Cubby-Blue

Cub Fans still excited about Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer.

Okay, imagine you're the illustrator.
You get an email from your editor a month before your illustration is to run in a magazine.
Your team has just fired their General Manager and hired Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer, but other than that you're not really sure about anything.
"Make the illustration about the holidays and how excited we are about the Theo and Jed and Jason", the editor asks.

Actually, I love these kinds of problems, even if they're as difficult as this one. 

So if you subscribe to "Vine Line", you've already seen this illustration.

If not, there it is.

And I could spend an hour writing about my favorite Holiday cocktails, but once again it's traveling time and I've got no time.

I heard John Grabow got picked up by the Dodgers.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Enjoy him, west coasters - he's awesome!

And BTW, I'm planning on cornish game hens and a prime rib all on the same smoky grill for Christmas dinner.
That'll take a couple hours at least.
What cocktail shall I have out in the back yard when it's (I imagine) freezing out?
Why, that would be a gin martini of course.
Up with a twist. 

 

 

 

There goes Coughin' Caleb Hanie.

You know, you can't even really blame Caleb Hanie for coughing up the ball so much.
He probably shouldn't be playing professional football.
And that isn't his fault.
Look to the guy who put him there.
That's right - Jerry Angelo.
I don't need to rail about this - you know I think he's a giant boob.

Luckily, the game wasn't on out here in Los Angeles.

I did get to see a little bit of the Broncos vs Patriots game though.
Tim Tebow vs Tom Brady.
Like watching an Impala vs a Porsche.

Anyway, the Bears have already kinda wrecked Christmas.
The Packers did too, losing to the Chiefs and giving up the chance for undefeated immortality.
Now it's the Bears vs the Packers and it means absolutely nothing.
If I'm the Packers, I'd play Aaron Rogers for the first quarter.
I mean, I'll watch and everything, but what could have been super cool will now probably be just background noise. 
Or maybe we'll mute the tube and listen to Vince Guaraldi's Charlie Brown Christmas while the game's on.
Love that album.

Ah, what am I saying?
I'll be a slobbering Bears Fan idiot by the time that game comes on. 

Phantom Cub Hat Syndrome

Okay, it's stupid time right?

Don't even read this unless you've got a couple minutes to kill waiting for baseball to start.

Here's what I do sometimes, and you can try it yourself.
Just don't tell anybody 'cause it's kinda gross.

Sometimes on Saturdays, I don't take a shower in the morning like I do every other day of my life.

Sometimes instead, I just get up and put on my Cubs hat.

It's like I just took a shower!

I can go right outside and walk the dogs and people think, "Hey look, that guy is walking his dogs after taking his morning shower."

Now, had I walked outside without my Cubs hat on, people instead would think, "Hey look at that poor homeless man. I wonder how he feeds his dogs."

It's all about the hair when it comes to faking people out about not taking a shower, because nobody thinks a guy with hideous bed head took a shower.

So then what happens sometimes is, I even fake myself out into thinking I took a shower and a whole day goes by and I go to bed thinking damn, I never took a shower all day.

Then I get up on Sunday and the same thing happens all over again.

Maybe I make pancakes for everyone and paint a little and catch a little ESPN and shovel a little snow and head down to Borders and not find anything interesting and suddenly it's 3 in the afternoon and my kids say hey man you promised to take us to the movies which is when I remember oh NO, I forgot to take a shower again.

Really seriously don't tell anyone this, because it's so gross I can hardly believe it myself.

But the point of the story is sometimes I end up wearing my Cubs hat for a seriously extended period of time because I didn't take a shower.

Then, I TAKE a shower and now that I've washed my hair, I DON'T put my Cubs hat back on.

Then for example lets say I DO take the kids to the movies.

I'll be sitting there watching the movie and casually reach up to adjust my hat,and it's not there. But it still feels like I'm wearing it.

I call it Phantom Cub Hat Syndrome.

You've heard about people who like, maybe got bit by a great white shark and lost a leg or something, and they say it still feels like their leg is there? 

It's the exact same thing, only I didn't get bit by a shark.

In a brighter room than a theatre, people might see me reaching up for the bill of my invisible hat and think maybe there are tiny flying insects around my forehead that I'm trying to squish between my thumb and forefinger.

Anyway, I told you this was stupid and of course you can accomplish Phantom Cub Hat Syndrome by still taking a shower every day, but then when you take your hat off and then go to the movies? 

Hat Head.

