you gots to somewhere, and a non-televised win on the road over a team from a 'power' conference is a nice place to start. cats 28, jayhawks 20. four td's for j.wright.

i'm quite lame. exhibit a: this game excites me.

bring on air force.

note: big ups to the mighty eastern michigan eagles, upending the men of troy.

notes from the past few days:

i saw the tail end of the mtv awards on replay tonight. (by 'tail end,' i mean less than five minutes.) missy elliot thanked a whole bunch o' people, presumably because 'work it' rocked the awards, and then chris rock said 'and now to remember the last 20 years of the vma's, here's metallica.' so metallica played a four-song instrumental medley, ostensibly to honor the last 20 years. their songs: lenny kravitz - 'are you gonna go my way,' nirvana - 'smells like teen spirit,' the white stripes - 'seven nation army', and michael jackson - 'beat it.' i mean, really. on so many levels.

the cubs bullpen angers me. i'm quite happy that i've not been able to see the last few games. today, i asked 40-something ex-reliever gary lucas if he'd be interested in a job (asking on the cubs behalf - - he's a lefty, and only a few years older than jesse orosco), but he declined. cubs're fucked.

my sister is departing for sarah lawrence college about 2 hours from now. barbara walters went to sarah lawrence college. i hope my sister gets to interview j-lo.

i've really enjoyed watching andy roddick for a few years now. i've loved tim henman every late-june, early-july for the past seven or so years. it was real tough to watch them play on tuesday, but i taped it, and watched every point. roddick seems to have tuned down the foot-stomping, whiny kid routine, which is nice. and the crowd loves him. it's neat to watch, but i don't think the crowd'll ever love him like they love jimmy connors. didja watch connors about 1990, the year he used the neon yellow racket? that was outstanding.

did you know the trucker cap thing has reached critical mass? roddick had one. and so did james hetfield of metallica.

a post-script on my blood donation story from earlier this week: as of thursday morning, there was a gigantic (4-6 inches in length, 1-2 in width) purple bruise, tender to the touch (then don't touch it, stupid). as i type, the bruise is still purple, but has started to move into yellow territory, and is no longer tender. instead, it's become a conversation starter (chicks dig unsightly bruises.)

fantasy football draft was held tonight, and it's tough when you use a second round (25th overall) pick on someone who apparently may be out for the season (michael bennett), a sixth-roundish pick (immediately rescinded - thanks nemes) on a player who no longer exists (olandis gary), and a ninth-round pick, a pick you consider a steal, on a player whose stats, upon further review, weren't that good, and even worse, is also a health question mark (james thrash) (comma record!). it's also embarrassing when kelly holcomb is your starting qb, backed up by kordell stewart. (can the pittsburgh-cleveland rivalry coexist on the same team...doubtful) then again, i did land amani toomer and donte' stallworth, and TE billy miller will be this year's biggest revelation, i hope.

and i can also turn my ineptitude into a positive: after all, i'm an adult. should it really matter that i don't know the relative health situation of michael bennett? of course it shouldn't...i've got dishes to worry about. (side note: it matters.)

finally, you may be familiar with the fact that i called joe mauer (youngest brother, way rich) and jake mauer's (oldest brother, not really rich) games on a daily basis last season. their parents were regulars, and i got to know them on a shake-hands-and-smile basis. well, middle brother billy was recently added to our roster. (joe now at double-a, jake at high-a.) this weekend, the grandparents tierney (mauer maternal, i believe), in town to watch billy pitch, found a lame excuse to come up and introduce themselves. they were looking for a phone book - - - where's a nearby catholic church? - - - and came up to the press box to say hello. it was neat...they were both grateful and great.

note: i've added and changed songs to the list at left. why you'd care, i don't know.

off days yesterday and today. some sitting. some sleeping. some shopping. (guided by voices - earthquake glue)

i also had an experience that i've never had before. i first donated blood back in 1998, and i became a fairly regular donor by 2000, and a completely regular donor by last fall. i've pretty steadily stayed on the every-two-months schedule.

