New York Mets, RIP

Posted by Bob Greenberger on September 30, 2008

The Mets sucked this season. No news there.

It was exceptionally disconcerting watching them self-destruct in almost the same fashion as they did last season, with less margin to spare.

While the Wilpons keep saying GM Omar Minaya did a good job, one has to question that considering he did nothing to upgrade an already shaky bullpen at the trading deadline and then only added Luis Ayala a few weeks later.

And while much was made of the bullpen’s collapse, I also question why Jerry Manuel went through 4+ relievers on average per game, telling us it was all about match-ups when the fresher arms brought up September 1 idly sat in the bullpen much of the month.

The Mets never fired on all cylinders with hitting and pitching in synch. It was one or the other while other teams found their rhythm and outperformed them in the stretch, including the Phillies and Marlins. If you checked the reports, you’d see how the Phillies put together beginnings and come backs to play their way into contention while the Mets continued leaving men on base and rallied way too infrequently.

I would like to think there will be some wholesale changes on the team so they’re better balanced and able to go into 2009 ready to contend.

Auction Update

The charity auction for the Siegel home ended earlier today and the naming rights for an appearance in next year’s Iron Man novel went for $512. I just need to hear from them who the lucky person is.

WAIT! There is more to read… read on »

Family Day

Posted by Bob Greenberger on September 29, 2008

We’ve been very vocal about our support of The Tommy Fund for Childhood Cancer. After all, we benefited from the Fund during the entire seven month stay at Yale-New Haven and its mission is a terrific one. Among their activities are funding for direct and indirect financial assistance to families dealing with childhood cancer, funding of fellowships in pediatric oncology, funding for a pediatric social worker, funding for child life and a child life specialist, funding professional development seminars for physicians and nurses, and funding recreational equipment in the pediatric specialty center and inpatient units among other activities.

And then there’s Family Day. This is a chance for families of patients, doctors and nurses to get together and have some fun while raising money. There’s a fun run for the kids, a 5 kilometer run and a 2 mile walk. People arrive having been sponsored and participants get the annual t-shirt, designed by a patient. One patient from Milford was supported by a team 100-strong all wearing Rooney Runners t-shirts – they looked cool.

This year’s shirt was co-designed by a young girl named Mirza and our own Robbie. He saw her design and suggested modifications so wound up tracing it and making the adjustments which everyone liked. Together, they had been asked to hold the flag for the opening ceremonies.

We could not miss the event and wanted to be there in his honor. Mirza was nervous about doing this on her own so we agreed to stand with her for the ceremony and then she walked the two miles beside Erica, the Child Life Specialist who worked with them both on the shirt.

It was with mixed emotions that we arrived at the event. After all, this was the first time we were seeing many of the doctors and nurses since his death and funeral. But you know what? We had a good experience. First, we were warmly welcomed with just about everyone saying .”I’m so glad you actually came.” So that felt good.

We grabbed some of the t-shirts and caught up with people then did the walk with Dr. Massaro and her family. Once that ended, people milled about enjoying hamburgers, hot dogs, fruit and ice cream, chatting amiably.

By 12 it was over and we’re told it was a successful event and one we intend to return for next year. It was nice to honor him and see his influence remains strong there.

A Boogie Knights Charity Event

Posted by Bob Greenberger on September 25, 2008

The Boogie Knights, in conjunction with the Musical Artists Theatre, will be giving a rare charity concert, proceeds of which will go, in memory of our squire Robbie Greenberger, to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and the Tommy Fund for Childhood Cancer

Here are the details:

WHEN: 8PM Saturday 8 November, 2008
WHERE:
Riverside Stage – located in the basement of
Salem Lutheran Church
1530 Battery Avenue
Baltimore, MD 21230-4615
ADMISSION: $10

Where else can you find a full evening of Boogie Knights live performance for less than the cost of a CD –and– have it benefit charity as well?

Please plan on attending. Please spread the word. Hope to see you there!

Paying it Forward

Posted by Bob Greenberger on September 23, 2008

I believe in giving back or paying it forward, call it what you will.

