Another Day At Home (Sigh...)

Well, the good news is that the car is home once more. The bad news is that we still have no work, and we don't go back till Monday. Nice for vacation, bad for wallet. Looking into a possible trade up, but probably down payments will put it off for right now.
Took a walk today in that lovely light snow this morning. We took the camera in case anything both interesting and capturable came along (it didn't), although we did see the red fox again, and Scrappy had a meeting with a Scottie (which, being a male, didn't go real well).
Hearing more and more about Jim Harbaugh to Miami. Gotta make Sparano feel real good that owner Stephen Ross et al are flying to the coast with reports saying they're going to offer him approximately twice what the 49ers are. At least Rich Rodriguez got the privilege of knowing that he was going to get fired even though Michigan knew they'd never get Harbaugh. Gotta love that statement in the chancelloor's press conf when he said no, he wouldn't be forming a committee to search for a replacement because he had plenty of people giving him advice. IOW, he was quite aware of the alumni breathing down his neck, chanting, "We told you not to hire an outsider...", and was confident they would make his life a living hell unless he hired someone they approved of without having to form a committee to expedite it.
Finally, a shout out to the Baseball HOF for FINALLY putting Bert Blylevin in. Remembering Bert reminded me of the biggest trade I ever saw, in December of '77. Texas was at the heart of this 4 team deal that sent Bert to Pittsburgh, where he would have his typical year in 1978- 14-10, 3.03 ERA. He would rack up 34 wins in Pittsburgh in 3 seasons, moving on to Minnesota, Cleveland, and California to pile up 148 more. Texas also shed themselves of: Tommy Boggs, a pitcher who ended up with a 20-44 career record; Adrian Devine, a pitcher coming off an 11-6 year but only went 7-7 the next 3 seasons; Eddie Miller, an OF who played only 6 games the next year, but went on to have some small success as a pinch runner, all to Atlanta; and Tom Grieve, an outfielder who was much better known later on as Texas' GM, and a player to be named, to the Mets. For Texas' grab bag, the Braves gave up Wille Montanez to the Mets. Willie was a capable OF who gave the Mets his last good season in 1978, .256 BA with 17 HRs and 96 RBI. The player to be named the Mets got was OF Ken Henderson, who had left his best years behind him in San Fran and the south side of Chicago and lasted just 7 games in New York before inflicting his eroding talents on Cincinnati. For all of that value, the Mets sent Jon Matlack to Texas, where he had one of the best years in his 8 years in the majors- 15-13 with a 2.27 ERA; and John Milner to Pittsburgh, where he put up 6 HRs and 38 RBIs the next year and chipped in 16 HRs and 60 RBIs to the "Fam-il-ee" World Series champs of 1979. To finish things off, the Pirates received from the Rangers minor league SS Nelson Norman and 1B Al Oliver, who also became a big cog in the "Fam-il-ee", hitting over .300 in each of his 4 years in Pittsburgh and notching 117 RBI in 1980. So on balance, Texas made out like bandits and so did the Pirates, while the Mets gave up on Matlack (who had had one of his worst years in 1977) a year too soon and the Braves got no more than they could've scraped out of their own double-A team. Oliver and Blylevin are the only ones to have had any lasting success after the deal.
That's hindsight, though. I still remember my excitement when Dick Defay announced the trade on the "sports today with Dick Defay" (subbing for "the gateway to sports with Hilliard Gates"). Ah, Memories.