somebody else's bad night

Well, I walked out of work
And I was tired as hell
Another day come and gone oh well
Somewhere there's a drink with my name on it

Thus starts the finish of my Monday night, 11/23/09. I'm nearing the tail end of a week of double shifts -- 9-5 at the old job, 5-? at the regular job, grit your teeth and hold onto something so you don't fall down.

It's 1:16 a.m. I'm at the office working on a widget that's due Tuesday night, trying to get it as far along as possible before I leave. Upstairs, my colleague Stan (all names changed from here on out except when I cannot resist) is working on a widget of his own. It's our most important widget of the season, and it's due in less than an hour. I text him:

I'm referring to one of the many undistinguished and indistinguishable watering holes that line the streets near our office. Stan is a guy who enjoys a good end-of-day beer as much as I do, so I know he'll find it hard to resist, no matter the hour.

He delivers his widget just before deadline and joins me on the 4th floor. Robbie, the widget fabricator I'd been working with, also agrees to come along. Robbie often works the late shift and apparently working the late shift means sometimes going across the street to The Bar -- because each time I've gone there with Robbie he's been on a first name basis with every bartender.

The Bar: it's roughly one step up from a Blarney Stone -- aggressively Irish and pretty dirty and lacking in any specific charm. Not too tough but you wouldn't be surprised if somebody punched you in the back of the head while you were taking a piss. Its claim to fame: the food is edible and the staff is a hoot and it's less than 400 feet from our office door. Plus, stuff seems to happen there. So it has become our local bar, for lack of a better one.

So now it's 2:30, and we head out into the night for our 390 foot walk to The Bar. We cross 3rd avenue, and Jimmy, one of the friendly off-the-boat Irish bartenders, is pacing outside the bar.

"Did you happen to see a fella in an overcoat over that way?" he asks us. I say no, Stan says no, but Robbie says maybe he did.

"The fucker just broke my window," Jimmy says.

We look and sure enough there is a nice big hole in the window, about the size of a loaf of bread. Jimmy fills us in: apparently a businessman came in a few minutes earlier, pie-eyed, and ordered a drink. Jimmy refused to serve him, giving him a glass of water instead. The Drunk finished his water, then walked outside and hailed a taxi. He opened the taxi door, pivoted, and hurled his pint glass back at the bar, smashing the window. He then leaped into the taxi and ordered the driver to floor it. It was the perfect getaway plan, except for one unforeseen complication: the light was red and the cab could not move. Out of The Bar rushed Jimmy, and with all his strength he pried The Drunk from the backseat. A tussle ensued, and somehow The Drunk wriggled free and scampered away.

Which catches us up to the moment when we arrive. Robbie says, yeah, maybe we saw a drunk-looking business dude back that way, and we all turn and look in that general direction. As if on cue, here comes The Drunk, wandering cluelessly back towards 3rd avenue, back towards the scene he just caused and the beating he narrowly avoided.

"That's him," says Jimmy, then pauses for a second. He looks the three of us over, then asks, "Which one of ya is the fastest?"

We all look at each other and shake our heads. No, no, no. We are not going to chase down The Drunk for him. We tell Jimmy so, and then I add, looking at The Drunk, "I think you can catch him, Jimmy."

At this point The Drunk is walking away from us, up 3rd avenue, and he's about 150 or 200 feet away. He seems to realize where he is, and glances back over his shoulder at us, assessing his own danger level. It's like that moment in a nature film when the wounded antelope is drinking from the stream but also keeping tabs on a group of nearby lions out of the corner of his eye. He thinks maybe he's OK, maybe he's far enough away, the lions appear to be resting...but he knows he's not in the clear.

"Jimmy, look at him, he's weaving, he can barely stand. You can catch him," I say. Jimmy doesn't look like much of a sprinter, but still I believe what I'm saying.

"Robbie, mind The Bar," Jimmy says, then begins a surprisingly graceful gallop across 3rd avenue and up towards The Drunk.

