on the people-to-call list:
- gurs, who has committed to seeing the cats at michigan, and further debauchery, i hope
- unstadt, who now is owed two calls. saturday afternoon. book it.
- didi, who i spoke with briefly during the night when the alcs and nlcs were both played...game 1 of one series and 2 of the other...i blew her off and haven't called back since
- melissa, another weekend - or maybe friday night - call...twas her birthday on the 22nd, i remembered on monday, and called on tuesday...i haven't returned her callback

i'm generally awful at making calls, although i used to be good at it. i guess you meet some people in three years on a job. or maybe the coworkers are just, in general, cooler. or maybe i've been overconsumed by baseball. or maybe i don't like to call until 9, but then i'm asleep.

i spoke with sister annie, who has changed her last name on emails to peacenik, which i think is funny. i'm not a naturally activist person - i don't thrive on conflict or complaint, which is a necessary trait of an activist type. my sister is, or is among people who are and has been sucked in. (like i learned in psychology a01[a big waste of my time], 'probably some nature and probably some nurture.') annie and 24 other future barbara walters (aka sarah lawrence students...) loaded up the vans and headed to ohio this past weekend to 'get out the vote' and actually go door to door and try to chat up people on issues and arrange for old people to get transportation to the polling places. i don't know if she deemed it a successful trip - i only know that i probaby interrupted to tell her that iron chef was on- but i think it's a real respectable and impressive thing for a 19 year old idiot to do. she's apparently going to pennsylvania on tuesday.

i've got lots of vacation time and an accrued comp day that i'm supposed to cram in before the holidays, so i'm taking tuesday off to watch election coverage.

i haven't followed the election so tightly, and i try not to live and die with the polls, but i think that bush will probably take pennsylvania because if i were from pennsylvania i'd cringe at the thought of theresa (ta-ray-za) heinz kerry representing my state.

an unsubstantiated theory that i've created, and that'll make republicans cringe: if bush does win/litigate his way to this election, the next gop candidate will be running against hillary clinton, who will win in a landslide.

has there ever been a more disappointing world series? absolutely forgettable, and absolutely incredible that st. louis had absolutely zero fight. boston led the entire series. at the end of every inning (perhaps not in game 1?). unbelievable. i thought st. louis won 105 games...ya still need an ace.

i love manny ramirez. he's clueless, but silly about it. he waves to friends while being interviewed. he's got silly hair.

jeannie zelasko is creepy.

not much is planned for this weekend. i'm reading a tremendous book - wonderland, about a pennsylvania high school, by sports illustrated's michael bamberger - that i'll probably finish tomorrow. i'll probably also make my second batch of winter chili tomorrow.

saturday i'll watch the cats...maybe i should have planned a trip in for homecoming. but nobody's really there anymore, except gurs. gurs is generally worth seeing, as are the entire numed crew + the west henderson crew. probably should have gone. saturday i'll also call unstadt. saturday i may be wrangled into working at the ballclub's haunted house, my third straight weekend with one 7-to-midnight shift. i may also get into a gigantic argument with a slacker coworker of mine who's self-important and has not taken a shift on any of the nine nights.

sunday eileen and i are going to my grandpa's 80th birthday party. we went to my grandparents 60th anniversary two weeks before. think about that. different times...pretty amazing.

i talked to my brother briefly today when i learned that steve stone was officially out of the cubs booth for 2005 (one more reason for my slacker ass to finish my freakin' tape and send it along), and i found out that he's officially started operation: sell out. more details to follow. it appears that, come january, he'll be spending a week at disney world for a accountant sellout 'training' session that should primarly include young male sellouts and young female sellouts and few seminars and lots of drinking, probably all paid for by The Man. (tongue partially in cheek. i think he should intern in sports radio instead.)

i'll only be proud of him if, in ten years, he's officially become the first-ever 'non-boring' accountant. or if he's caddying for phil mickelson.