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So, BabySBG is now just over eight days old, I'm trying to catch up on all the work that didn't get done over the past three weeks or so, and Lucy can't drive for up to six weeks because she had a C-Section (man was last Tuesday an extremely tough day). I have to run all the errands that she used to run and will again. This leaves me very little time to keep contributing to the WGOM.
I want to thank all of the people that have pitched in to keep this thing afloat. Of course, ubelmann has been pretty much running the site for three weeks. I feel like a guest writer. Big Mak's contributions have been very interesting -- I've enjoyed them a whole lot. AMR's Mugshot Purgatory is great. Thank you. brianS and frightwig have been manning the DJ role to great effect. Thanks. I have been enjoying the clips.
This has been a great experience. Lucy and I are thrilled with our new roles as parents. Our darling daughter has been a joy. She doesn't fuss much, she sleeps well, and she is strong and growing stronger. Did I say it's been great? I'm sure all of you fathers out there know what I'm talking about. Thanks for all the well wishes.
Anyway, I hope to get back into the swing of things in the near future. In addition, I hope that those who are contributing and who might want to contribute in the future feel free to do so. Without all of you, this site is just me and my blather.
Stupid website! It's time for some cats.
Jags is a ferocious killer. Don't you forget it!
Jags and Theo were wrestling. They seem to really enjoy playing together.
Elly loves to play fetch with the play mouse. She retrieves it just like a dog.
Elly and Theo in the baby's room.
That's it. I am more than ready to have this baby.
Love, Lucy
I haven't really written much lately about life with a pregnant wife. I'm really waiting until next week to start talking about the 2007 Twins in earnest, so I thought I'd talk about life tonight.
Lucy is about two months away from the due date. In fact, Saturday will be exactly two months from the due date. If BabySBG shows up on the due date, I'll be missing Game 14 at Seattle. Of course, that's a late night start, so maybe I'll catch it? If not, ubelmann, you'll have to run the game log.  (Moss, I'm not stupid, of course I'll miss a few games.)
Lucy has been doing quite well. One of the things I worried about was whether Lucy would have a difficult pregnancy. She's a little older than the average woman who has a baby, but she's been doing great. She's been buying things for the Baby. Want to see a sample? I knew you did.
Can you read that? How about a close up?
That girl is going to be well-dressed.
We've been taking birthing and parenting classes and tonight was the last class. I recommend these classes. I've learned quite a bit.
I have painted BabySBG's room pink. It looks pretty good. It looks good and isn't Pepto Bismol pink, but rather a little more understated.
This weekend, Lucy has a baby shower being thrown by my sisters in law. Next weekend, her friends are throwing her a shower. The weekend after that, we are heading to Winona for a shower thrown by her family. People are really excited about this baby. We have both waited a very long time. In addition, our baby will be the first baby in Lucy's extended family in about 15 years and my in-law's first grandchild. So, they are really excited. Of course, on my side of the family it's not quite the same. At one point, there were six cousins pregnant at the same time. Two of those kids are now born, but four of us are left. So, take a number.
Time is flying by. We are enjoying it immensely. I've been plugging away at the website on a regular basis, but I've been quite busy elsewhere. This has really been an increasingly minor part of my life. Nevertheless, I still have enough time to keep the WGOM humming along.
Have a good Friday everyone. I'm hoping to plunk out a couple of Top 40 VORP entries this weekend. The next two entries are an old timer and a much more recent player.
SBG
Hello everyone, I'm Lucy, SBG's wife.
I used to write on this site once in a while and I posted pictures of our cats. But, I don't post very much anymore. However, we got our annual cat pictures back on Sunday, so I thought that I'd take over this site and post a couple of pictures.
SBG tells me that some of you may never have seen any pictures of our cats. Also, the old pictures have been destroyed apparently. So, I'm going to tell the story of our cats.
When SBG and I were dating, I had a cat named Puddy. Puddy was an old cat and she wasn't very friendly to anyone besides me. I used to tell SBG to pet her and he'd try and she'd hiss at him. I really thought that was funny, but he didn't. He wasn't much of a cat lover. In fact, he didn't like cats at all.
