CUBS WIN! CUBS WIN! CUBS WIN! HOLY COW!

Sorry about that Harry.  I just can’t think of a better way to put it.

The Cubs are the National League Central Champions!  Holy Cow.  I am so excited.  I can’t stop smiling.  First, I had MLB Game Day up on the computer while we ate dinner and got the kids to bed to I could keep track of what was happening in Cincinnati.  Then after the kids were in bed and DH was surfing I was downstairs flipping back and forth between What Not to Wear and ESPN.  For some reason the Milwaukee game was blacked out, so I had to just watch the crawl. 

At about 9 DH came downstairs and we watched Friday Practice from Fuji for this weekends Formula 1 race.  I’m sure I will have more about that later. 

So after we finished watching practice on the Tivo I went back to ESPN to see if there was any news about the Brewers game, and there in the crawl were these beautiful words:

 

Cubs clinch the NL Central division

 

I couldn’t help myself.  I ran upstairs (crying of course) to tell DH.  He just looked at me and said, “Remember how awful you felt after 2003?  Well, it’s only going to happen again.” 

I know this only ends one way:  with me crying, but I can’t help myself.  

And I’m pretty sure about the crying.  

1984 – cried when they lost to San Diego

1989  - cried when they lost to the Giants

1998 – cried when they won the 1 game playoff to get to the postseason

1998 – cried when they lost to Atlanta

2003 – cried when they made it to the playoffs

2003 – cried when they won the NLDS

2003  - wept uncontrollably when they lost to the Marlins

 It was painful.

 But maybe this is our year.  I know, I know, spoken like a true Cubs fan.  But it has to be eventually.  Why not now?  Any team can have a bad century, but I think the time is right.  I know I should be more cautious.  But this is such a rare event it seems a shame not to throw myself into it body and soul.  Embrace joy while you can right?

 I remember all too well the agony that is the post season.  After they clinch, and before the postseason starts you are on top of the world.  Nothing can go wrong; you just walk around in your Cubs gear with a goofy smile on your face. 

 

And then the game starts.

 

You spend 4 hours rocking back and forth in your chair muttering please please please and come on come on come on.  You don’t breathe until the game ends.  It’s horrible.   And then it’s great.  Or it’s horrible again.  It all depends on the final score. 

So get ready for the roller coaster ride that is baseball in October.

 Come on boys, I know you can do this.

 

GO CUBS!

Packing, or at least thinking about packing

I’m starting to think about what to take to Rome.  I want to be sure we are warm enough. I really hate to be cold.  And I know that Europeans have a rather cavalier attitude toward central heat.  As in, they often don’t have any. It seems like all my memories of Europe are cold.  Cold and damp.  I don’t know why.  I know I lived in England during what was at the time the hottest summer on record. But for some reason I always imagine it as cold.

 Actually, I do know why.  It’s because our first flat in London had no heat of any kind.  It had radiators, but they were purely decorative. They were very handy for hanging up the laundry, but they were stone cold.  I used to bring the duvet off the bed and lie on the couch all day, cross-stitching and drinking Cadbury’s hot chocolate.  It was freezing.  I remember some evenings we could see our breath during dinner. 

 This summer we spent four weeks in Sydney, Australia.  It was winter there, but all the weather websites said the average temperature would be in the 60’s Fahrenheit.  We, of course, arrived during the worst cold snap in Sydney’s history.  It actually got down to freezing a couple of nights.  And our rented house had no heat.  Nothing.  We had 2 bedrooms and one tiny space heater.  It was so so cold.  And it felt even worse because we had come from the middle of summer to the middle of winter.

 So I am very worried about making sure we are all warm enough. I like Italy, and I don’t want to ruin it by always associating it with being cold. I have purchased big fleecy footy pajamas for the children.  I would buy some for me if I could find some in my size.  Other than that, I am at a loss.  We were under prepared in Sydney, and I don’t want that to happen again.  We need to bring more long sleeved shirts, more sweaters, heavier coats.  I’m sure now I will swing too far in the other direction and come April we will all be roasting, but I think I would prefer that. 

Can Alonso Pull this Off?

