"A New York Treasure" --Village Voice

Oh, I Can Brive a Dus

I had a good time reading from Lasting Yankee Stadium Memories in Brooklyn last night. I went on first and by the time I was finished the Yanks held a 3-2 lead. When I got to the subway, it was 4-2 and that’s the last I knew from anything until I reached Dyckman Street in uptown Manhattan. I sat on the 1 train, clutching my phone, waiting for the train to exit the tunnel so I could get a signal. The anticipation…oh, the anticipation. When I saw the score, the game was final–Yanks 5, Twins 2. I raised my right arm and let out a “Yeah.” A woman sitting across from me looked up and knew. “What’s the score?” she said.

“Yanks won,” I said.

A few more people looked up and we were all smiling.

I waited for the bus on 231st street and called Jay Jaffe for a recap.

When the bus arrived, I said hello to the driver.

“How you doin?” he said.

“The Yanks won, I’m great.”

I found a seat in the back and then I heard the driver’s voice over the loudspeaker.

“What was the score?”

“5-2” I yelled.

Bus full of sleepy but happy New Yorkers.

8 comments

1 Ben   ~  Oct 8, 2010 9:48 am

Yeah, but can you core a apple?

2 Jon DeRosa   ~  Oct 8, 2010 9:49 am

great call al. I've been on that train clutching a phone, waiting for an update at 125 or Dyckman.

I remember one game when they came back and won in the 9th, maybe last year, when the phone read 1-2 9th, refresh, then 3-2 F. Yee ha.

3 Ben   ~  Oct 8, 2010 9:52 am

someone wittier than me can come up with the big apple, core of the big apple spirit, yankee fans, something...

Oh speaking of these thing "..."

My 6 year old son just learned what an ellipse was. Told me it means that there's more to come on the next page. So I was chasing him around the park last night and he was doing his best play by play - "Daddy gets close to Lukie. But Lukie pulls away at the last moment. Too bad! Ellipse!" Friggn hysterical.

Picking up on Jon's thread. I don't hate Pavano so long as he's not Kenny Rogers in 2006.

4 Jon DeRosa   ~  Oct 8, 2010 10:04 am

[3] Hilarious - you should write that down for him, it's poetry.

My mom wrote down something I said when I was five and showed it to me years later - that meant a lot to me.

5 Alex Belth   ~  Oct 8, 2010 10:19 am

3) awesome

6 williamnyy23   ~  Oct 8, 2010 10:36 am

Would have loved to see you last night Alex, but I'd have exploded with nerves on my ride home.

The exhilaration of checking a score when you’ve missed the game can really get your heart racing. I usually try to get the box score without seeing the final and then slowly move my hand across inning by inning. I just hate the sudden shock of seeing they lost.

On the flip side, I can remember listening at work to the Yankees losing 6-2 in the ninth to the Indians, abandoning the game to go home and then being absolutely shocked when I hear Arod hit a walk-off three run homer.

7 Emma Span   ~  Oct 8, 2010 11:12 am

Jay was amused because you were so amped about the game and Pavano, Alex, he didn't even get the chance to ask you how the reading went. Hee.

8 weeping for brunnhilde   ~  Oct 8, 2010 1:53 pm

Oh, it can core a apple!

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"This ain't football. We do this every day."
--Earl Weaver