Solo Lawyering

Anyone who has any advice in regard to hanging my own shingle, please let me know.

CitiField Review

Yesterday I made it out to CitiField (not sure on whether it should be two words or one, will go with one for now). First off the disclosure: I hate the Mets. I do not claim to be unbiased here, I am sure some of that bias is coming through, but I do feel like I would have said the same things if the Yankees had built Citifield. Overall, Citifield is a vast improvement over Shea, but how could it not be? Other good things were the proximity to the Subway, ease in getting out through the copious stairways, the nice beer selection in the outfield food court and the slightly better concession prices than in Yankee Stadium. Kosher food options seemed somewhat limited with three types of sausage, pretzels and knishes at all 3 kosher stands that I encountered, but not that surprising.

Overall, HOK Sport/Populous – Official Architects of Major League Baseball – built a similar stadium here to all of the many others they have been building. Unfortunately, their postmodern style (most likely born of the 1980's when postmodernism was still a current trend) really doesn't work well at all in the wastelands of Flushing Meadows. Literally, you can look out from the building onto the junkyards of Willets Point, the Bridges of Pittsburgh or the Bay of San Francisco this view is not. I think this led to some major problems for the HOK formula, which is meant to incorporate landmarks from the skyline into the stadium experience (other examples include the capital building in Washington DC, the incorporation of old buildings into the structure in Baltimore and San Diego and downtown skylines in several other cities). So instead Citifield has to be closed in to avoid the view of the junk of the Willets Point. This leads to a confusing architectural formula, where the architects attempt to create something by varying every part of the park from another. This becomes distracting rather than beautiful, cute rather than intelligent. It feels like one of the great aspects of the newer stadiums, and HOK's design concept, is the open concourses that run continuously through the building, creating the ability to walk seamlessly everywhere. At Citi though, you will feel hemmed in at many points, most likely because you found a members only bar blocking your path. Also, the elements they add in seem to be counterproductive for effective viewing of the game. The out of town scoreboard blocks seats in several grandstand section. Light fixtures to illuminate advertising cast noticeable shadows on the videoboards and the extremely odd indentation in right field is just hard to explain. Worse still, the primary food court is actually behind the huge scoreboard and thus cut off from any view of the game whatsoever (I hope the line for Shack Shack ain't too long there or you could miss two innings).

In terms of the aforementioned club levels, I think they are more conspicuous here than at Yankee Stadium, because I found myself encountering them at so many points in my stroll through the building, blocking my path. Made it feel even more exclusive. In terms of the seats, I had a ticket for Section 511, and it felt quite high. Climbing the stairs to that level is pretty tiring, as it's the equivalent of 6 stories up. Part of the problem is that even the field level requires a hike up two stories. This explains the need for a huge rotunda with its hokey dedication to Jackie Robinson. Its just a way to filter fans upward. Other seats also left something to be desired. The outfield seats at field level were high enough off the ground to give a good view, but the long distance to the plate was noticeable. Most of these seats are covered by the next level up so it felt a little like being in a cave. I think in general the seats should not have been green in color, they just don't work all that well.

Finally, the worst thing about Citifield (other than the unfortunate sponsorship) is that it could have been so much more. The Mets should have hired someone to create the next generation of new ballpark, the one that will next make teams jealous. Now that there are 22 HOK Sport stadiums, doesn't someone need to come up with the next big thing? That should have been the Mets, because HOK's formula is so poor for the area they were building in anyway. This is a sports complex/wasteland, it would be like building a replica of a Fenway Park in the meadowlands, just would not fit. Ultimately, the Mets will regret this stadium because it could have been an opportunity to be leaders in design and fan comfort and instead the Mets took the relatively cheap and objectively safe route: They continued to chase the Phillies.

Punishment for Bush and Cheney

DEATH – TEXAS STYLE

18 U.S.C. 2340A

  (a) Offense. - Whoever outside the United States commits or attempts to commit torture shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both, and if death results to any person from conduct prohibited by this subsection, shall be punished by death or imprisoned for any term of years or for life. (b) Jurisdiction. - There is jurisdiction over the activity prohibited in subsection (a) if - (1) the alleged offender is a national of the United States; or (2) the alleged offender is present in the United States, irrespective of the nationality of the victim or alleged offender. (c) Conspiracy. - A person who conspires to commit an offense under this section shall be subject to the same penalties (other than the penalty of death) as the penalties prescribed for the offense, the commission of which was the object of the conspiracy.

