pretendastronaut

Oh see, now I know this is a lie at the end. There's no way Melvin only said "and that" around 5 times in that much conversation. Cool story bklyn!

This is really a non-issue. Rome asked a leading question, and Braun did his best to answer it cleanly. He didn't disparage Milwaukee in the slightest. He basically agreed with Rome that he's a "big city" type of guy and said, who knows what will happen in the future. I felt it was an honest answer.

Full Story Personally I don't see where Beckett would have had any reason to be throwing at Abreu's head at that moment. I believe it was unintentional, a slip due to the poorly timed timeout, so a 6 game suspension seems really over the top in my opinion. It doesn't seem likely to me that Beckett got upset mid-motion about the timeout and decided to aim at Abreu's head suddenly.

The interview is here for anyone who wants to see it. They talk about the WBC, Braun getting hurt in the WBC but not leaving, making the playoffs again, our pitching problems, and then some random bits about his swing, attitude and future.

Good job with the pic Series. I don't have any issue with it at all if its something they normally do. Maybe the weirdness of it was having to teach Bradley what to do. Overall, it was a really good game to watch, especially for this early in the season.

As for the outfield celebration by the Cubs, I don't know if that's something they standardly do, but it sure didn't look like it. Soriano and Fukudome seemed to have to direct what they were going to do. It looked to me like an intentional mocking of our guys.

Well, I'm in the minority that if he's a friend who you enjoy hanging out with, he should be able to be a friend who won't be a complete jerk to you as a fan if you do him this favor. I've gone to games with friends who are Cubs fans before, but they're my friends, and we can respect each other. There may be some good natured ribbing, but it's not anything like the majority of the Cubs fans at the game.

Since you said you consider her boss a friend, have you spent time with him socially before?

I'd like to jump in for the Prince bobble. Thanks for the opportunity Pedro!

That was two years ago, which I think was the first time in years we'd opened at home. We opened in Chicago in the rain last year. (EDIT: Actually we opened against the Pirates the year before that, but that was our first opening day at home in 10 years.) Anyone seeing how peeved TH is about this scheduling the past two days? He just keeps posting about it. It is funny though to see the Giants say they never have rainouts. I was in SF a few seasons back and they had their second game of the year rained out.

I remember thinking there was no way we'd play our first game last year, but they pulled it through. I'm going to comfort myself with that until this afternoon.

We're essentially on COBRA now, and that monthly payment hurts, but as whizkid said, we had some pre-existing conditions that we knew were going to lead to surgeries within that 18 month period. Every individual plan we looked at wanted to add a rider to not cover those conditions. So far we've had two surgeries done now, and a third coming up in a month. So even though the COBRA payments suck, they're allowing us to have coverage on those surgeries, which is huge. Legal protections for individual plans are almost non-existent. As for the job situation adoubleu, I'd have to say it depends on what your career field is and how comfortable you are about securing another job. There's nothing that says you can't continue to look for work if you take back your old job. I'd probably secure that while you can and see where it goes after that. At this point you're essentially talking about 1 paychecks worth of that additional 25%, so I wouldn't suggest letting that be a big decision maker.

This is a pretty funny thread, with some good thoughts! I wouldn't say you're walking the green mile exactly Brewtacular. That's not to say you shouldn't soak up the next 6 months though. Yes you obviously lose freedoms you previously enjoyed, and you're life changes in almost every manner, but I'd never consider giving up being a father for a moment, if given the opportunity. craigharmann, we try to avoid the television as much as we can with them, though it is helpful sometimes I must admit, and I know we won't keep it away from them forever by any means. Anyway, if you do any television, there is a show on Noggin called Jack's Big Music Show. It's puppets that focus on music and instruments. It is pretty much our go to choice if we turn on the tv and the boys love it. At 11 months old, one of them already dances with the show and they both will clap along with it. They recently moved it to 10pm and 10:30pm unfortunately, but you should dvr a couple a see what you think. And fondybrewfan, before our boys were born, I'd changed all of one diaper, that had resulted in my nephew urinating on the floor after he got all of his clothes off and tore off into the house. The very first time the nurse asked us if we wanted to change our sons, Avery peed on me. I've gotten way better since then. You'll do fine once you enter the game. jwill535, I grew up the only man in my house. I had 3 sisters and my parents were the splits, so I can somewhat relate to your pain. Now that my wife is the only woman in the house, I decided in the future, her vote counts twice, since she is outnumbered. Plus then, there can never be a tie vote either.

