The Cubs managed to take one out of three from the very impressive (and yet frighteningly evil) White Sox. Odds are this is not news to anyone out there, but I thought it made a nice lead-in for this post. Elegant even. So, without further ado (adu? adieu? doo-doo?), I give you all things Cubs.

BatGirl rides again

Over at Goatriders.org, BatGirl has taken a swing at defending her GM as the best...in brilliant Lego-vision. I have to admit, the lego-tastic representation lends a certain weight to her arguments, despite the pointy heads and claw-like hands. So, go over a check it out, because everybody like Legos (except communists. You don't want to be a communist, do you?).

Bleacher Bums

Seriously, there were some real idiots up in the bleachers (and I'm not even counting myself). Now, for the good folks at Bleed Cubbie Blue and View from the Bleachers, the bleachers are nothing new. But for this Cub fan, most games are attended in either the cheap seats or the really cheap seats (i.e. my couch at home), and so this was a rare experience for me. So, let me just say thanks again to Chris for the tickets, and share a few examples of really stupid people. And most of them weren't even Sox fans (but some were).

On the Sox ledger: a few die-hards made the trip up from the South Side after apparently having started drinking on, oh, tuesday maybe? They were super nice fellows and one Sox fan kept telling me how he knew for sure that the Cubs would win...which was fine until about the 100th time he repeated it. But in general they were all fine until that same Sox fan, in a fit of excitement over Wuertz's beating, jumped up and came down right on The Wife. Granted, she's pretty tough and more than held her own, throwing the guy off of her, but I was still pretty annoyed. I became even more annoyed when the guy apologized to me about 87 times in the course of the next 5 minutes. The fact that the Cubs had just given up four runs didn't really help. That was a trying 15 minutes or so.

On the Cubs side: This was worse. I expect bad things from Sox fans, but always get disappointed by Cubs' fans when they exhibit poor-fansmanshipitude. A couple of the worst cases:

• There were three very excited Sox fans with their Sox flag sitting somewhere towards the front of the stands. They carried on throughout the game, but were basically good natured despite rooting for the Sox. One of these fans was, let's say, large. Very large. And his shirt was a touch too small. So, somewhere around the 8th inning when fans were getting testy and these fellas were getting too happy, one brilliant fan yells out: "Why don't you eat another cheeseburger!" implying, I believe, that this man must eat many cheeseburgers as he is quite round. Clever, no doubt, but still annoying. Then she says it again ~ 20 seconds later. Then again, 20 seconds later. Then again, and again, and again. These Sox fans can't actually hear her, but that doesn't matter because I can, and I get to observe how very creative she is. Personally, however, I would have gone with: "hey, you are very fat!", but to each his (or her) own.
• The worse were the Suburban retreads sitting next to us. Awesome, awesome Cubs fans. How do I know they are so very awesome? Well, despite focusing in on the beer and the Sox fans rather than the game, they were still alert enough to
  
• Yell (repeatedly, I might add) "You suck Corey" and "nice defense Corey" and "way to go Corey" after Corey missed his sliding catch. Because, clearly, that was an easy catch.
  
• Realize that the game was over after the 4 run 8th and have the foresight to leave then so as to beat the traffic back out to Aurora. It takes a keen mind to judge the 8th as the precise moment for leaving so as to maximize the utility of the bleacher tickets. Upon getting repeatedly heckled by the wife for leaving the game early, one of the super-fans was erudite enough to respond "What?". I was about 70-30 on whether I was going to have to fight this guy (a fairly big guy at that). Luckily I didn't have to fight him, because it would have been a shame to embarrass him in front of his friends.

I give the bleachers high points for entertainment value...and the game was alright too.

Internet related wrist injuries

...are certainly common, but not usually due to typing too often. I think they are really reaching when they start to blame AIM for Zambrano's wrist problems. Swinging too often I could maybe see, but typing? I'm sure many of us type pretty often at work (I certainly do), but it is not keeping any of us from throwing complete game shutouts, now is it? (for that, I blame genetics)

Prior == good

Enough said. Now that he seems healthy, I can resume my non-sexual man crush (and the women of Chicago can resume their other kind of crush. Yes, yes, he's on your "list", I get it.)

Bullpen == bad

bullpen makes Jason==sad.

GROTA-wear

...is flying off the shelves. Goatriders of the Apocalypse is quickly becoming the #1 selling goat/apocalypse related clothing line on the market. Get yours now before your friends all shame you for having no goat-clothes in you wardrobe.

And finally, Houston is coming to town this weekend. I am predicting very bad things as Houston has been stuggling terribly (lost 6 in a row), are 2-19 (!) on the road, and are starting a rookie in his ML debut. All these things spell disaster for the Cubs and they will be lucky to not get swept.

Game time 7:05. Go Cubs!