Robbie goes inside to mind The Bar, leaving Stan and I standing there to watch Jimmy and The Drunk. Jimmy catches him at the corner of 45th and 3rd, and they begin arguing. They are still within sight but out of earshot. The Drunk tries to bull his way past Jimmy and the tussle is on. They are grappling and shoving and finally they go down to the sidewalk together, awkwardly. Jimmy has the upper hand, The Drunk is really trying just to squirm away, but we feel guilty leaving Jimmy all alone, and we also fear he may beat The Drunk up so badly that the cops end up arresting the wrong man.

Stan, who had just returned from a trip to North Carolina early Monday morning, says, "I better go make sure he stays out of trouble. Will you take my suitcases inside The Bar?"

So I take the suitcases inside The Bar and what a scene it is. If 5pm is happy hour, we need an entirely new term for 2:37 am. It's the hour of possibility, it's the hour of despair, it's the hour of regret, it's the hour of elation, it's the hour to play the fool and take a chance and ruin a good thing. It's the countdown to last call and it's your last chance to get out before it's too late. I've been a part of that pivotal hour so many times, and I always end up on the short end. But I don't recall ever being stone sober as I find myself on this night in this Bar.

In this Bar, there are about ten people. All men, I believe. All drunk. All staring into space or talking too close and too loud. Harmless sad sacks for the most part, but two characters will eventually stand out. I will get to them in a minute.

I head to the back of The Bar with Stan's suitcases. Robbie is sitting dutifully near the part of The Bar where the bartenders exit and enter, and I ask him if in the absence of any actual bar employees he's empowered to get us a drink. He says probably but I can tell he's a little uncomfortable with the idea so I don't push it. We wait for Stan for about 2 minutes and then I decide maybe it's best if I go see what happened with The Drunk.

I go back outside and I see them in the distance, the three of them on the corner of 45th and 3rd. I jog over and survey the scene: The Drunk is pancake flat in the gutter with Jimmy's knee in his back, holding him down. Stan is standing on The Drunk's jacket to make it even more certain that he can't get away. The Drunk is drunk alright, he's hollering and squirming but somehow not slurring his words.

"This is ridiculous," he says. "Are you really sitting on me like this? I'm well within my rights to punch you in the face."

"Nobody's punching anybody," Stan says, foot on jacket.

"Get off me!" says The Drunk. "I'm gonna start recording this. I'm recording this!"

I can tell I'd hate this guy even if he was sober. I ask if anyone has called the cops, Stan says yes.

"I'm recording this! You guys are in trouble!" says The Drunk.

The cops arrive, Jimmy explains the situation, they haul off The Drunk. The three of us walk back to The Bar. This marks the end of any real action in this story.

We get back to The Bar, Jimmy gives the three of us a beer on the house for our help. We play some music from the internet jukebox. Why don't I love internet jukeboxes more? Why do I crave the limitations of an old fashioned jukebox?

There are four men in a group talking. One of them says, "Now I don't mind being the sausage...I just don't want to be the only sausage." They all mutter a few things...there seems to be some sort of low-key disagreement or negotiation going on.

At the center of this negotiation is a one-of-a-kind creature who goes by the name of Mossimo. I am not changing his name because I don't think it's his actual name. He was just introducing himself to everyone who would listen: "I am Mossimo." The easiest way to describe Mossimo would be: if Mango had a gayer cousin, it would be Mossimo.

You often hear homophobic comments like, "I don't care if they're gay...I just don't want them rubbing it in my face." A lot of straightish dudes seem to have the irrational fear that gay men want to seduce them and have sex with them. It's ignorant and small-minded and there's just no place for that kind of thinking. Get over yourselves, straight dudes: most gay men have far better stuff to do than try to convert you to a life of homosexuality.

But then there is Mossimo.

Mossimo is not helping America become a more tolerant place, he is not changing opinions or enlightening the closed-minded. He is 5 foot 4 inches of flaming stereotype. He needs love and sex and he will take it wherever he can get it. In the 45 minutes we hang out with him, he throws himself at every man in The Bar (and yes, it did cross my mind that maybe The Bar becomes a gay bar after a certain hour, in which case: my bad, Mossimo), straight or gay. He flirts with Robbie, who is fascinated by people and cannot get enough Mossimo. Mossimo gets Robbie to put the Pussycat Dolls on the jukebox (hmm...perhaps I am realizing what I don't love about bottomless jukeboxes), and Mossimo sings and dances and puts on an incredible display of so-over-the-top-you-wouldn't-believe-it-if-you-saw-it-in-a-bad-movie gayness.

