Sunday ephemera

Taking it all in at Fenway Park.

My wife and I landed some free Sox tickets from the owners of the neighborhood watering hole, and once in the park, my cousin hooked us up with the chance to see a few innings from the Monster Seats. Here is a picture of your intrepid Sox blogger watching Salty shit his pants with the bases loaded in the eighth of a game against Kansas City.

• My new article titled "A Nation of Chicken Littles" is up at The Dirty Water News. If you didn't think it was possible to incorporate a quote from Sylvia Plath into an article about the Red Sox, think again.
• Cinco de Mayo actually provides a reason to stay sober. It is Amateur Hour, along with St. Patty's Day, New Year's Eve and the night before Thanksgiving.
• I have my first e-book coming out this summer. Some Sort of Ugly is a collection of inter-related humor pieces narrated by Hamlet Burns, a college student who has a series of bad haircuts and zany sexual mishaps. It will be published by the fledgling Marginalia Press. Look for it.
• It seems to me if everyone in the country were willing to fight for education with the zeal, ardor and dogged determination the NRA has when trying to assure the big, bad government doesn't fuck with their guns, we'd be on a path to a solution.
• I got my first Kindle for my birthday this year. Love it. Now I can download Some Sort of Ugly when it comes out.
• The Red Sox, for whatever reason, can't win in Texas. Houston, we have a problem.
• I wrote an essay for The Good Men Project about some problems my wife and I have encountered with co-sleeping. It's titled, ambiguously, "The Dude Sleeping with my Wife."
• Bull Durham is, hands-down, the best baseball movie ever made.
• Steve Henn wrote a thoughtful and thorough review of my chapbook Hangover Breakfasts that is worth checking out. Honestly, I didn't pay him.
• I saw this linked on a friend's Facebook feed. This is brilliant and creepy and gut-busting funny.
• My good friend Dan Crocker wrote an article about our friendship for wrestling website. I'm not sure if there is a homoerotic metaphor here or not.
• Don't forget, next Sunday is Mother's Day.  

Damn the damn Yankees

Here's this week's baseball piece. I think the title, "Damn the damn Yankees," sums it up.

You have to feel good about the Sox so far. They have gotten some quality starts, the bullpen looks strong, and they've found the new face of the franchise. On the whole, this seems like a team we'll be able to get behind, unlike the beer and chicken and "fuck you, I quit" characters from the past two seasons.

Of course, give it a week or a three-game losing streak. The songs change quickly on this jukebox.

And just when you're trying to like them...

[Warning: extreme vulgarity, rooted in righteous indignation, to follow]

With Opening Day on deck, as fans try to let bygones be bygones and get behind the motley batch of mediocrity that will take the field tomorrow, this shitty diaper surfaces.

Holy fuckoly!

Not only does this hokey three-minute cliche make me embarrassed to be a Red Sox fan, it makes me embarrassed to be a human being, co-existing on a planet where something like this is created and marketed. Think about the number of people culpable in the production of this wet fart---producers, cameramen, sound engineers, the fuck-stick singing. These people should receive a prison sentence their crimes against the decency and good tastes of humanity.

I cannot envision a single person---save said fuck-stick's mother---who could possibly derive a modicum of pleasure from this. I'd venture to guess that even the Pink Hats, the ones who haven't already jumped ship on the 2013 Sox, are vicariously embarrassed by this video. Again, ownership has proven to be totally and completely tone deaf to fans.

Pathetic. Absolutely inexcusable. I think I'm going to go and repeatedly punch myself in the dick for having watched then blogged about this. For once, I'm speechless.  

New gig, new book

It looks like I was called up to play for The Dirty Water News in Boston this year. I will be writing a bi-weekly article throughout the baseball season at the DWN, a free print newspaper distributed in the Boston-area. This, of course, means I would have to drive down to Boston every two weeks to pick up a copy and stare at my byline. However, seeing I'm on the verge of having a full-blown panic attack just thinking about driving in Boston, that isn't going to happen. But my aunt, my cousin, my sister and her husband live in Boston, so I can find someone in my family who will squirrel away copies for me.

Anyway, the posts that would usually go up on this blog will be linked to the DNW website, which generates slightly more traffic than my blog---although thank you to the two people who continue to regularly check it. The decision is simply a matter of trying to get more readers for my Red Sox rants (someone is feeling alliterative this morning!).

Here is my first article titled "They owe us penance!"

I will still be using this blog, however, for random rants in between my deadlines.

Also, I will have a new book coming out in the fall (no pub-date yet). It is a collection of fiction, poetry, and a one-act play that I co-wrote with my good friend Dan Crocker titled Oprah Recommended. Some of you might remember three out-of-print chapbooks that Dan and I wrote--- Idiot Warriors, Chickenshits, and Men of Letters---that centered around two thinly-veiled fictional characters named Natty and Cracker. We revised many of those stories, added new ones and some of our better poems, while forging a semi-cohesive narrative arc. It was a ton of fun to write and work with my best friend on a project, so we're both very excited and grateful that Leah Angstman at Alternating Current agreed to publish it in paperback next fall.

More information to follow.

In the meantime, nine days from now I'll be watching the Sox open in The Bronx against the Spank-Jobs. So close. Oh, so close. 

