Career Check 10:58

I have nothing lined up job-wise right now, and while I was busy helping move my mom into a new place (and myself into the proverbial mom's basement), now we're settled in here and the job hunt has begun in earnest. At least I had a few thousand dollars worth of cushion saved up, but that will fade quickly; the only income I've had the past three weeks or so has come in the form of winning $150 by having the SU _9-WVU _4 square on a $2 board that hit three times on Saturday. (Offensive ineptitude, for the win.)

My tentative plan right now is to work this year, save up money however I can, and try to make a break for Spain next fall. Doing what, exactly over there, I am not sure -- the Spanish government's "Auxiliares culturales" (uh, "cultural helpers") program looks awesome, but part of me wants to do a program with some kind of teaching certification. Only issue there is that those cost money, and the Auxiliares one is free.

I don't have my heart completely set on Spain and I would go to South America, too, if the right opportunity presented itself. I am trying to keep any options open and apply for a bunch of different things. Although I already missed the Fulbright application period, that could be in play next year.

Basically, my head just hurts. I am ready to stop living at home but I'd be kind of stupid to just move out and start paying rent with no job lined up when my raison d'être this year is just to save up as much money as possible so I can have an excellent year traveling next year. Living at home is basically free, but I'm also 23 and I basically have nothing going for me in the 'Cuse.

One thing I really need to do is just form some dreams for my future, and to stop living my life for anyone else. It doesn't matter what other people think I can or should be doing. I don't need to be thinking in terms of how I want other people to view me, or how I think I want them to view me. I don't need to be embarrassed or ashamed of anything I'm doing. I'm a lonely, confused twenty-something and I think that's actually OK for a while. But while I'm getting things in order, I'd love to find some meaningful work and save up some money.

Just feeling overwhelmed and underwhelming, at the same time. A potent cocktail of discontent.

At-Bat Music 00:29

Something I think about periodically, because I'm an idiot, is what my at-bat music would be were I to make the big leagues. According to MVP Baseball 2005, your at-bat music must fall into a predetermined category based on your race:

• Latino players and American guys with Latin-sounding last names have some kind of salsa tune. No exceptions.
• American black players get either a generic hip-hop beat or the Time ta Get Dirty song that was inescapable in the 2005 EA games. (PEEEEE-OPLE TIME TA GET DIRTAY PEEEE-OPLE TIME TA GET DIRTAY!!!!!!!!!)
• White guys -- that's me! -- are apparently all rednecks and have this awful-sounding country thing.
• Guess they didn't know what to do with the Asian players because they get a song from the game's soundtrack that actually doesn't sound like crap.

In real life, this pattern surprisingly breaks down, and you can pick whatever music you want. My ideas...

Abra Cadaver, by The Hives - Either a loop of the intro, or just as much of the song as they can play before I finish taking my sweet time getting to the batter's box. Up-tempo, awesome instrumentation, doesn't get old. The ideal choice, despite being more than a few years old. THEY TRIED TO STICK A DEAD BODY INSIDE OF ME!!!

Good Times Bad Times, by Led Zeppelin - Might be too sentimental and not quite quick enough, but I love this tune and, really, hard to go wrong with Led Zeppelin.

La raja de tu falda, by Estopa - If I were playing in low-low-low-low-A ball in Puerto Rico or something, or just trying to mess with people. This song is Spanish, not Latin American, but I don't think that would bother the producers of MVP Baseball 2005.

Blackest Eyes, by Porcupine Tree - This song has one of the dirtiest riffs I've ever heard, with great buildup, but it might start too slowly to be good at-bat music unless I could have it queued up, and I don't know if they're paying the stadium DJ enough for that. If I have a radio talk show someday -- sort of a dream of mine, to be honest -- this will be the intro music.

AND A FEW THAT WILL NOT FIRE ANYONE UP BUT WOULD BE HILARIOUS ANYWAY

New Age Girl, by Deadeye Dick - better known as "Mary Moon," the song from Dumb and Dumber. This song is inconceivably awful, but hardcore Dumb and Dumber fans are a special breed and this song can be fun to belt at the top of your lungs across European capital cities. Somehow, the "don't eat meat / but she sure like the bone" line didn't make it into the movie.

Dies irae from Verdi's Requiem mass - This is BADASS and would certainly be awesome, especially as a closer's intro music. I just don't know if the average, mainstream baseball fan is ready for an everyday player with choral music as his at-bat music. But tell me this wouldn't sort of freak the other team out, especially if they weren't expecting it.

This song. I probably haven't thought about this as long as I could have, but really, I can think of no worse song for the mood and purpose of at-bat music than this, although Ms. Leona Lewis and Radiohead's "No Surprises" are certainly worthy mentions as well.

Instant Replay in Baseball 18:39

In light of a few bad calls during this week's Division Series -- namely, the supposed trap by Greg Golson of the Yankees against the Twins and Buster Posey's slide against the Braves -- there has been a lot of talk about instant replay in baseball. Bobby Cox and Bruce Bochy were both spouting off about replay in their press conferences last night, saying that there would be too many "arguments and red flags" and that it would "slow the game down."

I don't know how many times I have to say it: IT WON'T SLOW THE GAME DOWN IF YOU DON'T LET IT. Make rules about replay so it won't turn into a free-for-all where replays dominate the game (like the NFL).

My pet instant replay theory is this: Each team gets one challenge per game. Win or lose, you don't get to challenge another play that game.

This works on so many different levels. With only one challenge, chances are most of the time both teams will get through an entire game without using one. Why? Because it forces you to be judicious. Wasted your challenge on a close play at first with nobody on in the third inning? Sucks for you if there's a blown call against you when you're scoring the winning run in the ninth -- you already used your challenge. Since nobody wants to be that manager, chances are challenges will go unused more often than not.

At most, there will be two challenges per game (plus any close home run/foul calls, which should be automatically reviewed as they are now). If done efficiently -- either by an "eye-in-the-sky" umpire at the park or from a "Batcave" at MLB headquarters -- these reviews will be quick. There are plenty of other ways to trim significantly more time from baseball games outside of replays, including further limiting mound visits, penalizing pitchers or hitters who stall, and reducing warm-up toss times.

Additionally, contrary to what Cox and Bochy stated, the number of arguments (and their durations) will decrease. In the current system, after a bad call, the manager runs out of the dugout and screams at the umpire for a few minutes, gets tossed, makes a scene and takes his time leaving the field, and then the game goes on like nothing happened. With challenges, there won't be lengthy arguments. The manager will just toss his flag (or whatever) on the field before the next play, and the replay monitors will decide what the correct call is.

I have lots of specific situational rules for this -- namely, that you can't argue balls and strikes or things that would be blatantly uncorrectable -- but that's the basic framework. One challenge per team per game, win or lose. Home runs still reviewed automatically. Try to tell me that would slow the game down. Seriously.