Jackson and Rivers

If you listened to Reggie, you’d think he was the only intelligent guy on the whole Yankee team. That’s what Reggie says – over and over. He told that to Carlos May once. May didn’t give a damn what his IQ was and told him so. Reggie said, “You can’t even spell IQ.” Another time Reggie was giving Mickey Rivers the same jive. “My IQ is 160,” he told Mickey. Mickey looked at Reggie and said, “Out of what, a thousand?” Cracked everybody up. Reggie’s always trying to show Mickey how much smarter he is. One day he asked Mickey, “What am I doing arguing with someone who can’t read or write?” Mickey replied, “You oughta stop reading and writing and start hitting.”

- from The Bronx Zoo, by Sparky Lyle and Peter Golenbock

Funny stuff.

Baseball starts in three weeks. I’m excited, as I was this time last year. After three months of taxes and payroll and taxes and payroll, I’m ready for a break. This year, as last, I found it difficult to lose myself in my standard regular reading. Particularly since I have so little free time. But I have a couple of baseball books acquired here and there for a few dollars, books I’ve started going through. It’s fun ’cause it takes my mind off the pressures of daily living without pondering all the existential literary questions I usually chase a busy day with.

The Mets are predicted to go .500 and might even challenge for the wild card if they can stay healthy. And the Yanks – according to one of my baseball forecast magazines – are thought to go all the way. We’ll see about both teams. The Mets can’t go any worse than last year, and as long as the Yankees make it to the playoffs, the family will be happy.

We’ve budgeted two trips to the baseball stadium this year. Once to Citi Field, for me, and once to Yankee Stadium, for the girls and my father-in-law. And if the wife can catch a cheap Groupon, we might do a third. I always have a fun time there, Citi Field more than Yankee Stadium but only by a little bit, and whether the temps hover around freezing or close to a hundred, I find those three hours almost as enjoyable as an endless afternoon in a used book store with a wallet full of cash.