We have twin boys who are 11 months old today. It's a total breeze. To bad you're not having a boy instead! If twins have taught me anything, it's that most advice on your first child means nothing until you go through it honestly, as everyone does things different, and every child is different. I could sit here and list you a whole article of the difference between our boys. Sure there are a lot of similarities, but when they were more newborn, they even like to sleep different ways. My best advice is to remain as patient as possible, and sometimes that's very hard, and I'm a very patient person, and even more, don't spend to much time worrying about what she "should be doing", but react to the clues that she's giving you. She can lead you more than you might realize. Good luck man, it really is a spectacular experience.

I never did bring the issue up with the Brewers, though in retrospect I should have, I'm sure my rep would have taken care of me. I guess I gave it exception because it was Opening Day madness. And I know I talked about this in a playoff thread last season, but they did a better job with this issue last season, and after a certain point, they would turn you away from the preferred lots if you didn't have a prepaid ticket. I don't think I had to park on the surround street at all last year, though twice I did get sent to the "preferred" lot by the busses. (I hate that lot.)

Two years ago, my friend opted to go to work before we went to the park, and of course, we got out to the lot far too late as a result. I had a preferred parking pass that I purchased with my pack, and I got shuttled all around the stadium, from Preferred to General, to the side streets by Preferred, which took forever with backups everywhere, before I finally was told it was a no go, and ended up parking illegally north of the stadium and got a parking ticket. It was not a pleasant experience. Outside of opening day though, I have gotten the street parking around the outside as you mentioned, with my preferred pass, when I arrived to late to busy games. I wouldn't have much faith in pulling that off on opening day.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=4033626

I was on TH's blog before checking in here, so fortunately I didn't buy this for a second. Well done all the same.

Ya, there were 2 helicopters that looked like military helicopters, I assumed those were the SEALS, and the other one was FBI. I initially suspected Jack would sneak out and try to get there, but then I realized staying their indicated that a problem would arise and Jack could follow to try to fix the problem. I just didn't expect it to play out the way it did.

I haven't counted it up, but it feels like there are more people in this thread that are upset about people who write checks, than people who essentially jump in front you in line. I find the latter worse, as it is blatantly disrespectful of other people, while writing a check is a choice in how someone manages their finances. And honestly, getting worked up about people writing checks in front of you because it slows you down, doesn't seem a far step from jumping lines, because it slows you down. It always amazes me how quickly we'll drop our humanity for inane things. Like in the video that Patrick425 posted, the bit about people running to the area around the airplane gate entrance, that always amazes me. On almost every airline, your seating is already decided, you have your ticket, yet everyone herds around the gate right away as if they might not get their seat. You don't talk to each other, you don't make eye contact, and you quietly vie for the best spot you can get, cutting people off if you need to. The one that really gets on my nerves though, for people not waiting their turn and disrespecting everyone else, is on the highway. When there is a sign saying "Right lane closed in 2 miles," the appropriate response isn't to take that nearly empty lane to the front and jump in front of everyone. It's those people that are making the whole thing take even longer to begin with, because everyone else was willing to get in line and wait their turn to go through, and then stop to let these other people cut in front. I refuse to let these people in when the lane ends, and it has gotten me into some interesting situations.

Tonight's episode was one of the more tense episodes of 24 I've seen in awhile. I really liked how the episode played out, and it looks like they're set up for an interesting story line to finish out the season.

I'm more surprised I think to know that some people don't consider that rude. I agree there's a gray area with the exact next person in line, but I always offer the people in front of me to move over first. It really annoys me when there's a line of 5ish people and the last person in line jumps over to the new line. How is that not rude to the people who were waiting in line before you?

I didn't see the ABs from today, but it strikes me as funny that the quotes on TH's blog seem very worried that Braun didn't swing the bat at all today, stated as if that indicates a real problem, however, it was also noted he only saw 8 pitches today. So he walked on 4 straight pitches twice today, and that's the sign of a problem? I'm going to try to refrain from getting to worried about it at the moment, because it seems like there may be a bit of over reaction going on.

Great looking basement man. I cried a little when I saw the urinal. Good to see you scored the Cubs urinal cake covers. *golf clap*

Wow, that was fast seeing as I did it late afternoon yesterday. Hope you enjoy it!