 

In Treatment

I love this year's season of In Treatment so far. The episodes are much snappier than last year, having been reduced to under a half hour in actual time, which prevents any of the sessions from getting too tedious as they did last year on occasion. This show is just too smart to be ignored (unfortunately, this fact hasn't helped Friday Night Lights). The show does raise some interesting questions for those of us not initiated into the world of psychotherapy. I suppose expecting a distinct phase of diagnosis and then treatment might be unfairly importing a medical paradigm that is not relevant or effective here, but it does seem that Dr. Weston has no structure to his therapy, and I wonder if this is typical. Another issue, do therapists have trouble staying sane and grounded listening to all these crazies every day. Either way, it seems hard to believe that these sorts of conversations are helpful. Luckily, Paul and Gina seem to know the whole thing is a crock, which makes their sessions particularly interesting.

Why I Joined Twitter and Became a Twit

A few people who know me, know that I think Twitter is for twits who cannot write posts longer than 140 characters. I haven't been disabused of this notion, but was also informed that I can possibly aid my job search by using twitter, though God knows how. So any readers, here or through Twitter, feel free to let me know. My twitter name is frischa. My resume is below.

Resume

Just in case anyone out there knows a job for me, I am embedding my resume here.

Discover Simple, Private Sharing at Drop.io

Some pictures from the first day at the new Yankee Stadium

New Yankee Stadium

To disagree somewhat with my dad, here is my take on the New Yankee Stadium. I agree that it will be a great place to watch a game and that they did a great job mimicking the old stadium while updating it with modern amenities, I can't help but feel that something was missing.

The fact that the Yankees can even pretend that the Stadium is not new is in a sense its great success and failure. Colonel Rupert's Yankee Stadium was a grand innovation that essentially dropped from the sky in a few short months in the winter of 1923. It was everything a stadium should be and something no other stadium was. It was huge, reflective of its city and the aspirations of the team that played there. Rupert wanted a stadium that overshadowed the polo grounds across the river and to house his larger than life star, Babe Ruth. He got such a stadium. This was a massive structure, the first baseball stadium with 3 decks, but also one with aspirations of being a modern coliseum. The Yankee Stadium of 1923 was an innovative and grand palace for baseball and the Yankees, it reflected a New York City just then becoming the center of the world.

Little needs to be said of how little of this 1923 structure actually remained after the misguided 1970's renovation, but the feeling of stepping out of the tunnels and into the stands to see the great field at Yankee Stadium was always there.

This new stadium is excellent at replicating the feeling of sitting in the old stadium. You feel like you are sitting in the same old place in many ways, until you realize that certain things are just different. Like the lack of the pennants indicating the divisional standings, the return of the frieze (often incorrectly called a façade) to the grandstand and of course the huge HD videoboard. The new stadium fixes the problems with the 1970's botch job of the old stadium, it has an exterior similar to that of the original 1923 stadium, clad in stone, it has tremendously wide concourses in most places, has improved sight lines (except for a few seats in the bleachers), and has more comfortable seating. The Yankees spared no expense in recreating a modern version of their 1923 stadium. Yet, they missed one thing, innovation. The new stadium has the feeling of an improved Yankee Stadium and no one will feel like the old stadium has been stolen from them, since there old friend is still here. This missed an opportunity to again rethink what a stadium should be. Instead they replicated their old stadium with a little Camden Yards thrown in for good measure. I guess what bothers me is that the Yankees had to copy from places like Baltimore for their new stadium and that it just does not feel like the Stadium is any different from those other parks.

A little could be said about the corporate nature of the place and the love of money that oozes from the field level "legends suites." All I think that needs to be said is that anyone who is paying $2500 a ticket for seats at Yankee Stadium should be ashamed that they could not find a more useful way to spend their money.

The Past Few Days

Sunday night I was pleased to attend a lecture on "Boxing and Jewish Law" given by my former student Rabbi Daniel Travis. The number two middleweight boxer in America Yuri Foreman (see YuriForeman.com) was also present. He is Rabbi Travis' student at the Rabbi's Rabbinical academy.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This morning I am to be seen briefly commenting on the new Yankee Stadium on channel 2 news.

It is hard to imagine a more perfect combination of the old field with the amenities of contemporary stadium construction.