Red-Eyed and Blue

Gotta love these short weeks. A couple more days and we're off to NJ for my nephew Danny's first communion. The four-day weekend was fun and relaxing. Friday was a perfect day to golf. I actually hit the ball pretty well; my putting sucked and I finished with a 54, but I had a good time.

Got some errands taken care of on Saturday before heading down to hang with Doobs and do some serious podcastification. Should have at least one more show posted before we head down to Joisey.

On Sunday, Deb and I went to see the Sox beat the Mets, 12-5, getting caught in a downpour as we got there; the rain stopped and it was pretty nice the rest of the game. Yesterday, I did the Dory Run 5K in Swampscott and had a decent time (22:03).

It always bums me out when people who I respect pass away, but even moreso when they're not much older than me. This happened twice in the last few days, as Jay Bennett, the multi-instrumentalist best known for his work in Wilco, died Sunday at the age of 45, and former NHLer Peter Zezel died at 44 from a rare blood disorder.

While the cause of Bennett's death wasn't immediately known, he had been suffering from some leg problems that were exacerbated by his lack of health insurance. He also recently sued Wilco leader Jeff Tweedy over back royalties. He released his last album, Whatever Happened I Apologize, for free online.

Zezel suffered from hemolytic anemia, which he had battled for the past 11 years; he recently had fallen into a coma after his condition worsened. He played 15 years in the NHL, but I'll always remember his contributions to the Leafs' 1992-93 squad that fell a game short of the Stanley Cup finals.

Watch out for falling anvils:

• The Pittsburgh Penguins clinched their second consecutive finals appearance with a win tonight over the Carolina Hurricanes, sweeping the Canes in four straight. Carolina just couldn't match the Pens' depth or skill, but they also looked as though their seven-game victories over Boston and New Jersey took too much out of them. The Pens look like the real deal. Looks like they'll be facing Detroit in a rematch of last year's Cup finals; hopefully they can win it this time.
• Holy crap, the Jays' slump continues. They've now lost EIGHT STRAIGHT games. WTF? Hopefully Roy Halladay can get them back on the winning track tomorrow night.
• I so far have resisted joining the legions of Twitterers out there, although I have followed some other Twitter feeds such as OJ's. Of course, now that there's rumors of a Twitter TV show, it may already be too late.