The 93rd running of the Indianapolis 500 is today! I’ve heard noon CDT/1 EDT for the start time. Television coverage on ABC starts an hour earlier, I think, and if past races are any indication, there still could be a lot of pre-green flag grabass even at noon.
So who the hell knows exactly when the race will start, but monitoring from noon CDT on seems a safe bet.
Clan BamaDan is coming over to watch it with us, with board game hilarities to follow. That is, assuming none of our children get cholera in the next four hours. We’ve had to cancel plans with them three different times because of child-resident pathogens, so I’m pleased we’re finally going to spend some fun time together. We are definitely overdue some merrymaking.
The forecast has consistently said a 30% chance of rain for Indianapolis this afternoon. There’s nothing organized up there, so anything that does happen should be of the pop-up variety and easily overcome. I’m optimistic.
So here’s the grid. Danica’s starting 10th. Teammate Tony Kanaan, aka “the best driver never to win the Indianapolis 500,” is starting 6th. Those are my horses. I also have a soft spot for Vitor Meira, mostly because it seems like every time he has a good car, something not of his doing takes him out. He’s starting 14th. Finally, I like Sarah Fisher because she’s so down-to-earth and also self-financed, but it’s unlikely she’ll be a factor. She’s starting 21st.
Helio Castroneves is clearly the driver to beat. He’s the pole-sitter by most of a full mile per hour, which is pretty scary considering how close the rest of the field is. We might need him or his team to make a mistake.
I’ve made the pitch before—if you like auto racing and you’re not currently following IndyCar, do yourself a favor and watch today. It’s the best series going.
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Well, Helio ran away with it. Danica finished third–her best finish to date at Indy, and another clear result signaling that ’09 will be a strong year for her. That’s three top fives in four starts for her.
We much enjoyed our introductions to Chrononauts and Settlers of Catan in and around copious food and drink with our delightful company this afternoon and evening. Lea won the two games of the former and one of the latter that we played. Rematches are clearly indicated.
I certainly love Sunday nights before Monday holidays!
We got smoked…Rematches demanded, possibly on our home turf. Sorry about screwing you out of the win in Settlers…well, not really.
Yeah, well, I was the only one not drinking… 😉
BamaDan: Hey, them’s the breaks. Strike first, strike hard, no mercy sir!
I really enjoyed Settlers of Catan. Looking forward to it.
Lea: Oh, come on. It’s not like any of us were sloppy. 🙂
Noted. The “I don’t know what to do” strategy will only work once I hope. Catan is a winner all the way, but a real time investment. Chrononauts gets better as players fully understand it.
Seriously, y’all need to give Killer Bunnies a whirl.
Late comment: You said you felt Tarantino was the greatest living director with Kubrick gone. I was stunned. Not by your choice, because you’re certainly entitled to it, but by the fact that it took me so long to think of living directors I liked more. Anyway, just because I am slow of mind:
Scorsese (easy), Coppola (also easy), Spielberg (should be easy), Terry Gilliam, Jean-Luc Godard (still alive!), Lars von Trier, Luc Besson, Seijun Suzuki, and maybe Wong Kar-wai and Werner Herzog.
Of course my list gets decimated if you run into “I don’t like subtitles” Guy
BamaDan: I overstated it if I really said “greatest living director.” (Not doubting I did; just don’t remember.) Tarantino just engages me like no one else. He’d fail a “best all around” evaluation that was at all rational. 🙂