June 2006 Archives for Agony & Ivy
AA Flight 2402
Editor’s Note: I wrote this last evening, but after going out on North Clark Street last night, I didn’t get a chance to post it until now, on my way out the door. I'm no longer cranky.
I’m on American Airlines flight 2402, Austin to Chicago, in the last row next to the toilets. There’s turbulence, and quite frankly I’m still not right from staying out too late last night. The occasion was my last week at my job. For the second consecutive year I’ve left a position in June to spend the summer meandering towards what comes next.
On Matt Murton
David Barber is poetry editor for the Atlantic Monthly, and in the May issue he published a poem of his own entitled, “Bambino Sutra” (subscribers only). In case anyone who reads this happens to know Matt Murton, maybe you could suggest that he read the following excerpted passage:
I Don't Want To Think About It
Well, it’s ten minutes to 1AM as I sit down to begin watching the game, and to write. Last night was pretty rambunctious, I guess you could say, with happy hour and then the Sonic Youth concert -- brilliant, by the way -- and my roommate and I stopped in for an extra beer to divide the walk home. So, tonight I’ve stayed clearheaded, and since I’m kind of wound up I figure I might as well meander along here and see what happens.
Best Of Game Notes Vol. 5
You might not believe this, but ignoring the pitcher, the Cubs have used a different starting lineup in 13 consecutive games. The last time they used two identical starting lineups were the 4th and 8th of June. How is this possible? This has to be another nefarious record... kind of like the 8 HRs allowed today, tying a club record that was set earlier this year.
I realize there’s the Dusty factor, and that’s most of it with the lineups, but even so, he hasn’t had the pieces to use.
Growing Up Lucky
Well, the Cubs season has imploded more explosively than Tiger Stadium will in a redevelopment plan. Speaking of redevelopment plans...
Nah, I don’t wanna go there. I’d rather reminisce a bit. After all, I’m going to miss Tiger Stadium. I already do.
One of my father’s favorite stories from recent years came at a Tiger game with one of his fellow high school teachers, who was also the baseball coach, and the other teacher’s young son.
Burning Questions
Well, Greg Maddux just threw his first pitch and I’m sitting down to finally write something for the site here. Feels good. There’s stuff I should be doing, or at least could be, but at a certain point, enough is enough.
I’m going to start by posting answers to a series of questions KJM posed me last week. I sent him original answers with follow up questions, but it stopped there as he’s been as busy as I’ve been, so now I’m going back to flesh my answers out and then just post it as-is. Here goes.
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