US Open Thoughts

As the golfers prepare to tee it up for the final round of the 2017 United States Open at Erin Hills, some thoughts....

You have to go sixteen names deep into the Leaderboard after the third round to find any golfers with a Major Championship to their credit, Louis Oostheizen and Sergio Garcia, who are T-17 with seven other golfers.  The first sixteen names include two top ten golfers (Fowler and Matsuyma) and a bunch of other guys who can be considered journeymen (Snedeker, Haas) or Up-and-Comers (Thomas, Koepka, Harman, Fleetwood).

What does it all mean?  Are guys like Thomas, Koepka, Reed, and Fleetwood truly "up-and-comers" who will share multiple Majors among them over the next ten years or so, or will they be a guy like Brandt Snedeker, a guy who has made a solid living on Tour, picks up a win a year and a bunch of top ten finishes, but never becomes a Star, or will today's winner be a One Hit Wonder, something that the US Open produces with some regularity (Andy North, Steve Jones).  

One thing for sure, none of these guys is "the next Tiger".

My own prediction is that Brooks Koepka will be hoisting that silver trophy come tonight (or tomorrow if a playoff is necessary).

Watch, but don't bet.

Oh, and speaking of Brooks Koepka, do you think he gets his golf shirts specially tailored for the sleeves to fit tight against his biceps to show off those guns of his?

In The Area of Critical Commentary....

Some quickie critical commentary as The Grandstander still tries to catch up from vacation.....

We saw the new "Wonder Woman" movie last week, starring the incredibly beautiful Gal Gadot in the title role.

You have heard me say time and again that I am not a super-hero, comic book movie fan, but something drew me to this one, and, yeah, maybe it was the chance to see a beautiful actress in a skimpy outfit, but Mrs. Grandstander attended as well, and we both liked this movie quite a bit.

If you can accept the idea that there actually ARE super-heros, then this was a pretty good story.  There were a lot of neat special effects and slow motion filming that I enjoyed, and Miss Gadot was charming and delightful as the kick-ass amazon warrior princess.  Like a lot of these movies, it went on too long (2:24), and the climactic battle between Diana and the Evil Bad Guy was implausible, even by comic book movie standards, but when the next WW movie comes out, and as this movie is killing it at the box office, there will be more of them, we shall be in line to see it.

Three stars from The Grandstander.

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The newest Lucas Davenport thriller from John Sanford finds Lucas in his new role as a US Marshall.   A couple of crooks/killers have robbed a drug cartel of millions of dollars and killed several people, including a little girl, in the process.  This sets both the Cartel and the US Marshalls on their trail.  Typical Davenport/Sandford action - brutal criminals, some new partners for Lucas, a compelling storyline, and a most interesting ending to the story that will set up future stories in the series.  As a side note, the story also describes a US Presidential election with fictional candidates, of course, but comparisons can certainly be made.

Three and one-half stars.

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In 2001, a college freshman is drugged and gang raped at a college fraternity party.  Thirteen years later, the woman commits suicide, and shortly thereafter, one of the football players who took part in the rape, is killed, and another one turns up missing.  

The missing guy was last seen in Portland, Maine, and that brings Portland police detectives Michael McCabe and Maggie Savage into the case.  This is the fifth novel in James Hayman's series about McCabe and Savage, and I have written of this series before. "The Girl on the Bridge" continues the series and is another excellent police procedural thriller.

There is a bit of a twist in this one as to who the villain is, and, I must say, I did see it coming, but not at first!  I highly recommend this one, and all of the novels in the series.  Oh, and this one also ends with a hint of a possible change in store for McCabe and Savage in the future.  Can't wait for the next book.

Four stars.

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Yesterday we took advantage once again of the fabulous TCM/Fathom Events Series of classic films on a Big Screen.  This one was Billy Wilder's 1959 classic - and it truly is a Classic - "Some Like It Hot".

Has anyone not seen this one?  In 1929 Chicago, musicians Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon witness the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. In order to escape the Mob, they disguise themselves as women, join an all girl orchestra to escape Chicago and get to Florida, where they will then ditch the band and go on their way.  Of course, another musician and singer in the band is played by Marilyn Monroe, and complications, and hijinks, ensue.

This movie is lauded as the Best Comedy Movie ever made, and it is hard to argue the point.  The three stars, Curtis, Lemmon, and Monroe may never have been better in anything that they ever did, Wilder's direction and script (with I.A.L. Diamond) was fabulous, and, of course, there was that memorable closing line from Joe E. Brown.

No matter how many times you've seen this movie, it is always funny. Always.

Four stars all the way.

The Mayoral Wager

As I was four time zones away when the Stanley Cup Finals began, I missed that standard journalistic chestnut, The Bet Between the Mayors. Can anyone fill me in on what was at stake between these two political titans? Let me take a crack at it before you tell me, though.  

Had the Predators won, I am guessing that Bill Peduto, in addition to having to wear a Predators jersey (okay, Tim Baker, "sweater") at an official function, he would also be sending a case of Iron City Beer and a dozen Primanti's sandwiches down to Nashville for Mayor Megan Berry and her staff to "enjoy".

