Afternoon Notes

1) The losses on the homestand are all Jessica's fault. She e-mailed me today reminding me that the Cubs won all four games in which she sat with us in the bleachers, and lost the other three, in which she was sitting in her season-ticket seats. Therefore, I will have to insist that if she does return later this year, she'll have to sit with us. Case closed!

2) Worth reading: an open letter to Richie Daley from former Mayor Jane Byrne which was published in Sunday's Chicago Sun-Times, in which she correctly blasts him for the Stalinist way he destroyed Meigs Field, along with several other things that she brought to the city in her 1979-1983 term as mayor, which the current occupant of that office has lost or destroyed. The mayor's office, in the response which you can also see on that link, is their typical sputtering nonsense.

Good for you, Jane. Though it's been 20 years since she lost a 3-way primary to Richie and Harold Washington, she is even now only 69 years old. In many ways, the city would have been better off if she'd remained mayor.

Click here for a short bio of Jane Byrne.