Friday, October 27

Cardinals 5 Detroit 4

The Cards battled all night from behind and found a way to win. They showed the character of a champion.

Cards lead the Series 3 games to 1

I think everyone in Cardinal Nation is holding their breath at this point, still not believing we are on the verge of winning the World Series. The Cardinals have been in more World Series than every baseball franchise except the Yankees, however this would be our first championship since 1982. Twenty-Four years! I was coaching at Eldon High School. Michelle was 9, John was 2, Rachel was a newborn and Matt wasn't born yet.

Tonight we have a chance to wrap it up at home and avoid going back to Detroit. It would be so nice to do this in front of the Cardinal fans. But, it is not over yet. Was reading today that there have been 42 World Series where one team was up 3 games to 1. Only 6 times has the team with 1 win come back to take the series, but 2 of those 6 times it was the Cardinals. We all remember 1985 and the I-70 Series when that very thing happened to the Cardinals. Not this year! We will find a way to win.

The winner tonight may be the weather.

The picture below is a view outside my kitchen door this morning. It is cold, dreary, a winter wind is blowing and it is raining off and on.

The forecast for today says: Nearly continuous rain will persist through the morning hours. Rainfall amounts will average around a tenth of an inch per hour with amounts of around one-third of an inch per hour in the heavier bands. Expect temperatures to be nearly steady in the upper 40s and lower 50s.

For tonight: Mostly cloudy early in the evening and then becoming partly cloudy with a low around 40. Northwest wind 10 to 15 mph. Gusts up to 25 mph in the evening.

For the Cardinals, Jeff Weaver takes the mound tonight with a chance to make history.

He has made a remarkable comeback after the Angels released him and the Cardinals claimed him off the scrap heap. He has been a major contributor for the Cardinals in the playoffs.

Weaver has made 4 postseason starts. He has lasted at least 5 innings in each start and has allowed 3 earned runs or less in each outing. In the postseason he is 2-2 with a very good 2.91 ERA. So far he has alternated wins and losses and took the loss in game 2 in Detroit, the Kenny Rogers smudgegate game.

Last night's MVP would have to be Cardinal Favorite David Eckstein.

The ultimate tough player with limited ability who always finds a way to excel, he is loved by Cardinal fans who have grown accustomed to him coming through in the clutch.

Last night "Eck was superb," as described by teammate Aaron Miles. Eckstein was 4-for-5 with 3 huge doubles that carried the Cardinals to their 5-4 victory over the Tigers in Game 4 of the World Series.

Said Cardinal Manager Tony LaRussa, "He is the definition of a clutch performer. He is the toughest guy I've ever seen in a uniform."

Eckstein already has 1 World Series ring after playing with the Angels in 2002. Now he has pushed his teammates to within 1 win of adding another.

It is amazing that we have scratched and clawed our way to this point without a whole lot of input from the greatest player in baseball, superstar Albert Pujols.

Cardinal fans are waiting and hoping for "el hombre" to break out of it and begin hitting like he has taught us to expect from him. Perhaps he is waiting for the most dramatic moment to launch one of his awesome shots high up into the left field seats.

So far though, in 4 games, Albert is hitting only .167 in 12 at bats with 3 runs, 2 hits, 1 double, 1 home run and 2 RBI's. "Sir Albert" has walked 4 times and struck out twice.

After today only 4 days until I make the trip south for the winter to the Dominican Republic.

The picture below is from my front yard before all this bad weather began. It is definitely fall in the midwest. In another week or so, winter will set in here (jeez I believe it already has) and it is definitely time for me to flee back to the warmth of my winter home.

I have been here for 5 months and it has been a very nice time in my life. Life has been slow and easy with lots of family time. It has been everything I had hoped it would be.

I am a little sad that I will not see my brother, my mother and my kids for awhile, but at the same time, I love the time I spend down in the Caribbean, have lots of friends there and it is time to move forward and enjoy a change of the routine.

I will be especially sad to say farewell for awhile to my youngest son Matt. Matt will leave on November 7 for his permanent duty military assignment at Ramstein Air Force Base in Germany. It may be awhile before we see each other again. I will give him a stern lecture to keep his head down and not volunteer for anything while he is over there. As usual, he probably won't listen to "ole Dad."

I plan to stay until the end of March, but often end up coming home early. We will see.

On Tuesday the 31st, I will meet the transit bus (MO-X) in Columbia at 2 pm for the trip to the airport in St. Louis. Rachel is going to pick me up at the airport and we are going to enjoy some time together over dinner. I will be staying the night at the Holiday Inn-Airport so that I can easily catch my early flight leaving from St. Louis at 6:55 am on Wednesday the 1st of November.

My flight takes me to Miami for a 3-hour layover and then a flight into Puerto Plata. I will arrive there at 4:30 pm local time and my good friend Bruce is going to meet me at the airport.

There is a 2-hour time difference between Sosua and here in Missouri.

As of this writing, almost all my tasks on my list to get ready are completed and for the most part the only thing left are the good-byes for awhile and packing up the suitcases.

The picture below is from the deck of my last apartment outside Sosua.

I will not be going back to the Portofino Apartments (below) because of the distance from downtown Sosua and because the prices have suddenly skyrocketed. When I first started living in Sosua, I could live in most any of the nicer complexes in town for incredibly little money. But, as the outside world discovers the north shore of the Dominican Republic, rentals have more than doubled.

I have a number of goals for the winter in la Republica Dominicana:

Though lately, I have not been very good about making frequent entries in this blog, I do hope to keep a daily journal during the winter. I want to carry my camera more than I have in the past and take lots of pictures of daily life to share with those close to me.

As usual, I have gained a bunch of weight up here in "The Land of the Incredibly Obese." Unbelievable how morbidly fat Americans are these days. I always lose weight in the Caribbean because there is no "fast food," very little processed food, much more exercise since I don't have a car in Sosua. So, as usual, I hope to lose weight and get back into decent shape for an old guy like me.

As always, it is a goal to live the easy, laid back Caribbean life. I will go to bed when I want, get up when I want, hang out in the mornings at my favorite internet restaurant, spend the afternoons either reading by the pool or on a lounge chair at the beach, enjoy a quiet dinner at one of the little restaurants around, some television or time in the evening with friends. Life is good.

I will be moving into a smaller, less luxurious studio apartment this time. The price is right, the location is perfect (downtown Sosua), but it is going to be spartan without many amenities to begin with. Being a single guy and being totally non-materialistic, I don't need much to be happy. The little apartment I have here in Missouri is not large, but it is perfect for me and I have it fixed up just the way I like it. So my goal for the winter is to find a nice little out-of-the-way downtown apartment and get it all customized so that I will have a "nest on each end and can freely go back and forth without worrying about housing.

It will be important to be in daily contact with family through phone calls, e-mail and of course this journal.

I love living within the latino culture and am looking forward to getting back into that atmosphere. I have many Dominican friends and am anxious to see them again.

After having spent 3 years learning to speak Spanish, I am sure my speaking ability has slipped while living up here this past 5 months. So it is a goal to brush up on my espanol and continue to move toward fluency.