With the Penguins victory, I am guessing that Mayor Peduto and his staff will be dining on some Nashville barbecue and receiving CD Box Sets of Vince Gill, Luke Bryan, and Kenny Chesney (but definitely not Carrie Underwood!). I am also guessing that Mayor Berry will look pretty attractive wearing that Penguins jersey (sweater) at whatever ribbon cutting she has to attend this week.

Megan Berry

Mayor of Nashville

Very attractive Mayor you've got there, Nashville. Let's face it, Sophie Masloff she ain't!

To A Trio of Absent Friends

While away on vacation, and in the whirl of catching up with life upon the return from vacation, some notable people have left us.

Frank Deford

1936-2017

Sportswriter Frank Deford, one of the very best and probably the most literate sportswriters of his generation, died two weeks ago at the age of 78.  Rather than detail Deford's distinguished career in this space, I will just refer you to this Grandstander post from May 18, 2012 that describes Deford's memoir, "Over Time, My Life As A Sportswriter".

http://grandstander.blogspot.com/2012/05/book-review-over-time-my-life-as.html

It is a terrific book that assures that Deford's wonderful writing and stories will always be with us.

Adam West

1928-2017

Adam West, who died at age 88 last week, had an acting career that, according to IMDB, included 193 acting credits, stretched back to 1954, and was still going strong as one of the voice actors on the cartoon series "Family Guy".  However, West will be forever remembered as Bruce Wayne/Batman on the camp classic TV series that ran from 1966-68.  You read in the obits that West chaffed at first at becoming typecast and remembered only as Batman, but, in time, he came to embrace the form of immortality that this gave him.  I can remember seeing him play himself in a 2016 episode of "The Big Bang Theory".  It was a self-deprecating role, and he was quite charming in it.  And he worked until the end of his very long life, which is something any actor would want.

Glenne Headley

1955 - 2017

Actress Glenne Headley died over the weekend at the  age of 62.  According to IMDB, she has 73 acting credits going back to 1972, and was currently staring in a cable streaming series.  She also had a successful stage career.  I best remember her for two roles:  Elmira Boot Johnson in the great 1989 mini-series "Lonesome Dove" and as Iris Holland, Richard Dreyfuss' wife in the wonderful movie, "Mr. Holland's Opus" (1995).  She had many other film and television roles, and I always found her to be quite good in anything that she did.

No cause of death was released, but 62 is way-too-young for anyone to leave us.

RIP Frank Deford, Adam West, Glenne Headley.

Another Paradigm Shifts, or How We Met and Fell in Love With Uber

We were going to be in Seattle for two days and nights, we had no car, no tour guide, and little idea how to get around.  The solution.....Uber.  (That's one of our rides pictured above.)

Now I realize that many of you reading this have already made use of this ride sharing service, and that we are hopelessly late to the party here, but in our pre-travel planning with the Bonks, we pretty much decided that Uber would be how we would get around while in Seattle, so I loaded up that Uber App....

onto my phone prior to our leaving and prepared myself for yet another plunge into the 21st century.

How was it?  Well, as Dan kept saying repeatedly during our time in Seattle, "this Uber really is the cat's ass, isn't it?"   Indeed it was and is. From the airport to the hotel to the Space Needle and various other tourist spots to the Chateau St. Michele Winery (a 30+ minute drive from downtown) and back again to the railroad station.  Never a wait of more that five or six minutes for a ride.  Never a worry about navigating in a strange city.  It was great.  It was, well, the cat's ass!  Our total costs (we alternated our Uber calls between us) were probably around $160, easily less than what we would have paid to rent a car and pay for parking, and you can't put a price on eliminating the stress of how to navigate from one point to another. Honestly, I don't know that we will ever rent a car again when traveling.

Again, I know that we are way behind the curve on this, and I know many of our friends who have been Uber-ing for several years, but when you discover something like this for the first time, it is a revelation.

Sleeping in Seattle

 It's a funny story as to how we came to spend the first two days of our recent vacation in Seattle, WA. 

This whole tale began last December when Dan and Susan said that they would be visiting their daughter, Alyson, in Seattle, where she was employed as an engineer at Boeing.  They then thought they could use the opportunity to tack on a Disney cruise to Alaska, and would we consider coming with them, and the rest is history, as they say.  The deal was that during our two days in Seattle, Aly would serve as our tour guide.  In the intervening months, Alyson was recruited by and took a job as a software engineer with Uber in....Pittsburgh! So, Aly came home, the Bonks now have their daughter living close to them, but we all lost a tour guide!!

That didn't stop us from having a terrific two day visit to Seattle, a first time visit for both Marilyn and me.  It even included us posing for the cornball picture before a green screen at the Space Needle.  That's the picture that heads this post, and believe it or not, it was freebie.   You get the picture taken, choose a backdrop, scan your ticket and they email it to you.  What a bargain!  We also found Seattle to be a very interesting city.  Very vibrant, very diverse, and very young.  We spent time on Saturday evening in the Capitol Hill area of downtown (bars, restaurants, cultural spots) and the place was just teeming with young people, many of whom, no doubt, employed in the Seattle's burgeoning high tech economy.

