Balls, Sticks, & Stuff | Phillies, Eagles, golf and other matters of great importance...

IBWA Awards

The Internet Baseball Writers Association Awards have been announced at All-Baseball.com. To no surprise, not a single Phillie player coach or executive won a category. The only Phillie that received any attention at all was Ryan Madson, who finished fifth in the voting for National League Debut of the Year.

Another Win for Boston

In what has become an annual tradition for me in late October, I pit the recently crowned World Series champion against the 1980 Phillies through the magic of WhatIfSports.com. Despite having home field advantage, I am sad to say the '80 Phightins lost the What If World Series 4 games to 1. Curt Schilling beat Steve Carlton twice and just like this year's World Series, Derek Lowe pitched for Boston in the series clincher.

The R-Braves

Nothing about the Braves minor league system gets by No Pepper and so several days ago, a development in the the Richmond Braves stadium saga was mentioned. To make a long story short, the Braves AAA affiliate has agreed to stay in Richmond for at least two more years in return for the city agreeing to $500,000 worth of work on The Diamond's playing surface.

From firsthand knowledge, I can say The Diamond is in sad shape, a characterless stadium that is starting to show its age. Ironically though, one of the reasons that has The Diamond's playing surface in such sad shape - the record setting amount of rain in Richmond this summer - is also one of the reasons the effort to move the team to downtown Richmond is floundering. Due to the damage of a freak of nature - also know as Hurricane Gaston - the city has become wary of building the stadium in an area of the city flood that is prone to flooding.

Managerial Candidate Roundup

Just as Ed Wade & Co. is keeping an informal mental ranking of the managerial candidates as they interview them, Balls, Sticks, & Stuff has been doing the same. The list so far (ranked in order from most preferrable to least preferrable):

Jim Leyland
Strengths - Managed several early 1990's Pirates teams to the playoffs and won a World Series while managing the 1997 Marlins. Some will devalue his job with the '97 Fish, pointing to the rent-a-Superstar nature of the roster. But Joe Torre will be the first to say that it is no easy task to take a team of superstars to the World Series. Plus, like Torre, he is an ex-catcher, and catchers make the best managers.
Weaknesses - Does he really want to manage again? This is a question Monday's interview might not be able to answer. How do we know that Leyland will not decide by the All-Star break that he is burned out again? But if the Phils brass pheels as if his heart is truly in it again, he should be their guy.

Charlie Manuel
Strengths He is Jim Thome's "guy", but more importantly, he led several Cleveland Indians teams to the playoffs. It was only after the Indians owners decided they had run out of money and gutted the roster than Manuel's winning percentage declined.
Weaknesses - Questions remain about his ability to handle a pitching staff (he is a hitting coach by trade) and his relatively short tenure as a manager makes it difficult to judge such things.

Terry Pendleton
Strengths - He has sat at the feet of several masters, Whitey Herzog and Bobby Cox, certainly osmosis must have occurred at some point.
Weaknesses - He has never managed before at any level, and judging from his own comments, on some internal level he probably has some questions of his own about his ability to lead.

Jim Fregosi
Strengths - Has managed successfully in the past, most notably with the 1993 Phillies.
Weaknesses - It is difficult to re-create the magic of past success. Joe Gibbs is finding that to be the case, and to a certain extent the Phillies are guilty of it already by hiring Larry Bowa. Plus Fregosi isn't of the laid-back variety, something the Phillies are clearly looking for in their next manager.

John Russell
Strengths - The comparisons to Andy Reid are inevitable because hiring a lesser-known, but grounded and confident assistant taking over the reigns has certainly worked well for the Eagles. Also, Russell has had a great deal of success managing in the Pacific Coast League.
Weaknesses - Has never managed in the Bigs. Like Pendelton, he probably deserves a shot somewhere, I'm just not sure I want it to be with my team.

Buddy Bell/Don Baylor
Strengths - Their previous managing experience.
Weaknesses - Their previous managing experience.

Grady Little
Strengths - If the Phils biggest priority is to get the anti-Bowa, then Little is their guy.
Weaknesses - Do I really need to say it again?

Fortunately, the Phillies have several candidates to choose from as Leyland, Russell, Pendleton, and Manuel all deserve to be managing somewhere if they so desire. The case could be made that Pendelton and Russell are unknown quantities and therefore the Phillies - with a dwindling window of opportunity - shouldn't take that kind of chance. That dwindling window of opportunity is the same reason Baylor, Bell, and Little should be passed over because they are known quantities.