One day I was at work and a co-worker brought in this little kitten. He was only four weeks old. My co-worker had found him on a country road on the way in to work. His mother and siblings had all been run over. He was lying in the middle of the road when he got rescued. I wanted so much to take him, but Puddy didn't like other cats, either. So I called SBG and asked him if he would take him. Much to my surprise, he agreed to do so. So, SBG took in this little cat, named him Jags and little Jags became SBG's buddy. Jags is a big cat now. When I say big, I mean he's REALLY big. He's a Maine Coon cross and we've measured him at 36 inches nose-to-tail.
SBG was going to law school and working when Jags was a kitten and Jags had some serious separation anxiety. Every morning, Jags would lie in front of the door when SBG was leaving for work. He was making a stand! SBG figured that he wouldn't eat at all when he wasn't there. What to do? SBG said that Jags needed a playmate. So, when a client of the clinic where I worked at brought in some kittens one day, I picked out one to be Jags's brother. SBG named him Theodore Finkle (Theo for short). Theo is about nine months younger than Jags. We got him when he was about six weeks old. For two days, Jags hissed at poor Theo. Then Jags got over that and The Boys have been partners ever since.
Here are Jags and Theo. Theo is the gray cat. Jags is the beauty with the big white paws.
After we got married, SBG and I were at the pet store getting some food or litter or something and the store had cats to take from a shelter. There was a cute little girl that looked a little like Jags. SBG thought we should get that cat and I didn't disagree. We brought her home and were a little worried about how "The Boys" would react. Well, the boys were very excited and welcoming to Eleanor Rigby ("Elly"), but Elly hissed and growled at either one of The Boys whenever they got close to her. That went on for about a week. I thought that we'd have to get rid of Elly, but eventually, she relented. Now, she gets along with them okay, but I must admit that there is some tension between them. She fights with both of The Boys, especially Jags.
Here's Elly:
With Baby SBG coming, we are little concerned about how the cats will react. We think Jags and Theo, who love pretty much anyone that they come in contact with, will be okay. Elly's a little more skittish and we worry about her. However, the cats have their own little social network and I think they will be fine.
Anyway, I wanted to show off our little guys. Happy holidays from the SBG and Lucy cat family!
- Since the NBA began keeping track of steals and blocked shots in 1973, a player has reached 100 steals and blocks in the same season 51 times. KG has done it 8 times, third behind Hakeem Olajuwon and Julis Erving, with 12 each. KG's not a premier shot blocker and I think that's an indication that he doesn't have fantastic leaping ability.
- Patrick Reusse hands out his annual turkey of the year award. "The Turkeys are what we thought they were! Now, if you want to crown Koren's keister, then crown it. But the Turkeys ARE what we thought they were!" ScruFi is a nominee for the Twins flop in the post season (I'd have done it for making us watch the Cubinistas for 50 games). The winner is a good choice, I suppose, but not where I would have gone. I would have gone after Kevin McHale, but this choice is deserving as well.
- A while back, ubelmann did a little digging into the home court advantage in the NBA. I posited at the time that it was officiating that gave home teams an advantage. NBC Sports.COM has an article on the home court advantage in the NBA. While they don't discount the refs completely, they note that home teams perform better across the board.
Team FG % eFG % Ast'd Blk'd FTA FT% OReb DReb
Home .460 .496 27.0% 5.5% 27.0 .746 30.6% 71.5%
Away .447 .484 25.2% 6.4% 25.6 .744 28.5% 69.4%
Home cooking? Tired road team? More aggressive because the refs have made a more favorable environment? It's the fans? It's something. What was surprising to me was that the NHL has an even bigger home ice advantage.
- Lucy and I are heading to the van Pelts for Thanksgiving. Lucy's mother isn't feeling well, so we are cooking. I made some cranberry sauce last night that is pretty good. I don't like the tin can shaped cranberries, but I can go for this.