As I did with Alaska post, I will spare the prose, and go heavy with photos and some minimal commentary.

 It rains a lot in Seattle, but not the two days that we were there, so we were able to see Mt. Rainier, a magnificent natural wonder that dominates every view in Seattle.  In the foreground of this photo, is the Seahawks' Century Link Field and the Mariners' Safeco Field.

I suppose that no visit to Seattle is complete without a visit to the famous Pubic Market.

It is huge and jam packed with many colorful sights:

 This is also the home of the famed Pike Fish Market where the fishmongers throw the fish to each other.  No one was buying fish when we were there, so for the benefit of the myriad of tourists, the guys are willing to throw your baby for you:

 Just kidding.  They didn't actually throw that kid!

What else did we do in Seattle?  Well......

First, we had to figure out where things were.

Dinner at a Mexican restaurant.  That picture is actually of our reflection in a large mirror opposite from our table.  Very artsy of me to take that, don't you think?

We proudly display our senior citizen discounted tickets on Seattle's monorail.

Great Sunday morning breakfast at they elegantly named establishment.  I mean, how could we NOT eat there?

Then it was on to visit the Space Needle, the signature structure of the 1962 World's Fair in Seattle.

 I was struck by how small the actual overall area of the World's Fair's grounds were.  Some of those Fair structures still stand today, and much of the space is now public space.

 We got a senior discount of our Space Needle tickets, too.  The kids, Dan and Susan, had to pay full boat.

For twelve days in 1962, Elvis Presley was on location at the Seattle Fair filming "It Happened At The World's Fair".  We were indeed on hallowed ground.

 The views from atop the Space Needle are amazing, and they acknowledge how many people have visited the place since 1962:

 And they can be very specific in acknowledging your presence there as well:

We then visited the Chateau St.Michele winery in Kirkland, WA.   We have visited a lot of wineries over the years, and this was easily the most beautiful one.

On Monday morning, it was on to catch the train to Vancouver, BC.

Sitting in a railway station,

Got a ticket for our destination.

 Ridin' the Rails

It was three hour smooth and relaxing ride to Vancouver, BC.  Such a ride was another first for us.  Had never been on a passenger train before, and it was very nice way to travel.  From the Vancouver train station to the Vancouver pier was short cab ride away, and what followed after that was the Alaskan adventure that I detailed in yesterday's post.

Oh, one thing I didn't mention was how we actually got from Point A to Point B to Point C and so on as we toured around Seattle.  That was yet another new experience for the two of us, and it is one that deserves its own separate post, which will be coming in the next day or two, so stay tuned.

Tony Awards Time

Once a year, The Grandstander turns his bully pulpit over to old friend (by the way, that's "old" as in "older than me" and also "old" as in, well, you know) Bill Montrose, this Blog's Official Broadway Correspondent for his predictions on the 2017 Tony Awards, which will air on CBS the coming Sunday evening.

So, without further ado, take it away, Bill.....

I can't really improve on last years' picks; (10 for 10), plus I don't have the "Hamilton wave" to ride, but I'm still confident with these fearless prognostications:

BEST PLAY ............................................................    Oslo

BEST MUSICAL .....................................................    Dear Evan Hansen

BEST BOOK OF A MUSICAL ................................    Steven Levenson, Dear Evan Hansen

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE ......................................    Dear Evan Hansen

BEST MUSICAL REVIVAL .....................................    Hello, Dolly!

BEST PERFORMANCE - ACTOR .........................    Ben Platt, Dear Evan Hansen

BEST PERFORMANCE - ACTRESS .....................    Bette Midler, Hello, Dolly!

BEST PERFORMANCE - FEATURED ROLE

                                                         ACTOR ..........    Gavin Creel, Hello Dolly!

BEST PERFORMANCE - FEATURED ROLE

                                                      ACTRESS .........    Jenn Colella, Come From  Away

BEST DIRECTION MUSICAL .................................    Michael Greif, Dear Evan Hansen

Well that's it!   Looks like I'm leaning heavily on "Dear Evan Hansen" to capture most of the big categories.  "Come From Away" could pull some upsets,

but I'm still sticking with 'Evan'.  Even though "...The Great Comet" got the most nominations, their wins will come in the more technical "Design" categories;

e.g., Scenic, Costume, etc. And - as you usually point out  ......

                                                                                             WATCH BUT DON'T BET!

Thanks, Bill!

You've got to love how Bill has appropriated The Grandstander's "Watch, but don't bet" dictum, which The Grandstander freely admits he appropriated (stole?) from the late Post-Gazette Sports Editor/Columnist Al Abrams.  (An Al Abrams reference.  How's that for skewing old?)

I shall be reporting in on Monday to note Bill's winning percentage, and everybody enjoy the Tonys on Sunday night, or sometime on Monday because many of you will have DVR'ed the Tonys so as to be able to see the Penguins clinch the Stanley Cup on Sunday night.