February: Ice
"The most serious charge which can be brought against New England is not Puritanism but February." - Joseph Wood Krutch
Please give what you can afford.
New Release: "FRONTIER MOTOR COURT: Like a Big Time Criminal" by A. A. Aritz
For my crime comedy side projects, I use the pen name A. A. Aritz. The new short story is available on Kindle to read and you can hear it on Audible and soon on iTunes.
Please get one and leave a review. It is not necessary to write anything, just leave stars if you like. The point is, this little book is not real to Amazon until it has a certain number of reviews.
I tried to make it a fun ride. Hope you like it.
SCREEN: Baseball Films
I love the game. Here are some of the films that I think do it justice. I don't care for baseball comedies. No screwballs in my partial list of picks here.
My favorite baseball movie. Boseman is phenomenal in this performance and Ford is doing what he should be doing from now on, putting his natural talent into character acting.
Accurate. Compelling. Inspiring. And fun.
This movie is sweet. Based on a true story. It's a middle-aged baseball fan's secret dream.
This movie is faulted except for one thing--it captures the nearly insane competitive nature of the best MLB pitchers. There is a true story underneath this film, but there is a romantic story pasted over it. Ignore that and focus on the baseball story. The no-hitter at the end, to my mind, is perfectly filmed.
This is a great documentary. It moves right along and illuminates the incredible athleticism of pitching.
This documentary is astonishing. The bat boy for this crazy team grew up to be the film director William Todd Field, the author Jim Bouton pitched for them for a time, and the son of the actor/owner was Kurt Russell.
I better stop now before this list becomes too long. Spring Training has started, so it must be true that winter has an ending.
BOOK: Ball Four: 50th Anniversary Edition by Jim Bouton
This is a different book from the original Ball Four and far superior. This 50th Anniversary Edition captures the first and second half of the author Jim Bouton's life. (March 8, 1939 – July 10, 2019.)
I read this book on Kindle and listened to the author narrate it on Audible. It's funny, a bit crass at times, and finally, deeply moving. And incidentally, this autobiography showed the promise of digital publishing as Bouton kept updating the story as he aged, something that would not have been financially possible in print media.
MUSIC: Documentary "San Francisco Sounds"
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