View of the Pru
As Game 1 of the 2004 World Series is just getting underway right down the street, here’s what the Prudential Building looks like from the ninth floor of Bringham and Women’s hospital:
Updates from October, 2004 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Brian Sawyer
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Brian Sawyer
Democrats Wear Red Sox; Republicans Wear Pin Stripes
As I write this, the big game between the Red Sox and the Yankees is getting underway. This strikes me as a fitting moment to draw your attention to a post by the venerable Edward Champion, in which he brings up a connection I’ve been thinking of for quite some time, actually:
Mark my words: the Sox will make it. And if the Sox make it into the Series, then I have a strange feeling that Kerry will take the White House with ease. It’s only a working theory and I have nothing sizable to go on other than the Massachusetts connection. But for the love of baseball and for the love of the nation, suffuse all your good juju into the Sox, baby. Let’s take this nation back. Preternaturally. This will be Mass’s year.
I’m grateful to Ed for forcing me to put to words a version or angle of a theory I’ve been developing. You’ll want to head over there to read the whole lively thread, as Ed has some great insights into this connection (I hadn’t even considered the Yankees’ pin stripes as a factor), but I give you my contributions here.
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It’s more than just a Massachusetts connection, even if you can’t quite put a finger on it. For a while now, I’ve been developing this theory that the Red Sox are to the Democratic party as the Yankees are to the GOP. I too can’t quite flesh it out with a proof, but it strikes me as true in a very real sense.
The corollary to this theory is my belief that no one should root for the Yankees. Beyond representing support of the Right, it also strikes me as rooting for wealthy or powerful people; they just don’t need it, and even if they did, why would you want to give it to them?
But then, I live in Massachusetts and embrace the liberal reputation Bush ascribes to the state as a whole, so perhaps this theory is just me. All that said, go Sox!
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Just to clarify my position, though I did say that supporting the Yankees is “like rooting for wealthy or powerful people,” my point wasn’t really about money. That really wouldn’t make a lot of sense, because if the Sox aren’t really that poor in comparison to the Yankees, Kerry certainly isn’t poor either.
It’s just that the Yankees have had it so good and are so pretty and … oh, I don’t know, there’s just something very creepy about them in a Stepford Wives kind of way. The ugliness of the Sox might just be shtick, but it’s hardly wholly ironic. When you look at Derek Jeter (either in his shampoo commercials or on the field) standing next to any of the Sox (excluding, perhaps, Johnny Damon, who actually knows he looks good and intends to keep it that way) it’s clear that the Sox are just embracing a grittiness that has always been there, which I kinda like.
Perhaps it’s nothing more than a gut reaction, but I can’t see how supporting the Yankees can give anyone any pleasure. The Sox just make me feel good to live in Boston and like following baseball, and the Yankees don’t make me feel good about anything. And that’s basically how I feel about the respective political parties I’ve assigned them in my theory (subsituting US for Boston and politics for baseball, of course).
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Plus, have you noticed how the very logo for Yankees seems to have become synonymous with the American flag? Like its overused and abused counterpart, it’s turned into some kind of symbol for what it means to have “American pride.” Just as I can’t stand the American flags plastered all over the huge bumpers of SUVs to show how much everyone uncritically supports anything that the current administration does in the name of America, I cringe at the ubiquity of the overlapping NY I see everywhere. When I lived in Northern California last year, I began an unsuccessful search for a Red Sox cap in any sports store I could find. What did I find? Caps for every Californian team (as one would expect) … and Yankees caps.
It’s one thing for a New Yorker to be a Yankees fan. But when being a Yankees fan became the mark of a true patriot, that’s when I started associating the Yanks with Republican rhetoric.
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And now, I’m off to clutch my Red Sox cap (which I finally acquired when I moved back to this fair city) and hope for the best, in both baseball and politics. Let’s break the curse. Let’s take back the White House. I believe …
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Brian Sawyer
ABC News: Check Your Hed!
I realize that when it comes to editing text, I’m a little more anal than most, but I can’t imagine there are many people who wouldn’t catch this headline gaffe (click image for larger version).
