Long day. This is the first opportunity I've had to sit at a computer and write anything.

It started at 5 A.M. when I got up to herald the 2004 baseball season. The Yankees were playing the Devil Rays in the Tokyo Dome and it counts in the standings as the first game of the season. Being a frustrated Mets fan, I was amused at watching the Yankees lose by a score of 8-3. When it comes to my fantasy league, I had one player who I was rooting for to put me on the board and hopefully gain an early lead. He was Carl Crawford. Naturally, he went 0 for 5.

Then I went to work where the annual review with Commissioner Benepe at Green-Wood Cemetery finally took place. All went well as our two months of preparations paid off. My boss, Marty Maher, sure worked tremendously to put it together. It was especially nice to hear Commissioner Spiegel thank me by name in his speech. I could talk about the meeting and the presentations but all of that is boring shop talk and I don't think anyone reading this blog would be interested. But I do want to give Chief of Operations Charlie Gili credit for the anti-littering public service announcement. It was a great piece merging the "Crying Chief" PSA from the '70s with footage of Charlie and his staff, teaching a Brooklyn-style lesson to a litterer.

After the meeting, the Director of Green-Wood Cemetery took about 20 of us on a walking tour of the grounds. It was amazing to see the care put into many of the stones that were created in the 19th century. We passed Leonard Bernstein's gravesite and I was surprised at how simple the footstone was. All it had was his name and the years he was born and died. There wasn't even a headstone. We also visited the grave of Edwin Litchfield. Litchfield is the man who in the 1850s constructed and lived in the building where I currently work, Litchfield Villa. We also stood on the highest altitude level in Brooklyn and from there we were able to look down upon the Statue of Liberty and the Manhattan skyline. It's an amazing place, full of NYC history. I intend on returning to Green-Wood on May 29 to go on their "Gangs of New York" walking tour. That will be based around the gravesites of Boss Tweed, William Cutting (Daniel Day-Lewis' character) and victims of the Civil War Draft Riots.