Brad Zellar Is anybody still paying attention? Some of us, of course, can’t help ourselves. Some of us actually watched that game tonight. And some game, huh? I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a game end on a dropped pop-up to the second baseman. That there qualifies as tee-ball heroics. Still, the Twins did come back after … Read more
Fifty songs for fifty states. Not bad, but I’m sure we could swap out better choices for at least half of these.
We shall find peace. We shall hear the angels. We shall see the sky sparkling with diamonds. –Chekhov, Uncle Vanya It’s all just history now, that still incomprehensible day six years ago, history buried under history, with more awful history heaped on top of it. It gets buried deeper all the time. Rubble and ruin … Read more
How was your lovely Labor Day weekend? Mine? Horseshit, but thanks for asking. Though it pains me to admit this, and though I should be ashamed of myself, I spent the weekend watching baseball. Over at On the Ball, Britt Robson, David Brauer, and I discuss the disappointing season to date. Go over there and … Read more
It’s kind of nice when a headline can make your day, and even nicer when the story is even better than the headline: “Beauty Contestant Bitten By Rattlesnake.”
Well, that was a tough series to watch. A team that we’ve learned to take for granted when it comes to executing the fundamentals of the game and not giving away ballgames has officially become a colossal disappointment. It would be hard, really, to even know where to start. I’ll say this, though: Nick Punto’s … Read more
I’ve got Little Jimmy Scott crooning from the stereo and that’s never a particularly good sign, at least so far as mood barometers go. At this point I’m not fool enough to say that’s it, but I nonetheless can’t deny that I’m mighty tempted to say that’s it, even as I’ve been mighty tempted to … Read more
May you be forgiven. May you be given a second chance: May you come back as a dog. May you be lost. May you be found. May you be loved. May the whole world smell wonderful. And may you know the touch of gentle hands and the soft voice of someone who sees and knows … Read more
Junot Diaz’s debut collection of short stories, Drown, appeared ten years ago and drew the kind of attention usually reserved for writers with more established résumés. A big part of that was the cool intensity of the prose, which chronicled the lives of adolescent boys living in hardscrabble communities in the Dominican Republic, or transplanted … Read more
It’s been a huge year for Norwegian writer Per Petterson. The acclaim for his latest novel ranged from Thomas McGuane’s front-page rave in the Times Book Review (“A gripping account of such originality as to expand the reader’s own experience of life”) to the $135,000 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. .___________________________________________________. Award-winning author Richard Ford … Read more