that Baseball May have been reluctant to. (Although, I won’t for a second suggest it would be easy to determine who deserves punishment or how one would even begin to sort out which wins/stats are legitimate or how the record should be ‘fixed’.)
I’m intrigued by your Packard history book. I’ll have to keep an eye out for it. I have the one published by Crestline, which I enjoy but it’s quite dense and dry. Let me know if you’d like to review the book as a guest post!
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Thanks for sharing. I didn’t really know you are a baseball fan.
The Kimes book about Packard is probably out of print and not inexpensive to acquire. I think I bought mine on Alibris.com. I would welcome a review as a guest post or you could write about something else having to do with cars.
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When I was younger, I used to watch a lot of ball, but I’m a much more casual fan these days. I guess it wasn’t in my blood as much as hockey and football.
A look on Amazon confirms that while there are some of the Kimes book available, they are indeed expensive. Maybe I’ll just have to re-read my Packard history from the Crestline series (also not an inexpensive book to get it seems).
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I am a pioneer of sports analytics and a “father” of Moneyball, but I don’t follow baseball at all. To be crude, baseball divorced me (as has the rest of the American work infrastructure) so I don’t give a sh*t what my “ex-wife” is doing.
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I can certainly understand that.
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Thanks, sir, but many people cannot understand.
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