The Death of Imagination

1. das Baseballcap
2. de baseballcap
3. la gorra de béisbol
4. la gorra de beisbol
5. la casquette de baseball
6. y cap pêl-fâs
7. an caipín daorchluiche
8. baseballówka
9. 야구모자 (野球帽子)
10. 棒球帽 bàngqiúmào

Notes: It's hard to credit that daorchluiche is the officially-recommended term for "baseball" in Irish when it looks like the kind of clumsy overliteral translation you would expect from a machine. The first element, daor means "base" in the sense of "lowly" or "servile". Or is this just an unkind commentary on our National Pastime from a bunch of hurley-wielding maniacs?

These West Coast games are for the birds. Thank the Lords of Baseball that tonight's triple header is forcing those Southern Californian layabouts to get to the park by three in the afternoon, 'cuz I'm not up for another late night. I confess, I'm a bad fan: I tuned out during the 8th inning. Sorry, but I know my team and they're not the Cubs; eleventh-hour comebacks are not their forte. When they failed to get on the board in the 7th I figured it was all over, and so it was.

I should've known that when I mocked the Cubs for their 13-inning opus it would come back to haunt me. Cards and Dodgers just went to the top of the 15th. Sorry, I love you guys, but I need my damn sleep. Games lasting past midnight just ought not to be allowed.

ETA: I lied. The top of the fifteenth went speedier than expected, so I hung around to see Pujols end the game with a single in the bottom of the inning.

As much as I enjoyed tonight's 8-1 blowout (sorry, bunj, for ruining the 4th for you with my lack of TiVo awareness), the game I really wish I'd seen is last night's. Nine-and-a-half scoreless innings, and it all comes down to a single run in the bottom of the 10th? Amazing!

In other baseball news, how bout them Padres? Also, Cubs fan must be overjoyed at the end of their club's eight game losing streak. (When I made mention of the recent sweep last weekend, my touchy neighbour pointed out that at least they were doing better than the White Sox. Yeah, you and fourteen other major league teams.)

When the team with the best record in baseball currently (15-7) plays the one with the worst (5-15), the outcome is something of foregone conclusion, so I have to give credit to the Nationals for keeping it interesting all the way up until the top of the ninth when their defence collapsed completely. (Seriously--how often do you see a walk, a balk, and a passed ball all in the same inning?) With the Cardinals so hot, there's next to no chance of us seeing them in New Busch this year, but I'm hopeful we'll be able to catch a game in Miller Park before the summer's out.

It was another rainy day up here on the North Side, but I'm okay with it since it's made everything so very green. The warm days last week jump-started a number of plants, among them the sugar maples, which are in full bloom around the house and along campus. Ferns are unfurling, shrubs are filling out, and the moss is lambent with verdor. The adjective that came to mind for the scene outside the office today was "Tolkienian".

It was a little taste of summer today. The mercury hit the 80s, the kids were out sunning themselves on the grass, and the Cubs have started their June Swoon just a bit early.

monshu's lucky I don't believe in jinxes. I came bounding into the bedroom earlier tonight to tell him that the Cards had just scored in the fifth to lead 2-0 against the Cubs. "Isn't that the same as what happened in that other game?" [Last Saturday's 5-7 loss.] I scolded him, saying "That's not what a supportive boyfriend would say!" Within two innings, the Cardinals had made two errors and the score was 3-3. I was glued to the television for the next couple hours until they pulled it out in the 8th. (Can't really cast stones what with Schumaker dropping a routine fly and all, but, really, how sucky do you have to be to let Pujols steal bases in back-to-back games?)

So, to recap, two things I need if I'm going to be watching Cards-Cubs games on a regular basis: (1) sympathetic boyfriend; (2) alternative audio so I don't have to keep listening to the suck that passes for calling in the bleak post-Brickhouse era. Usually the chuckleheads just babble on instead of, you know, describing the action on the field, but tonight they outdid themselves. When Pujols made it home, one of the nimrods said, "That's three for the Cardinals!" Um, they had three from the end of the fifth inning on, moron. But a win is a win, even when it's the fourth one in a row. (Beating the Cubs is nice for the bragging rights it gives over our neighbour, but sweeping the Mets is what warms the cockles of that 12 year-old's heart inside me.)

