My name is AlaskaFan, and I am a Cubs fan. There, I've admitted it, which I am told is the first step to defeating an addiction. It all started in school in the early 1970's, when one of my business law professors, former attorney to Tigers' great Denny McClain, used to take us to the bleachers in Wrigley Field to "study antitrust law." Seated behind a chili dog and two or three Falstaffs, I watched unbelievably bad Cubs teams lose game after game. I watched Rick Monday commit three errors in one play. I watched three consecutive Cubs strike out with the bases loaded. But despite the breath-taking awfulness of their play, the seeds of my addiction were sown. Before too long, I was a WGN junkie, a slave to the baseball columns in the newspaper. The internet, of course, has made it far worse. You can feed your addiction with sites like this, where you can hang with other junkies, feeding each other the glimmers of hope that this year, this year, this year might be different. 1984 broke my heart twice, first when the late, great uber Cubs fan Steve Goodman died just weeks before the Cubbies won a championship for the first time since 1945. And then again when that great team lost the NLCS in five games and didn't make the Series. Again in 1989 and 1998. And then in 2003 they absolutely crushed my heart by choking after the infamous fan interference on a foul ball. They lost. To the Fish. And that was the last time they got close. Since then they're winless in post-season play in 2007 and 2008. Nine post-season losses in a row. It's probably another record in futility, but it's far too depressing to check. I know all the jokes. Any team can have a bad couple of centuries. "The doormat of the National League." But I can't stop myself. I still watch. I still care. It's an addiction. I know it's bad for me - the crushing agony when they lose can't be healthy - but I am helpless in the face of my hope. Some day, some how, they will win, they will win it all, and my spirits will soar, like a juiced Sammy Sosa home run, completely out of Wrigley Field, bouncing and rolling along Waveland Avenue. But not this year. My name is AlaskaFan, and I am a Cubs fan.