Dodgers

Looking back over the past year of Dodger- and baseball-related posts here on Celsius1414 or, heck, the last couple of weeks, it should be pretty obvious that the subject has become pretty popular 'round these parts. A glance at the tag cloud page confirms it.

I've been thinking of splitting off baseball content into its own website for some time now, and with the Hot Stove League in full swing, this seems as good a time as any to debut trolleydodger.com.

The Trolley Dodger website is a standalone blog dedicated to the Dodgers, affiliated teams, and baseball in general. There are a few posts there already, and while I won't be transferring any existing stories here on Celsius1414 to the new site, I am really looking forward to covering one of my favorite topics in great verbosity over the coming months. Given the events of the off-season so far, there should be a lot to write about.

Celsius1414 will continue on as always, minus the new baseball stuff.

Thanks for reading!

Cool video describing the upcoming sbX E-Street transit project.

There's also a new website describing the planned Intermodal Transit Center in downtown San Bernardino: Are You In?

The new intermodal center will connect 13 existing Omnitrans bus lines, along with forthcoming sbX Bus Rapid Transit routes, 2 Metrolink route extensions, and a future light rail line to downtown Redlands.

The downtown center will not only be an iconic, world-class transportation gateway, but will be a catalyst for economic revitalization and development in San Bernardino. This will be the center point for a new transit village, where pedestrian-friendly, mixed-use neighborhoods with sustainable urban design encourage walking, bicycling, and using transit. The Village will include new public spaces- such as parks and plazas, new retail centers, new restaurants and cafes, new office spaces and meeting places, as well as new housing units for people with varying incomes.

Can't wait for that new light rail service to Redlands, but it'll likely be another five years at least.

My dream is to ride my bike to the train and take it to Union Station in Los Angeles, then bike up the hill to Dodger Stadium to see a game. :)

My thoughts on the new baseball season at Trolley Dodger: "Open sesame!"

Does anyone else feel like this has been a frickin’ long off-season? Never mind the extra week of Spring Training thanks to the WBC (which was again a very cool experience), it feels like the end of the World Series was a really long time ago.

Continued...

This year's LA Marathon will be proceeded by a Bike Tour along the same course, to benefit various organizations -- including the Dodgers' official ThinkCure! charity.

You'll need to get up early, as it starts at 5 AM, but you can join 15,000+ other riders on the 22-mile course.

• Acura LA Bike Tour info, including course map and registration
• ThinkCure! Launches Teams to Ride to Fight Cancer

(Also posted on Trolley Dodger.)

DJ Ruby Rhod:

What was that honey? It was BAD! It had no fire, no energy, no nothing! So tomorrow from 5 to 7 will you PLEASE act like you have more than a two word vocabulary. It must be green.

Happy St. Patrick's Day to one and all. Here are a few related Celsius1414 posts of yesteryear:

"Beannachtaí na Féile Pádraig oraibh!"

You might surmise from the surname, and you’d be correct, that today is a special day for yours truly. As fellow Irishman Vin Scully said prior to this morning’s first televised Dodger spring training game, “Happy St. Patrick’s Day to you all, especially if it applies.” :)

"Irish and Jewish cuisine exchanges?"

Naomi over at Will Tell Stories For Food posted earlier today on a curious culinary coincidence, “Ethnic Food”, prompted by the upcoming St. Patrick’s Day.

The story starts out with the odd corned beef tradition on the holiday, which apparently started in the States, a dish which the Irish didn’t have back in Ireland. A cuisine that does have corned beef (or brined brisket at least) is Jewish.[...]

The plot thickens, too. Guess who likes lox.

"Guinness good for you. And the Pope is Catholic."

Drink a Guinness for your health! The BBC is reporting on a study that shows a Guinness a day keeps the heart doctor away.[...]

Since I always feel better after having a pint of Guinness, this seems to confirm my findings. ;)

"Bearded drinkers lose out"

Almost £500,000 worth of Ireland’s world famous stout is lost each year in the moustaches and beards of imbibers of the creamy headed black stuff.

Research carried out in the UK by Guinness reveals that an estimated 92,370 moustachioed drinkers of the Irish brew lose up to 162,719 pints each year.

And from Grown Diaries over the weekend, "Ode to the Potato"

Being of Irish and German extraction, I am, as you might expect, enamored of the humble potato.[...]

It is thus with great pleasure that I point to today's poetry entry from the ongoing and endlessly entertaining Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor, "Ode to the Potato" by Barbara Hamby:

"They eat a lot of French fries here," my mother
   announces after a week in Paris, and she's right,
not only about les pommes frites but the celestial tuber
   in all its forms: rotie, purée, not to mention
au gratin or boiled and oiled in la salade niçoise.[...]

Continue...

At the Dodger Stadium blogger meetup back in April, one of the questions raised with owner Frank McCourt was bringing public transportation back to Dodger Stadium. He seemed genuinely interested at the time, though he made it clear he didn't see it as a problem the Dodgers organization needed to solve by itself.

This past weekend brought news that the Dodgers and the city of LA are going to resume shuttle service from Union Station for all home games, beginning in July. And it sounds as if the two entities have divided up the costs as well.

The shuttles would run from Union Station, with two stops along Sunset Boulevard, enabling fans to connect from Amtrak, Metrolink, the downtown DASH shuttle and several city bus lines. The estimated ride time from Union Station would be 16 to 19 minutes, according to city documents.

From the Times story, the Dodgers are treating this as an "interim solution," so look for more info some time in the not-so-distant future.

No word on if you can bring a bicycle along on the shuttle. ;) But if you're at Union Station already, it's not that far if you don't mind the hills. In fact, you can check out the terrain, along with a 3D model of Dodger Stadium in the latest version of Google Earth.

This is a pretty spiffy day.

• The Phoenix landed safely and is already sending back amazing photos.
• Clayton Kershaw had his major league debut for the Dodgers, and while he didn't get the win, he acquitted himself quite well, and the Dodgers wound up winning in the 10th inning off of Andre Ethier's first career walkoff hit. Luis Maza also hit his first career homerun.
• This is Towel Day, honoring Douglas Adams, the hoopiest frood ever.
• It is the one-year anniversary of my epic Star Wars Day marathon.
• It also marks the beginning of a one-year countdown to the even-more-epic Alien vs Predator Saga movie marathon in 2009.