Friday, January 29, 2010

Bob Feller on Life (and Baseball) (Which as we all know is really the same thing.)

"I threw just as hard. The ball just didn't go as fast."

-Bob Feller




I think I have my new motto.

Thursday, January 28, 2010

Tough Week To Be A Wordsmith

Word broke across the Twitterverse today that JD Salinger, the author arguably more famous for his decades of reticence than for his prose, is dead. Honestly, I haven't read him in quite a while. It will be interesting to see, if I reread him, if his work resonates differently with me after all these years.

***

I finished Michael Chabon's "Manhood For Amateurs", and I really enjoyed it. Chabon is a marvelous writer, and the book consists of essays arranged around the general topic of manhood-fatherhood, and his life as a child. There are a couple of frankly sexual sections, but it would make a great Father's Day gift for literate leaning husbands out there.

Monday, January 25, 2010

A Cowboy Looks At Thirty

Yet another 100 Words, inspired by the wondrous prose stylings of Velvet Verbosity, on display aqui.

What is Thirty?

Thirty is when “I'm gonna be” becomes “I used to think I was gonna be”.

when “ACTIVE-Will Play” becomes “DOUBTFUL-Hamstring”.

when “I'll meet you there” becomes “I have to be up early tomorrow”.

when “Why not?” becomes “Do you think it's worth the effort?”

when “Yes, we can” becomes “Do you really think that's wise?”

when “I saw them play downtown” becomes “I've never heard of that band.”

when “I will do what I want” becomes “I'll do what is best for them.”

Keith Olbermann on Free Speech




Keith Olbermann on the Citizens United Supreme Court decision.

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Sad, and somehow, funny

A sad, and somehow funny, post from the Bloggess, the immortal, and immoral, Jenny.

Cute ESPN Spot




(h/t Surviving Grady)

Truck Day is coming, my children. Spring is almost here.

I May Be Wrong

They say it takes a big man to admit when he's wrong. And those of you who have met me in person know I am nothing if not a big man.

I may be wrong.

Senator Elect Scott Brown may be the wisest man since Solomon, and a legislator to rival Daniel Webster. Tying the Obama Administration in knots may be the key event that saves America from the Red Menace. Stopping people from being able to see their doctors when they are sick may have just prevented us all from having to dress the same and carry the President's autobiography around with us everywhere we go. Torture may be a key element of the war on terror, and climate change may just be some loony plot cooked up during a hash reverie at The Nation magazine. Saving corporations from having any restrictions on political spending may be the key that unlocks the new American Arcadia.

Charlie Pierce does not agree.

Maybe Charlie and I are wrong.

But I doubt it.