Blogging on a Sunday.

Me and the wife went to see Derek Lowe, or "D-Lowe", as the fans affectionately call him, and the Boston Red Sox face the Baltimore Orioles this afternoon. The Sox won in a 12-3 blowout, but the main event was a bench-clearing brawl during the fourth inning when D-Lowe hit Gary Matthews, Jr. with a pitch in retaliation for the Orioles' pitcher hitting Manny Ramirez in the inning before. Apparently Matthews and Lowe had words, and then Matthews tried to charge the pitcher's mound, with predictable results (though nothing like Izzy Alcantara's immortal kickboxing fracas). The funny thing about watching a fight at a baseball game is that you have no idea what the hell is going on, only that the players aren't where they should be and the crowd is even more unruly than usual. There are no announcements explaining the situation, no instant replays of the offending actions, just a lot of noisy confusion until the teams go back to their respective dugouts and resume play. Reality is messy, I guess. So much of what we experience is now so parsed and packaged by our myriad forms of media that it's hard to imagine that there was a time when life was nothing but the mess, with the detailed play-by-play of what actually happened not emerging for days, months, or even years later. Sure, we always had carrier pigeons, fire signals, and Marathon runners to satisfy our ancestors' need for Headline News, but back then true information junkies really had to work for their fix.

Speaking of information junkies, here's a strange collection of links. Have fun!

I'm supposed to be hosting a kitten poker game this evening, but there's something seriously wrong with the message board at Clem's Corner. Hmph. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Sunnydale's most popular underground sport, kitten poker - which is traditional poker, using kittens as betting currency - is all the rage with the demonic set. We at Clem's Corner use virtual kittens, and try not to let the demons get out of hand. Or cheat. Still a little confused about all of this? Then click here.