- Last night's lineup for the Knicks represented a change in the starting lineup. Isiah Thomas benched Steve Francis and started Jamal Crawford instead. The Post's headline? "Chump Change". The Daily News offers us this: "The numbers for the Knicks were deceptive, as Crawford (19 points), Francis (19) and Marbury (18) all scored in double figures. All but nine of those 56 points, though, came in garbage time - the second through fourth quarters." Ouch. It's nice to be on the right side of a laugher once in a while.
- I've talked a little about the glory days of Bison football when I was there and how good the 1986 team was. The Fargo Forum had a writeup about the 2006 team and its place in NDSU history. Any talk of Bison football history centers on that 13-0 1986 National Title team. I found this little tidbit to be indicative of the type of team that was.
The 1986 team ran the veer option offense, a risky ball-handling scheme usually accomplished in the midst of defensive traffic.
Yet, that team fumbled only once all year and recovered it to boot.
“The question with the 1986 team wasn’t if they’d win but how much they’d win by,†said WDAY news anchor Dana Mogck, a former sports director who covered NDSU in the ’80s and ’90s. “The big argument that year was whether NDSU could beat the Gophers. Everyone wanted to see that Gopher matchup.â€
That's true. Back then, I was pretty convinced the Bison could have handled the Gophers.
- Gary Matthews, Jr. just signed a 5 year, $50 million contract coming off a season where he hit .313, 50 points higher than the year before. According to Elias, that's the second highest increase among players that qualified for the batting title in both seasons. Guess who was number one? I'll give you a hint. His 82 point jump saw him go from a replacement level player to an MVP.
- The Wolves travel to Oklahoma City on Friday to take on the Hornets. I checked ticket availability for the game and found that a club level seat on the corner of the court was available for $60 plus another $13 in fees. An upper level seat at about mid court was available for $25 and a $4.85 "convenience fee". Ticketmaster, the bane of our existence.
- Reading the OKC Hornet blog, I got this tidbit: "One lady in the OKC airport had a monkey. That's right, a monkey. I can't take my toothpaste on the plane, but this lady can take a monkey?"
Turns out the monkey was a trained monkey (was it Kevin McHale?) who helped her perform tasks around the house (she was infirm). Reminds me of our flight to North Carolina. On the way through security, Lucy had to declare her lip gloss. Security then put it in a ziploc bag and Lucy carried it on the plane. On the way back, she declared it again. This time, they confiscated it (damn, they are tough in Raleigh). When security took it, they informed us that had she had it in a ziploc bag (where did she put that damned bag she got the first time?), she could have kept it. Yeah, because once it's in the bag, you can't possibly take it out mid flight if you had evil intentions. Good gravy.
- Happy Thanksgiving to you all. I have a lot to be thankful for this year. Of course, the most important thing is my wife and our as yet unborn little girl. But, I'm also thankful for all the enjoyment each of you have given me for participating in my little hobby. It has been a lot of fun this year. Have a good Thanksgiving, wherever you are.
Lucy and I are headed off to North Carolina for the weekend to visit some friends. Is there a more basketball crazy state?
No, I don't have a golf game scheduled with Mike Jordan. That old knucklehead! I hate taking his money on the course all the time.
See you next week, when I start my season long lament on the state of the T-Wolves!
SBG
Last night, I was minding my own business, watching the game when the phone rang. Lucy's dad is in the hospital. He's had some heart problems in the past and wasn't feeling well yesterday. It's unclear to us exactly what the situation is, but it's not good news when anyone is in the hospital (unless they are having a baby). I'll post game logs, but I don't know yet exactly what is going on there or whether I'll be around this weekend to provide the normal half-baked crap.
Got this text message from the wife this afternoon:
I like yankees b of a cute player
Hi SBG fans, this is Lucy, SBG's long suffering wife.
I don't understand the attraction of this website. Every day a Twins game. Don't these guys ever get tired of baseball? I know I do. In fact, I can't stand watching even five minutes of any game.
