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Book 55 (of 52) – The Maid

The Maid – Nita Prose

When a hotel guest is found dead in his bed, all evidence seems to point towards the neuro-divergent maid who found him.  When she is charged with murder, her friends rally around her and help put in place a plan to go after the real bad guys.

The Maid, the debut novel from Nita Prose, was an interesting read.  It came to my attention as the winner of Best Mystery and Thriller in the Goodreads Choice Awards for 2022 and, while it wasn’t bad, it wasn’t that great.  It wasn’t even the best of the three nominated novels that I’ve already read.  Now again, it wasn’t a bad book.  It just wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.

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FB8 – Week 48

The second week of my annual December vacation saw a big drop-off as I dived into streaming shows and movies.  The week got off to a bad start on Sunday, finishing with only 2800 steps.  Monday was the big day of the week, managing to come within 19 steps of 5200.  Tuesday saw a big decline, dropping down to 3900 steps.  Wednesday improved somewhat, going up to 4400 steps thanks to a trip to the barber and the not-so-local Tesla shop.  Snow and falling temperatures on Thursday left me 19 steps shy of 2300.  Friday jumped back over 4100 steps despite a sub-zero high.  No Christmas Eve plans on Saturday left me with just 2700 steps.

Total steps: 25,251

Daily average: 3607.3

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2023 Calendar

Now that Christmas has come and gone, we can unveil the cover to this year’s calendar gift, given annually to my mom and sister, and made up of pictures I have taken throughout the year.  It is getting harder and harder to get enough pictures to flesh out the calendar, especially with Angelina spending more and more time in Boston and Michael being homebound for the most part.  Danny, on the other hand, is an embarrassment of riches, between his different band activities.  As in year’s past. the calendar was produced by the good folks at Shutterfly and we will unveil each month’s photo(s) on the first day of the month throughout 2023.

This year’s cover features Angelina, Danny, and Michael masked up outside of Agganis Arena on the BU campus from our visit this summer for Angelina’s graduation.

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Book 54 (of 52) – The Hotel Nantucket

The Hotel Nantucket – Elin Hilderbrand

After a 1922 fire killed a young maid, the Hotel Nantucket saw its fortunes drop.  Before the summer of 2022, a new owner buys the property and spares no expense renovating the property, hiring a local favorite to run it.  Over the course of the summer, the new staff of the hotel comes together to turn the fate, and reputation, of the hotel around.

The Hotel Nantucket by Elin Hilderbrand crossed my path when it finished as a finalist for the 2022 Goodreads Choice Awards for Best Fiction.  The cover grabbed my interest, which is ironic since it has nothing to do with the book’s plot, and I was able to check it out from the library.  I did like it and, the next time I feel the need to return to Nantucket, I’ll look out for one of the author’s many other offerings.

 

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FB8 – Week 47

The first week of my annual December vacation led to my first week over 30,000 steps in nearly two months.  The week got off to a decent enough start on Sunday, finishing with 4200 steps.  A drop on Monday, my last work day of the year, left me with only 3700 steps.  A nice bounce back on Tuesday put me at 4300 steps.  Wednesday was pretty similar, with 4250 steps.  Thursday saw a slight decline, coming 12 steps away from 4000.  Friday jumped back over 4100 steps.  A trip to the grocery store on Saturday pushed me up over 5400 steps, easily my highest total of the week.

Total steps: 30,111

Daily average: 4301.6

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The Cubs Get Their Man

After being linked to nearly all four of the star free agent shortstops this winter, the Cubs nabbed the last one on the table, getting Dansby Swanson on a seven-year, $177 million deal.  The deal is expected to include a full no-trade clause.  Since the Braves had given Swanson a qualifying offer, the Cubs will lose their second-round draft pick and $500,000 in international free agent allocation.

Swanson, who will turn 29 prior to the start of the 2023 season, put together the best offensive season of his career last year.  He will push Nico Hoerner to second base, giving the Cubs a solid defense in the middle of the infield.  It also leaves Nick Madrigal, acquired from the White Sox in 2021, on the outside looking in.

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The White Sox Get Their Man

The hot stove warmed up a bit this past Friday as word broke that the White Sox had signed former Red Sox/Royal/Yankee outfielder Andrew Benintendi to a five-year, $75 million contract.  Slotting into left field, Benintendi strengthens the outfield defense, where the White Sox have been playing first basemen out of position for most of the past two seasons, and adds a much needed lefty bat to the lineup.