At one point, Mossimo decides that he wants to make a play for Stan, who like Robbie and myself is married and straight. Mossimo asks Robbie if he can think of a celebrity who Stan resembles; apparently this is his go-to entry line. Stan has red hair, so Robbie decides to be a dick and says "Carrot Top." Mossimo apparently has no idea who Carrot Top is, and approaches Stan with a "Hey Carrot Top...how you doing?" Stan is perfectly willing to be friendly with Mossimo, but tells him to cut out the Carrot Top business. Mossimo retreats temporarily, then returns moments later with "Hey Carrot Head...why you don't wanna talk to me?"

So that is Mossimo. Then there is Kevin.

Kevin is a 50 year-old Irishman, drunk beyond all possible reason, and he simply won't stop talking. In his leather jacket and skinny tie, he'd be sort of dashing if it was 1982. Kevin is a genius, Kevin is a celebrity, Kevin is an intellectual, Kevin is an M.D. and a PhD, Kevin has been at the center of every significant global event of the last 30 years...according to Kevin. His favorite maneuver is to quote a line of poetry, get lost in the middle, then stare at you as if he's about to throw a punch. Then he'll say, "Fuck you!" before smiling and saying, "Yeah, baby!" He pulls this about ten times. In the hour I sit with him, he drinks 4 big glasses of whiskey and I'm guessing they were the last 4 of maybe 24.

He's obnoxious but somehow keeps redeeming himself with some tidbit of fascinating information or a good story. Here are a few of Kevin's conversational highlights:

-He says he taught Shakespeare in Cambridge. "Yeah, Harvard," he says as if someone forced him to admit it. He claims to be one of the best Shakespeare professors in the world -- his words.
-He says that he really wrote the screenplay for "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" and that while he loved his good friend Hunter S. Thompson, Thompson's substance abuse problems were out of control.
-He is also friends with Johnny Depp. In fact, Johnny and his wife Vanessa rented Kevin's flat from him when they first moved in together in Paris.
-He tells a long and winding story about Depp, which is just getting interesting when Kevin delivers the last minute of it in French. None of us speak French, but we nod politely. He then laughs out loud and says, "Johnny's a cool guy, man."
-He claims that he once owned two prominent newspapers.
-He alternates every few minutes between "Don't you fucking know who I am?" and "Don't you know who the fuck I am?"
-At first he says that The Drunk is lucky that the cops were called, because it's an Irish bar and usually the Irish just kill people for stuff like that. Then he says, "Wait...that's not true. All violence is terrible" as if he is being quoted. (Now I guess he is.)
-He shakes his head in disgust when Stan tells him his family is originally from County Cork. When I tell him my Irish last name, he just stares at me as if my people have been stealing food from sick babies for 1000 years. He hates us but cannot stop talking to us.
-He demands to know our favorite poets, and it turns out that he means Irish poets only.
-He says that in his work for the United Nations, he negotiated a transfer of power in an African country that technically made him the President of that country for approximately 12 hours.
-He sort of offers me something -- it's not clear if it is drugs or sex, but when I decline, he says, "Yeah, not that I'm into that anyway but I guess some people here are."
-At one point I ask him his full name and he tells me, and I type it into my phone for future reference.

So that is Kevin.

Around 3:30 I decide I better leave, with another double-shift looming in just a few hours. It's been one of the most memorable and, in its own bizarre way, thrilling bar hours in my life.

When I wake up in the morning I google Kevin. I confirm that he ran two newspapers and taught at Harvard. He is currently a big shot at the UN.

Johnny Depp is unavailable for comment.

Replacements, "If Only You Were Lonely," 1981.

9 things

I have a lot of thoughts going on right now for the first time in a while, and I guess with the proper time and focus I could turn them into a few coherent posts for your enjoyment. But I got none of that stuff. I got minutes to spare and work to do so y'all are getting one of my little numerical list jobbies.