Let the B.S. begin

This is, exactly, the bullshit NESN and owners will be spewing this season.

Every year, come February and The Grapefruit League, a sort of schizophrenic fever comes over me. As soon as the pitchers and catchers report to spring training, I'm suddenly torn between approaching the season like a rational human being---someone who bases their ideas and opinions and prognostications on sound logic, statistics and experience---and my bat-shit/nut-bag thoughts as a Red Sox fan.

Admittedly, the latter are based on nothing but an implausible scenario where I imagine myself condescendingly patting an imagined Yankee fan on the back in October, as said fan collapses into a fit of fury and tears. I then lick the tears off their face and say, "They taste so sweet, so sweet."

This season is no different.

Here is what I know logically about 2013 Red Sox: If they win 80 games, we'll consider it a successful first season for John Farrell.

Let's face it, the last two years, beginning in September of 2011, have been a veritable circus sideshow. From the beer and chicken boys to Bobby V; from a bogus sell-out streak to the slow exodus of The Pink Hats, who may have finally gotten tired of singing "Sweet Caroline"; from cuffing the Dodgers with the ridiculous contracts of the aging and the arrogant and the injury-prone to the asshole who is Alfredo Aceves, following the Red Sox has been like peeking inside a tent to look at a donkey with three dicks.

This year ownership tells us they're bringing in good "clubhouse" guys like Shane Victorino and Jonny Gomes, who add zero-pop to the line-up. Meanwhile, Mike Napoli and Big Papi will be flipping through their AARP pamphlets as Princess Ellsbury keeps one foot out the door. Oh, did I mention J.D. Drew's brother, Stephen, who will never shake the name "Drew's brother"? J.D. was about as much fun as an enema, so I imagine Stephen will also be doing his post-game interviews with a lampshade on his head.

In other words, the ownership---aka, The Dick, The Nerd, and The Creep---is trotting out a horse on its way to glue factory and trying to sell fans on the fact that it is a stallion. Thankfully, most of the Red Sox base isn't buying it. The Globe reported yesterday that even season-ticket holders are starting to jump ship.

Now here is where bat-shit/nut-bag thoughts start to enter my mind.

Listen, if Lester, Buchholz and Lackey (who lost 30 lbs., meaning he is now an ass-wad who weighs 30 lbs. less) can win 15 games each, pitching to their potential, maybe the offense doesn't have to be explosive.

And who knows? Maybe Xander Bogearts or Jackie Bradley Jr. will be the next Mike Trout. Maybe Middlebrooks isn't fluky or still hurt, and maybe Salty will crush 30 home runs. Maybe The Dick (Lucchino) is right, and these guys will be competitive and make a run at the pennant. Maybe Kate Upton will finally start returning my calls.

You see, these are bat-shit/nut-bag thoughts. I know this and I own them.

As my father says at the beginning of every baseball season: "Here we go again." Indeed, here we go.  

Christmas ephemera

Happy holidays from all of us here at Nate Graziano's Big Baseball Blog, meaning me. In no specific order, this is what I currently have to contribute to the blogosphere:

• My new chapbook of prose---I'm not really sure how else to categorize it, if categorization is even necessary---Hangover Breakfasts was published by Bottle of Smoke Press last week. Here is the information for ordering a copy. It will make a great Christmas gift for any heavy drinker and/or chronically depressed person on your list.
• We bought the kids an Elf on the Shelf, and despite the lameness of all those mommy blog posts with crafty and cutesy tips for hiding the damn thing, the elf is Stalin-esque in getting your kids to adhere to your every parental whim.
• I have been writing for The Good Men Project lately. Here is my latest offering.
• Thank you, Santa, for bringing us Shane Victorino and Johnny Gomes and the inimitable Ryan Dempster. Hopefully, you put plenty of Ben-Gay and Geritol in the training staffs' stockings this year.
• We really need an emoticon for sarcasm.
• I'll go ahead and say it: The Patriots are the best team in the AFC, maybe the NFL.
• I continue to keep it classy at Drunk Monkeys, too. This story is nothing short of Faulkner-esque.
• My friend Becky Schumejda's new collection of poems Cadillac Men is one of the best collections of poetry I've read in a long, long time. Even if you're not a fan of poetry---which includes about 99.9% of readers---you will enjoy this one. It reads like a novel. Order here.
• I'll admit it: I love Christmas music. Here is my favorite holly-infused tune.
• Do you want to read an interview with me? Tough. Here it is.
• Did you notice authoritative I'm becoming in my old age? Look at how many times I linked the word "here." Now click here. You'll love it!
• Merry Christmas, everyone. Please remember to hug your kids.

Happy Thanksgiving

I have been away for awhile, and I certainly have some ideas about the Sox' teenage boy-like lust for Farrell, who was a losing manager for the newly-competitive-since-the-Miami-fire-sale Blue Jays. And I have some ideas about their ridiculous, sad and subservient need to sign for a 56 year-old Papi to a two-year contract to appease Pink Hats who might not recognize another name in the starting line-up on Opening Day, other than Pedroia or Lester or Ellsbury (who has a ticket stamped out of town after next season).

Instead, I've chosen to enjoy the holidays, put my cynicism on hold, and offer up these mirthful words from a man who would never sell out to corporate America, or Pink Hats (we need a sarcasm font, no?).

Happy Holidays!