Eat These Foods Episode Two: Attack of the Kebabs

Here are a couple more places to satiate the hungry pains afflicting millions of Americans throughout the country. Hungry pain is a serious epidemic that can only be squelched by eating large amounts of food at top draw restaurants. Put down that Hot Pocket, it does not have the abilities to cure hungry pains! It will only add to your pain, as you will find out in the bathroom hours later. Remember that eating out not only helps you but also the American economy. We all must do our part to help out in these turbulent times. Go out and eat a gyro for America! If we don't, the communists win and Putin will be kissing children's stomachs all over the world. Save children's stomachs and your own by sharing a kebab with a beautiful girl.

Joe's Market
When to go: Lunch
What to order: Gyro
When asked to pick one particular item from the meat on bread category as my favorite, the Gyro wins out nine out of ten times. The combination of spiced lamb meat on a warm pita smothered with cucumber sauce is heavenly. I've often stated that if I were to come into a large amount of money I would buy a rotating vertical spit for my kitchen and constantly have gyro meat cooking. I'd keep a gallon tub of cucumber sauce in the fridge and pick up fresh pitas every week. If only there was a rotating vertical spit at Macy's I could put on our wedding registry. Gyros are easy to find around the Cities. There are many restaurants that make adequate to great gyros. Chris and Rob's makes a decent gyro. Shish, a restaurant I will discuss in a little bit, makes delicious gyros. Dino's, a chain around the Cities, offers many different types of gyros, including the delightful spicy gyro which substitutes a spicy feta sauce for the cucumber sauce. The spicy gyro is satisfying, but I always miss the cucumber sauce. To find the epitome of the gyro in the Twin Cities, one must venture over to Como Ave near VanCleve Park to a convenient store named Joe's Market. They make a gyro the way everyone should. Take a pita, put a glob of cucumber sauce on it, and spread it all around so every bite gets the sauce's flavor. Put on a little lettuce, onion, and tomato to make it seem like there is some healthy aspect in eating a gyro. Fill up the pita with gyro meat until the pita can barely fold up. It should be so full of meat that one can't put the gyro down without fear of all the contents falling out. This is how Joe's makes their gyros and they only charge $4.49 for one. In comparison, Dino's gyros don't have nearly as much meat and sauce yet they charge over six dollars for one. The combination of the best gyro with the lowest cost makes Joe's one of the best places to grab lunch in the Cities.

Shish
When to go: Dinner
What to order: The Kebab Trio
Laura and I were recently introduced to this excellent Mediterranean restaurant in St. Paul located near Macalester College on Grand Ave. We've only been there a couple times and everything we have eaten has been fabulous. The first time we went I was obligated to order the gyro and compare it to Joe's. While it wasn't as good as Joe's, it was an excellent gyro, possibly the second best I've had in the Cities. On our second trip, I branched out from my meat on bread love and ordered meat on sticks. The Kebab Trio included a kebab of chicken, a kebab of lamb, and a kebab of beef. The meat was cooked beautifully and each kind was spiced differently, giving us a wide array of flavor. I'm unable to explain what the different spices were on the meats as picking out distinct spices is beyond my palate. All I know is they tasted good and I wanted three more skewers of each. As I'm partial to lamb meat, I found it to be the most delicious. It came with a white sauce on the side that I assumed was cucumber sauce until I tried it. The sauce was great with the meat but I couldn't figure out what the ingredients could be. Again, I have no discernible palate. It's very frustrating. It turned out to be a garlic sauce, which is right up my ally as garlic makes everything taste better. The Kebab Trio also came with some well cooked saffron rice and fresh pitas with hummus. Give me some pitas with hummus and I'll be happy. It was a great meal and permanently placed Shish on our dining out rotation, even if it is all the way in St. Paul.

It's a good thing Laura and I just went to Joe's Market on Wednesday. If we hadn't, I would be having excruciating hungry pains right now thinking about all this gyro meat. I should be good now for a week or two. Stay tuned for the next installment, which will include the best coleslaw in the world. And what do you do with that coleslaw? Put it on bread with meat. Damn, now I have hungry pains.

