Overlooked Posts of 2024

Introduction

Last year, I enjoyed an article in the New York Times about overlooked stories—those their editors felt didn’t reach as many readers as they should have. Following the Times’ lead, I blogged about overlooked albertnet posts. Did it make a mark? Well, of the twelve 2023 posts I spotlighted (one per month), two subsequently moved from last place to second place, and four moved all the way into first place (i.e., have now reached the  most pageviews of any posts that month). That strikes me as a pretty good response, so I’m going do this again. Below are the 2024 posts that I think deserved more attention from my readers (I’m looking at you, Mom). Like last year, I’ll explain why they deserve your attention.

January

I thought “New Year’s Resignation” was a catchy title since readers’ brains would automatically think “Resolution” when they hit the first syllable of that third word, and then be surprised. If my readers had any such reaction (which I now doubt), it evidently wasn’t enough to get them to click the link; this post has the fewest pageviews of any I ran last January. Perhaps “resignation” is just too negative a word … I’ve received advice that negative words turn people away and we should always use positive ones. But how, then, would we explain the success of the heavy metal band Megadeth?

I feel the Resignation post should have done better. I mean, don’t we all get sick of the swirl around New Year’s Resolutions, and thus shouldn’t readers welcome a suggestion like improving their capacity for resignation? Wouldn’t they be interested in how this behavior, which we’re all trained to feel bad about, can actually be a superpower? Well, to get that message they’d have to actually open the post, duh! I guess it really is all about window dressing. If I decide to do a post this month on the theme of New Year’s Resolutions, I’m going to call it “Make $150K working from home,” or maybe “Megadeth.”

February

The loss leader for February was “Virtual Reality Killer App!” Any reader expecting a well-researched, informative article on VR technology apparently doesn’t know me very well. The more a topic requires actual research, the less I do, and the higher I rev my BS engine. In other words, it should have been obvious that was a humor piece. Doesn’t everyone deserve a good laugh? I guess it’s possible you identified it as a humor piece but didn’t click through because you don’t think I’m funny. If that’s the case, why are you here at all? Shoo! Shoo!

What? You’re still here? You do think I’m funny? Well then click here right away! I won’t say more about that post because there’s a plot twist I’d hate to give away. So go read it now. And then came back here for the rest of this post. Or not. Whatever.

March

If you consider my lowest-performing March post, “The Power of Loafing,” in the context of my earlier “New Year’s Resignation” post, you might conclude I was (and/or am) burned out and just going through the motions of my life, running out the clock. And you’d be right. Er, wrong. Maybe both. Look, this was a useful post in challenging the so-called “grind culture” of “performative workaholism” while introducing a new buzz-phrase that’s sure to take the workplace by storm: “clip out.” Give it a read!

April

I haven’t seen much response to my April post “Can We Unplug Our Kids?” despite it being a serious commentary on an important societal problem. Oh, wait a second … I just realized this is the last sort of thing anyone wants to read, and that moreover reading is the last thing anyone wants to do. I should have posted a video of myself doing a silly dance, or better yet, a video of a really attractive woman doing a sexy dance. In other words I should have just forwarded something from TikTok, like everybody else.

But wouldn’t earnest parents be naturally drawn to this topic? And aren’t parents among the most earnest type of people alive? Maybe parents didn’t read this because they don’t see that I’ve earned the right to pontificate. Don’t they realize I’m a tall male so I automatically have the right? Well, anyway, I do think I’ve earned that right because I raised my kids in a highly unorthodox fashion and reported on the remarkable results. I should have titled this post “Raised By Nutjobs: the Sad Story of a Cell-Phone-Free Childhood!” Or maybe “TikTok Twerk Tease!” or “Megadeth.”

May

Once again, a useful-looking how-to advice post was largely ignored: “Five Home Remodeling Mistakes to Avoid.” Would-be readers may have seen that title and thought, “So what, I’m not contemplating a home remodel anyway,” or “What does this unheralded bookworm cyclist blogger know about remodels that the helpful folks at Home Depot couldn’t tell me?” or “OMG, after my disastrous remodel I can’t bear to think about that topic ever again.” Evidently they weren’t thinking, “Oh, this is obviously another purely BS humor piece along the lines of ‘COVID-19: Helping Teens Cope’ or ‘Plumbing Emergencies for Dummies.’ I’ll bet it’s a scream!”

