SNOW IS ON THE GROUND, but single game tickets for next season went on sale today. And, just like Butch asked Sundance, Gordon Edes of the Boston Globe asks what we're all asking: "Who are these guys?"

So, we ask again: Is this progress? Loretta and Lowell have been productive players, but they're both coming off subpar seasons. The Sox are high on Youkilis, and he should certainly give them more production than Kevin Millar did. If a Tejada deal is a nonstarter, Gonzalez, the free agent shortstop who was not offered arbitration by the Marlins, is a terrific fielder. Marte could be a jewel, a throwback (Lajoie's word) third baseman who might wear out the Wall. The plan is for Marte to move up as the need arises, though some Sox insiders still wonder if the team would be willing to give up Marte for a pitcher such as Javier Vazquez.

Loretta's presence gives top prospect Dustin Pedroia another year to develop, too.

If Damon and Ramírez stay, the offense should still be potent. The pitching will be better with Josh Beckett, and the bullpen is already better with Guillermo Mota.

But what we knew about Kevin Millar and Bill Mueller and Tony Graffanino and John Olerud and Doug Mirabelli and Wells is that they knew how to win.

The new guys from Florida can flash World Series rings, but the imports still have some proving to do here.

IF THIS WAS A POEM

You would say,

Oh, what an interesting poem.
I especially like how he
rhymed crispies del cocoa
with risotto.

But it's not a poem.
So it sucks.

IN A PERFECT WORLD, we'd still be boring and intolerable, because we'd all be running around obnoxiously content and at peace with everything, rubbing it in each other's faces, as if there was absolutely nothing wrong in the world, which would be true, which would make it all that more annoying. On the bright side, the world isn't perfect, and even better, whenever we foolishly begin to think things can't get worse, George Saunders is there to remind us, "Why not?". Exhibit A, an excerpt from his story, "CommComm":

Dad worked thirty years at Gallup Chain, with his dad. Then they discontinued Automotive. Only Bike remained. A week after his layoff, Grandpa died. Day of the wake, Dad got laid off too. Month later, we found out Jean was sick. Jean was my sister, who died at eight. Her last wish was Disneyland. But money was tight. Toward the end, Dad borrowed money from Leo, the brother he hated. But Jean was too sick to travel. So Dad had an Army friend from Barstow film all of Disney on a Super-8. The guy walked the whole place. Jean watched it and watched it. Dad was one of these auto-optimists. To hear him tell it, we’d won an incredible last-minute victory. Hadn’t we? Wasn’t it something, that we could give Jeanie such a wonderful opportunity?

But Jean had been distilled down to like pure honesty.

“I do wish I could have gone, though,” she said.

“Well, we practically did,” Dad said, looking panicked.

“No, but I wish we really did,” she said.

After Jean died, we kept her room intact, did a birthday thing for her every year, started constantly expecting the worst.

Believe it or not, there's a happy ending. But even better, maybe there's such a thing as redemption in real life, too.

PITCHED A NUTTY? In the end, I think I like Piniella. Crazy can be good for baseball if it's the right kind of crazy, I say.

IT'S SUMMER, AND THE SKY SMELLS LIKE TRASH. One of the few downsides of living in New York City is the ubiquity of trash in everyday life. Walking out of work on this warm, moist summer night, the sky smelled like trash. The gentle breeze reeked of refuse. The hot gust from the subway entrance, like urine. The sticky subway car, like an armpit. In February, it's a winter wonderland of garbage bags and beer bottle snow cones. In October, newspapers and used napkins mingle with the drifting brown and yellow leaves. Ah, the changing of the seasons! Still, it's better than the empty, unrelenting prettiness of partly cloudy, bone chilling San Francisco — an experience that a coworker accurately described as, "Like the worst day of Spring every day of the year." I'll take the stink and grime over that, that's for sure.

FROM NOW ON, I shall evaluate the loyalty of my friends based on whether they would back me up in a knife fight. This includes the girls. This is how it works. If this friend and I were, say, stuck on a prison planet and one of the other inmates started picking on me to the point where shivs were drawn and ready, would this so-called friend stand with me and make sure I didn't get jumped from behind? (Friend.) Or would he/she skulk in the shadows and pretend not to know me? (Not friend.) It's just something that occurred to me. And, I think, it's the only way to be sure.

INAUGARATION DAY and here we go again. The one bright spot – JibJab and their Monty Python-esque little balls of Flash fun. Sure, I laugh because it's wacky and goofy, but I also think it might be one of the most impressive uses of Flash animation yet. Not because of its technical sophistication, but because it's able to create its own aesthetic – instead of just passing as a poor man's cell animation or a slightly more ambitious Sunday funny. (Likewise, this Radiohead video is also very good.)