T-shirt seen at Penn Station today, on a Black guy around 35 or 40: “In my defense, I was left unattended.”
So, wow, Wander Franco has been accused of doing some improper “wandering.” He’s the 22-year-old superstar shortstop the Tampa Rays signed to a $182 million 11-year contract last year. He’s from the Dominican Republic, one of the leading exports of which is shortstops. He is married with one son. The concern is whether he has been consorting with a 14-year-old girl. The girl is Loredana Chevalier, below, quite a mouthful. [The name, the name.]
Owl Chatter photographer extraordinaire Phil was able to snare one of the few known photos of the young lady before being thrown out of the apartment by her dad. (Phil would like us to know he’s been thrown out of much finer places than that. We’re with you buddy!)
For everyone’s sake, we hope there’s no truth to the story. It does, however, give new meaning to the notion of working your way up the minors.
I’m going share two plays of Franco’s with you. The first one (click the link) shows you how good he is, and the second (the video) shows you he’s a bit of a hot dog.
https://www.mlb.com/video/steven-kwan-grounds-out-shortstop-wander-franco-to-first-baseman-yandy-di
This poem is called “Home Movies: A Sort of Ode,” and it’s by Mary Jo Salter. It’s today’s Poem of the Day from The Poetry Foundation. It rewards rereadings, IMHO.
Because it hadn’t seemed enough,
after a while, to catalogue
more Christmases, the three-layer cakes
ablaze with birthday candles, the blizzard
Billy took a shovel to,
Phil’s lawnmower tour of the yard,
the tree forts, the shoot-’em-ups
between the boys in new string ties
and cowboy hats and holsters,
or Mother sticking a bow as big
as Mouseketeer ears in my hair,
my father sometimes turned the gaze
of his camera to subjects more
artistic or universal:
long closeups of a rose’s face;
a real-time sunset (nearly an hour);
what surely were some brilliant autumn
leaves before their colors faded
to dry beige on the aging film;
a great deal of pacing, at the zoo,
by polar bears and tigers caged,
he seemed to say, like him.
What happened between him and her
is another story. And just as well
we have no movie of it, only
some unforgiving scowls she gave
through terrifying, ticking silence
when he must have asked her (no
sound track) for a smile.
Still, what I keep yearning for
isn’t those generic cherry
blossoms at their peak, or the brave
daffodil after a snowfall,
it’s the re-run surprise
of the unshuttered, prefab blanks
of windows at the back of the house,
and how the lines of aluminum
siding are scribbled on with meaning
only for us who lived there;
it’s the pair of elephant bookends
I’d forgotten, with the upraised trunks
like handles, and the books they meant
to carry in one block to a future
that scattered all of us.
And look: it’s the stoneware mixing bowl
figured with hand-holding dancers
handed down so many years
ago to my own kitchen, still
valueless, unbroken. Here
she’s happy, teaching us to dye
the Easter eggs in it, a Grecian
urn of sorts near which—a foster
child of silence and slow time
myself—I smile because she does
and patiently await my turn.
If you’re looking for a beer with that “old-timey, oy-my-back-hurts” taste, try some of this. It’s by the Union Craft Brewery in Baltimore. You can see it says “For Drinking” on top, in case you forgot why you went to get one.
From the Dirty Old Man Sports Department, word has reached us that devoted female Green Bay Packer fans have supplemented the “cheesehead” with the “cheese bra.”
For the discerning Owl Chatter reader who just has to have one, and who isn’t lactose intolerant, our exhaustive research has uncovered a used one selling for $80 on eBay, and one that will run you just $20 on Amazon.
In today’s puzzle, I learned the word RETCON. The clue was “Literary device that revises a previously established narrative, for short.” The full term is retroactive continuity. It’s when a show uses some gimmick to completely reverse what was happening so that it can return to something, e.g., Frank’s death turned out to be a dream of Ella’s so the last ten episodes never “really” happened, so the actor who played Frank can return to the show.
I also learned GODDESS LOCS (29A): “Crocheted hair extensions.” I had trouble with the K missing from LOCS. They can be pretty amazing.
The nitpickers grumbled about 51A. The clue was “Remove from its husk, as a peanut,” and the answer was UNSHELL. Some preferred SHELL, but technically unshell is correct.
The Hindu Spring festival (HOLI) crossed the gymnast Suni LEE. I didn’t know them, so I crashed. Ouch — a DNF on a Tuesday — not very impressive as I head towards the tournament Saturday. Here’s Suni (short for Sunisa) Lee. She did very well in the Tokyo Olympics.
We’ll let Sunisa’s pretty smile send us off tonight. See you tomorrow. I have to go order Linda one of those $20 cheese bras now. Seems like the perfect Labor Day gift, no?
The Wellington Files 