ClimbingSky

Why Baseball, Books, and the Grateful Dead matter

  • What’s In A Name?

    On July 15th, 1990, Chicago’s Bobby Thigpen became quickest to reach thirty saves in a season as the White Sox beat New York 8-5. Thigpen is one of those names that just sticks with you. Like: When I played fantasy baseball in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Thigpen was a highly coveted player. In the early… Read more

  • Hardboiled Coffee Scenery

    I found Big John and Doc on a small flagstone patio that opened off the kitchen. They were seated at a large glass topped, wrought iron table and there was a huge pot of coffee on a hot plate at Big John’s elbow. The view from the patio was of the tumbled mountain range north… Read more

  • Walt Weiss

    On July 12th, 1987, Shortstop Walt Weiss played in his first Major League Game. I have said it here before, the most fun I have writing about baseball history on ClimbingSky is when I get to write about below-the-radar players that I think deserve to be more “remembered.” Walt Weiss is one of those kind… Read more

  • FRIDAY FOOD FOR THOUGHT: DANA GIOIA ON STORIES

    “There are some truths that we can only express to one another in stories. These insights need to be embodied in action, character, and circumstance. Otherwise the truths seem vague and unconvincing. To say “You can’t avoid your destiny despite your best efforts” is a dull platitude, but the tale of Oedipus, who mistakenly kills… Read more

  • THROWBACK THURSDAY: “In Dubious Battle” by John Steinbeck

    Throwback Thursdays” at ClimbingSky feature posts I wrote over a 15 year period for various blogs. This was first posted on April 30, 2020. On the edge of Butte, Montana, in the Mountain View Cemetery, there is a gravestone for labor organizer/martyr Frank Little. On August 1, 1917, he was pulled from a boarding house… Read more

  • Baseball Movies

    When I was growing up in Townsend, Montana, we had a movie theatre that showed two movies a week. The first one on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday was always a newer one. By “newer” I mean released within the previous couple of years. (For example, it would take at least a year to a year-and-a-half… Read more

  • Midsummer

    Next week is the Midsummer Classic, otherwise known as the Major League Baseball All-Star Game. The only other use of the term midsummer that comes readily to my mind is Shakespearian, A Midsummers Night Dream. In my mind that seems quite appropriate. I must confess that I often wonder about those who do not like… Read more

  • Hardboiled Coffee Manners

    I was about to apologize for having disturbed him in the middle of the night, then decided it would be better to play it tough. Big John had said I had “manners.” A certain amount of manners would be okay. But guys just didn’t come real polite in the heavy rackets and courtesy could be… Read more

  • The Bash Brothers

    On July 5th, 1987, Mark McGwire became the first rookie to hit 30 homers before the All-Star break and Jose Canseco homered twice, leading Oakland to a 6-3 victory over Boston The 1987 OAKLAND Athletics finished the season with a .500 record (81-81). But a year later they began a dynasty. In 1988, OAKLAND won 104 games and… Read more

  • FRIDAY FOOD FOR THOUGHT: P.D. James on The Art of Short Stories

    The scope of the short story is inevitably restricted and this means it is most effective when it deals with a single incident or one dominant idea. It is the originality and strength of this idea which largely determines the success of the story. Although it is far less complex in structure than a novel,… Read more