How Babe Ruth Influenced Modern Golf

As you probably already know, the name of this little corner of the web is Balls, Sticks, & Stuff. The title was chosen because golf and baseball are my two most passionate diversions, two sports which involve balls and stick-like implements. In the magazine Golf World, writer John Strege performs his own "Double Play" and pens a piece about the relationship between baseball and golf and the players that try to crossover from baseball to golf, particularly Mark McGwire:

McGwire is 41 now, still a stalwart of a man, stronger than a two-club wind, but with hands so gentle that his two toddlers are content to wile away hours at home in them. He plays to a scratch handicap at Shady Canyon GC in Irvine, Calif., his scoring buttressed by a tour-caliber short game that allowed him to win the ADT Golf Skills Challenge last year against a field that included Greg Norman, Colin Montgomerie and Padraig Harrington.

But what is really interesting about the article is the Six Degrees of Separation game Strege sets into motion involving the influence of Babe Ruth on modern golf. It begins with a batting tip former Yankees outfielder Sam Byrd got from the Babe:

Babe Ruth taught him to bat, to hold a towel under his left armpit and to take batting practice by shifting to his right leg, then to his left leg. The towel made his elbow stay down going through the ball. It promoted a flat, level swing. Good hitters will never let the lead arm separate and drop the towel.

Byrd would go on to play the PGA Tour in the 1940's after his baseball career was over, eventually taking Jimmy Ballard under his wing as a golf instructor. In the late 1980's and early 1990's, Jimmy Ballard was to professional golf what Butch Harmon is today, the pro's pro. Byrd and Ballard both felf that the golf swing and the baseball swing were very similar, the only difference was that they were on different planes - the baseball swing is on a plane roughly waist high, and the golf swing tilted downward from that. And just as the baseball swing uses a players entire body to swing the bat, so should the golf swing.

During practice sessions with Curtis Strange when he was in his prime, winning back to back US Opens in 1988 and 1989, Ballard would have Strange tuck a towel under his arms and swing, promoting what Ballard called a "connected" swing. Due to Ballard's success with Strange and others, a trace of the the philosophy can be noticed somewhere in nearly every instructors mantra. Go to any professional golf event's practice range, and chances are you will see at least one player tuck something - a glove, a clubcover, a towel - under his arms and hit balls.

Try it, and maybe it will work out better for you than it did for the Babe. Says Ballard:

He [Ruth] wasn't a very good golfer, Sam [Byrd] could hit his 5-iron farther than Ruth could hit a driver, and it drove him crazy.

The Fat Lady Sang...

...in a Boston accent. Congratulations to the Red Sox Nation.

Thursday's Boston Globe.

Catcher Jason Varitek on bended knee.

If It's All Good, Cut a Deal

Every time phans think they know of all contents on the list the Phillies are keeping of managerial candidates, another one emerges. Last week, the surprise was Terry Pendelton, the hitting coach for the Atlanta Braves. Pendelton is an interesting candidate because he has shared a dugout for several years with a Hall of Fame quality manager, Bobby Cox, though skeptics feel there are ulterior motives.

But the latest candidate to emerge is perhaps the most interesting. Jim Leyland has the best record of any other managerial candidate thus far, and seems to be interested in at least interviewing for the job:

"There are several reasons why it could be a good situation," Leyland said. "But I don't really know yet. I haven't talked to them. I don't know if they're really interested in me, and I don't know if I'm interested. When I say 'not interested,' I mean to a degree where you say everything is perfect. I don't know that. I know they got several candidates, some very impressive names, but how interested they are I don't know. I'm just going to have a conversation with Ed. I don't even know I'd call it an interview. I guess it is, but I'll have a conversation with him and assess some things. There are a lot of positives going on, but I have no clue what Ed is looking for or what their philosophies are. I have no idea what their intentions are, but I guess I'll find out Monday."

That seems like "interested", right?

Lets get ahead of ourselves for a moment. Lets say that Leyland and the Phillies get together and each side decides they can't live without each other. There is still the issue of the Colorado Rockies wanting compensation for someone that managed their team 5 years ago. Certainly the Rockies do not actually want Leyland back, but what they do want is something in return for what might, possibly, could be, may be, theirs. Typically, in cases such as this in modern baseball, the team relinquishing rights is usually awarded draft picks or finacial considerations. And if that is the only thing holding up officially hiring a world champion manager of the laidback variety (exactly what the Phillies have been looking for), then the Phillies should do it. Do it.