What I like is gymnastics! SBG calls it "child abuse" but I find it very exciting. While SBG was wasting his time at the baseball game on Saturday night, I was at the Visa National Gymnastics Championships in St. Paul. It was a wonderful event and I was thoroughly impressed and happy to be there. SBG made sure I had good seats, so that was nice. I went on Thursday night, too, while SBG was lawyering.
I asked SBG to write about the gymnastics but he said, no. That's okay, because all he could say is something stupid like "Oh! She didn't stick the landing!" As if that's all there is to it. He doesn't appreciate any of the artistic elements, not to mention the incredible athletic requirements for these young women. It was a wonderful event, and I was thrilled to see the 1996 Gold Medal team, Bela Karolyi, and Mary Lou Retton. I suppose none of you baseball heads care about this, but I was thrilled! I think this may be the best gymnastics team we've ever had. I am looking forward to the 2008 Olympics with a lot of hope for this team.
Thank you everyone for expressing concern about my toe! It was badly deformed! Actually, it was bent the wrong way a little and it swelled up. I fractured the toe and it is displaced. They just wrapped it up to the next toe, and I'm toughing it out. It hurt a little and it's bothering me a little more tonight, but it's not that bad. SBG made sure I was well taken care of, as usual. He's not a bad guy, no matter what Bat-Girl thinks.
Now, time to talk about the cats. Jags, Theo, and Elly are doing quite well. I don't have any pictures because that great husband of mine lost the battery charger to our digital camera. Maybe he'll find that darned thing one of these years. So, I am reduced to telling you about the cats. Actually there's not much to say. The cats have a maddening tendency to show SBG affection and not me. However, I have recently resigned my job and am now a full-time cat sitter. In a month or so, those cats will be all mine! 
Any way, I don't really have much else to say. I hope you all enjoy SBG, The Magazine. I'm trying to like baseball. It's not really taking, but at least I'm giving it a shot. He tells me that this has been a great season, so I'll take his word for it.
Bye!
I was sitting in the living room last night with my lovely wife, Lucy and she said that I should head on into the den and write on my blog. Now, you can about imagine how insulting that was for me. She basically wanted me out of the way so that she could get control of the TV. It's come to that already. She'd rather have me writing the blog than sitting by her!
Anyway, I really had nothing to say last night. I watched part of the game yesterday and I saw Bradke doing his thing again. He looked extremely good and the Twins cruised to a very nice victory. Jason Tyner had a single, double and triple and upped his extra base hit total to three for the season. Moss dubbed it the Tyny Cycle. Very nice, Moss.
Anyway, I had an extremely long week last week. I'm now sitting in my office, it's 6:15 and I'm ready to go to work. I've got a stack or stacks of files to work on and I'd better get going.
The Twins are off today. If you have any other topics to discuss, today would be the day to bring them up. 'Course, the Twins are a good topic, too. On Saturday, I asked people to "get on the record" about the Twins post season chances. You might want to weigh on that if you haven't already.
On Saturday night, Lucy and I went to the game. Before the game, we went to the GameDay party. Twins Geek was there and we met the founders of that great publication. It's a beautiful thing that a couple of guys with passion about this team have taken it upon themselves to educate the fans about the team. I never buy the Twins program, only the GameDay. Anyway, it was a fun little event. We met Intern Sam from the Twins Geek site. He was an extremely interesting guy and Lucy enjoyed talking to him about his business. We intend to go to the next Game Day party as well. Hope some of you will come out as well. When it is scheduled, I'll make a mention of it here.
I sat with the Geek for several innings and talked Twins, Las Vegas, and whatever else came up. He's a great guy to talk to and the whole evening was fun, except of course for the game, which was a shutout loss. The Twins had seven hits, a walk and a hit batter, but the Blue Jays faced only three batters over the minimum. Yuck.
Hi everyone, this is Lucy, SBG's long suffering wife. When SBG is chatting about Twins, I'm usually slaving over a hot fire, washing clothes in the river, or running. But once in a while I demand some time on the SBG website. Today is one of those days. And what do I talk about when I take over the website? Cats!
