Monthly Archives: May 2015

Food 52 gives a lovely-looking recipe for Shaved Asparagus and Arugula Salad.

Picture by Bernard Deschamps via MPD.

Last weekend at the Beast, I had the pleasure to reprint Ross MacDonald’s 1965 essay for Show magazine, “The Writer As Detective Hero”.

Dig in:

A producer who last year was toying with the idea of making a television series featuring my private detective Lew Archer asked me over lunch at Perino’s if Archer was based on any actual person. “Yes,” I said. “Myself.” He gave me a semi-pitying Hollywood look. I tried to explain that while I had known some excellent detectives and watched them work, Archer was created from the inside out. I wasn’t Archer, exactly, but Archer was me.

The conversation went downhill from there, as if I had made a damaging admission. But I believe most detective-story writers would give the same answer. A close paternal or fraternal relationship between writer and detective is a marked peculiarity of the form. Throughout its history, from Poe to Chandler and beyond, the detective hero has represented his creator and carried his values into action in society.

At long last, the Yanks win a game. And not only did they win it, well, they put a beatin’ on the Royals to the tune of 14-1.

The Yanks sored early and often, launching a trio of 3-run singers. Nathan Eovaldi was terrific, and a couple of youngters–Mr. Heathcott and Mr. Lindren–pitched in to make this a happy, worry-free afternoon of baseball for the home town team.

Wunnerful, wunnerful.

[Photo Credit: Chris Heads]

The Yanks turn to none other than Nathan Eovaldi to put an end to this losing nonsense.

Feel better?

Right.

Brett Gardner LF

Chase Headley 3B

Alex Rodriguez DH

Mark Teixeira 1B

Brian McCann C

Garrett Jones RF

Stephen Drew 2B

Didi Gregorius SS

Slade Heathcott CF

Never mind no negative thinking:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Image Via Markmcevoy]

Goodness.

At least the best team in the league isn’t coming into town. Oh–wait.

Picture by Bags

Yanks playing like they’re under the influence these past few weeks.

Tonight gives celebrating Bernie Williams, one of our favorites. Check out this nifty appreciation by our man C.C.

Brett Gardner LF

Chase Headley 3B

Alex Rodriguez DH

Mark Teixeira 1B

Brian McCann C

Garrett Jones RF

Chris Young CF

Didi Gregorius SS

Jose Pirela 2B

Never mind the losing:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

Picture by Bags

Put your feet up, relax, and enjoy the day.

Well, goddamn, this thing seems to have a life of its own, doesn’t it? The Yanks didn’t just lose today, they were embarrassed, 15-4. I mean, good grief, already, when you’re going bad everything you touch turns to shit.

This is how it goes when you’re losing. You’re down 7-0, you then score 9 runs, and still come up short.

Got to say, as irritating as this losing has become, I was encouraged last night. Encouraged by their fight. I think they’re going to be OK.

In a few hours, on a gorgeous afternoon in the Bronx, they’re back at it.

Let’s end this horseshit now, whadda ya say?

It’s the Big Fella.

Yanks are winning tonight, you guys.

Brett Gardner LF

Carlos Beltran RF

Alex Rodriguez DH

Mark Teixeira 1B

Brian McCann C

Chase Headley 3B

Stephen Drew 2B

Didi Gregorius SS

Slade Heathcott CF

Never mind the losing:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

Hey guys. Sorry for the lack of posting. I’ve got some technical difficulties I’m dealing with. But I’ll have a game thread up for the game tonight.

Hope you all have a great holiday weekend.

Time for the Yanks to start winning again.

When your team is on a losing streak none of the calls go their way, the bloops don’t fall, and line drives don’t hit off the wall then drop onto the warning track, they skip off the top of the wall into the stands. The walks and errors bury them and even when they do catch something of break, like when a touchy home plate umpire ejects the oppositions’ best player early in the game, it doesn’t help. Nothing does. Mustaches, no mustaches. You’re screwed.

Adam Warren pitched well tonight and started the 7th inning with the game tied at 2. Then Chase Headley boots a ground ball, Warren walks a batter, gets ahead of the next guy then walks him to load the damn bases. His night was over and Warren walked off the mound with an aftertaste that will no doubt last until his next start. The Nat’s scored a run and the Yanks couldn’t match them. Alex Rodriguez was called out on strikes by the same schmuck home plate up to end the game. How it was called a strike I still can’t figure, though balls were called strikes all night so I suppose Alex should have prepared to swing at horseshit in order to stay alive.