The loss of draft picks can be overcome by scouting a little harder for free agents in Latin America. The money can be made up by winning games. But passing up an opportunity for someone like Leyland might not be possible to make up for down the road.

Baseball Preparation, NFL-Style

The Inqy's Jim Salisbury takes us behind the scenes of the Boston Red Sox juggernaut to see the effort the team puts into preparing for every game. Volumes of digitized video clips and column after column of statistics approach a level of effort comparable to most NFL teams, a league which is famous for its efforts in preparation. It's fun to get caught up in marvelling at the tools/toys at the team's disposal, who wouldn't be amazed by a sortable database of video clips of pitchers and their pitches in various game situations on a laptop computer? But there was an interesting remark made by Terry Francona when the discussion turned to the information at his disposal as a manager:

"I like this stuff," he said. "It's what I believe in. I believed in it when I was in Philly, but I wasn't sure how to put it into practice and we didn't have all these resources. These guys have broken it down to where I can handle it and apply it."

Not only is the NFL known for its preparation, but it is also known for teams copying ideas and philosophies of successful teams. This has gone on for a long time in the NFL (it's only recently that the 49ers offensive coordinator is not a candidate for a head coach opening is not an annual event) but we are only beginning to see similar trends in baseball (Oakland A's assistant GM's getting hired away annually so that they can employ their sabermetric know-how for other organizations).

To be fair, the Phillies should not be taken to task because these tools were not available to Francona four or five years ago, as much of this technology and analytical power was in its infancy. But while we are drawing analogies to the NFL, perhaps the Phillies can learn something from their counterparts on the gridiron and begin to copy the latest trends that seem to be paying large dividends on the diamond.

Dumb Golf is Fun Too

Geoff Shackelford debuts his column in the Golfobserver.com with a piece entitled "The Demise of Intelligence". Shackelford has written numerous golf books, most of which deal with traditional golf architecture. One of which is even a piece of fiction.

In "The Demise of Intelligence", Shackelford laments the dumbing down of competitive golf due to the current state of course design:

Restrictive course setups born out of a response to improved equipment have all but eliminated the tradition of intelligence. One could argue that intellect is on the verge of becoming a negative attribute for the professional golfer. After all, who needs to think about picking a fairway side when you are given 25-yards to hit to? And who needs to decide between a 2-iron and a driver when you can drive it past all the trouble and have a flip-sand wedge approach?

The fear is that by de-emphasizing strategy and promoting a style of play that encourages players to repetitively hit the ball high, straight, and far (rather than shaping shots) competitive golf will go the way of competitive tennis, and drag the rest of the sport down with it.

Certainly, the level of interest in the highest competitive forms of any particular sport influences the sport's overall popularity. Everytime Mia Hamm scores a goal, countless young girls take to the soccer fields of suburbia. But golf has been addictive to humans long before the PGA Tour began to take shape or Bobby Jones amazed the world by winning the Grand Slam in 1930. In fact, the first sign of a society being addicted to golf (which is also cited as the earliest known existence of the sport), was when King James II of Scotland banned the game in 1457 because he felt it was distracting the male population from archery practice.

Yes, the elite golfers in the world should be forced to think their ball around the course a bit more, it would certainly be more interesting and therefore add to the overall health of the game. But as long as the masses find golf to be an escape and a challenge - and they do, go to your local golf course and you will find very few people who can reptitively hit the ball high, straight, and far - the state of the game should be of no serious concern.

Fire Ron Zook Dot Done

The Associated Press is reporting that Ron Zook has been fired as head coach of the Florida Gators football team. His departure from the team leaves exactly zero head coaches remaining on my "Run Out of Town List" (Larry Bowa was the other). According to reports, Zook will coach the remaining games on the Gators schedule, excluding any possible bowl berths.

The firing follows a seven point loss to Mississippi State on this past Saturday, the third Gators loss this season - the Gators had blown fourth-quarter losses to Tennessee and Louisiana State. Fourth-quarter losses were also suffered last season to Miami, Florida State, and Mississippi. The fourth-quarter losses caused some to suspect that Zook did not have the composure to be the head coach of a major college program. These suspicions were further enhanced when Zook had a confrontation with an on-campus fraternity the week before the loss to Mississippi State.

