PLAY BALL ! ! !

Can't type much. In a rush. Off to Orleans to see the Mariners play the Firebirds! Too much traffic in the other direction. I am certain that I will have something very cogent to report tomorrow. Or not. It's a beautiful night for a ballgame. Let's play two, but let's not eat sushi.

Maybe a good excuse to hit the Yardarm for an extra inning or two. I still miss Locicero's.

Rainmakers ! ! ! with a beer chaser

Hey, how come none of the weatherjerks knew that the rain was coming this morning . . . rather than later in the day? Don't know. Don't care. It was nice to get a little wet this morning, and it might have been nicer to have it hang around until beer-thirty. Then we could sit around the bar and discuss rainmakers, like Burt Lancaster and Matt Damon. Movies, that is. Or rain songs: Dylan's "Rainy Day Women" or the Beatles' "Rain." Or others.

Perhaps one of the most popular (and most dippy) rain songs of the Sixties was Burt Bachrach's "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head," which was popularized by the legendary (cough!) B.J. Thomas. The only saving grace to that song, though, was Paul Newman's bicycle scene from "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid."

Always love Newman; always will. Guy had class. And all that Newman's Own stuff was for a good cause. And often tasted pretty damn good. (Exception, that crappy frozen pizza! Sorry, Pablo.) But I digress.

So, below you will see that scene with Newman's lead actress in that film, Katharine Ross. You know, the same one that Dustin Hoffman wanted to marry in "The Graduate" (after he was seduced by her mother, Mrs. Robinson.) But I had to look up her name, because I always confuse her with Ali McGraw, who made more motion pictures (talkies!) than Ross. After falling for that Harvard hockey player (Mr. Farrah Fawcett) in (gag me) "Love Story," she redeemed herself by marrying a real man, Steve McQueen. But, again, I digress.

I need to find a rainy day barstool somewhere soon and sort this all out with Harvey. I sure hope he doesn't get going about "Bonnie & Clyde."

Mayor Alec Baldwin, NYC?

Okay, fellow barflys, let's bust out a round of Manhattans!

Alec Baldwin says he might run for Mayor of NYC.

Why not?

After all, who's nuttier than Baldwin? Yes, the entire effin' City of New York and all of its voters!

This could be even more fun than the year that Norman Mailer ran for the office with the promise to secede from the rest of the Empire State. Remember, Baldwin promised that he'd leave the country IF George W. Bush were re-elected. Well, he's here and he's still crazy.

Don't get me wrong. I luv the guy. I just think he's nuts (even moreso since he went to Harvard). He's even hosted SNL more times than Steve (Excuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuse me!) Martin.

So, here's the story:

Alec Baldwin is mulling a run for mayor of New York City now that kinky Congressman Anthony Weiner appears to have sexted himself out of the 2013 race.

The “30 Rock” star, who has long talked about running for political office, believes Weinergate has shaken up the field of candidates enough that he might have a chance to win, a friend of the actor told The Daily.

“Alec said, ‘Hey, maybe this changes the race. The dynamics have shifted,’ ” said Baldwin’s pal.

“The Democrats need a high-profile candidate, and Alec can fill that bill.”

Baldwin, a die-hard Democrat originally from Massapequa, a suburb on Long Island, N.Y., has said 2012 will be his last year on “30 Rock,” which would free him up for a 2013 mayoral run.

He’d be the biggest name by far to throw his hat in the ring to succeed Mayor Michael Bloomberg at “the second hardest job” in the nation, Weiner’s dream gig before his sordid fall from grace.

Bloomberg, who had New York City’s term-limit law rewritten to win his third term, isn’t expected to run again in 2013. The likely candidates include City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, Councilman Bill de Blasio, and former New York comptroller Bill Thompson, who narrowly lost to Bloomberg in 2009.

Meanwhile, Baldwin probably won’t be able to run for Weiner’s congressional seat representing parts of Brooklyn and Queens, even if he wanted to. As a result of the last census, New York State is expected to lose two seats.

“They’ll take one Republican district upstate, and one Democratic district in the city,” said one political operative. “Weiner can say goodbye to his seat.”

Baldwin, 53, famous for his liberal politics, has been talking about the possibility of running for office since the ’90s.

“Is this something that I want to do? Yes,” Baldwin said in a 1997 New York magazine cover story on his political ambitions. But he said it didn’t seem like the right time.

“The men and women that run the world are in their 50s. It takes time to build that kind of thing. I’m 39.”

