BEg2 chapter 1 Maxine’s walk to the Otto Kugelblitz School

[Michael Bailey]

I’m trying to find something useful to say about it.
It’s good. Workmanlike. Factual.

More to learn myself than expound, about the “pick” which “Maxine drifts
into….”

 - in basketball (mentioned approvingly in VL)

https://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/articles/how-to-set-pick-in-basketball.html

“When an offensive player legally blocks the path of a defender to open up
another offensive player for a shot or to receive a pass.”

In football, it’s an interception, but March is basketball season.

Maxine and her sons are on offense, to stretch (or maybe just catch) the
allusion.


Moving on to quote the passage, claiming fair usage:

“At the corner, by reflex, she drifts into a pick so as to stay between
them and any driver whose idea of sport is to come around the corner and
run you over.

  Sunlight reflected from east-facing apartment windows has begun to show
up in blurry patterns on the fronts of buildings across the street.
Two-part buses, new on the routes, creep the crosstown blocks like giant
insects. Steel shutters are being rolled up, early trucks are
double-parking, guys are out with hoses cleaning off their piece of
sidewalk. Unsheltered people sleep in doorways, scavengers with huge
plastic sacks full of empty beer and soda cans head for the markets to cash
them in, work crews wait in front of buildings for the super to show up.
Runners are bouncing up and down at the curb waiting for lights to change.
Cops are in coffee coffee shops dealing with bagel deficiencies. Kids,
parents, and nannies wheeled and afoot are heading in all different
directions for schools in the neighborhood. Half the kids seem to be on new
Razor scooters, so to the list of things to keep alert for add ambush by
rolling aluminum.

  The Otto Kugelblitz School occupies three adjoining brownstones between
Amsterdam and Columbus, on a cross street Law & Order has so far managed
not to film on.”