The addition of Benintendi likely spells the end of Eloy Jimenez as an everyday outfielder and pushes the slugger into the DH role he was destined to inhabit.  He should also add some balance to a lineup that has struggled against right handed pitching over much of the past two seasons.

Benintendi has been a long target of the White Sox.  They were linked to him in the 2015 draft, where the Red Sox selected him one pick before the White Sox selected Carson Fulmer.  He was also rumored to be a target in the Chris Sale trade, which eventually netted fellow Red Sox prospect Yoan Moncada.  Not to mention that Benintendi spent the most of the past two seasons with the Royals, alongside new White Sox manager Pedro Grifol and coaches Mike Tosar and Eddie Rodríguez.

Benintendi’s $75 million contract now becomes the largest deal in franchise history, surpassing Yasmani Grandal’s $73 million deal inked prior to the 2020 season.  At this rate, the White Sox will crack the nine-figure contract mark in 2048.

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Travelling The 50 States – Mississippi

Over my 48 years, I’ve done my fair share of travelling across these United States.  I thought it would be an interesting experiment go look back at those trips to each of the 31 states I have visited (62% isn’t bad, is it?) and see if, and when, I may be returning.  Working in alphabetical order, we continue today with the 20th state to be added to the Union: Mississippi

State: Mississippi
Joined the Union: 1817
Visits: 1

I made my lone visit to the Magnolia State in 2015 as part of an Elvis-themed road trip.

 

During a road trip to see the sights related to the life of Elvis Presley, our group of intrepid travelers arrived in Tupelo, Mississippi on a Sunday night.  The next morning started with a trip to the former Tupelo Hardware Store, a present-day Ace Hardware, where Elvis purchased his first guitar as an 11-year-old in 1946.  From there, we headed to the two-room house where Elvis was born and lived until his family moved to Memphis in search of a better life in 1948.  That site also contained the Assembly of God church, where the Presley clan worshipped while living in Tupelo.  After that. we headed back north, away from Mississippi.

Will I return?  I don’t see any compelling reason for me to touch down in Mississippi a second time.

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Team Stats: Doubles

It will just over three months until baseball returns to Chicago, so I thought it would be a good time to revisit, for the first time in six years, the all-time rankings in both offensive and defensive categories for all iterations of the current 30 teams for the 1040 games I’ve identified that I have attended.  We continue today on the offensive side of the ball with doubles.

Based on the raw numbers, the White Sox and Cubs are far and away the leaders in this category, as they are the teams I’ve seen most often.  When you adjust the numbers per game, the Guardians, Blue Jays, and Rays all come in with more than two doubles per game.  The Miami iteration of the Marlins are at the bottom, with 1 double every other game, followed by the California incarnation of the Angels, who went double-less.

Doubles

Team Name Doubles
Chicago White Sox 1026
Chicago Cubs 757
Minnesota Twins 107
Kansas City Royals 103
Detroit Tigers 99
Houston Astros 98
Cleveland Indians 95
Milwaukee Brewers 74
Pittsburgh Pirates 67
Boston Red Sox 64
Texas Rangers 64
New York Yankees 57
Toronto Blue Jays 57
Baltimore Orioles 55
Los Angeles Dodgers 53
Cincinnati Reds 53
Oakland Athletics 50
St. Louis Cardinals 49
Seattle Mariners 48
Tampa Bay Rays 47
Los Angeles Angels 45
Florida Marlins 38
Philadelphia Phillies 36
San Francisco Giants 35
Arizona Diamondbacks 34
New York Mets 31
San Diego Padres 31
Colorado Rockies 30
Atlanta Braves 29
Washington Nationals 14
Montreal Expos 8
Tampa Bay Devil Rays 8
Cleveland Guardians 7
Anaheim Angels 4
Miami Marlins 1
California Angels 0

Doubles per Game

TeamName Doubles per Game
Cleveland Guardians 2.33333333333333
Toronto Blue Jays 2.11111111111111
Tampa Bay Rays 2.04347826086957
Houston Astros 2
Arizona Diamondbacks 2
Boston Red Sox 2
Anaheim Angels 2
New York Yankees 1.83870967741935
Los Angeles Dodgers Continue reading →