So infrequently do I get a chance to do this in my field, I wanted to make everyone aware of something that just kicked off today.

As part of the fund raising for Jerry Siegel’s boyhood home, I have offered up a part in my forthcoming Iron Man novel. As I wrote here, the size of the part is entirely dependent on the amount raised.

Already it has 11 bids and is up to $81 as I write this. For that much, you’re a victim of a terrorist attack.

Anyway, I want everyone to know and have a chance for a little fame and fun.

There and Back Again

Posted by Bob Greenberger on September 22, 2008

Deb and I were offered a chance to get away from it all and wisely we took it.

From Thursday through Sunday we were away from home, resting, relaxing, shopping, sightseeing, hiking, eating, napping and so on. It was very nice to not fuss over work or household chores. We weren’t expected to put everything behind us but the trip allowed us the time to focus on each other and allowed us to miss Robbie without distraction.

We finished our trip last night, got home and as usual, unpacked the car and get everything put away before dealing with phone messages and mail.

And that’s when reality hit. In short order, we discovered we lost four more people – two members of the extended family we barely knew; an old pal, and Mikayla.

Mikayla was a redheaded nine year old spitfire that acted well beyond her years. She and Robbie would often do activities together during playground and when both were up to it, sit in the common area playing cards to all hours. When they saw each other at clinic, the games continued, with Kate joining in whenever she was around. She left for Boston over the summer, to have her bone marrow transplant and from all reports things were going well. Yale-New Haven’s child life staff kept in touch and sent her care packages including a stuff animal she named Robbie so she’d never forget him.

As she prepared for discharge last week, she came down with a fungal lung infection which took her rapidly. She was gone on Friday, a tragic loss.

The fourth and final passing was that of Brian Thomsen. I knew Brian when he was an editor at Warner Books up on the ninth floor while DC was on the 6th floor of 666 Fifth Avenue. We struck up a friendship and kept in touch as he moved on to TSR and later returned to New York and worked as a freelance writer and editor. For years, he would come to DC on Wednesdays and bring lunch, camping out in Julie Schwartz’s office to be regaled with stories. He introduced Julie to the joys of sushi which became a dietary staple until Julie left us.

It was Brian who did what others could not, which was getting Julie’s stories into print as co-author of Julie’s biography. Not every story got into print but more than enough to immortalized Julie’s contributions to SF.

Brian always looked after me, seeing to it I had something to do between jobs. I wrote fiction and non-fiction for him, the last being essays for next May’s Haunting Museums. He was overweight and suffered from gout but remained cheerful and caring – a real mensch. The heart attack Saturday night was quick and sudden and now he’s gone.

The rest and relaxation rapidly dissipated as we were hit with the boom, boom, boom, boom of their passing and the return to reality was harsh.

Customer Service Revisited

Posted by Bob Greenberger on September 17, 2008

Every now and then I rail about the service economy or lack thereof. I’ve had some mixed experiences of late and it has me uncertain if things are getting better or worse.

It took a few phone calls to cancel Robbie’s credit card and take him off the insurance. The bank explained the required paperwork then worked with us to process his sizeable stack of savings bonds.

When we tried to cancel his plane ticket to a family event via Travelocity, things ground to a halt. The first customer service guy I spoke said the request was in the system and a Travelocity credit was being filed which we could access the next time we used the site, minus any applicable penalties.

Deb tried to use the credit days later and no credit was on file. She handed the phone to me as I railed at the customer service agent who suddenly had a checklist of things required that the first guy never mentioned. One involved sending in a PDF of the death certificate or faxing it. We scanned a copy and sent it with the required account numbers.

I then heard from a rep by e-mail who asked for a copy of the credit card charge. I pointed out that we do everything electronically so there was no copy to forward. That seemed to mollify her but then she needed more information that I had already sent.

The next rep asked for a copy of the death certificate so I sent it a second time.

The next two reps also asked for a copy of the death certificate so I sent it a third and fourth time, noting they were turning a painful process into something unnecessarily excruciating. The last time I sent it as both an attachment and embedded in the e-mail and that seemed to do the trick so now they’re processing the request.