Eat These Foods

We go out to eat quite a bit. Probably more than my wallet and health would like. As long as my weight doesn't balloon and I can keep the lights on, I won't be cutting back. Some people spend their money on clothes. Others buy the latest ipods and cellphones. I buy Italian beefs and burritos. We've had memorable meals at many restaurants, but here are the top spots and the food to get when you're there. They are listed below in no particular order as they are all equally stupendous. If you come visit and we go out to eat, expect it to be at one of these places.

Dinkytowner
When to go: Breakfast
What to order: The Cajun
Surprisingly located in Dinkytown, this dive bar located under Blarney's is the destination of choice for breakfast. Great biscuits and gravy, the latter being pretty thick and full of sausage. The Tex-Mex, a tortilla filled with breakfast goodness, is humongous even for the largest of men. Both are excellent choices, but the crown jewel is The Cajun. A pile of hash browns with cooked onions and green peppers. Cheese is melted on top before two eggs are placed on the pile. It's finished off with lots of hollandaise sauce and cajun seasoning to give it a little spice. If you want some sausage thrown in there, they'll do that for you. I say no to the sausage so it's a vegetarian meal. Makes it seem a little healthier after eating all the hollandaise. It's a cheesy, gooey, yolky mess that comes together to make the best breakfast in Minneapolis.

Chris and Rob's Chicago Taste Authority
When to go: Lunch
What to order: Italian Beef w/hot peppers
I've never had the pleasure of eating an Italian Beef in Chicago. I was a picky eater as a kid and refused to eat many things that I'm sure tasted wonderful. To look back and think of all the great foods I passed over as a child make my eyes well up. I was already a fatty in middle school from eating hot dogs and mac & cheese all the time that it might have been for the better that I didn't enjoy many meats. Things have changed drastically. If asked what my favorite food is, my answer is meat on bread. The Italian Beef falls into this group as its a ton of roast beef, dripping with its own juices, on a sliced loaf of Italian bread. Throw a couple of hot peppers on there and the sandwich is finished. No need for any sauce or extra toppings. The roast beef drippings soak into the bread, permeating every bite with the delicious au jus. Chris and Rob's has by far the best Italian beef I've ever tasted. The restaurant is adorned with Chicago paraphernalia including a picture of Coach Ditka. The owners look like Superfans. I think we can trust the authenticity of the restaurant.

Stay tuned for more restaurants you need to eat at when you are in the Twin Cities. Be ready for the recurring theme of "meat on bread". It will show up at least three more times. At least.

TV To Help Get Through the Winter Doldrums

This has been the longest, coldest, most depressing winter I can remember. Our shower pipes have frozen. The thermostat has read 57 degrees when I get up in the morning even though its set at 68. We've had to put plastic over our windows to hold the heat in. There are two blankets and a towel in front of our apartment door to keep the draft from the back hallway out. Weeks went by when the temperature barely reached double digits. It snows every week and its going to snow this weekend. Our cars haven't started from sitting outside overnight. Reindeer have been eating our garbage. It's time to move to Arizona. Or Florida. Or anywhere that I won't need the Bear Claw to scrape through an inch of ice sheeted to my windshield. I used to prefer being cold to hot as you can always put more layers on when your cold, and you can only take off so much when you're hot. I was delusional. I would rather sweat my balls off than freeze my nuts off.

Thank god for television. It has helped immensely in getting me through this bone-chilling winter. Besides the countless hours of sports and Wii playing, there have been some excellent series that have saved my mind from falling into a stupor. Here now are five shows, some currently airing on TV and others available on DVD, that should keep you entertained through these tough months.

1. Lost - Finally returned this month for its fifth season. Never have I been so invested in a TV show. It is difficult to jump into for one episode and understand. There are many characters and tons of interweaving stories that make it increasingly difficult to start watching without seeing previous seasons. Therefore everyone should go out and get seasons one through four and watch all the episodes to get caught up. There are 83 episodes in the first four seasons. That will keep you busy through the cold. There are still fourteen episodes left to air this season, still early enough to get hooked. Every Wednesday at eight on ABC.