This post takes five perfectly logical and reasonable rules of thumb and smashes them with a hammer. It is the perfect remedy for the dread that contemplating home improvement can generate. Here’s a teaser so you’ll understand what vein I was shooting up in:

Spring is in the air. Out in their driveways, your neighbors are beating on old Turkish rugs with broomsticks, maybe more enthusiastically than is really necessary. Birds are building nests in your trees, without asking. No matter where you look, spring cleaning and other restoration projects are underway. The warm breeze is whispering in your ear: “Time to start pulling your weight.” Or maybe that’s your spouse, and it’s proceeded from a whisper to plain speech to aggressive beseeching all the way up to a flat-out demand, which has become increasingly hard to ignore. So it’s time to bite the bullet and agree to a home remodel.

In summary, check this post out immediately!

June

I read an article yesterday about how a majority of the movies that Hollywood is working on this year are sequels, prequels, reboots, or remakes, because that’s the kind of crap that gets people into the theaters. The logic of this is not lost on me: I understand that people are lame and don’t like to gamble on new stuff. Thus, when a post does well, I often try to work my way around to a sequel. A post from 2009, “We Have a Winner,” has racked up about 1500 pageviews, and—get this—over 850 of them were in the last year alone. That’s not an albertnet blockbuster but it’s pretty solid. So in June I posted “We Have a Winner! – Part II” and it has done … very poorly.

This post concerns the winner of my second non-annual albertnet Amateur Product Review contest, and recaps the three consumer reviews I featured of various products, with one review each being a fake that I contrived. Then this post provides the correct answer and the winner’s brilliant commentary around how he came to his answer. Give it a read, it’s fun!

July

I am very disappointed with the performance of “What Are Men Extenders?” which concerns a term that (after harrowing Internet research) I traced etymologically to the movie “Barbie.” This post provides a very thorough definition of “men extender” and plumbs the fascinating topic of what products are the quintessential examples. This phrase is utterly useful, as is the examination of what it means to be a man—a man’s man, even—in our modern, enlightened times. This post is my finest on this theme since “The Sissy Syndrome” which I posted back in 2010, and which has been really popular. Read ‘em both!

August

Okay, the loss leader for August, “Ageing Focus – Make Balance a Habit!” is unabashedly earnest, helpful, useful, and understandably has been ignored. It’s really not very amusing and concerns the unpleasant reality of getting old and lame. I guess I could have titled it “Try This Weird Trick That Your Therapist Doesn’t Want You To Know About” or “Too Hot For TikTok!” but that would be a bait-and-switch. Look, there’s some helpful stuff in this post, okay? And if you want the punch line without having to read anything, just scroll down and watch a couple of the 20-second videos shot by my daughter. (In one of them you can hear her yawning, which is probably the highlight of the whole post.) Just do it. Do it for your future self, assuming you don’t want to be falling-and-you-can’t-get-up.

September

All of my posts did pretty well in September, but one had to be the loser, so I’ll draw your attention to “Major League Baseball FAQ – a Guide for Foreigners.” Given that a large percentage of albertnet viewers are overseas, I figured this would be popular (especially given the strong performance of “Super Bowl FAQ – A Guide for Foreigners”). But it hasn’t gone viral or anything (not really, not yet).

You should read it whether you’re foreign or not, whether you’re a baseball maven or a total newb. (My nephew, who played varsity baseball in college, says he learned a couple things.) It’s not because you need this knowledge, but because you need a laugh. Here’s an excerpt to whet your appetite.

Cuba has won more Olympic medals for baseball than any other country but they have never played in the World Series. How can MLB baseball call it the “World” Series?

Because America.

What is the seventh inning stretch?

This is when all the fans in the stadium stand together and stretch, since they’ve been sitting so long on those uncomfortable bleachers.

So it’s like yoga or Tai Chi?

No, just stretching out your arms a bit, and singing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”

Is it always the same song, across the nation?

No, in Boston they sing “Sweet Caroline” by Neil Diamond.

Why Boston? Why don’t they sing “Sweet Caroline” in North or South Carolina?

Nobody knows. That is to say, I don’t know.