Amazing.

On the other hand, Cablevision, which I generally dislike, has proven to earn their J.D. Power certification for having terrific customer service. Our DVR has been acting up and nearly two dozen premium channels (all the Starz and Encores) were garbled. Over the last few months they came and changed various hardware and fiber optical cable and nothing fixed the problem. They said we needed a new box. Well, as you know, this took a low priority so it was only this week we focused on the matter. Over the last few weeks we’ve been catching up and had just 8 shows left so dumped them onto DVD and I took the box back. I was on line longer than I was at the window. The new box seems to be working so I’m pretty pleased with how that turned out.

Where Have I Been?

Posted by Bob Greenberger on September 12, 2008

Sorry I haven’t posted in a week. Getting adjusted to the new routine at home and with ComicMix has been preoccupying.

When I took on the News Editor role, I thought I was inheriting a team of writers and would be able to add to the roster and go forth and assign and edit stories, sort of like a Lou Grant. Instead, apparently, a lot of the regulars had moved on to other sites just before the San Diego convention and as I took over, there were one or two regular writers and one or two regular reviewers. Hard to beef up a site’s content with so few of us.

I now spend my mornings hunting for news, writing the news, posting and scheduling the news while establishing new working relationships with publishers and media establishments. I also go out seeking new writers, hoping to establish a series of beats so we can cover everything.

It’s also enabled me to bring into, ahem, the mix pals who I know have areas of expertise. My first call was to Chuck Rozakis, son of Bob, to put him on the webcomics beat. I also tapped Insane Ian Bonds to begin writing video game coverage. Alan Kistler, a pal and one of the regulars, has also been connecting me with other writers so the site is slowly filling out.

The response so far has been rather gratifying and we should be growing nicely from this point forward.

The rest of my day is spent on little projects such as an article for a forthcoming issue of Star Trek Magazine and prepping some reviews for ComicMix and Famous Monsters of Filmland. It’s all clearing the decks awaiting approval from DelRey/Marvel on the Iron Man novel which, in theory, is due on October 20 but clearly will be delivered later.

This week we’ve also gotten back into old routines. I attended a PTA event on Monday while Deb began grad classes and choir two other nights. Our days are filling which is good.

How We’re Doing

Posted by Bob Greenberger on September 5, 2008

We’ve been receiving a lot of calls and e-mails asking how we’re holding up.

The answer is: as well as one can expect.

Deb and I both aren’t feeling 100% as yet and we seem to be taking turns going through rough patches. Fortunately, for the most part we ‘re able to sleep, something we couldn’t say for the first week.

The odd thing is despite the ceremonial aspects of his passing, it still feels unreal, as if he remains away at school. We look around the house and there remain so many Robbie touches that anything might trigger a reaction. As his friends were leaving for school, several stopped by to say goodbye and we let them rummage through his stuff for mementoes. Now we have a room full of stuff that needs dealing with.

We’ve also been going through the mechanical aspects of his passing. A few phone calls and we managed to shut off his credit card and cell phone. We’ve cashed in his savings bonds and are in the process of closing his bank account. Such simple little things and bit by bit, we’re taking him off the grid.

The outpouring of support has been wonderful and a pleasant treat. The cards keep coming and with them come many memories of Robbie that brighten our day a little. We got a nice list of people who made donations to The Tommy Fund which has been terrific and we still get flowers.

Deb visited the gravesite yesterday and found someone had planted some flowers there in addition to the rose plant Kate placed. Later that day, she got a ride from a neighbor and by coincidence, she was the very person responsible.

It’s odd. We anticipate sending the kids to college or the arrival of a milestone such as graduation so when the big day arrives, we’re ready. This came with such suddenness there was no way to prepare to be done saving for college, done with going to 7-West everyday, and make the transition to full time empty nesters. That lack of preparation probably has something to do with the way we feel.

We’re trying to create new routines and habits that are just for the two of us so his absence is less obvious so we’re taking regular walks with the dogs and trying to make certain to spend time together in different ways.

It’s very clear that the only real salve will be time so we’re…managing.