To Zook's credit, he has recruited quite well at Florida, bringing in Heisman-quality quarterback Chris Leak, running back Ciatrick Fason, and outstanding linebacker Channing Crowder. Zook's recruiting classes were always held in high regard nationally (though as a friend of mine said, "He coaches at Florida. I could recruit at Florida."). Zook also managed to rally last years Gator team to several late season wins to obtain its second consecutive berth to the Outback Bowl (which was a loss for the second consecutive year).

UF officials state that a search for Zook's replacement will begin immediately. And for all the FireRonZook.com-ers out there, Steve Spurrier is reportedly interested in returning to coach the team he left in 2002 to coach the NFL's Washington Redskins. Florida officials are reportedly interested in Spurrier, but they are also said to be interested in several other possible coaches as well, including Oklahoma's Bob Stoops, who was discussed as a possiblity in 2002.

Anniversary of Payne Stewart's Death

Jason at The Golf Blog reminds us that today is the fifth anniversary of Payne Stewart's death in a plane crash just months after winning the U.S. Open.

F.A.Q.

Why do you call the site "Balls, Sticks, & Stuff"?
The two sports I follow the most are golf and baseball.  Both entail striking a spherical object, such as a baseball or golfball, with a utensil often referred to as a stick (as in, "Yeah, I can tee off at 5, but I have to swing home and get my sticks").  I tacked "Stuff" on the end because I am only 99% obsessed with sports and so sometimes I'll post something non-sports related.

Where are you from?
I reside in the suburbs of Richmond, Va., but I grew up in eastern Pennsylvania.  Update: In June 2005, The Missus and I re-located to the Philadelphia area.

How do you remain such a strong Phan even though you live in Virginia?
Mostly through the internet.  I watch Phillies games on MLB.tv, I faithfully read the team's coverage on Philly.com, and read a lot of other great Phillies blogs (check the sidebar and links page).  But to be honest, there was a time not so long ago when I didn't follow the Phillies.  With the Phillies wallowing beneath medicority for much of the 90's, living in another state, and not having any Phillies phriends, I sort of drifted out of touch.  I followed baseball closely, but didn't have a particular team I lived and died with.  Then a couple of years ago, I made a road trip to Cooperstown and the Hall of Fame.  Seeing all of the Phillies history there reminded me that the Phillies are in my heritage (talk about baggage), and so ever since then my interest in the Phightin's has been renewed. Update [June, 2005]:  Despite The Move, much if this is still true, the only difference is that instead of watching the Phillies on MLB.tv, I can now watch them on My.tv or The Local Watering Hole dot tv...basically all around me.  Awesome.

What is your greatest Phillies moment ever?
Well, a close second is 1980, but for me, the greatest is a simple regular season game in July of 2003 against the Expos.  Surprising me for my 30th birthday, my wife rented a room at the Vet, catered it with food and birthday cake, and managed to get all of my best friends and family there.  Friends, family, birthday cake, and baseball...the only thing that was missing was pony rides.

What is your worst Phillies moment?
Joe Carter. 

Where do you get the statistics and facts for your posts?
Several places:  ESPN.com, Sportsline.com, MLB.com, Philly.com, The Hardball Times, USA Today/Baseball Weekly/Sports Weekly, and Baseball-Reference.com.

What is the "trackback" link I see at the bottom of your posts?
It's basically a way to promote discussion amongst blogs, and it's quite easy to use.  For instance, if someone has a blog and wants to link to a particular post I've made, the trackback feature can be used to let me know that the link was created.  Click here for more info.

What makes you write all this stuff down?
I have quite a few friends who are strong baseball fans, but there are few who want to get into the minutia that I like to, so this gives me an outlet for expression and discussion.  But the main reason is because I realized I missed writing.  I did quite a bit of it in graduate school, and there is something about the process of boiling a concept down on paper that I enjoy.  If you asked my wife (usually referred to as The Missus) she would tell you it is because I am my own best audience.

What is your policy on comments?
If you have something to say of the non-malicious or non-spam variety, then post it!

What is the Highlight Reel?
It's a collection of posts that I refer to often in other posts.  They are planks in the Balls, Sticks, & Stuff Party Platform.