I should go easy on the Old Man, however. He was too sleepy for our planned trip to Andersonville, so I took him out to Uncommon Ground instead. On false pretences, as it turns out: They were the only place around that has outdoor seating, but I don't know what made me think they left it out all year round. It also turns out we'd stayed away just long enough for me to forget what ruined the meal I had there before. When my pork belly arrived dried out, I thought That's right, didn't they fuck up the meat then, too? Looking back, I see that they did, but what really exasperated me was the burnt cornbread, so it turns out I can't blame them after all for the Heartland Cafe mistake of letting the vegetarians cook the meat.

I lacked the conviction to send it back when I should've, but still whined about it anyway, which caused our server to softheartedly comp both my beer and our dessert. "You really don't want me to leave in a bad mood, do you?" I told her. And I didn't, but I'm really tired of paying $20 for a piece of meat and have it turn out more poorly than at someplace which would've charged me half as much for a more generous portion. Bitch, gripe, moan. I blame my pissiness on something in the air. After all, the couple right next to us got into an argument in front of their young child and, on the back porch earlier that evening, our neighbour was cursing his wife into his Bluetooth receiver. Seriously, people, what about doing your laundry at home?

Okay, Midwestern teams, it's time to stop sucking! When the World Series rolls around at the end of the month, I don't want to have to root for the damn Dodgers or--god help us--the Phillies. I mean, either of these beats the Mets by a mile (I can't thank you enough, Milwaukee, for at least keeping them out of the playoffs), but still, I'd like to be rooting for the NL team for some reason beyond it being merely the NL team.

The tulips and azaleas are peaking and the Bradford pears are not far behind. Hawthorns are blooming, crabapples are budding, hostas are leafing, and I expect to see irises before too much longer. Spring is icumen in!

Unfortunately, while admiring all those I got myself my first sunburn of the year, and I can tell from the tightness in my face it's a bad one. Also, temperatures and humidity are already approaching summertime levels.

And there's another way in which it's like a taste of summer early: The Cubs are a game-and-a-half out of first place. (No need to mention the team which just put them there, I trust.) Suck it, bleacher bums!

So tired, but three beers = late bedtime and no amount of Tums Ultra will change that. In any case, what better time than the last hour of my Birthday Week to review what I'm thankful for?

• Why I have the best boyfriend in the world. You'd think after two years of hints, someone in St. Louis--where Cardinals gear is as ubiquitous as humidity and bad hair--would've bought me so much as a lousy t-shirt. You would, unfortunately, be dead wrong. It takes a complete alien to sports fandom to throw himself into the breach and buy me a shirt fit for a rabid fanboy. Two, in fact--one for everyday wear and one for special occasion. Like what?
• Why I have the best brother in the world. How about tickets to one of the hottest match-ups of the season? The Cubs, first place in the Division for the first time in a very hot year (which is to say, for the first time in years). The World Champion Cards, within striking distance of them for the first time in a rather dismal year. And us, in the penultimate row of the upper deck. (Thank goodness there are no bad seats at Wrigley Field!) And he wasn't even going to let me pay!
• Why I have the best sister-in-law in the world. Sometimes it's as simple as saying, "Lunch at Meinl before the game?" Or letting me take her husband out for bar food and wet fries even when that wasn't what she'd been planning for.

All in all, a fantastic day. Sure, it rained intermittently. But if I have to be cooped up in a ball park for six hours, there are so many worse choices than the Friendly Confines. (Miller Park probably isn't one of them, but I'd have to go to each a few more times to be sure.) And, as much as love him, bunj probably shouldn't be allowed to watch the Cardinals play. Three games I've gone to with him against three different teams in three different parks, and they've lost every time. (I know it can't be me because I saw them stomp the Astros on their home turf.)

But I don't ask that my team win every time, only that they play hard. Which they did. One less bad call (Pujols safe, you jackass!) and one fewer rain delay (Who stops the game in the middle of a count? Who schedules an afternoon game for 2:55 p.m. in the first place?), and it would've been--as they say--an entirely different ball game. But it was close until the very end and I can't say I was ever bored. When nothing was happening on the field, there was always plenty going on in the stands.