Fighting

I got home from my meeting today, and the ants had returned.  Ugh.  Only a couple, just enough to annoy me.  The vinegar really doesn't work, so I am not sure what to do next.

I am reading Mailer's The Naked and the Dead -- the next on my fiction list -- and it is actually quite good, mainly because (I didn't know it going in) it is a WWII combat story based on his own experiences.  So, it's sort of like "Band of Brothers" or "The Pacific," though Mailer has these odd throwback chapters where he looks at the lives of each character.  Some are interesting, some are not.  The writing is highly descriptive; on the one hand, I think he could have cut 100 pages, but on the other, it adds to the quality of the piece, and much of it is pretty fine writing.  Hence, I have been really going through this one, almost a record.  I suspect -- strongly -- that if the subject was anything else, I wouldn't be so interested.

The whole A-Rod/Dempster/Giardi contretemps amuses the hell out of me, mainly because it seems the whole thing is designed to bring sympathy to A-Rod.  Yes, Dempster should have been thrown out of the game.  Yes, Girardi should NOT have been thrown out of the game.  Yes, A-Rod has helped the Yankees, especially with the bat, since their offense has not exactly been swimming lately.  He is a hard man to find empathy for, but sure enough, now people can.  Odd.