We're talkin' Baseball (and Guttenberg)

A couple of my favorite websites/blogs have some interesting things to say:

• Ever wonder how a team can turn a triple play without ever touching the ball? John Beamer at Hardballtimes.com has the answer here, along with some other quirky aspects of out Nation's pastime.
  
• Ever wanted to read a detailed comparison of the career trajectory of Tom Hanks vs. Steve Guttenberg? Me too. Luckily, Joe Posnanski (he of The Greatest Blog on the Internet) has it for you.
• Did you know that Mitt Romney dislikes eggplants? Well, Wikipedia did.
  

Finally, I have a dark and disturbing confession to make: I am, in all likelihood, the least competent person in the world when it comes to voice mail. How does my incompetence manifest itself? Well, in a couple of vital areas:

1. I have a congenital inability to listen to an entire message. Check that, I have a congential inability to listen to a message past the "Hey Doug, it's X" part of the message. And I only make it that far if I don't recognize the person's voice before they identify themselves. Why is this a problem? Well it's not unless you consider the following type of exchanges somewhat annoying:

Me: Hey! You called!
Person who called: Yeah, so what do you think?
Me: (Confused) Umm...think about what?
Person: The urgent message I left you...
Me: (remembering I deleted the message after.021 seconds and have no idea what the person is talking about) Umm...well I think you raised some interesting points.
Person: My message said that I didn't get in to law school and I'm devastated.
Me: And I thought you raised some good points when you implied you're not very bright and that your life is ruined.

--Scene--

2. I leave work messages for people without indicating what I want to talk to them about.
3 (related to problem #2). I never write down what I left people messages about. This very problem reared its ugly head yesterday. Leading to this, equally awkward exchange:

Guy I called: Hey Doug, it's XXX from YYY. You had a question for me
Me: (In a panic trying to remember what I called about): Hey XXX! Good to hear from you!
Guy: So how can I help?
Me: (Having no recollection as to the purpose of my call and quickly deciding to lie) Actually, I already got that information so I think I'm all set. Thanks for the call though!

Hello, my name is DRH. And I have a voice mail problem.