SBG and I have three cats. I used to write about the cats more often, but I have slacked off recently. SBG told me that I could have a category (whatever that is) and that he would categorize all the cat posts. So, hopefully, he will do that so that you can bypass all this stupid baseball stuff and look at pictures of the cats.
Our first and oldest cat is Jags. He is a Maine Coon cross that one of my co-workers found in the middle of a country road when he was four weeks old. I asked SBG if he would take this cat, as my old cat, who has since passed away, didn't like other cats. I wasn't even sure if SBG was all that crazy about me then (we were just dating), but he took the cat in and named him after Mick Jagger. He was about 6 inches long then, but now he's 36 inches, nose-to-tail. Jags will be three years old on August 15th.
Jags has always been SBG's best buddy. He sleeps on SBG's pillow. Every morning, Jags wakes up SBG and gets him out of bed about five in the morning. Good boy, Jags. Jags is the Alpha Cat and he likes to roughhouse with the other two. He's also far and away the most affectionate and the most interested in people. Whenever we have guests, Jags is quick to make friends and rub up against our visitors. Even if it's the cable guy in to fix our cable modem.
Jags was lonely, so I talked SBG into taking Theodore Finkle or "Theo" for short. Theo is very quiet. He almost never makes a sound. He loves to climb and has the best disposition. He was pretty shy and didn't like to be petted. Now, however, he has become much more friendly. Darn it! He seems to like SBG the best, too!
Theo came from a former client of the business where I used to work. Theo's father was a deadbeat dad leaving the mother to raise all the kittens alone. We adopted Theo to come and be Jags' playmate. We think he is a British Shorthair cross, but he's no purebread. Theo turned two on May 27th.
Here are Jags and Theo looking at something on the wall. I don't know what, I couldn't see anything. See Jags behind the TV?
Finally, there's Eleanor Rigby. Theo and Jags are males and little Elly is a female. She fights with her brothers from time to time and likes to hiss at them. However, none of them get hurt and for the most part, they all get along. Elly is a plain old short hair tabby, but she has beautiful markings, including a charming little white stripe down her nose. Elly and I have to stick together against the men of the house.
Isn't she beautiful? I just love her! But, she seems to love SBG more. I hate that! Elly had her first birthday on Feb. 14.
Here are some more pictures of the cats in action (or rest).
Here's Elly hiding in the TV stand. She likes to hide, especially when we have visitors. Unlike Jags and Theo who ham it up when people come by, Elly hides. She likes to go into our closets, which the other cats don't do. She snuck into this spot. But it wasn't a good idea, as you will see.
Poor Elly! That big brute Jags attacked her inside the TV stand. If Jags wasn't the Best Cat that Ever Lived, I'd really be mad about that!
Theo is stretching out almost to the ceiling here.
That's all for now!
Lucy
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Cup of Coffee   7 LTEs
A colleague of mine who is a big sports guy (primarily college) read Top Jimmy's column and told me that the Twins should trade Joe Mauer. What do I take from that? Joe's demands are large enough that some of the more casual fans are starting to get turned off by him.
Citizens Online 28 Users Online
Users: Beau, hungry joe, Jeff A, SBG, Milt on Tilt, socaltwinsfan, UncleWalt, 18 Guests, 3 Bots
Retired WGOM Jokes
- "The Twins should have drafted Mark Prior."
Race to the Bottom: Highest Loss Totals in T-Wolves History 67: 1991-92
63: 1992-93
62: 1993-94
61: 1994-95
60: 1989-90, 2007-08
58: 2008-09
56: 1995-96
53: 1990-91
51: 2009-10
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May 3, 2007, at 8:31 am 
Recent Letters to the Editor
In Response to Music Day,
UncleWalt wrote: I haven't gotten around to setting up the stereo system since we moved back here from Chicago ... nearly three years ago. Flume, Bon Iver, For Emma, Forever Ago Brainy, The National, Boxer I Saw the Light, Spoon,…
UncleWalt wrote: Pacing and playing Wagon Wheel from OCMS on a loop was the only way I could get my son to fall asleep for the first two years of his life. Nice list.