Fast-forward 11 years. In a 2008 interview on “60 Minutes,” Baldwin mused about being in his 50s and said it was possible that politics would be his second act.

“There’s no age limit on running for office, to a degree,” he said. It’s “something I might do, one day.”

Last year, the New York Daily News reported that the Working Families Party had considered Baldwin as a replacement candidate for its gubernatorial ticket, after a federal probe cast doubt on whether Andrew Cuomo would accept their ballot line. Baldwin’s spokesman told the newspaper he wasn’t interested.

Baldwin said in an interview with CNN’s Eliot Spitzer in January that he was “very interested” in running for office. He said he had been approached in the past about political offices outside New York, but that he would prefer to live in the Big Apple.

“I do believe that people want to believe that someone who deeply cares about the middle class … would like to seek public office,” Baldwin said.

Bellying up to the sandbar: April the 41st

It's a shame that The Sandbar at the Lighthouse Inn in West Dennis is open so little during the course of the year. Today would be a great afternoon to have a cool beer in the warm sunlight.

It was April the forty-first
Being a quadruple leap year
I was driving in downtown Atlantis
My barracuda was in the shop
So I was in a rented stingray
And it was overheating

So I pulled into a Shell Station
They said I'd blown a seal
I said, "Fix the damn thing
And leave my private life out of it
Okay pal?"

While they were doing that
I walked over to a place called the Oyster Bar, a real dive
But I knew the owner
He used to play for the Dolphins
I said "Hi Gil"
You have to yell, he's hard of herring

Think I had a wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh
Wet dream

Gil was also down on his luck
Fact is he was barely keeping his head below water
I bellied up to the sandbar
He poured me the usual

Rusty snail, hold the grunion
Shaken not stirred
With a peanut butter and jellyfish sandwich on the side
Heavy on the mako

I slipped him a fin
On porpoise
I was feeling good
I even dropped a sand dollar in the box for Jerry's squids
For the halibut

Well the place was crowded
We were packed in like sardines They were all there to listen to the big band sounds of Tommy Dorsal
What sole

Tommy was rockin' the place with a very popular tuna
Salmon Chanted Evening
And the stage was surrounded by screaming groupers
Probably there to see the bass player

One of them was this cute little yellowtail
And she's giving me the eye
So I figured this is my chance for a little fun
You know, piece of Pisces

But she said things I just couldn't fathom
She was too deep, seemed to be under a lot of pressure
Boy, could she drink
She drank like a . . .
She drank a lot

I said "What's your sign"
She said "Aquarium"
I said "Great, let's get tanked"

Think I had a wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh
Wet dream

I invited her to my place for a midnight bait
I said "Come on baby, it'll only take a few minnows"
She threw me that same old line
"Not tonight, I gotta haddock"

And she wasn't kidding either
Cause in came the biggest, meanest looking haddock
I'd ever seen come down the pike
He was covered with mussels

He came over to me and said
"Listen, shrimp, don't you come trollin' around here"
What a crab
This guy was steamed
I could see the anchor in his eyes

I turned to him, I said
"A-balone, you're just being shellfish"
Well, I knew it was going to be trouble and so did Gil
'Cause he was already on the phone to the cods

The haddock hits me with a sucker punch
I catch him with a left hook
He eels over
It was a fluke but there he was
Lying on the deck, flat as a mackerel
Kelpless

I said "Forget the cods Gil
This guy's gonna need a sturgeon"
Well, the yellowtail was impressed with the way I landed her boyfriend
She came over to me, she said
"Hey, big boy, you're really a game fish
What's your name"
I said "Marlin"

Think I had a wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh
Wet dream

Well, from then on we had a whale of a time
I took her to dinner, I took her to dance
I bought her a bouquet of flounders
And then I went home with her
And what did I get for my trouble
A case of the clams

Think I had a wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh

Wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh

Wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh

Harvey's big day!

On this gorgeous June day, Harvey and I will probably stop on the way home from the bar to grab ourselves a Hoodsie. No, not a hoodie. A Hoodsie cup!

Yes, you ice cream snobs, we're talking about that 3 oz cardboard cup of Hood vanilla and chocolate ice cream that comes with its own wooden spoon.

After all, it was on this date in 1823 the Harvey Perley Hood was born, and went on to become a cream of the crop, so to speak. Too bad he was born a little ahead of his own time and never had a Hoodsie at his own 6th birthday party.

Sure, snobbo, you can go stand in line for three hours at the Sundae School or the Ice Cream Smuggler or the Cape Cod Creamery and pay top dollar for that premium ultra fat stuff that the hippies used to make in VT. Or, you can have a good time with a Hoodsie. And the money you save on the ice cream can go toward paying off your bartab with the overpriced beer your drinking.

