Jeff & Krista

... are two of my friends from the RF bleachers.

They're both flight attendants for "a major airline". No, I'm not going to say which one. Anyway, Krista's been off work for almost a year due to an injury she suffered on the job. Now she's fine, and has been undergoing job-related reviews, etc. in preparation for going back to work.

Why am I telling you this? Because last night she brought her in-flight manual to the ballpark; it's a two-inch thick dossier of everything a flight attendant is supposed to know at work. And we all spent some time paging through it. After the inevitable "is there a chapter 11 in that book?" jokes, I read that in an emergency you're supposed to tell the passengers "BEND OVER! HEADS DOWN!", which sounds remarkably like that old joke "Put your head between your knees and kiss your ass goodbye".

There's some stuff in there that absolutely stuns you at being so obvious that a ten-year-old could figure it out, but Jeff told me that some of his co-workers are... well, let's say I know some ten-year-olds who are brighter.

Jeff & Krista and her sister spent yesterday afternoon at "Baseball as America" at the Field Museum, and they learned that the human air-raid siren has become a volunteer at the exhibit, to the consternation of all the full-time employees at the museum. At least he's learned something; when he saw Jeff, he ran rapidly in the other direction.

Seriously, why can't the Cubs put an end to this stupid act? The only people who like him are completely drunk; his only ability is to stand next to you and annoy you by screaming in your ear for an hour at a time, and if you ask him politely to stop, suddenly you are causing a problem. There's absolutely no reason he should be allowed to do this. Period. Fortunately, he did not show up at last night's game. Maybe the museum people put him in storage.

I also wanted to mention that something that's happened to me has begun to happen to a couple other season ticket holders. We are being approached by co-workers who don't care one bit about baseball, who suddenly want Cubs/Yankees tickets.

OK, I'll say this only once. IF I could get extra Yankees tickets, they'd go to my friends in the bleachers who can't get them on their own. IF any of you give me $1500, I will get extra Yankees tickets for you.

Otherwise, you're on your own.

Oh, you wanted to know about last night's game? Yes, I've been avoiding talking about the depressing 5-3 loss to the awful Brewers, which was [cliche meter on] not as close as the score indicated [cliche meter off].

Ben Sheets does seem to have the Cubs' number; now 6-0 lifetime vs. the Cubs, 19-29 otherwise. A couple of people pointed out to me that Sammy Sosa doesn't quite seem the same since his beaning, and I think they might be on to something here. The strikeout in the 8th, looking at three pretty much perfect pitches, was something we haven't seen from Sammy since before his big awakening in 1998, particularly in a game situation like that.

Here's where the young pitching staff could really step up. If Mark Prior is going to be the ace of the staff, and he may be already, tonight is the time to step up and stop this before it becomes a slide.

Sights seen: a couple of dozen Korean tourists in the bleachers, who were all absolutely thrilled when Hee Seop Choi homered. And, the mini-Tron scoreboards, which have been showing pitch speeds and out-of-town scores, were broken last night. Perhaps they blew up when they realized the Tigers were about to go on their first winning streak (two) of the season.