This post is from February of 2010.
I remembered it because right now we're staying at a very nice hotel - one with movie stars and Ferraris and $7 bags of potato chips in your room.
You know how I love the free coffee service for people who wake up super early?
They have that here too.
But my problem is I forgot to pack my Cubs hat.
So yesterday, I'm up at 5:30, throw on jeans and a shirt and think I'm just going to very quickly run through the empty lobby, grab a cup and get back up to my room with nobody noticing.
But it's not just a lobby here - the hotel has two buildings and it's the other one with the coffee.
In between is a driveway where there are car hikers and guys who are paid to open doors for people all day.
I get down there, and sure enough there's some freaking supermodel starlet standing there waiting for a car.
It's been so busy for the last couple months that I literally haven't had time to get my hair cut, so my bed head is Nick Nolte-ish.
I rush by her, but as I do I hear her high heels begin to walk behind me, and I realize that she was holding a cup of coffee and probably is going to the same coffee service destination I am, only for a re-fill.
This next part takes maybe ten seconds.
As I'm crossing the driveway, I realize that it's SO early there isn't a door guy waiting to open the door.
A woman is following me to the door, and I can't help it - common courtesy demands that I hold the door for her, even if I've got Nick Nolte hair sticking straight out in all directions.
So I stop at the door, holding it open, and watch her as she comes forward, politely trying not to stare.

"Thank you," she says.
"You're welcome." I say.
My embarrassment complete, I abandon coffee and slink back to my room.

 

The waiting is killing me. Aren't the Cubs gonna do something?

Well, I thought once the Albert Pujols thing was figured out, the floodgates would open and there'd be a flurry of activity. 
Maybe so for a bunch of other teams, but since then pretty much the only thing that happened with the Cubs was getting a new third baseman and the Ricketts' buying that McDonald's land.

Here's the depth chart I copied off Cubs.com:

See over there at first base?
Where there's a picture of Jeff Baker?
There's gonna be a new picture there before long.
Everybody's talking about Prince Fielder, and seriously - given how sorta un-inspiring the team looks...
Where's the power? Where's the (cough) speed?
Do you see an all-star here besides Starlin Castro?

You're aware of my nervous nellie attitude towards Prince.
He's giant!
And knowing he's gonna have to sort of... bend over and... jump around while fielding those throws from Castro?
Just gives me the goats, thinking about it.
But on the other hand, they gotta sell tickets next year.
Nobody's gonna come to Wrigley to watch Theo and Jed.
Nobody's gonna come to Wrigley to watch Jeff Baker at first, either.
And then there's this, from Prince's agent Scott Boras (out of the Trib):
“I’ve had people come out (and say) ‘Oh, you ought to do a three-year deal. Well, that doesn’t fit anybody’s purposes in doing these things. The length of a contract has a lot to do with an understanding from both sides about what franchise players are and what they mean, the branding part, the whole media rights part. ... All those things go into it.
That initial concept is ‘the shorter the better.’ But the reality of it is, in these types of player, it’s usually not the best dynamic for the franchise. … The great thing about young free agents is the probability of performance at optimal levels is so high for the majority of the year of the contract.”

Dude is slick, no?

You've already been reading the rumors - that Prince's contract will likely be long and large and Pujols-like.

This is why the drawing above looks like it does: the anxiety of it all.

But I kinda think the Cubs have to do something like sign Prince, just because.
Or maybe not.
I DON'T KNOW. 

They're making other noise with the qualifying bid for Yu Darvish, an apparent interest in Jason Varitek and 45 year old Tim Wakefield. Kooky Phil Rogers thinks Varitek's in the running so the Cubs can trade Geovanny Soto and bring up Wellington Castillo later on, which actually doesn't sound kooky to me.

Something's gonna happen, and I'm both dying to see what it is and freaking out at the same time.

Lastly, I'm at a hotel and we've been working late and all that, so I just stayed in last night.
I looked at movies, and for instance "Real Steel" is $17.99.
So that's insane.
The HBO movie was that one with Zac Efron talking to his dead brother in the woods, so I ended up switching channels for a couple hours.

On one stop, it was a replay of some European soccer match, and the announcer's voice seemed calm. Like he might be saying, "Darling, the grass is getting a little high. Shall I get out the mower?"
But what he said was something like, "And if you're squeamish you might turn your head because the white thing sticking out of his sock is his shin bone."
To which I replied, "AaaaaaaachhhhhhhHURLBUICKRETCH!"
Of course I feel bad for the soccer guy, but GOOD GOD WHY DID I HAVE TO SEE THAT? 

Didn't you think the Bears were good? What a fake out.

Not even sure when it was.
4 weeks ago now? 5?
The Bears were sort of becoming the Bears again.
Got a runnin' game, scoring some points, the D was looking good.
"They're SO going to the playoffs!" I thought.
Then the thumb of Jay Cutler, the knee of Matt Forte, the exposure of Caleb Hanie, the 15 minutes of shame for Marion Barber...
And I check into a hotel and hit myself in the nads.
I didn't do such a good job with the gif, but that story is absolutely true.

When you expect a drawer to have the weight of a drawer, and in fact it's just a little wooden door... why, it flies open much faster than a drawer, and at a much more unexpected angle.
I was in a hurry.
I yanked on the knob.
Even as it was swinging open in a sort of slo-mo, I thought, "Hey, that's not a drawer at all. It's a little doorway with a safe behind it. A fake drawer!"
Then I went, "oof", fell on floor, and rolled around a little.

Later, I thought of the Bears and tried to re-enact with those photos. 

ps: It's been so busy lately guys, sorry I haven't been so diligent with the posting every day.