You Gots to Chill.

Brand Nu

[Photo Credit: d00bied]

[Photo Credit: littlemissslut]

The Great One: R. Crumb

Serious Eats shows us how to make something good and delicious.

Smitten Kitchen does Matzoh Ball soup. And as we know, soup is good food. Especially on a cold rainy day like today.

“Yuki Onna” Digital Painting by Charlie Terrell

In celebration of my cousin’s birthday how about getting the Led out with Three for Thursday:

Oh, what the hell, here’s a bonus beat:

Two photographs by Man Ray.

Head on over to the always entertaining site, Scouting New York, and check out this fascinating post about an abandoned missile base in the Adirondacks.

David Lebovitz makes fresh pasta.

Townes.

I’ll fake it to ya.

Edible Art.

Rothko Cookies

Mondrian Cake

[Photo Credits: Mimi O Chun and Through My Blue Eyes]

You want great Sichuan in Manhattan? Peep Legend on 7th Ave between 15th and 16th Street.

I’ve been four times in the past two weeks and can recommend almost everything that I tried. I especially liked:

Sichuan Cucumber

The Green Beans with Ground Pork

Sichuan Spicy Ma Pa Tofu

Dry Spicy, Tasty Diced Chicken with Ginger and Peanut.

Photo Credit: Serious Eats, from their fine slideshow of the place.

Graham Greene was one of the first novelists that I liked. I think I read three or four of his books before I was twenty. I haven’t revisited him in a long time but he came to mind when I read about a new book by Pico Iyer. Check out this excerpt from The Los Angeles Review of Books:

It’s not of great cosmic interest that Graham Greene seems to be writing my life, even as I’m so proud of making it up myself. Or that he reads me better than many of the friends and family members who see me every day do. But what’s more intriguing is that all of us have these presences inside our heads, who seem somehow to shadow us, and in ways we can’t quite explain. “I can’t listen to Joni Mitchell’s Blue,” a friend once told me. “And I can’t stop listening to it. It’s as if she stole my diary and is broadcasting its secrets to the world.” “I’m almost afraid to see what Henry James will write in the next sentence,” another friend says. “Because it’s so close to my life that he might be telling me what I’ll do and think tomorrow.”

These days, in our virtual lives, this sense of spectral affinity may be more intense and unnerving than ever. Every other celebrity seems to have a stalker who feels he’s Gwyneth Paltrow’s other half, if only she would wake up to the fact; and many of us probably know more about Princess Diana or Tiger Woods, at least when it comes to their intimate lives, than about our siblings or parents. It’s almost as if we have one official life, in which we look and sound like our mother or father; but underneath is a more mysterious life in which we’re really closest to Zadie Smith, or that painter who’s produced our portrait without ever meeting us.

One of the writers who was most interested in this secret universe — we dream, again and again, of a place we’ve never seen in life, but almost never of the building in which we live; we meet a stranger at a party, and feel she knows us better than the old friends we came with do — was, as it happens, Graham Greene. At the age of 16, after failing to run away from the school where his father was headmaster, he was allowed (unusually for his time and class) to go and live for six months with a dream analyst in London, and the man’s glamorous wife. For much of his life thereafter he kept a careful diary of his dreams, meticulously indexed, and two of his novels, he said, came straight from dreams. The last book he prepared for publication before his death was a record of his dreams.

And here is a review of Iyer’s book in the New York Times Book Review.

A couple of mid-’90s Hip Hop Gems.

Jim Steranko

[Image via Whiz Bang Pow]

Andy Carey was not a star–perhaps he was no more than an average player–but he was good enough to start at third base for a pair of world championship teams during the glory years ofNew York City baseball. And if not for his presence at the hot corner, Don Larsen might not have made history in the 1956 World Series.

Carey died on December 15 at the age of 80, succumbing to a severe form of dementia, but his death was only reported publicly last week. Perhaps that’s a testament to the family’s desire for privacy. Or perhaps it’s evidence that Carey had become a forgotten figure in Yankee lore, having not played for the franchise in over 50 years. If the latter reason is the more accurate, then perhaps it’s something of a sad commentary on our society’s lack of interest in history.

Well, Carey should be remembered. First, he had a bit of quirkiness to him. For example, he was known as a voracious eater. He ate so much that he started costing the Yankees money. On road trips, the Yankees typically allowed players to sign for their meals in hotels and restaurants. Because of Carey’s insatiable appetite, the Yankees changed the policy.

On the field, Carey was the Scott Brosius of the 1950s, except for the fact that he never had the kind of breakout season that Brosius enjoyed in 1998. When Carey first came up, he was so strong defensively that the Yankees considered converting him to shortstop, with the plan to have him succeed an aging Phil Rizzuto. Ultimately, the Yankees decided that he was a better fit at third; he became the starting third sacker in 1954.

Offensively, Carey had only marginal talent. He led the league in triples one year and batted over .300 in 1954, but those achievements were the extent of his hitting highlights. Conversely, he was a solid defensive player, once turning four double plays in a single game to tie a major league record. On a team surrounded with sufficient offensive talent, like the Yankees had in the mid-1950s, you could win with a player like Carey at third base.