FirstTimeLongTime wrote: New computer next week, until then, Pandora … Oberst & The Mystic Valley Band "Big Black Nothing" Outer South The Strokes "Last Night" Is This It? George Jones "Wrong Is What I Do Best" The George…
brianS wrote: Lucky Old Sun is a great little song. I especially enjoy Ray Charles' version. I'll have to find the Johnny Cash version for a listen.
brianS wrote: 1. The Beatles, "Eleanor Rigby," 1962-1966 2. Living Children, "Now It's Over," Garage Beat '66 Vol. 3: Feeling Zero... 3. Simon & Garfinkel, "Mrs. Robinson," Bookends 4. Gary Lewis & The Playboys, "All Day and All of the…
AMR wrote: Week 2 of listening to my entire iPod from A to 9. I'm only 56% of the way through. 1. Ministry "N.W.O." … The Knife "N.Y. Hotel" The Knife 3.…
Big Mak wrote: * We Insist – Zoe Keating - Natoma * The Mountain – Heartless Bastards - The Mountain * Dancing Through Sunday – AFI – Sing the Sorrow …
hungry joe wrote: i like the dichotomy of "8 full hours of sleep" and "no sleep till brooklyn".
rob wrote: I have an old 3 CD changer, 4-speaker setup that I recently installed in the basement. It's great for listening to Twins games and CD's and okay for movies/games. I predominantly use the…
CarterHayes wrote: . 01. Against Me! - 8 Full Hours of Sleep Against Me! Is Reinventing Axl Rose 02. John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman - Autumn Serenade John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman 03. Beastie Boys - No Sleep Till Brooklyn…
In Response to Cup of Coffee: March 12, 2010,
socaltwinsfan wrote: Read somewhere that the Twins think they might sell out every game before Opening Day. Get your tickets now! Of course, this could be a PR strategy to cause people to panic and buy season…
freealonzo wrote: The Pmac-Reusse baseball conversations might be worth listening to. I agree with lack of KFAN baseball knowledge. Pmac will be missed. Btw Milt, I think I'm going to go the perv route and root for…
Milt on Tilt wrote: I'm intrigued. The only competent baseball mind on KFAN, Phil Mackey, is switching over to 1500 to … I might have to tune in from time to time to hear them butt heads…
Algonad wrote: I really want a Frito Lay rep to issue a press release saying they're offending by Guillen's comments.
Milt on Tilt wrote: It sounds as if you're not tapping x once the pitch meter reaches the white line? Or at least not very well.
freealonzo wrote: Hey MLB10 The Show Players I need help. I picked up the game and played it for the first time. As a newbie of course I am horrible but I'm really having a…
rob wrote: I think the biggest thing is that Joe made such a big deal about how he wanted to make sure the Twins had a commitment to winning. If he doesn't sign, it makes it…
In Response to Cup of Coffee: March 11, 2010,
AMR wrote: You mean Aaron, Tim, Paige, and Katie?
Milt on Tilt wrote: It was criminally wrong. This is easily the worst season ever. I think I'm gonna tune out and just come back for the final 4
AMR wrote: Well, that was bollocksed up. Todrick, Alex, Katelyn, and Lily. I think we can both agree that was very wrong. At least those four won't have to tour.
In Response to Frank Sinatra and Antônio Carlos Jobim -- Girl From Ipanema,
brianS wrote: You want to be careful where you say such things. Johnny Fontane Mr. Sinatra has friends.
corybante wrote: Mr. Sinatra continues to leave me cold, at least it was short.
In Response to Cup of Coffee: March 10, 2010,
AMR wrote: Huh, he changed the article. Instead of Robert Fick, it used to say Mike Jacobs.
In Response to Happy Birthday--March 12,
CarterHayes wrote: . I love the look of those old Visalia jerseys.
In Response to Happy Birthday--March 11,
CarterHayes wrote: .