Toledo Free Press

Tigers notes from loss to Angels

WHAT HAPPENED: In a turnabout, Justin Verlander became the victim of a masterpiece. The Angels' Dan Haren threw a two-hitter, and Verlander lost a 1-0 game for the first time in his career, ending his winning streak at nine games. Haren walked none, and he retired the final 15 Tigers in order.

DISPUTED RUN: The only run came with one out in the second when Howie Kendrick barely beat out an infield single -- manager Jim Leyland argued Joe West's call -- and scored on Erick Aybar's double. Rightfielder Magglio Ordoñez threw to second on the play, but Kendrick never stopped coming around third.

LEYLAND EJECTED: In a series that has featured several arguments with the umpires, Leyland got ejected by West after the final out in sixth. Leyland might have been upset that third-base umpire Angel Hernandez made Verlander throw a baseball out of play in the sixth after he rubbed it up behind the mound after putting his hand to his mouth. Or Leyland might still have been upset over West's safe call on Kendrick in the second.

VERLANDER EJECTED: Acting manager Lloyd McClendon lifted Verlander after 129 pitches when he issued a two-out walk in the eighth. On his way off the mound, Verlander gave a blast to Hernandez, who superfluously ejected him. Then Verlander got up at the railing of the dugout and yelled at West.

ONE STREAK CONTINUES: This became the sixth straight start in which Verlander didn't allow more than one run and pitched at least seven innings. He's the first Tiger to have such a streak since Al Benton in 1945, and the first big leaguer to do so since St. Louis' Chris Carpenter in 2005, according to Baseball-Reference.com.

HUNDRED THE HARD WAY: Haren (9-5) got the 100th win of his career. He's 100-79.

MEMORIES OF MAYS: Austin Jackson hit a triple in the third on which fellow centerfielder Peter Bourjos missed a try for a spectacular catch. So perhaps something that Bob Stevens of the San Francisco Chronicle once wrote about a Willie Mays triple was true of this one: "The only guy who could have caught it, hit it."

FARM UPDATE: Carlos Guillen returned to the Triple-A Toledo lineup Tuesday night after he sat out Monday as a precaution due to soreness in his surgically repaired left knee. Guillen started at second base and went 1-for-4 with a home run in the loss at Indianapolis. He’s 2-for-13 (.154) in four games with Toledo.

McGinnis: Reasoning with vampires — blogger ... - Toledo Free Press

— Dana, “Reasoning with Vampires.”

The author of the blog “Reasoning with Vampires” prefers to be credited simply as Dana. She is not an English teacher, though one could be excused for thinking so, given her work on the site. For nearly a year, Dana has engaged in one of the most exhaustive and entertaining pieces of literary criticism ever seen: A page-by-page, almost line-by-line dissection of Stephenie Meyer’s “Twilight” saga.

She analyzes everything in the books, from poor writing and grammatical errors — and there are plenty — to head-scratching character choices and storytelling elements. Her work is so meticulous, even those who have never touched the novels can gain an excellent sense of what they are like and why Dana is so offended by their content.

She learned of the phenomenon well into its run, Dana said in an interview with Toledo Free Press Star

“I first heard of ‘Twilight’ on NPR. I was a little behind, I think it was the summer that ‘Breaking Dawn’ came out, maybe 2007,” she said. “I got it for my boyfriend’s little sister for her birthday, because she really liked the books, but I didn’t actually know anything about them.”

She didn’t read them herself until the spring of 2010.

“My sister read them, and she just felt they were fantastic, and from what I heard about them, they just didn’t seem fantastic,” Dana said.  “Hearing the way people talk about Edward and just how dreamy and wonderful he is, and he’s just kind of a tool,” Dana said with a laugh. “I don’t think it’s a really great model when your boyfriend starts by sneaking in your bedroom and watching you sleep.

“I had an opinion about that. When ‘Twilight’ would come up — I’m not really a quiet person when it comes to things that I dislike — so I had no qualms in saying that, but it did feel that it’s not completely appropriate to make a lot of those leaps without actually reading the books. Maybe stalking is really sweet, the way it’s framed. So I thought I should at least check.”

Not only was Dana troubled by the story and characters, but she also was struck by how poorly written the whole enterprise was. It was plagued with bad word choices, unnecessary punctuation, terrible structure — things a competent editor would notice and correct. Even then, however, Dana’s first inclination was not to share her observations with the world.