Final Score: Nats 3, Yanks 2.

This two-game series in Washington wasn’t going to be easy for the Yanks but adman, they could have won both games–especially last night, man. Instead, the losing continues. Tomorrow gives another off-day, then its back home for the weekend.

Let’s hope a return to the Bronx peps them up.

Brett Gardner LF

Carlos Beltran RF

Mark Teixeira 1B

Brian McCann C

Chase Headley 3B

Stephen Drew 2B

Chris Young CF

Didi Gregorius SS

Never mind the losing streak:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

Picture by Bags 

Break.

[Photo Credit: Nina Leen]

DIY

“Fire Escape” by Alice Neel (1946)

Tasked with holding a 6-2 lead in the 5th inning, Nathan Eovaldi faltered and earned the Ken L Ration Award for the night. His performance was a dog.

He didn’t blow the lead entirely, leaving the game with a 6-5 lead but the damage was done. The Nats tied the score and it remained tied until the bottom of the 10th inning when Andrew Miller gave up his first runs of the season–a two-run home run by Ryan Zimmerman off the right filed foul pole.

Dem things happen, of course, but after a bad week, this loss was regrettable.

Final Score: Nats 8, Yanks 6. 

But that wasn’t the worst of it as Jacoby Ellsbury is headed to the 15-day DL. 

Can I get a “Harumph”?

After a lousy week, the Yanks have a tough couple of games down in D.C.

I’ll settle for a split.

Jacoby Ellsbury CF

Brett Gardner LF

Chris Young RF

Mark Teixeira 1B

Brian McCann C

Chase Headley 3B

Jose Pirela 2B

Stephen Drew SS

It’s Eovaldi vs. Gio Gonzalez.

Never mind the monuments:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

Picture by Bags

The Road Warrior is one of my favorite action movies. Mad Max is creepy as hell, too. The thing about the first two Mad Max movies is that for all the unrelenting action, and despite the fantastic premise, it’s all rooted in credibility. I always felt that part of Miller’s achievement was to make you believe you are there–with these guys coming after you. They are a comic book–and the third movie went someplace that didn’t really appeal to me)–but realistic in a strange way; that’s what made them so frightening and effective. (The second movie also has some nice comedic touches).

Plus, I liked Max’s dog.

The new one looks pumped up with the action and pyrotechnics. I hope that same sense of urgency and credibility exist.

Mad Mad: Fury Road is supposed to be dope. Think I’ll have to cart my ass to the theater for this one.

Over at Esquire, our pal Scott Raab profiles Charlize Theron:

Her career is pure stardust.

She was a teenage model in Italy, came to New York City at eighteen, and left for Los Angeles when her knees gave out for good; there she was discovered by her first manager, who was in line at the bank where she was trying—loudly and without success—to cash her last New York modeling-job check to keep her room at the Farmer’s Daughter, formerly an L. A. fleabag. But Theron came up hard in a hard country, on a hard continent.

“On the street where I was raised—75 percent of the people who lived on that street are not alive anymore. For no reason. For nothing. Life means nothing. In my formative years, I was in an environment that was filled with turmoil—political turmoil—in a world that was incredibly unsafe. And still is. In the early nineties, we were number one in homicide in the world. In HIV/AIDS, we’re still number one. We were number one in carjacking; I think we’re now number three. It became a place where the value of life—there was no value of life.

“You can’t oversimplify it; it comes from a very real place. It’s sad, because the people are good. They’re good people, and they’re resilient people, more than anywhere else in the world that I’ve ever come across. There’s something about South African flesh—we get up and we move forward, and we sometimes don’t take a moment for a little bit of self-awareness or self-pity. We’re such beasts at having to survive—I have the utmost respect for that, but it’s not the healthiest way to go through life. We’ve become a generation in South Africa that is driven by very valid anger, but the cost is coming at such a high level—and that’s a painful thing to watch. A lot of my emotional drive comes purely from the fact that I was born on that continent, and that I was raised there, and that it was different. I have a very strong relationship with Africa, one that’s built on lots of love and massive pain.”