Hi everyone,
Welcome back! It seems like it's been forever since we hung out. How was your weekend? What's the plan for this week? It's supposed to be fairly nice weather today, though it's a little dreary right now. Make yourself comfortable, grab a nice medium DD, and let's kick off this shortened week with a little Tuesday Clutter. Sound like a plan? Excellent, here we go...
Before we get to today's headlines, I have to say that Mom Clutter and I had a nice day at Fenway Park on Sunday. The weather was terrific, our seats were great (loge section behind home plate), and we sat next to Jenny Dell's aunt and uncle for some bonus randomness. Clay Buchholz had his strongest outing of the year, Adrian Gonzalez hit a three-run home run in the 7th inning to give the Red Sox the lead, and it was all good...except for the part where Alfredo Aceves blew his first save opportunity in at least a month, and the Red Sox lost 4-3 to the Tampa Bay Rays. Other than that small part, it was a nice day at the park.
Jenny Dell has friendly relatives. (pic via boston.3432.com)
The Red Sox recovered from that loss, though, and beat the Detroit Tigers 6-4 yesterday. Boston got the benefit of a blown call for once, as the first base umpire ruled that a pitch Mike Aviles swung at in the 2nd inning was a foul tip, and that it hit the ground before going into the catchers mitt, so it wasn't strike three. That was definitely not the case, and the Red Sox took advantage, as Aviles went on to hit a single and start a three-run drive. There was some concern when Dustin Pedroia came out of the game after jamming his thumb on yet another great diving play, but it doesn't sound like it's a serious injury. Felix Dubront was strong, going his usual 6 innings, and Jarrod Saltalamacchia continued to be on a roll, hitting his 9th home run of the year. So, Boston is back at .500 once again, and all they have to do for a winning record now is beat Justin Verlander tonight. No sweat, right?
Salty taking care of business again. (pic via sports.yahoo.com)
I didn't realize Big Papi recently gave his seal of approval to Bobby Valentine.
The Boston Celtics seemed to be getting called for technical fouls every 30 seconds last night, and I think one of them was for sneezing. They were such blatantly bad calls, that even the announcers were commenting on the poor job the referees were doing. I expected "The Million Dollar Man" Ted DiBiase to come out at some point with his usual cackle that "everyone's got a price." Make fun of pro wrestling all you want, but at least the WWE admits it's pre-determined entertainment. However, even after you remove the poor officiating, the Celtics still couldn't keep up with the Miami Heat and lost 93-79 in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals. Hopefully they'll find a winning strategy for Game 2 in Miami on Wednesday.
Did the Million Dollar Man get to the refs? (pic via facebook.com)
Looks like the GOP is starting to realize what a mess they're going to have on their hands if the U.S. Supreme Court throws out the Affordable Care Act. The general public will be irate if they lose features like preventing discrimination based on pre-existing conditions, insurance companies will be angry if they're not allowed to spread that risk out via a mandate, and the Tea Party extremists will be furious that they're even discussing any of this. Perhaps they should have thought of some of this before they launched their assault on the law to begin with?
Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson finally cuts to the chase: Mitt Romney is a habitual liar.
It will be interesting to see what's the fallout from the sudden resignation of the NH House GOP leader. Representative D.J. Bettencourt resigned after it was revealed that he falsified extensive documentation about a law school internship he claimed to have had working for another state representative, even though he only actually worked one hour in that role. Bettancourt tried to postpone his resignation until the last day of the legislative session, June 6th, but it was made clear to him that was not a viable option. Will voters remember this incredible dishonesty in the fall?
Sunday might have been the most disturbing Mad Men so far, as women were treated figuratively and literally like whores for the entire hour. The interactions between Don and Joan continue to be some of the strongest acting on the show, but I was squirming for most of the night as the men were generally cruel to the women all night. Cheers to Peggy Olson for deciding she'd had enough and taking a job with a rival agency. I will say that the scene where she gave her notice to Don was also well-acted. You felt like these two had been through the wars together, and that there was great respect, but watching Don's face as he realized Peggy wasn't negotiating for a raise, was moving television.
Okay kids, that's going to do it for now. Let's have Rowan Atkinson (known to many for his roles on Black Adder and Mr. Bean) take us out with some impressive air drumming for today's, "Clip of the Day."
Thanks for stopping by, everyone. It was great to see you, as always. It's going to be a warm one out there, so try to stay cool, and make sure to come back again for more fun soon. Until next time, that's today's Clutter, and we are outta here.