1. Pete asks for an iPhone re-review, which is interesting because I was just about to do that. Here is the latest news: the iPhone is the greatest damn thing in the history of the universe. I recommend getting the new 16GB model, that shit will make you extremely happy. I stand by all the points from the earlier review -- the internet surfing is slow, you rarely find yourself in a hotspot. I misdial and mistype a lot. There are a hundred annoying things about this device. But...it is still the greatest damn thing in the history of the universe. The fact that it is an iPod too, and that it can play movies and shit, and you can surf the web at reasonable speeds while sitting on your toilet (assuming you have wifi), and that it has so many other cool features, combine to make it the greatest damn thing in the history of the universe. The only legit reasons to wait on buying one are:
-Price = outrageous and insulting.
-AT & T = not so good.
-Soon they will come out with one with the proper cell-surfing protocol, getting rid of this EDGE BS. That said, the EDGE is not as bad as I initially thought. I can play youtube videos without skipping even when I am not in a hotspot.

Just fucking get it already.

2. I have thought about doing this before but realized I don't go out to enough bars anymore to come up with very many entries. That said, here is the first edition of Name That Bathroom:


3. That pic was taken during Chicago Vic's recent visit to NYC. We had a grand old time. I was surprised to discover that the bars seem to still be going strong without me. We're all just temporary in everything we do, I am reminded. Only the buildings survive. Also, bars are full of interesting shit, like overly made-up dogs:


And Vincent-Gallo-lookin' hipsters who are unable to resist being amused by Vic's 4am coaster-flipping prowess:

4. I am missing my pop so much. There have been at least 50 times since January 20th when I want to call him and then remember he's gone. Mostly I just feel sorry for him. He enjoyed life so much, it seems unfair that he can't be here anymore checking out the world and soaking it all in. At the end, as the things he loved kept getting taken away from him (booze, food, Manhattan), he didn't need much to make him happy. Just the TV, the newspaper and enough health to carry on. But I guess that was too much to ask. It also crushes my heart when I point to a picture of him, even one from 50 years ago, and ask my daughter who it is, and she says, "Papa Bob." I feel lucky that they got to know each other but somehow the fact that they were able to form a real relationship makes it all even sadder. I keep thinking back to the last ten years, when a lot of things didn't go his way, and I wish I had been there for him more often. He was the single most important person in my life and I guess he always will be.

5. I got an email from our old pal CLee -- he was a website now and a softball page that puts our site to shame. He sent this picture that made me feel old and nostalgic:


Nothing special, really, just a reminder of how long we've been playing at JJ Walker ballfield and how many people have come and gone. (Isn't that a pre-shearing Dipak on the hill?) Man am I ready for spring and softball and tall boys and the fuzzy upper lip of Hiatus. Looking forward to stuff is the best. Is there any other way to live than doing everything in your power to forget the wreckage of the Past while gathering up the measly crumbs of happiness the Present offers you and looking forward to the majestic morning of Tomorrow? I am open to suggestions.

6. Why can't I get one of my all-time favorite Beatles songs on iTunes?


7. Maybe this comparison is obvious, but Michael Beasley = Derrick Coleman. In every way.

8. Work continues to dawg my ass. Shawshanking this week at the ol' FN. Should be pretty unpleasant. Then going home to work on stuff for the regular job. The future will be better. Right?

9. Prediction for the Yanks this year: 85-77.

kid 'n play

Sometimes I miss going out. Not always, but definitely on crisp early fall evenings when even New York City smells and feels like the Midwest on a football Saturday.

Nick S. was in town this weekend and he and PBdotC and company went and drank down a few over in the East Village. I was invited. But I got home at like 11, collapsed in a heap and dreamed fucked up dreams about work and dying and maybe a little bit about my lost moustache. I missed the bar.

I miss the bar.

Aside: a guy stood up during the Colorado-San Diego tiebreaker game tonight and he had a shirt on with huge-ass letters going down the side:

A
B
E
R
C
R
O
M
B
I
E

I didn't hate him or nothin'...but I thought to myself, man, that guy and me could never, ever be friends. Like if he was my friend and he bought that shirt, even if he had a pretty good reason, I would probably have to stop being friends with him. That would be it: the proverbial letter to Urkel* certifying the end of our relationship as humans.