Come on, ABC News. So you picked up the story from the Associated Press. The least you could do is read the headline all the way to the end before running with it. This pains me. It really does. -
Brian Sawyer
Still Reading, Improbable as That May Seem
Though my recent schedule has kept me from posting here as often as I’d like, I am still managing to find the odd moment or three to read. At the moment, I’ve once again pushed aside the perennial Wodehouse collection (which I will finish–oh yes, I will) and am really enjoying an advance copy of Improbable, the first novel by Adam Fawer, which will be published on January 18, 2005.
The book is quite the page-turner and is therefore tough to put down, but given my sporatic attention to reading lately, I might not get to curl up with it as often as I’d like. Since I’m not quite halfway through the book yet, it’s far too early for me to give the review I’ll eventually get to (hopfeully sooner than later), but I want to at least mention the book as early as possible here. So, in the meantime, here’s the publisher’s synopsis:
David Caine’s life is spinning out of control.A compulsive gambler plagued by crippling epileptic seizures, he spends his nights trolling Manhattan’s underground poker clubs. Able to calculate the odds of any hand in the blink of an eye, Caine wins more than he loses, until the night he makes a costly miscalculation–and suffers his most intense seizure ever.
Desperate to regain control of his life, he agrees to test an experimental medicine. But the drug has unexpected–and unnerving–side effects: inexplicable visions of the past, present and future. Unsure whether he’s perceiving an alternate reality or suffering a psychotic break, Caine embarks on a journey that stretches beyond the possible into the world of… the IMPROBABLE.
Gradually, he discovers the extent of his astonishing ability–the power to foresee the consequences of his actions and the probability of various outcomes–as well as its limitations. But he’s not the only one who knows his secret. And now powerful forces want him for their own. With the help of a rogue female CIA assassin, Caine must fight for his survival–and his sanity.
In the tradition of The Rule of Four and The Da Vinci Code, IMPROBABLE’s brilliantly accessible prose weaves an action-packed, fast-paced plot with dynamic characters and straightforward explanations of historical and modern theories of mathematics, probability, quantum physics and psychology.
William Morrow executive editor Mauro DiPreta notes, “IMPROBABLE is A Beautiful Mind meets Kill Bill: with a savvy plotline, an intellectual risk-taker of a hero and an ultra-empowered secret agent heroine, I bet this book will appeal to readers of every persuasion.”
I must admit, when I first read this back-cover copy I was a bit concerned about what I’d find. With a build-up like this, a book could be just what I’m looking for, or it could fall flat on its face with an embarrassing and uncomfortable thud.
The ambitious promise of “an action-packed, fast-paced plot” in combination with “straightforward explanations of historical and modern theories of mathematics, probability, quantum physics and psychology” is quite a tall order for any book, but it’s all working. In fact, the smart use of probability theory to support the plot is one of the most satisfying parts of the book.
Probability that I’ll finish the book and review it before the book’s release: 99.7%
Probability that the review will be overwhelmingly positive: 82.3%
(All signs point to that result now, but with a book like this, everything hinges on the ending.)UPDATE
I finally finished it. See my complete review here. -
Brian Sawyer
Knitting Update
No, I haven’t stopped knitting since completing that sweater I’m so proud of.
Here’s my latest progress on a baby blanket I’ve been working on (my first attempt at cabling). My deadline is actually approaching quickly, so I plan on having it finished by the end of the month.
For those of you who haven’t kept up with my knitting projects, here’s an archive.
Anonymous is discussing. 
Anonymous 6:38 pm on December 16, 2004 Permalink |
Sorry to be anonymous, but i really am not a regular blogger. But I want to know more about this book…did you finish it? what did you think? It might be right up my husband’s alley and I need to figure out if I should buy it for him…
Thanks so much,
Kathleen
London
Brian 9:35 am on December 17, 2004 Permalink |
Hi, Kathleen. I sure did finish it. I’m not sure how you stumbled to my site to land on this old post, but I’ve since posted my full review here: http://olivepress.blogspot.com/2004/11/improbable-success.html
I do recommend you get it for your husband.
Oh, and thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment. And you’re only “anonymous” by Blogger’s standards (I hate their sign-up requirement for leaving posts with names). If you sign your post, you’re no longer anonymous to me.