October

It’s not often that the title of an albertnet post includes “Mea Culpa.” In case you’re not fluent in pig Latin, that roughly translates, “Just kill me.” I fell on my sword with this post (schadenfreude, anyone?) based on the myopia of my April loss-leader post, “Can We Unplug Our Kids?” My “Part II: Mea Culpa” post considers the social media conundrum afresh, letting parents somewhat off the hook and examining how the Internet industry is more to blame. I examine in particular how privilege and luck helped my family grapple with social media responsibly. Gosh, any time I tap into liberal guilt I ought to touch a nerve, right? With readers either commiserating or condemning me, possibly both? Well, not this time … people simply ignored it. Do you want to remedy that? Click here! (Note: reading the post will not actually help you save the world. But you might feel smug and/or indignant. Won’t that feel good?)

November

Frankly, November was a great month for albertnet. Its four posts have accumulated over 1,100 page views so far, and the count from those four is still climbing with well over 100 views in the last week. The least number of views is from “Bell’s Seasoning II – The Spawning” with only 180 views so far (38 in the past week). I already mentioned how sequels are supposed to be a slam-dunk, so what’s going on here? I even included “The Spawning” in the title, which strategy seems to have borne fruit in the past (e.g., “Tire Chains II – The Spawning,” “Keep Calm II – The Spawning”). And yet my Bell’s sequel hasn’t yet propelled me to international fame and stardom.

You should read it anyway, because it’s not just about a spice concoction that is the key to Thanksgiving, but also about a dogged blogger who is persistent beyond all reason. It’s almost like a cautionary tale, except there’s no moral (unless I missed it, in which case you could enjoy some first-rate dramatic irony). I know your next turkey dinner is over ten months away, but you should check this post out anyway.

December

Well, I posted only three times last month, and it’s probably not fair to pick on the most recent, lowest-performing post for December because it’s only been up for a week and a half. I’m talking about “A Mysterious Note” which is the strange, true story of a mysterious note, and includes as a bonus the even stranger, also true story of the time I terrorized a junkie during his heroin fix. At least, I think I terrorized him. I can only assume he experienced actual terror (since I’ve never tried heroin myself, obviously). Does any of this make you curious? Good, good. Click on through!

Here’s to 2025!

Thank you for visiting albertnet. I look forward to another year of writing about, well, anything that amuses me, and I hope you look forward to reading it.

Overlooked posts of 2023:

• Jan: Ask a Fitness Dweeb (now up to second most popular of the month)
• Feb: What We Should (and Will) Be Embarrassed By
• Mar: Schooling ChatGPT (also up to second)
• Apr: Errata
• May: More Tom Swifties
• Jun: Impromptu Commencement Address
• Jul: Gravel Riding in the Rockies
• Aug: If William Wordsworth Were Writing Today (now up to first place!)
• Sept: Jumbo-Visma & the Kuss Conundrum
• Oct: Epic Trans Alps Cycling Trip – Part VI (also now first)
• Nov: Undeterred - A Critique of a Book About Life Without Free Will (also now first)
• Dec: Cycling Smackdown – Small Cog Tale (also now first)

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Email me here. For a complete index of albertnet posts, click here.

Major League Baseball FAQ - A Guide for Foreigners

Introduction

I am no expert on Major League baseball. That might make me seem like a poor authority to consult about the sport, but most Americans are far too steeped in its lore to be of much help to a foreigner. Ask almost any baseball fan what “the count” means, and you’ll get an answer like, “Oh, it’s simple. If it’s like, 3 & 0, that’s ahead of the count, and 0 & 2 would be behind the count. Very basic.”

I recently attended an MLB game with a variety of family members including my Dutch nieces and nephew, and it occurred to me that this seemingly simple game is actually pretty complicated. As a service to foreigners trying to wrap their brains around our national pastime, and for native-born Americans who could use a chuckle, I offer this guide.

Major League Baseball Frequently Asked Questions

Is baseball modeled after cricket?

No, baseball and cricked both descended (or, you might say, ascended) from other games, and though the history is murky, the sports of “rounders” and “stoolball” are the most direct antecedents. “Stoolball” holds the distinction of being the most disgusting name ever applied to a sport.

I get that the point is to hit a ball and try to run around the bases, which seems straightforward enough. But why does the language of the game have to be so complicated?

I don’t know what you mean.

Come on. When the batter swings at a pitch and misses, such that there is absolutely no contact between the bat and the ball, that’s called a “strike.” And when the batter just stands there doing nothing, it’s called a “ball,” even though the baseball is involved throughout every activity of the game including a hit. How is that not confusing?

