Picture by Robert Adams.

Heaven is a playground.

[Photo Via: This Isn’t Happiness]

The script was written. It was just up to Chase Headley to play along.

The newest Yankee had a chance to win the game in the bottom of the 12th, bases loaded, 2 out. No score, as the Year of the Infield Pop-Up Revival continues all across the land. Francisco Cervelli had just lined out to Adrian Beltre. Couldn’t hit a ball much harder and for a brief moment, Cervelli and the Yanks must have felt that the game was won. But he hit it to the wrong place. Headley had his Yankee moment all lined-up but he grounded out to second instead.

He got another chance in the bottom of the 14th though. First and third, 1 out, score tied at 1. Headley got a sinker moving away and he took it to left. Good enough for a single and the game-winning hit.

Had it all along, right?

Yanks 2, Rangers 1.

Beautiful win.

Headley ain’t here yet. The other Chase, Mr. Whitley, is and gets the start.

Brett Gardner LF
Derek Jeter SS
Jacoby Ellsbury CF
Carlos Beltran DH
Brian McCann 1B
Kelly Johnson RF
Brian Roberts 2B
Francisco Cervelli C
Zelous Wheeler 3B

Never mind last night:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

Saveur’s guide to chile peppers.

So fresh and so clean.

[Photo Via: Black white & gray]

Chase Headley: New York Yankee for Yangervis Solarte and Rafael De Paula.

Nice upgrade. Still, Port Gervis! We hardly knew ye. Wish him the best of luck in San Diego.

[Photo Via: Getty Images]

This New York Minute is brought to you by The Lively Morgue.

The 18th letter.

The Yanks let one slip away.

[Picture by Bags]

At least so far. Brett Gardner LF Derek Jeter SS Jacoby Ellsbury CF Carlos Beltran DH Kelly Johnson 1B Brian Roberts 2B Ichiro Suzuki RF Francisco Cervelli C Zelous Wheeler 3B Never mind the ruckus: Let’s Go Yank-ees! [Painting by Daniel Heidkamp]

Groovin’.

[Picture by Bags]

Food 52 gives us: Salad.

“Le placard rouge” by Pierre Bonnard (1939)

R.I.P. James Garner.

I recently told a friend of my interest in telling stories with pictures and he recommended Cartooning, by Ivan Brunetti. This slim volume is a written version of a class Brunetti teaches on the cartoon format (he doesn’t care for the terms graphic novel and I don’t blame him). It is broken down into a 15-week course. There is no point in cheating or cutting corners. Brunetti insists that the reader, or student, follow each assignment. If they do, they’ll arrive at a place where they’ve acquired some fundamentals.

Dig this, from Brunetti’s introduction:

Most Italian dishes are made up of a few simple but robust ingredients, the integrity of which should never be compromised. It is a straightforward, earthy, spontaneous, unpretentious, improvisatory, and adaptable cuisine, where flavor is paramount: not novelty, not fashion, not cleverness, and not prettiness. If it tastes good, it will perforce also look good (note that the inverse is also true). It is a cuisine entirely based on a relative few, but solid and time-tested, principles. The techniques are not complicated, just hard; mastering them really takes only time, care, and practice. Originality, as Marcella Hazan instructs, is not something to strain for: “It ought never to be a goal, but it can be a consequence of your intuitions.” One plans a meal around what is available and what is most fresh, usually a vegetable, allowing this ingredient to suggest each course.

…Once you know the basic principles, what you are “going for,” you can add your own personal touch. The most important thing is the potential misstep at the beginning that can ruin the entire dish: don’t burn the garlic. If you do, it will not matter what fancy or expensive ingredient you add to try to cover it up; it will still taste bad. Thus, what I hope, in essence, is that by the end of the book you will learn not to “burn the garlic” and to create art based on sound principles.

[Picture by Will Eisner]

David Carr writes about the way it is:

For the last six months, my magazines, once a beloved and essential part of my media diet, have been piling up, patiently waiting for some mindshare, only to be replaced by yet another pile that will go unread. I used to think that people who could not keep up with The New Yorker were shallow individuals with suspect priorities. Now I think of them as just another desperate fellow traveler, bobbing in a sea of information none of us will see to the bottom of. We remain adrift.

As Alexis Madrigal wrote in The Atlantic, “it is easier to read ‘Ulysses’ than it is to read the Internet. Because at least ‘Ulysses’ has an end, an edge. Ulysses can be finished. The Internet is never finished.”

Some days, when I board the bus or train to the city, I’ll stash a print copy of The Journal in my bag with a magazine or two, in high hopes of reading them. And after I settle in, I will check my email on my phone. The relevant message usually comes in faster than I can get rid of it. Sometimes when people ask what I do for a living, I am tempted to say that I write emails.

…Still, there was some trouble in paradise on the Ethan Allen Express. More than a few people around me were cursing the indifferent Wi-Fi as they desperately tried to remain tethered to the grid. Behind me, a passenger made serial phone calls in a mind-erasing loud voice. “I’m on the train!” he would always begin.

It struck me that part of the reason we always stay jacked in is that we want everyone — at the other end of the phone, on Facebook and Twitter, on the web, on email — to know that we are part of the now. If we look away, we worry we will disappear.

We are all on that train, the one that left print behind, the one where we are constantly in real time, where we know a little about everything and nothing about anything, really. And there is no quiet car.

Bzzzzz.

[Picture by Bags]

Remember that tough at bat Paulie O’Neill had against John Rocker in the 1999 Whirled Serious? I couldn’t help but think of itt today in the 9th inning when Jacoby Ellsbury led off against Aroldis Chapman. Tie score, Yanks 2, Reds 2. Paulie O in the booth calling the game along with Michael Kay.

Ellsbury took pitches and fouled off more–all fastballs, all 100 mph or faster. Nine pitches in all, the last one grounded through the left side for a base hit, his fourth of the day.

Ellsbury stole second without a throw, moved to third on a wild pitch and then trotted home with the game winning run when Brian McCann’s pop fly to short right field fell in between 3 fielders. The Red had the shift on against the lefty McCann and there was some confusion as to who was going to get the ball. It was a Mack Sennett moment, minus the casualties–though I could already hear the Old School commentators on the MLB Network talking about this being a drawback to the shift. The Reds’ feelings were plenty hurt, though. What a lousy way to lose a game.

The Yankees? After hanging tough against Johnny Cueto, surviving Dellin Betances serving up a game-tying home run in the 8th–taking a win out of Hiroki Kuroda’s pocket–they sweep the Reds and should enjoy themselves plenty tonight.

The Yanks played well–although they left a ton of men on base–and they got some luck.

Final Score:

Yanks 3, Reds 2.

Oh, yeah. Ellsbury really has been a pleasure, hasn’t he?

[Picture by Bags]

The Wife and I ran errands yesterday afternoon and so we followed the game in fits and spurts with John and Suzyn. Wouldn’t you know it but the Yanks won, 7-1.

Not bad, so far. 

Today gives a stiffer challenge with the Reds throwing Johnny Cueto.

Bombers counter with our man Hiroki.

Never mind this dreamy cool weather:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Picture by Bags]

Overcast but pleasant July Saturday. Yanks and Reds again this afternoon at the Stadium.

Brett Gardner LF

Derek Jeter SS

Jacoby Ellsbury CF

Mark Teixeira 1B

Brian McCann C

Carlos Beltran DH

Ichiro Suzuki RF

Brian Roberts 2B

Kelly Johnson 3B

F what you heard:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Photo Credit: Ann Street Studio]