2. The Office - I was heartbroken last night when NBC showed a rerun during The Office's normal time slot. Instead of a new episode on Thursday when I'm awake and ready to laugh, NBC will air a new Office after the Super Bowl on Sunday night. Factoring in game time, half time show, a million commercial breaks, the post-game trophy presentation, and John Madden's seventeen trips to the bar, the new Office will air around 3:15 in the morning, same time I'll start my shift at UPS. Thanks to the wonderful invention that is the internet, I can watch The Office for free online whenever I please at Hulu.com. Funniest show on TV with so many supporting characters who can steal the show with one line. Especially Creed. All he wants to do is hang out and throw things down the quarry or be part of a cult. Just remember that it's more fun to be a follower.

3. Flight of the Conchords - Second funniest show on TV. The second season just premiered on HBO a couple weeks ago. If you don't get HBO, think of something that is wrong with your cable. Maybe a couple of the channels don't come in real clear. Call up the cable company. Bitch and complain to them until they give you premium channels for free. If they try to charge you for them, threaten to cancel subscription. They will then offer you a deal and everyone wins (in theory). Go to YouTube and search "Most Beautiful Girl in the Room", "Inner City Pressure", "Business Time", or "Leggy Blonde". Great show and music from New Zealand's fourth most popular guitar-based digi-bongo acapella-rap-funk-comedy folk duo. Formerly, that is.

4. Big Love - Another HBO show that recently premiered its new season. Starring Bill Paxton as a Mormon polygamist who wants to live the American dream but have three wives doing it. Paxton's character, Bill Henrickson, has to hide his true lifestyle from the public as polygamy is looked down upon by the greater Mormon population of Salt Lake City. He has to juggle his business, his three wives with their own unique issues, and his eight children. To make matters more difficult, Bill is constantly feuding with Roman Grant, the leader of a Mormon polygamist compound. Bill was raised in the compound until he was banished by Roman and now is married to one of Roman's daughters. It's a twist on the family drama with a great cast of characters, especially some of the people living on the compound like Bill's mother Lois and his sister-in-law Wanda, who has a nasty habit of poisoning people when they pose a threat to her husband. Funny, touching, and suspenseful, it's a fabulous show that we were glad to discover this winter.

5. Deadwood - The one show that is currently not airing on TV. Deadwood ran for three seasons on HBO from 2004 to 2006 and can be found on DVD. After finishing up with The Wire (one of the greatest shows ever made and something white people like) on Netflix, we started getting Deadwood as a couple people had recommended it to us highly. Thank you Geoff and Faust, it is another great show from HBO. Set in the 1870's in Deadwood, South Dakota, the show chronicles the rise of the camp to a town and it's precarious position of being governed by it's own set of rules seperate from U.S. law. It is loosely based off of real events and real historical figures, such as Calamity Jane and Wild Bill Hickok. It boasts a great ensemble cast with many intriguing characters. The stand out is Ian McShane as Al Swearengen, the owner of the Gem Saloon, the most popular place for drinking and whoring in Deadwood. Hilarious one minute, vile and contemptible the next, Swearengen is the central figure in the drama that surrounds Deadwood. Outstanding show.

Get your Netflix queue updated. Set your Tivo for Wendesday and Thursday night. Call your cable company and yell till they give you something free. Go online and search for these shows. January may be over, but February is still cold as hell. Check your schedule. You've got eighty odd hours of Lost to watch.

My Services Are Needed Elsewhere

My wondeful fiancee found an ad on Craigslist last week for a new sports blog in the Twin Cities that was looking for writers to contribute to their website. Thinking this would be a good way to try to get my name out in the blogosphere, Laura encouraged me to contact them and possibly write for them. I sent them this blog and even though I hadn't written in over a month, they liked what they saw and offered me the possibility of writing a weekly column for their website. I finsihed my first article today and it was posted on the website Twinsmix.com for all to read. It was pretty exciting to see something I wrote be on a website not controlled by myself. I should be writing for the Twinsmix site once a week and I might contribute to their Gopher and T-Wolves websites. Maybe something will come of this and maybe not, but it is great fun for me to write about something I love and perhaps a few people will enjoy my words.

Because I will be consistently writing for the other blog, I'm hoping it will get me in a routine where I will not only blog for Twinsmix but also for this wonderful, spicy blog. I will try not to be redundant and only talk about the Twins on the other site. I will try to get back to writing about movies, restaurants, and any other sports that I see fit. I could write five hundred words right now about the current Premier League season but I think a large chunk of my readership (Karl, father) will be bored to tears. Prehaps I will channel my inner Simmons and do a running dialogue this Saturday morning during the four hours I plan on watching the Premier League. Yes, I will be sitting in our living room from 9 until 1:30 watching soccer on Saturday. Laura is wonderful for putting up with this soccer loving bum. She even bought bacon over the weekend so maybe I'll have some of that to go with my soccer. Start liking soccer everyone so I can write about it!