Let's go, Harvey.

Coors fails to defy gravity!

Before there was any of that hosspiss known as "Coors Light" ("Hey coach! Wanna drink some hosspiss after you make an ass of yourself in this beer commercial?"), there was Coors so-called "Banquet Beer." Brewed in Golden, Colorado, it was a highly-prized beverage. "Colorado Kool-Aid" is was called through the 1970s, and then it went national. And that's when the world discovered that it was delivered in that odd-sized, tall 12-ounce can. Then came Coors Light and all the marketing nonsense. (Gee, can we get Eva Gabor -- Zsa Zsa's sister -- to sell some of our stuff with the backing of all her fame from "Green Effin' Acres"?)

Surely, had Adolf Coors, Sr., been alive at the time, he would have been rolling over in his grave.

Instead, the founding patriarch decided to check out of the Cavalier Hotel in Virginia Beach, VA, on this date in 1929. From the sixth floor, he did a one-and-a-half-gainer into the stratosphere, but fell to earth instead. Of course, he had already checked-out of the beer business thanks to Prohibition. He was dabbling in malted milk (wink, wink), pottery, and cement. Thunk.

In his place, though, he does leave the memory of a time when his beer was both local and good. R.I.P. A.C. Sr.

 

Some people say that Canada's to blame!

Not that anyone missed my musings, but Harvey and I spent Thursday and yesterday helping friends in Monson clean up some of their mess. I'm sure that all the watering holes throughout the Cape & Islands are thinking about those folks about as much as they are thinking about the hapless souls in Joplin and Tuscaloosa. (Sarcasm.) Two words: Hurricane Bob. Just remember the next time we get walloped by a storm, why should anyone else care about us, right? Karma.

Meanwhile, today's the date in 1957  that a guy named John Kinder Labatt  finally got around to registering the name "Labatt's" as a trademark, even though it had been used for their Canadian ales and beers since 1895. (Of course, beer snobs would rather celebrate this date from 1907 because Guinness finally got around to trademarking the "Guinness's Extra Stout James's Gate Dublin Bottled By Arth  Guinness Son & Co. Limited" that they had been using since 1862. Then, again, maybe it's not just those annoying beer snobs, but also those people who insist that they are Irish because they drink Guinness and know all the words to that goddam unicorn song. Ugh! But, I digress.)

Labatt's, as well all know, is a Canadian brew, but it was only 1837 when John Kinder Labatt first landed in London, Ontario from Ireland. (You know, the land of those annoying "humpty-backed camels and long-necked geese" songs, as well as those songs about men wandering the countryside and whistling. Or is that Australia? Again, I digress.)

Then, in 1847, Kinder admitted to his wife that he was having some sort of affair. "I have been considering this brewing affair for some time," he wrote in a letter, "and think it would suit me better than anything else . . ." So, he bought himself the Simcoe Street brewery in London, Ontario, in partnership with Samuel Eccles. When he became the brewery's sole proprietor in 1855, he cleverly renamed it: John Labatt's Brewery.

Along with a passion to brew beer, John Kinder also knew a thing or two about business. He realized the Great Western Railway, completed in the late 1850s, was the company's ticket to expansion outside London. No longer limiting beer sales to London and its surrounding areas, the railway opened new markets for Labatt in Toronto, Montréal and the Maritimes and formed the foundation for future aggressive expansion.

Not long after that, he invented ice hockey and the internet, which gave us both the Vancouver Canucks and Justin Bieber. Thus, concludes the trifecta of Canadian achievements (not counting their crappy healthcare plan, Canadian Mist the McKenzie brothers, and William Shatner.)

Aren't you glad that I'm back?

Go Bruins! Drink Labatt's!

Vuja de! AND mud in your eye!

On this date in 1495, the first written record of Scotch Whiskey appeared in Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, Friar John Cor is the distiller.

While you might recall that "Scotch and Soda" was recorded by The Kingston Trio in 1958 and included on their first album, here's a couple little known facts about that one. Dave Guard, a member of the Trio, first heard it while he was dating the older sister of baseball's Tom Seaver at their home. The song had been a favorite of Seaver's parents since they first heard it played in a piano bar on their honeymoon back in 1932, and they decided to make it "their song" and had the piano player write down the music and lyrics. Guard loved the song, the Trio recorded it, but they never discovered who wrote it although they searched for years to discover the composer.