well, yesterday, for the first time, i felt some serious discomfort. there's always a bit of that discomfort - - the tightness in the vein. but yesterday (the first time my left arm was used - - don't know why i let them do that), i felt tightness-plus. i started squirming and wiggling after about five minutes. the nurse said "are you okay?" and i said "sort of" and she said "i'm not convinced" and i explained my general squeamishness. as a result, they tilted back my chair and placed a big ice bag on my chest. it was wild.

don't know why it happened. perhaps it was my left arm. but they said that i donated a full pint, so at least they didn't have to throw it out.

i hung out in the chair for about 10 more minutes - eyes closed and ice on chest - and then went to the recovery area and had four of those pink wafer-like sandwich cookies and about 11 glasses of mountain dew. i was ready for the world by noon, 1:15 after entering the place.

in other news, i think earthquake glue is destined to reside in the realm of most gbv releases. it's not alien lanes or bee thousand or not in my airforce, but it also outshines do the collapse and kid marine and devil between my toes. it'll probably wind up somewhere in that precarious 8th-best to 16th-best range (including solo albums and side projects that i've heard, etc.). it's too early, but i don't know how much replay it'll get.

fun fact: the intro to track two, "my son, my secretary, my country" features a 45-second horn intro - - - as performed by a middle school marching band.

and finally, piazza's back, johan santana's hot, nick johnson's back, and aramis is heating up, and i sort of think that willie's destroyers are about to make their run. currently the eighth seed, five is well in reach. (the goal is sixth, to avoid the top two teams until the second round.)

it's been a bit of time, and for that i apologize.

what have i been doing for the last week? drinking. and complaining.

i believe i had the longest 'get-drunk-on-consecutive-nights' streak of my life this week, as monday night, tuesday night and wednesday night in dayton saw me imbibe. (thursday was a 11 EDT to 430 CDT bus ride...) man that makes me sound lame. i also imbibed on friday. that's a pathetic longest career streak, i guess. i was supposed to make it 5 of 6 nights yesterday, but could not for various reasons, related to the second thing i've been doing.

the highlight was most certainly on tuesday, when my pal nemo made the trip to ohio to join in on the fun. for his appearance, i am appreciative. however, dude left in the morning. didn't even leave a note.

former ticket manager fred, whom few have met but a few more may have heard about, was in this weekend. he wound up crashing at my place both friday and saturday. he's capable of brightening up a week.

he certainly brightened up friday, during which we imbibed. however, last night was an 11-inning game and it was late and sunday's are way too short to get much done and i was frustrated (see next paragraph) so i just headed home to get back to work. the soundtrack was nirvana's in utero, which has hooked me a bit.

and why the complaining? because the past two weeks saw me watch baseball in appleton (a pretty nice environment), kane county (an unmatched environment) and dayton (an environment only slightly less exciting than kane's) before returning back home to our environment. (not such a good one) it's saddening. or maddening. or just anger-inducing.

but there are only two weeks left, so that's cool.

my dad's a pretty not-petty kind of guy, and, i'd assume, so are the people he 'runs' with. i have learned that this is not true.

and i think this story is too ridiculous to not report, being that it involves three 50-something men. (although my dad only tangentially.)

take three men - - - we'll call them gene, tony and pat. these men have been friends since at least high school, and i think before then. let's say they struck up their friendship in 1960. it's 2003. the men are married. they have kids. gene's son (me) works in baseball, broadcasting in the midwest league. pat's son works in baseball, in the sales department of the mighty kane county cougars.

being that andrew's club, the mighty river bandits, have a weekend series at kane county, and being that the pat, gene and tony live within an hour of kane county, it would only be natural that the three men, their wives and their sons would go out for a snack or drinks or something after the saturday night game.

right?

So the time for preparations comes (reference point: Thursday, July 31). And Gene, the spearhead-er, calls Pat. And Pat and wife are in. And Gene calls Tony. And Gene says "Great. And Pat and (insert wife's name here...Andrew can't remember it, because he's a bad son) are in too." And Tony says "I'll believe that when I see it."

Huh?

So the time for final final preparations comes (reference point: Tuesday, August 5). And Gene calls for final confirmation with Pat. And Pat says "Something's suddently come up." (Note my Brady Bunch reference) So Gene calls Tony and asks Tony what's going on. And Tony says something to the effect of "Pat's mad at me for some reason. I don't know why. Let's just go play pinball to make things better. And I'll trade you my Bill Hands for your spoke-damaged Ernie Banks."