Why are some of the links in your archived posts to a Blogspot/Blogger site?
Originally, my blog was hosted at ballssticksstuff.blogspot.com, but for the purposes of customization, reliability, and all around user-friendliness, I moved everything over to Typepad.  So while I was able to import all of my posts from Blogger, there was no way to update all the links within all of my posts.  Unfortunately, none of the reader comments made their way over either.

What is the Back Page?
As Balls, Sticks, & Stuff evolved over at Blogger, most of my posts were longer diatribes regarding the Phillies and baseball, however, there were little things I would want to point out to readers that didn't warrant a long post.  So rather than clutter up B.S. & S. with short little blurbs, I created a second blog and called it the Back Page.  Since Typepad enables posts to be sorted into categories, I decided that having a second blog was unneccesarry, but the concept remains.

If I was bored enough to ever come back to this site, should I go to www.BallsSticksStuff.com or ballssticksstuff.typepad.com?
As of now, I have no intention of moving away from Typepad, but one never knows what some pasty high school kid is developing in his basement, so someday I might move.  But since I own the BallsSticksStuff.com domain, you will always be able to find me that way.

Is there anything else?
No, I think I've learned more than enough.
OK, email me if you think of anything else.

Seen and Heard

--- On Saturday night, on the pre-game coverage of Game 1 of the World Series on ESPN Radio, Larry Bowa was analyzing the St. Louis Cardinals and made it a point to say that he thinks Scott Rolen is a tremendous and great player. My jaw dropped, nearly hitting the steering wheel. Uh, Larry, if he is such a great player, why did you run him out of town?

--- Watching the local NBC channel's morning news is similar to watching a drunk man try and cross an icy street. Every morning's broadcoast, hosted by Andrea McDaniel and Aaron Gilchrist, always contains at least one - if not more - verbal or technical gaffes. This morning, Gichrist stated that last night, Curt Schilling took the mound for the Red Sox with a bandaged knee.

--- This one is a bit older and has been mentioned many times in other places, but I just can't pass up the chance to comment on it. As you may recall, late in Game 6 of the ALCS, Keith Foulke walked Hideki Matsui with the score 4-2 in favor of the Red Sox. The walk prompted analyst Tim McCarver to say, "That's just as good as a home run." Al Leiter and Joe Buck, were left speechless and the broadcast got kind of quiet for a second (cricket, cricket). I used to be of the opinion that if McCarver was good enough for Lefty, he was good enough for me, but that one was the last straw. On the bright side, Fox appears to be grooming Al Leiter, who seems to be not only knowledgeable but has a talent for passing along nuances of the game.

Designated Papi

One of the most argued, discussed, examined, analyzed, detested, and diatribed, topics in all of sports is the concept of the designated hitter. Should it exist? How seriously should career designated hitters be considered for Hall Of Fame induction? If it is allowed in one league, should it be allowed in another league? The sub-arguements go on and on. Google (yes, it's a verb, but that is another arguement completely) "designated hitter" and in 0.59 seconds, about 87,500 results are returned, the first of which is a website entitled Abolish the Designated Hitter From Major League Baseball.

So, if you are looking for that type of arguement, this column is not for you. As a matter of fact, this is a column about something we should all agree on: David Ortiz should play be in the starting lineup when the World Series goes to the Cardinals home field. According to the rules, the designated hitter position is included when World Series games are played in the American League team's park, and not used when games are played in the National League team's park, which leaves the Red Sox in an interesting predicament because Ortiz can flat out hit, but in the field he leaves you a, well, a little flat. So, the Red Sox will be faced with a decision, do they bench Ortiz and use Millar (the usual first baseman) or do they say "defense bedamned" and insert Ortiz at first base (Ortiz's lack of speed prevents him from playing anywhere else)?