End of aside.

Anyway, I miss going out so much sometimes. Maybe it's 'cause I'm feeling old; I just got the invite to my 20 year HS reunion this weekend (anybody going?). Maybe it's 'cause going out is fun as hell.

The Bar, sure. But The House Party, oh The House Party. That's what it's all about. You're never more alive than when you're at The House Party. The only limits on your good time are your imagination and your ability to inspire stupidity in others. And eventually the unwelcome arrival of the morning sun with its sack of daggers.

I hopped out of a cab that night, the night I almost made it out to the bar, and there were like seven young people spilling loudly out of the apartment building next to mine. They were drunk but they were gonna get drunker.

"Where is it again?" one of them asked.

"14th and 7th," another answered.

Two cabs lined up perfectly for them like chariots and since they were young and drunk and getting drunker they didn't even take the time to appreciate how good they had it. There were like four dudes and three girls and you knew that meant one of the dudes was gonna end up being the extra dude at 4 in the morning and they probably already knew who he was but it was 11 o'clock and the night stretched out ahead of them like a water slide full of possibilities and who had time to be lonely or angry when The House Party was already in full swing on 14th and 7th?

They knew that 4 in the morning was still a ways off. And even though they were young they already knew a lot of the many things that can change between now and then.

I miss The House Party. I miss the moment where you walk in and you look around and half-wonder if it's gonna be lame while knowing damn well in the back of your mind that the only way it's gonna be lame is if you let it be lame and there's no way that'll happen. I miss glaring at the asshole in the corner who thinks he's really funny. I miss being that asshole. I miss losing my beer cup, giving up and grabbing another. I miss meeting new people and trying to entertain them with my tired old stories. I miss discovering pearls of Midwestern wisdom like, "Johnson, Party of One" and "I don't drink anymore...I don't drink any less..." and "I wish I had a horse's cock...instead of this big thing." I miss girls chewing tobacco and guys on crutches with crazy stories and I even miss the fear accompanying the moment when you realize you've pissed off an NFL offensive lineman. I miss lying about who I am to strangers for no reason and fake New Year's Eve countdowns at 11:47 and beating the same joke senselessly into the ground until you're the only one who still thinks it's funny.

I miss the beer and the conversations screamed into each other's ears, as private as whispers. The crappy songs and the fight over the stereo and the guy who lives there eventually telling you you gotta go man. And I miss the triumph of talking yourself back in.

* This reference is to an underrated SNL skit from the mid-90s in which a bunch of office workers sneak into their co-worker's empty apartment to give him a surprise party. When they get there, they find all sorts of creepy shit in his pad, including a blowup sex doll with the face of his female co-worker attached to it, and a fan letter the dude was apparently preparing to send to Urkel. They are so repulsed by the stuff they find that they decide to leave. Just as they are about to walk out the door, the guy comes home and is excited to see his friends. They insist on leaving, but he won't hear it. He's all, "Come on, guys, hang around," and they are like, "Nah, man...this is weird," but he keeps insisting they stay until one of them finally grabs him and says, "Look, we found your letter to Urkel." The guy still looks unconvinced, so the dude shakes him again and says, with immacculate comic timing, "We FOUND...your LETTER...to URKEL." As in, the jig is up. please never speak to any of us again, don't you fucking understand? Does anyone remember this sketch? I can find no mention of it on the internets. It was funny. Nearly as funny and underappreciated as "Connie Stinson Talks"-- which is now, finally, gloriously, likely temporarily, available on YouTube.

jack don't know jack

I should have known better.

After all the horseshit that's come out of my mouth in bars over the years, I should have known not to trust that old drunk Jack in the bar the other night.

His trivia question: who was playing RF for the Yankees when George Brett hit the infamous pine tar homer?

My answer: Don Mattingly (a guess)

Jack shook my hand and said nice job, nobody ever got that one before. I beamed. And I stupidly posted his question as a challenge for you fine people.

