Petruck and Friends: Love the Read

First Vikings Post

From reading this blog you can tell that I watch movies and cheer for the cubs. My Football Passion is not rooted in Illinois. I am a Minnesota Vikings fan. I spent some time in the land of 10,000 lakes when i was little and have always rooted for them. My dad is a huge Bears fan and my Mom is huge Packers Fan. When the Bears play the Packers, I'll cheer for the Bears but thats it.
A bunch of Players have been "journaling" about their teams and their lives. Today Daunte Culepepper (last years MVP runner up) updated his for the first time.

...Troy Williamson, who is probably the fastest one out of all of them, and has the big play capability.

Its really exciting for me since Chicago news does not really care about anything not chicago (especially rivals). Once and a while you will hear about a trade or if Randy Moss did something stupid but not anything to keep anyones attention. ESPN does not care about anything that is not Randy Moss or Terrell Owens which really sucks because they are both no good for any team off the field.

Wild Card Chat

Alright as of 8/12/05 at 1:30 the Cubs are 7.5 games behind the Wild Card leading Houston Astros. Which is not the 18 games behind the NL Central leading but it is still catchable. But if the Cubs do win the wild card, they have a little bit of recent history on their side...

What the Wild Card turns out to be really ideal for, of course, are teams such as Anaheim, 2002; Florida, 2003; and Boston, 2004, who don't start particularly well, but eventually turn it around in the second half, qualify for the postseason and emerge playing October's best baseball. All of these teams richly deserved their championships, Wild Card or not.

While the Wild Card is a great thing for the TV of baseball and the marketing of baseball but there are some people who do not like the Wild Card. I am not one of them, In 1998 during the Sosa-MaGwire steriod home run fest, the Cubs won the wild card after beating San Fransico in a one game playoff. It was very exciting for the people around here and sometimes whats good for the fans is not always the best for the sport.

8 is NOT GREAT

But 8 is better 9 when it comes to the Cubs of recent. Winning their first game in over a week against the Cardinals...

The collective funk that resulted in eight straight losses, sloppy play and ineffective hitting by the Chicago Cubs disappeared on Thursday. Maybe the pregame rain washed it away. Maybe it was the return of good-luck charm Tom Hellman as bat boy. For the first time in more than a week, the Cubs could fly the "W" flag on top of the Wrigley Field scoreboard.

Thank you Jesus Lee

ESPN Viking Update

After the 1999 season, I'm not using those two words in the same sentance which is the final game of the season. So i'll just fill people in with some good quotes and some predictions from the Sports leaders:

"Offensively, I don't think we will miss a beat," Culpepper said. "We've got five good offensive linemen doing a great job. We've got five backs, and we have been focusing on the running game and being more effective in the running game. The five receivers we have are really good and they work hard."

This is the last line and I love it....

Minus Moss, the Vikings changed their personality. So far, they like it.

Cubs Losing Streak Post

I guess we all know who the clubhouse leader is up on the north side...

"I saw a sign out there that said, 'Please stop losing, Cubs,'" Chicago second baseman Todd Walker said. "That kind of stuff breaks your heart. Believe me, we're trying. I'm bewildered."

Continued,

"If we were two games behind them, it'd be different," Walker said. "Right now, it doesn't matter if it's the Cardinals or the Mets or whoever. We just have to find ways to get wins. Whether we beat the Cardinals or anybody else, it's all about winning. We're not doing too much of that lately."

Good for you Todd Walker. Its about time somebody in that locker room steps up the "plate" not affraid.

Death by Nintendo

As I have posted recently, I have a MVP 2005 addiction. After reading this, I am going to cut back...

A South Korean man who played computer games for 50 hours almost non-stop died of heart failure minutes after finishing his mammoth session in an Internet cafe, authorities said on Tuesday.

The 28-year-old man, identified only by his family name Lee, had been playing on-line battle simulation games at the cybercafe in the southeastern city of Taegu, police said.

I should stop there, but this is crazy... so i'll continue

Lee had planted himself in front of a computer monitor to play on-line games on August 3. He only left the spot over the next three days to go to the toilet and take brief naps on a makeshift bed, they said.

"We presume the cause of death was heart failure stemming from exhaustion," a Taegu provincial police official said by telephone.

My favorite park of the entire article...

Lee had recently quit his job to spend more time playing games, the daily JoongAng Ilbo reported after interviewing former work colleagues and staff at the Internet cafe.

All of you who just bought the new Madden be careful

Pod Cast Craz Cont

From Micro Persuasion:

"...the Oxford English Dictionary added new words including `podcast'..."

I am huge fan of Podcasts, as long as we don't have to start hearing commercials.

This past weekend spent sometime in Coloma, MI for a film Festival. The Festival was quite exciting and the movies consisted of an episode of Saturday Night Live. During the time on the water there was discussion about a perticular character on the famous Sesame Street. The comment made was that Snuffy was invisible. The rest of the crew on the S.S. Dorthy 2 was shocked, well Jake was right.

Snuffy is literally one of the biggest characters on Sesame Street,
yet often the one who receives the smallest amount of attention! In
fact, for his first 14 years on the show Snuffy was invisible to
almost everyone! Only Big Bird could see the super-sized guy, and he
tried his best from 1971 to 1985 to convince friends and neighbors
that Snuffy really did exist. Unfortunately, no one believed him--but
why would they? They never saw Snuffy! Finally, in an unforgettable
moment in 1985, the people and Muppets in the neighborhood met the
wonderfully wooly fella!

Well, Sorry Jake about that.

World Series

Today on The Capitol Fax Blog, the question of the day is Simple White Sox, Cubs, or Cards.

White Sox, Cubs or Cardinals?

I really HATE the George Stienbrener Yankees and Cardinals more than anyother professional sports teams. The Yankees just make me sick. All they do is spend money. The Yankees of old I have nothing but respect for Ruth, Gehrig, Maris, Mantle, Berra, Dimaggio and Stengel. There are more on the list but those are my favorites. I will give props to Derek Jeter and Joe T. but that is it.

The Cardinals hatered is much more embedded in the fact that they are the natural rivals of the Cubs. First of all the state bird of Illinois is the Cardinal, slap in the face if you ask me. Secondly,

The Cubs and Cardinals have been facing one another for
decades. And just like the other two rivalries above who can
point at one moment when the rivalry came to a head, the
trading of Babe Ruth and the Shot Heard Round the World, the
Cubs and Cards point to June 15, 1963.

On that fateful day, the Cubs gave up on a young outfielder
named Lou Brock and traded him to the Cards for Ernie Broglio.
The Cubs, who have been losing since the early 1900s, have not
made a World Series since trading Brock. And the Cards have
been to six and won three.

New Cell Phone

It has been a long time coming, but I am finally getting a new cell phone. The cell phone I currently have is the worst phone in history. Not only can the thing not take a fall on the ground, but it doesn't like to have reception for more than 2 minutes at a time. Which I do not like one bit. So I splurged a little bit and went to the Net to find a new phone. Everyone around the office has a BlackBerry and I like to fit in. EBay (My new favorite store) had some phones for some good prices. I picked up the Blackberry 7100g. It looks sleek and has to be better than the old one. Hopefully it will come in the mail today. I hope!