With three races remaining, Alonso is only 2 points behind teammate Lewis Hamilton for the World Drivers Championship. Alonso has been steadily clawing his way back since the Hungarian Grand Prix where he was seven points down.I think he can do it. I think we are starting to see the chinks in Hamilton’s armor.Hamilton has been making rookie mistakes. At the German Grand Prix he went to the dry tires way too early and lost a lot of time slip sliding around waiting for the track to dry.In Hungary Hamilton refused to move over and let Alonso pass during the third session of qualifying. Alonso and the team tried to even the score and give Alonso the last lap by holding Hamilton up in the pits. Alonso got docked 5 grid spots, and McLaren lost all constructors points for that race. All because Hamilton refused to follow team orders. Hamilton ultimately won that race, but the repercussions for the team were tremendous. The question remains, why wouldn’t he let Alonso pass? Perhaps he has been reading too much of his own press, and thinks he’s above team orders.In Istanbul Hamilton’s tire delaminated. Bridgestone and McLaren insist this was a tire defect, and out of Hamilton’s control. More on that later. At Spa we saw Alonso take a very aggressive line in turn 1 forcing Hamilton wide. Hamilton later complained to the press that Alonso had deliberately knocked him off the track. Alonso, of course, denies this. Even the powers that be at McLaren called it a racing incident. Make that two rookie mistakes in one. First, shooting off his mouth without checking for the party line. And second, by shooting off his mouth letting Alonso know that he was rattled.So, back to the tire delamination in Istanbul. After the Hungarian Grand Prix, there was a big team meeting designed to relieve tensions inside the team. As part of that cooling-off process, McLaren allegedly told Alonso he didn’t have to share his set-up data with Hamilton anymore. Could it be that Alonso had just set up his car better, and Hamilton’s tire went because his set-up was putting too much stress on it?Nobody has confirmed this rumor about Alonso keeping his setup data to himself. And many people say that would be impossible anyway, given the fact that the telemetry data from both cars is available on the team computers. However since then Hamilton has been running slower than Alonso:Istanbul – Alonso finishes third, 18.9 seconds ahead of HamiltonMonza – Alonso wins from pole. Hamilton finishes second, six seconds behind.Spa – Alonso finishes third again, this time 9.3 seconds ahead of HamiltonThat may just be a coincidence. Or it could be that Alonso has finally found his feet with the Bridgestone tires, or it could be that Alonso can see this championship is within his grasp and he has decided to just shut up and drive. Or perhaps, the pressure is starting to get to Hamilton.Alonso has been around since 2001. He’s been in this pressure cooker before. Hamilton hasn’t and you could argue that Hamilton has more to lose. He has to protect his lead while Alonso has nothing to lose and everything to gain. Plus Alonso knows there’s always next season. If he doesn’t win this year, well, try try again. The same is true for Hamilton of course, but he is trying to become the first rookie to ever win the WDC. If he blows it, there is no next year for that. You only get to be a rookie once.Granted ther is a huge amount of conjecture, speculation and, frankly, wishful thinking in all these arguments. Ultimately though, I think this will come down to experience over (relative) youth. Time will tell.Watch this space…

My McLaren conundrum

I’m having a hard time with this. If you follow motorsport you may know that the McLaren Formula 1 team got busted for having and using proprietary information from Ferrari. Here is a link to the WMSC transcript they can explain it better than I can.So it looks like my favorite driver, Fernando Alonso, did in fact have some information he shouldn’t have had. I don’t want to have to stop liking him. He’s wicked, scary fast. He has 19 Grand Prix wins in 102 starts (101 if you don’t count Indianapolis 2005). He’s a 2x World Drivers Champion. He’s really, really good. And sooo easy to look at. Here’s his pictureI don’t want to be just a fanboy(girl). I like to think I can see Alonso’s failings and mis-steps. He’s a little rough around the edges and emotional. He needs to be in an environment where he gets his ego stroked at regular intervals, and is clearly the #1 driver. He has some anger management issues. And it looks like he was cheating. And maybe he threatened to turn over his emails to the FIA if team principal wouldn’t give his clear #1 status over his teammate Lewis Hamilton. Frankly, I don’t believe that one. I think if Alonso had done that Dennis would have fired him. He’s fired drivers for less.I’ve been thinking about this a lot. Michael Shumacher cheated all the time, but when he did it, he tended to run another car off the road. At least Alonso looking at Ferrari’s weight distribution wasn’t likely to get anybody killed. And really, how much good did this information actually do Alonso? It’s not like he’s running away with the Championship. He’s acutally in second place, 2 points behind his teammate. He has 4 wins, Hamilton has 3 and the Ferraris have 7 between them. If this information was all that useful wouldn’t Alonso be way out in front in the points? But perhaps I am just grasping at straws, desperate to find a way to rationalize Alonso’s actions so he doesn’t have to be the bad guy. Maybe I am just a fanboy after all.

Reading Material

I’ve just started reading Four Seasons in Rome by Anthony Doerr. It’s a beautiful book. It seems like the kind of book you want to read again as soon as you finish it. I think I will definitely read it again either in Rome or when we return, when hopefully I will recognize some of the neighborhoods he talks about.

It’s good to be reading a book about Rome. I’ve been reading a lot of books about Italy lately, but most of them have been set in Florence or Venice. I won’t bother to list them all here.

No Italian class tonight, as all the students are on a field trip to Boston. I tried to convince the children that we should parle Italiano tonight anyway to practice, and that was greeted with a resounding NO! They hate when I speak Italian. Too bad because it is a beautiful language, and a lot of fun. I find myself using my hands a lot when I speak Italian (all 10 words I know). It drives the children crazy. I told them tonight that I don’t expect them to be fluent, but they should at least be able to say hello, goodbye, please and thank you. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.

We have plane tickets!

I just got off the phone with the University travel agency. Actually, I don’t think it’s part of the University, it’s just the agency the Big U uses. Anyway, we have tickets to Rome. Yay. Now I just have to get us from here to the Richmond, VA area for a pre-Rome visit with my in-laws and we will leave from Washington. I’m starting to get really excited.