Gosh, I guess you got me there. I guess it’s only perplexing if you haven’t been immersed in the culture of the game since childhood. I’d speculate that the weird terminology serves as a shibboleth. We like it better because we’re in on it.

How come the batter can get a strike called against him when he doesn’t even swing?

That is an excellent question, and I learned the answer the hard way. I was playing baseball in elementary school gym class, and was absolutely terrified of striking out because in those days, at least in my hometown of Boulder, Colorado, mercilessly mocking a fellow student was not only tolerated by the gym teacher, but expected and even encouraged, as part of our education. I figured as long as I didn’t swing, I couldn’t strike out and be teased about it, and walking to first after four balls seemed entirely civilized. And yet the umpire, who was not the gym teacher but my regular teacher (whose very attendance during gym class was a mystery to me) kept calling strikes. I thought I wasn’t holding the bat still enough, and concentrated harder and harder on holding it absolutely still. My teacher kept yelling at me, with unconcealed disgust, “What is your problem? That was a home run pitch!” It would have been helpful if she’d explained the strike zone. It’s the area of space above home plate, at a reasonable elevation, meaning the batter has no valid excuse not to swing. If batters weren’t required to swing at pitches in the strike zone, I suppose the game could get pretty boring because lousy batters could just walk all the time. Like I’d dreamed of doing.

I gather a foul ball counts as a strike, but if a batter has two strikes already he can apparently hit as many fouls as he likes. What gives?

There is a special rule about this: you cannot strike out on a foul ball. As with the strike zone, I had to be corrected on this. A bunch of us kids were playing baseball in the street, and David K— hit a foul after two strikes and I declared him “out.” He protested, and we argued, and I told him not to be a baby, and he ran home literally crying to his mom. She stormed up the street in her apron and her horn-rimmed glasses and gave me a good scolding. “You can’t strike out on a foul ball!” she shouted. “Everybody knows that! What’s wrong with you?!”

(Was David’s father similarly supportive? Well, sort of. He did frequently host pickup baseball games for all the neighborhood kids at a nearby park, so his son could get extra practice, but Mr. K— also had a “house rule” that it was permissible to get D— (and only D—) out by throwing the ball at him like in kickball. This looked painful, and one time D— started bawling, and his dad gathered everyone around the poor kid and said, “Who wants to see a crybaby?” That was Boulder in the ‘70s.)

What exactly is stealing a base? How does a player decide to do it?

Normally, a runner can only advance to the next base after the batter has hit a non-foul ball or a pop fly that has been caught. But when the pitcher has started the wind-up to his pitch (and is committed to it such that he can’t change his mind and throw to a base), the runner can try to run to the next base because it takes time (though not much!) for the pitch to reach the catcher, who will throw the ball where needed to try to get the runner out.

You mentioned a “pop fly” just now as though I had any idea what that is.  So … what is it?

A pop fly, also called a pop-up, is a ball that goes really high and really far but isn’t that hard to catch, and has so much hang time any player in the outfield is allowed to catch it. The runner has to “tag up” (i.e., return to the base to tap it if he’d advanced a few feet beyond it, which is called “leading off” and is legal), and can do so only after the pop fly is caught. Interestingly, advancing on a pop fly isn’t technically stealing.

This is so terribly arcane. How am I supposed to know and keep track of all this?

You’re not. It’s really not that important. The real point of the game is that these players can hit and throw a baseball incredible distances, and that fans in the stands can sometimes catch (and keep!) the ball, and there’s food and beer and it’s all very pleasant in a distinctly American way that other sports, like soccer, are not.

What is the World Series?

This series of games (the number of which depends on how things unfold) determines which MLB team is the world champion for the season.

Is it like the Olympics where the best players in each country play for their national team?

No, it’s the normal league trade teams competing. It wouldn’t work to have national teams because all the teams playing are American.

You mean other countries never qualify? How is that possible?

Actually, they simply aren’t invited. Our national pastime, our rules.

Have foreign teams ever participated?

Yes, the Toronto (Canada) Blue Jays played in 1992 and 1993.

How did they do?

They won, both times.

Did they ever qualify again?

No. (Which I find a bit fishy.)

Cuba has won more Olympic medals for baseball than any other country but they have never played in the World Series. How can MLB baseball call it the “World” Series?

Because America.

What is the seventh inning stretch?

This is when all the fans in the stadium stand together and stretch, since they’ve been sitting so long on those uncomfortable bleachers.

