Let me first say this. The New Layman's Almanac is dedicated to two people: Robert Pinsky and the memory of Kirby Puckett. Now, I’ll admit I know little of the former other than he helped translate the copy of Dante I read in college, but Kirby Puckett (post-career allegations aside) might be one of the most lovable characters to play baseball in the last twenty-five years. That’s what makes this book so great. Some stuff is going miss. It might breeze right over you, but he’s able to keep you drawn in with his willingness to relate simple memories, many of them sports influenced.

I mean so many of these hit right at home for me. “A guide to Alternate Histories” made me remember my own introduction to the song “Basket Case” and how the kid who sat across from me in fifth grade gave me the tape because his parents would let him listen to it because it mentioned masturbation. And then there’s “The difference between St. Valentine and the 1994 Olympic Hockey Schedule” which made me remember being in the locker room for my own youth hockey game during the Canada-Finland shootout and how my hockey coach had a Paul Kariya rookie card in his breast pocket because everyone from the state of Maine was cheering for him after he went to our University for a year and won us a national championship. And then there was my Dad saying afterwards that for years to come kids in the backyards of Finland will be pretending they are Tommy Salo stacking their pads.

Read more here...

Jacob Mooney is an editor at Thieves Jargon.  Get a taste of some of his work here if you want.