And Gene says "That's strange. Ernie rules. Fuck off. I guess it'll just be the four of us, and Andrew."

How wild is that. Petty junior-high relationships among fifty-something men rule!

on thursday, one of our top venezuelan players, a .280-something hitter, wanted to be interviewed. his english is limited and highly accented. i wanted to do it, but i had a previous commitment inverview-wise. anyway, i said "get three more hits tonight and i'll get you tomorrow," and he agrees, and he winds up getting four that night.

so that meant interview day on friday. and after i requested his presence, he said "i do so good in june and you never interview me" and i responded with "remember in burlington when we were going to do it with a translator?" and he replied "okay man."

so we sat down to begin the interview, and he asked me what i'd ask him about...he wanted to practice his english beforehand. so i said that i'd be talking about his improvement (he batted .150-something in april) or how tough it is to skip a level (this is the third level in the minor league ladder...he jumped from the first rung to this one).

and he began talking quietly to himself: "i've been woorking vely haad on my sweeng, and ze coaches have worked a lot on the eenside peetch and zey showed cone-feedince in me..."

and i asked if he was ready, and he said "les go man."

so i do my little intro...the team won in 13 innings on thursday...and i open it by saying "it had to be a real nice win for the team..."

and he said "i feel good. i've been working vely haad on my sweeng, and ze coaches have worked a lot on the eenside peetch and zey showed con-feedince in me..."

and all was good. (by the way, he carried himself very well for the three-minute interview).

due to the fact that i spend my time in the press box, and not in the dugout, i'm not able to give many 'slice of life'-type accounts from the life on the field. i wish there were more opportunities for this but, alas, there are not.

however, here is a secondhand account.

setting: a ballgame.
situation: it's a boring one.
principal characters: cory, trainer; ryan, strength coach; unnamed relief pitcher

what they're doing: 'stopwatch baseball,' a popular game featuring that always-sought-after accomplishment: stopping the stopwatch at exactly 1.00 seconds.

how to play: the game is simple. 0.97=single. 0.98=double. 0.99=triple. 1.00=home run. there is no defensive counterpoint. as many players can play as needed. they're generous with taking extra bases...i.e. runners move up an extra base on hits, so a double will score a man from first.

play as long as you'd like. in the case of cory, ryan, and unnamed reliever, this meant four games during tuesday's doubleheader.

today marked my least productive rainout day ever. ever.

sunday game scheduled for 1...bus at 9:30. I'm out of the room at 9:15, and am told that the bus is now at 10. so i do a bit of work, and get out of the room at 9:50.

right after the national anthem, this gigantic storm comes to town. pouring. lots of it. and thunder too. so the game's called at 2, and i got out of the booth by 215 and we're back at the hotel by 245.

i'm pumped - - - cubs are on wgn, and i'll get the rare opportunity to watch them. i spend the next hour doing some minor league baseball-related minutiae, all the while flipping constantly back to wgn to see if the cubs are on. rain delay there too. i also give melissa a call, as we've left messages for two weeks. i leave a message.

so finally, around 4:30, the cubs in action. and boom. i'm asleep. until 7:15. (i'll later find out that i also slept through a 'come to dinner with us' phone call.) i'm not hungry, so i decide against going to dinner at the moment. (at this point, it gets foggy.) i think i fall asleep again. until 9:30.
i wake up to see that i've missed a melissa callback, and we finally make that connection and put in our half-hour of conversation. so now it's 10:30. and i go to get some animal crackers for dinner from the vending machine. and i watch sportscenter for a bit and then ben adler calls needing career advice or something.

and, about 24 failed internet connections and a check of fantasy baseball results later, here it is 2:30 and i'm not really tired owing to the five straight hours of sleep this afternoon.

and all i've noticed is this: vh-1's insomniac music theater has used the same playlist (which it always does), but has kept it in the exact same order for the past two days. no joke. (exception: last night was pink's "get this party started." today's it's "don't let me get me.")

check ya later.