Only problem is, Jack was full of shit. Mattingly didn't play RF in that game, according to the box score. He pinch hit, played first base, and, in a sarcastic gesture from Billy Martin, played second base in the second part of the game that the Yankees were forced to play a month later when the AL upheld the Royals' protest. He did play RF in the game just prior to this one.

So who was playing RF? Well, both Piniella and Kemp played RF that day -- Kemp started in left but moved to right at some point. As to who was there when the ball went out, well let's just do a quick youtube search and we'll dig this up...uh, hold on...what's that? you say the video has been removed from youtube after a judge cited it in his ruling and the attention this brought got the video taken down...? Shit. Internet masters, we need you to dig this up. Genius points are at stake.

(Edit: A closer look at that box score indicates that the Yankees brought in Jerry Mumphrey as a defensive replacement to start the top of the 9th, with Winfield moving to left and Kemp moving to right. So 12 genius points go to B. New, he was the first to guess Kemp. Strange that the real answer turns out to be my favorite player at the time, and I didn't guess him. Also, note that Mumphrey was due to bat in the second half of the game but he'd already been traded to the Cubs...why didn't they fly him in?)

I should have known Jack was full of crap -- he also said he was at the second part of the game. I said, wow, that was crazy, only a couple thousand people showed up, it only lasted a few minutes, right? Jack said, no, it was game 1 of a doubleheader so we all stayed.

I knew that was wrong. I knew there was no other game scheduled that day because Graig Nettles talked about in his book. That was the Yankees' only scheduled day off for like a month, and when the league told the team they'd have to play the final 4 outs on that day, the players took a vote and (unanimously) decided not to play. They would rather have forfeited the game, in the middle of a pennant race, than show up and try to scratch across a run. Somebody (Steinbrenner?) stepped in and said, Get your asses to that stadium, so they ended up playing. Although Martin made a farce of it, God Bless him.

Here is some more cool shit about that game.

***

I took my pop in for a couple of doctor's visits in Manhattan the other day. He's in a wheelchair now so we booked a car service to take us from his Brooklyn apartment into the city. On the way back, we decided to take a cab to save time. We were standing there hailing away, me on foot, him in the chair, 85 degrees outside, for like 15 minutes. In that time, THREE open cabs just drove right past us, pretending not to see us. They clearly didn't want to deal with the wheelchair, which is actually a snap to fold up and put in the trunk.

To those cab drivers, I say:

I know your job sucks. Low pay, danger, bad hours, unhealthy working conditions, stress, aggravation, etc. I am sorry for this. I salute you for working so hard and so thanklessly, all so that your kids may have a better life than you did. I thank you for not becoming muggers or drug dealers instead.

But...when you refuse to pick up an 80 year-old man in a wheelchair on a hot summer day, well, that entitles me to say go fuck yourself. That entitles me to say, here's to you being treated like shit when you are one day old and sick yourselves. May cabs drive by and spray gutter sludge in your faces. And at that moment, may you remember what douchebags you were when you were young.

We finally got home to his apartment and I was taking a leak when I noticed a big ol' fly buzzing around the bathroom. I was thinking, "You know, I should really get rid of that shit-eating, germ-carrying fly. But I am so tired I don't have the energy to chase it around."

Plus, the pussified vegetarian in me does have a problem (only a slight one) killing insects. I do it all the time, but I admit I somehow feel cosmically accountable for it. After all, the fly is just minding his business, sharing the earth with me and you and our friends.

I just kept pissing and pondering what to do, when suddenly the fly flew directly into my urine stream and was sprayed right down into the toilet. Poor little bastard was probably in deep shock. He started trying to swim his way out, the little fighter, but I quickly flushed his ass out to sea.

What does this mean (25 points)?

In other news, my monthstache seems to be growing on me.

jack grows old in a bar

Do you ever find yourself playing out entire conversations in your head before they even take place? It usually happens with one of those talks you don't want to have. You'll think, "OK, so I'm gonna tell the boss I need one more day to finish the Hanrahan report, and of course he'll be like, 'I already gave you an extra day,' so I'll say, 'yeah, but the time frame you gave in the first place was unrealistic, and a lot of other stuff came up,' and he's such a dick he'll inevitably say something like, 'stuff comes up all the time for all of us, that's no excuse,' and I'll be like, 'well it's not done, what are you gonna do, fire me?' and he'll be like, 'you're goddamn right I'm gonna fire you,' and I'll get fired. Shit."