During the regular season, Ortiz compiled 41 HR's and 139 RBI, hit for an average of .301, got on base at a .380 clip, slugged .603, and put countless dents in the Green Monstah. So far in the post season (through the first game of the World Series), Ortiz has stepped it up a notch, hitting .458, with 23 RBI, and last night put a dent in Tony Womack's collarbone similar to the dents in the Monstah. In fact, let's look at Ortiz's regular season offensive numbers compared to the other two options the Sox have at first base:

...........................HR.....RBI.....OPS......AB
D Ortiz................. 41.....139.....983.....582
K Millar..................18......74......857.....508
D Mientkiewicz.........6......35......676.....391

So clearly, the Red Sox will lose a measurable amount of firepower if they decide to bench Ortiz. But by keeping Ortiz in the lineup, they will obviously be forced to erect him at first base. So, let's take a look at the defensive measures of these three players (FPCT = fielding percentage; ZR = zone rating, which according to ESPN.com and STATS, Inc. is the percentage of balls fielded by a player that enter his "zone"):

...........................FPCT.....ZR
D Ortiz................. 986......797
K Millar..................989......789
D Mientkiewicz........995......851

Contrary to conventional wisdom, there is very little difference between Ortiz and Millar in terms of fielding first base, while Mientkiewicz sets himself apart from Millar/Ortiz. Given the small statistical difference between Ortiz and Millar in the field, and the large offensive disparity between Ortiz and Millar/Mientkiewicz, it would seem that the strategy the Red Sox should employ would be to erect Ortiz at first base and replace him with Mientkiewicz in the late innings if the Sox have a lead, and reserve Millar for pinch-hitting duties or a double switch scenario.

This post was written on the 4,587th rainy Sunday morning of the 2004 golf season.

Credit Where Credit is Due

It started out innocently enough, I swear.

When I asked PhillyDad in an email where he obtained the banner for his blog, he replied that he did it himself and graciously offered to do the same for me, even emailing one to me before I could accept his offer. One thing led to another and before a short story gets long, let me just say Steve was kind enough to do a few more for me. Look for a rotation of the banners periodically.

Thanks again Steve.

The World Series in Light of 'Protection Externality'

Nearly a month ago, Sabernomics posted the results of a study examining the effects of a batter on the batter that preceedes him in the lineup. In other words, Sabernomics asked the question, "Is there such a thing as protection in a baseball lineup?"

The author of Sabernomics and the study is an economics professor and therefore the post reminds me a great deal of an extended abstract of an academic journal article (and as the author himself states, "it's written for an audience of academic asshats"). The issue at hand is described, followed by a "review of the literature" - a synopsis of other studies on the topic including their respective strengths and weaknesses - followed by a hypothesis statement, a description of the methodology used in the present study, and finishing up with a discussion of the results and their meaning to the issue at hand. In this case, the author concludes that just as other studies have shown, there is no such thing as protection in a lineup. The study is tightly controlled and there is no objective reason to reject the results or the conclusions drawn from it.

But I do anyway. Yes, I've written in the past that I lean heavily towards the sabermetric school of thought, but I am not sold on the absence of protection(yet).

Let's take a subjective look at the two lineups that will take the field for the World Series tonight. Walt Jocketty's Fantasy Lineup should be frought with protection, especially when you consider the point of view of pitchers opposing that lineup. The leadoff hitter, Tony Womack, is enjoying probably the best season of his career, and I think it is reasonable to assume that some portion of credit should be awarded to the four or five sluggers that proceed him in the lineup and not to coincidence. Turning to the dugout on the other side of the diamond, the pitches that come Manny "Sometimes I Forget Which Hand the Glove Goes On" Ramirez's way are certainly influenced by Big Papi being on deck. The reason that protection exists is because the pitchers and their managers believe it exists.

I am not sure how one can objectively and/or mathematically prove the existence of protection in a baseball lineup because smarter and more dedicated people than me have obviously thoroughly examined the concept and have reached the conclusion that protection does not exist (and I couldn't applaud their efforts more). One suggestion I would have might be to somehow chart the location of pitches batters receive rather than analyzing the outcomes. But I think that one thing sabermetricians should keep in mind is that just because we can't measure a tangible effect, does not mean it doesn't exist.

New Digs!

Thank you for coming by the new site, powered by Typepad. The transfer from the old site is nearly complete, however I still have to do the blog equivalent of fixing the dings in the door frames from moving the furniture in (over 150 posts from the "old front page" and "back page") and displaying all my knick-knacks (sidebar links). And like any move, there was a casualty - something that broke - and in this instance, all of the thoughtful comments posted by readers did not make it to BallsSticksStuff.com.

The email address remains the same, but obviously the RSS feed has changed. The old front page and back page have now been consolidated, and so for those of you that were curiously amused by my random posts on the old back page, they can now be found here.

Something else that has not changed is my openness to comments, questions, and suggestions.