On a cold, damp evening, C.C. Sabathia pitched brilliantly, giving up just one run and four hits in eight innings, and completely covering up the fact that the Yankee hitters have not exactly been tearing the cover off the ball. In fact, had the Angels’ infielders not botched a simple pop-up, Game One of the …
Cara passed her driver’s test yesterday. I’m proud of her. She practiced all summer. Did a good job. Maintained the speed limit. Left a lot of distance between her and the car in front of her. Used good judgment. When we got home, predictably enough, she wanted the keys. Needed to go to the supermarket. …
Andy Pettitte, adding to his glowing resume, and Carl Pavano, finally pitching the game he was always meant to pitch, locked last night in a tense pitching duel that was playoff baseball at its best. The Twins broke a scoreless tie in the bottom of the sixth, but the lead didn’t last a half inning, …
Yesterday in The New York Times Book Review, Slate‘s Internal Affairs Correspondent Jack Shafer favorably reviewed A Bomb in Every Issue: How the Short, Unruly Life of Ramparts Magazine Changed America, by Peter Richardson. “Ramparts stands with a handful of 20th-century American magazines–Playboy, the Harold Hayes-era Esquire, Rolling Stone, Spy and Wired–whose glory days continue …
The walk-off has become the by-word of the 2009 Yankees. Fifteen times the team won in its last at-bat, enjoying implausible theatrics at the hands of Melky Cabrerra (3 times), Johnny Damon, Hideki Matsui, Robinson Cano, and even Francisco Cervelli and Jose Miranda. Last night, in a terrific Game 2 of the ALDS, the heroics …
Writing in The Daily Beast, Rebecca Dana contends that by avoiding the use of euphemisms in his announcement of his sexual affairs, David Letterman “has perfected the art of disclosure.” “When David Letterman confessed last week to having had sex with women who work on his show, the real shock wasn’t the affairs themselves (I …
Even before I liked the Yankees, even when I still cheered my beloved Baltimore Orioles, I knew that for someone who lived in New York, it was important for the Yankees to win. Their success changed the psyche of the city. People here are happy if the Mets, Giants or Jets win, and a certain …
Greg Olear, the author of a novel called Totally Killer that is “part thriller, part satire, part period piece” that has to do with the collision of conspiracy and pop culture in New York in 1991, writes about his “unlikely influences” on a blog on the Powell’s Bookstore site. After citing Weird Al Yankovic, Mad …
This is high season for sexual censoriousness. Facts are in short supply, but conclusions are abundant. We do know that David Letterman has allegedly been the victim of a crime involving affairs with members of his staff. We don’t know whether Letterman was married at the time of any of these events (as if it …
AFTER POLANSKI AND LETTERMAN, CAN “AN EDUCATION” SURVIVE? Read More »
Thanks to the Columbia Journalism Review for publishing my little tribute to Norman Mailer and Jimmy Breslin on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of their campaign for Mayor and City Council President of New York, and to Joe Flaherty, whose memoir of the campaign Managing Mailer, was one of the funniest things I ever …