Then you'll go into the boss's office and be like, "Um, is it possible I could have one more day to tweak a few things on the Hanrahan report?" and he'll be like, "Sure, take your time, turn it in when you're ready."

And you'll wonder why you wasted so much time thinking about stupid stuff.

It happened to me the other day. I was having a tough day, and to be honest every day has been tough lately. And I started thinking about how good to me Ma Bungle's been. And I decided, you know what? Ma Bungle could use some flowers. So I stopped and got her a nice little bouquet and I started walking home.

There is a little concierge service that handles packages and dry cleaning and stuff for Stuy Town and Peter Cooper and the surrounding neighborhood. It's a crappy little place but it's useful and all the guys in there are pretty nice. I had to stop by there to pick up a package after I had bought the flowers, and I was already dreading the inevitable small talk. I'd walk in with the flowers, and of course some comedian would say:

"So, what'd ya do?" (referencing the generally accurate belief that the only time a man gets his woman flowers is when he has fucked up badly)

I came up with what I thought was a good response line and walked in. To my disappointment, nobody cared about my flowers and nobody said anything. I got my package and headed home.

As I was entering my apartment building there were two guys who live on my floor (one about 50, one about 75) outside having a conversation. I nodded hello and walked past them.

One of them muttered something so I pulled off my headphones and asked him to say it again.

"So what'd ya do?" said the 75 year-old, eying my flowers.

"It's not what I did, it's what I'm GOING to do," I said, possibly winking although probably not. They both laughed knowingly at my vaguely suggestive joke. I was proud.

That thing I ended up doing was going to the terrible bar right outside Stuy Town and slurping down a few delicious Buds with Joe née Monkeyweb. It was cold beer, depressing clientele, and lots of baseball talk. Our conversation ended up spilling over into the rest of the bar, which up to that point had been engaged, apparently, in their own baseball talk.

There was an old Yankee fan there named Jack. Jack was probably 60, full of stories and trivia, and he seemed fairly certain that he was The Fuckin' Man. He was one of those guys who preferred that everybody gave him their devoted attention whenever he spoke, and if you did that, maybe you could throw in a few words of your own if time allowed.

He and a couple of other dudes were having a friendly debate about who was the most 'money' pitcher of all-time (loosely defined as the guy you'd want pitching if you had to win one game -- one guy said, 'you know, the guy you'd want to start game 7 of the world series,' to which joe replied, 'wouldn't game 6 be more important if you were down 3 games to 2?' which made everyone scratch their heads). They had the whole discussion sort of confused, though. Some guys were naming a pitcher and a year -- Hershiser '88, for example -- while other guys were talking about a pitcher's entire body of work.

Here were some names thrown around:

-Hershiser '88
-Guidry '78, my suggestion, and I quoted this rather amazing fact about that season for the 19th time: in the span of four starts in September of '78, with every game a must-win (literally, remember they ended up in a tie with Boston), Guidry pitched three 2-hit shutouts, including 2 against Boston.
-Bob Gibson
-Sandy Koufax
-I drunkenly threw in Babe Ruth
-Walter Johnson (I said something sarcastic when his name came up, like 'come on, he probably only threw 75 mph')
-Somebody said Gooden which seemed stupid
-Somebody said Clemens which also seemed kind of stupid
-I threw in Mike Scott '86

And there were a few others. The discussion slowly dissolved and talk turned to the 2007 Yankees. Jack had looked at the upcoming schedule and decided the Yanks needed to go 16-4 in the next 20 games to have a shot at the postseason. I drunkenly nodded. I made a mental note to get more into baseball for the rest of the year, with the Yanks hopefully making a push for the playoffs (or not).

Jack asked me his stumper trivia question, which I answered correctly on a guess, earning his lifelong respect, I believe. The question: when George Brett hit the pine tar home run, what Yankee right fielder watched the ball sail over his head into the seats? 12 GP's for a correct answer, one guess per person.

New softball recap is alive and kicking like Jim Kerr.