DAN'S PAPERS, November 6, 2009 Page 17 www.danshamptons.com
Me, My Remote and I A 21st-Century Story about Stopping Time for the World Series By Dan Rattiner This is a true 21st-century story, and it involves a terrible text message I received as I was plugging my iPhone into its charger in East Hampton just a few minutes before one o’clock in the morning on October 23. The text read ARE YOU WATCHING THE YANKEES?, and it came from my daughter in California, where it was three hours earlier—10 p.m. her time. Frankly, it ruined everything. One of the big fascinations in sports is that you root for your team and hope and hope and hope. On TV, you often see the fans, at crucial moments, with their hands touching in prayer in front of their faces, trying to invoke God to help them through. You just never know. This particular night was the second game of
the American League Pennant playoff between the Yankees and Angels. It began at 8 p.m. EST. I am not a baseball fanatic but I do watch important games, and this was one of them. We would be out to dinner at Nick and Toni’s at 8 p.m. So, at 2 p.m., thinking ahead, I scheduled to record the 8 p.m. game on TiVo. I would get home around 10, put the game on from the beginning but whiz through all the commercials, and get to bed at 11:30, satisfied with whatever the outcome might be. In case you are interested in whom I root for, I spent my boyhood going to Brooklyn Dodgers games. I know that dates me but I don’t care. This means that I root for anybody who plays against the Yankees. Since this year, or since the All Star Break anyway, the Yankees have
played the game better than anybody in the history of the game, and that is a fact. This perverse rooting has been a formidable task for me. We got home from dinner, as planned, at 10 p.m. I was full of my favorite dish at this restaurant—roasted chicken with baked potatoes, garlic and pancetta—and I was a happy camper. I would get through three hours of angst in two (I could clasp my hands and pray for the Angels, an appropriately named team, at fast forward), and go to sleep satisfied. I should note that when I set this up at 2 p.m., I was very smart. Baseball games in the 21st century are very cerebral and calculating affairs, often moving at a glacial pace and exceeding the three hours allotted them by the (continued on next page)
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