So it’s like yoga or Tai Chi?

No, just stretching out your arms a bit, and singing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”

Is it always the same song, across the nation?

No, in Boston they sing “Sweet Caroline” by Neil Diamond.

Why Boston? Why don’t they sing “Sweet Caroline” in North or South Carolina?

Nobody knows. That is to say, I don’t know.

Why are the benches called bleachers?

According to Wikipedia, the uncovered wooden boards that traditionally comprised these benches were so named because they got bleached by the sun.

What is the “nosebleed section” of the stadium?

These are the bleachers that are so high up and so far from the action, you can barely see anything. The nickname derives from how mountain climbers can get nosebleeds at very high altitudes.

Why would anybody want to sit that far from the action?

Because it’s cheap. MLB baseball is actually a sport that you can afford to watch live, for as little as $4 for a whole game (which lasts, on average, over two and a half hours). This sets it apart from, say, football, which is far pricier (averaging about $150 a game).

Do baseball fans look down on other sports?

I don’t know for sure, being only a cycling fan (whom the fans of other sports all look down on). But at a Colorado Rockies baseball game I attended recently, I happened to wear (along with my brothers, as shown above) a University of Colorado (CU) Buffaloes t-shirt. (The Buffs are a football team.) Lots of people called out to us (“Go Buffs!” etc.) and made some hand gesture resembling horns. It was as though our modest show of support for a local football team elevated us somehow, even at a baseball game. Maybe it was the beer talking.

Speaking of which, are there baseball hooligans?

Violence at baseball games isn’t nearly as common as at soccer games in Europe. Maybe it’s due to the different energy in general. Baseball games don’t seem nearly as intense as soccer (or even American football), perhaps because there are so many games, and so many opportunities to score points. I almost get the impression that the spectators aren’t actually that focused on the game.

Seriously?

Yes. At the game I attended, I had a nice conversation with my niece’s husband about our fathers’ deaths, while watching the Rockies pitcher strike out several Cubs batters. Having something to focus my gaze on made it a lot easier to have this dialogue than if we were, say, across a table having coffee.

Are you suggesting that most baseball fans are just using the game as a foil to have deep heart-to-hearts?

No, I am not saying that. Honestly, I’m not really a fan and really have no idea what most fans do.

Is baseball cooler than soccer?

Hard to say. Soccer requires more physical stamina, but then it has the problem of flopping, which is disgraceful.

Is there doping in Major League baseball?

Yes, of course. There have been many highly publicized cases of steroid use. Even more prominent is the use of chewing tobacco, a known stimulant, which—though it’s legal, and not technically doping—is completely disgusting.

Is Major League baseball as dangerous to players as pro football?

No, not at all. There’s no tackling, and each player kind of has his own territory, so other than getting beaned by the ball or accidentally colliding with another player, there’s not much risk of major injury.

Is “bean” a technical term?

Actually, yes. The verb “bean,” and its noun form “beanball,” refer to the pitcher deliberately throwing the baseball at the batter’s head.

Wow! Does the pitcher get arrested and booked for assault?

No. As with hockey, the rules of the game supersede the law of the land. In all cases, the batter who’s been beaned is allowed to proceed to first base, to punish the pitcher’s team. In egregious cases, the pitcher can be ejected from the game. But the assault is not treated as though it were criminal.

Why do baseball uniforms have belts? Surely these teams can afford trousers that fit?

There is a rule stipulating this, which goes all the way back to 1882. It’s not clear that this rule is still in effect, but I guess these traditions die hard.

Given how hideously ugly modern cycling helmets are, particularly those worn in time trials, couldn’t it be said that baseball is actually far more elegant and tasteful, in its adherence to tradition over whatever-works?

Yes, it could be said.

What is a switch hitter?

Baseball players are typically expected to do two things well: 1) whatever position they play on defense, and ) batting. Some players suck at batting, so they get to have somebody else hit the ball for them. As a former bike racer, I find this ridiculous. Cyclists have to be good at pretty much everything: climbing, descending, sprinting, cornering, and tactics. Imagine if a rider with poor bike handling skills could just tag in a teammate for a descent, or if a pure sprinter could have somebody else tackle the big climbs for him. It would be a mockery of the sport.

So it could be said that you’re more elitist than the baseball fans who openly celebrate the CU Buffs football team?

Guilty as charged.

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