Larsen was certainly appreciative of Carey in Game Five of the ‘56 Series, when he took part in two remarkable plays. In the second inning, Carey knocked down a line shot off the bat of Jackie Robinson, the ball caroming to the left of the third baseman. Yankee shortstop Gil McDougald retrieved the ball and nipped Robinson at first. And then in the eighth, Carey made a diving snag of Gil Hodges’ line drive. Carey’s two-time heroics preserved both the no-hitter and the perfect game, the latter being the only one of its kind in postseason history.

Carey remained with the Yankees through the 1959 season. With the arrival of Clete Boyer via trade, the Yankees deemed Carey expendable. They traded him to theKansas CityA’s, Boyer’s former team, in exchange for power-hitting outfielder Bob Cerv.

From there, Carey bounced around with the A’s, White Sox and Dodgers before calling it quits in 1962. But it was as a Yankee that he would always be remembered. Carey became a frequent visitor toCooperstown, where he took place in baseball card shows, almost always signing with other Yankees from his era, like Larsen, McDougald, Yogi Berra, Moose Skowron and Hank Bauer.

Off the field, Carey led a busy life. He was married four times, including a past marriage to Lucy Marlow, a relatively little known actress who appeared in such programs as “Gunsmoke” and “The Blue Knight,” two old shows that I actually remember. The IMDB web site describes her as a “knockout-looking minor 50s film and TV actress.”

Some might describe Andy Carey as a “minor” player of the fifties, too. And that would be unfair. When you’re good enough to start for a quartet of pennant-winning teams and a couple of world champions, you deserve more of a description than that…

***

It continues to be a quiet off-season for the Yankees, with the latest non-development being the inability to sign Japanese star Hiroyuki Nakajima by last Friday’s deadline. Nakajima wanted more than a one-year contract, which represented the Yankees’ limit, and was not thrilled with the prospect of playing a backup role inNew York.

While most observers have fluffed off the non-signing, I think there’s something deeper here. That the Yankees had such interest in Nakajima, an All-Star shortstop inJapanwhom Brian Cashman projected as a utility infielder, indicates that they are not completely satisfied with Eduardo Nunez, last year’s utility man, or totally enamored with the prospects of re-signing Eric Chavez.

The Yankees love Nunez’ raw tools–he has an appealing combination of power and speed–but they are legitimately worried about his throwing problems. Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez are going to need more days off in 2012, not fewer, so Nunez will have to become more accurate in making throws from the left side of the infield. Perhaps that deficiency explains why the Yankees have been willing to include Nunez’ name in trade talks with teams like the Braves and the White Sox.

With regards to Chavez, he did play well before breaking his foot, but then showed little power after his return. And then there’s the problem of his repeated trips to the disabled list, which have become an annual occurrence. If a utility infielder cannot be trusted to stay healthy and fill in when needed, he loses a lot of his value.

If the Yankees don’t re-sign Chavez, where will they turn? On the free agent market, the pickings are slim, but there are some intriguing names, including Carlos Guillen, Bill Hall, Jeff Keppinger, and Miguel Tejada. All carry asterisks, if not outright questions. Guillen was once a star, but he’s now 35 and can’t stay healthy. Hall played so poorly for a bad Astros team that he was released in mid-season, and then he flopped during a 16-game trial with the Giants. Keppinger can really play only one position, second base, and doesn’t have the ability to play shortstop for more than a game at a time. Tejada, at 37, is as cooked as the Christmas goose in Scrooge.

All in all, the choices appear so limited that the Yankees may be forgiven for having the following thought: Is Chicken Stanley still available?

[Photo Credit: Hy Peskin]

Bruce Markusen writes “Cooperstown Confidential” for The Hardball Times.

Check out this long appreciation of Townes Van Zant by Aretha Sills in the Los Angeles Review of Books:

TVZ: There’s so many good young people and old people, I can’t listen to it all. I end up listening to Muddy Waters and Mozart, Muddy Waters and Mozart. Hank Williams every so often, and Lightnin’ Hopkins. I mean, I listen quite a bit, but mostly I’m playing. Traveling and playing. And when I’m in a car, somebody gives you a tape, you listen to it. That’s one of the best places, but eventually it comes down to the hum of the wheels.

TVZ: But this land is covered with brilliant young and old musicians. What it takes is perseverance, and you have to be lazy. You have to be too lazy to work. When you start, at least, it helps not to have a family, because I started before I had a family. Young men come up to me and say, ‘I’d really like to do what you, how shall I go about it?’ I say, well you get a guitar or a piano (I prefer a guitar because it’s a lot easier to carry than a piano), then you’ve got to blow off security, money, your family, your loved ones, your home, blow it all off and stay with your guitar somewhere under a bridge and learn how to play it. That’s how it goes. That’s what I did. And that discourages a lot of them, ‘cause some of them are like, ‘I have two kids and I work in a gas station. I’m going to save my money and go to Nashville for a week.’ But that ain’t it. And girls, young ladies, occasionally ask me. I say, well first off, you’ve got to cut all your fingernails on your left hand off. And that stops most of them. But it ain’t easy. I mean, it’s not hard; it ain’t easy. It’s killing me, I know that. Something’s killing everybody. Just sometimes I get so tired that I can’t even sleep.

[Photo Credit: Al Clayton]