Thank you all who read this blog and I hope you will check out my work at the other website. Even if you don't care about baseball, just skim through it and support the site. Maybe you will be the start of the fan base that grows Twinsmix into a mammoth sports blog and brings me to prominence in sports journalism! Keep reading, I will be back for more on this blog.

Walking Out

Going to the movie theater is usually a risk. There are very few movies that you know unequivocally will be good. Other than The Dark Knight, I can't think of another movie in the last six months that I had no doubt about. Even Iron Man, one of the best movies of the year, had me a little worried that it wouldn't live up to expectations. This risk has reduced the number of trips we've made to the movie theater significantly over the past couple years. When we do head out to the theater it is often to Riverview Theater, which plays second run movies for three dollars, or St. Anthony Main, which has a student rate of $5.50. St. Anthony Main is one of the main reasons I've held onto my student ID. The last movie I recall paying full price for was The Strangers at the Mall of America. Since dropping twenty-one dollars to see a movie less frightening than the Care Bears, we have not paid full price for a movie other than The Dark Knight. It is much easier to sit through Baby Mama when you pay a total of twelve dollars for two tickets, a large soda, and a medium popcorn. I used to think Riverview's prices made it easy to sit through any piece of garbage Hollywood churned out. This notion was challenged one Saturday night when Laura and I took the risk and and saw Step Brothers at Riverview.

Step Brothers had some promise. It was written and directed by the same man who wrote and directed Anchorman, one of the funniest movies of the last five years. The two stars, Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly, have starred in numerous hilarious movies, most recently the little seen Walk Hard. The concept of two grown men being forced to co-exist under one roof as step brothers was something new that would present the actors with funny situations. All this promise never materialized on screen as humor was non-existent and the characters were excruciatingly annoying. The movie seemed to think the audience would find two forty year old men acting like juveniles funny. It wasn't. We weren't the only ones not laughing in the theater. It was fairly silent except for a couple of meat heads who laughed at every misguided, moronic joke. After forty-five minutes of one of the most painful movie viewing experiences I have had, I asked Laura if she wanted to leave. A quick "Yes" was all I needed as we stood up and walked out halfway through the movie. It was the first time I had ever walked out of a movie before it was finished, and I couldn't have been happier.

A movie has to be pretty unenjoyable for me to walk out on it. I've watched so many awful movies throughout my life yet I've always sat through until the very end. I don't know what it was about Step Brothers that I couldn't handle. Perhaps my tolerance for dick and fart jokes is starting to wear thin. Perhaps I was expecting to much and should have gone into the movie with lesser expectations. It was late on a Saturday night, so maybe I felt like sleeping was a better alternative. Whatever the reason, I will never forget Step Brothers for being my first walk out. I can't help but be a little angry that I wasted my money on less than an hour of entertainment that was by no means entertaining. Paying to see a movie is a risk. It's a risk I used to take a couple times a month. With Netflix, the internet, and cable providing ample amounts of movies, it's a risk I might only take on special occasions. I'll use my twenty dollars to buy a case of Premium and watch whats on one of the ten HBO's we get.

Baseball Is Over

What's a man to do when his two favorite sports teams are eliminated from the postseason in the span of a week? Sob uncontrollably. Drink heavily. Eat continuously. It was a rough week. At least the Brewers made it to October and won a game. Its much better being a Brewers fan today than a Cubs fan. The Cubs have lost nine straight playoff games dating back to the infamous Steve Bartman series in 2003. Give it up Cub fans, they will never win the World Series. Be happy you can go to numerous day games at a classic ballpark that serves one of the finest beers on tap, Old Style. Teams should schedule more day games. Cutting out of work or class to go to a ballgame is a staple of summer. Throw in a few beers and some sunny seventy degree weather and you have a perfect day. I envy you Cub fans. For the day games. Not the hundred years of losing. I'll pass on that.

It's been more than two weeks since the Twins lost the one game playoff to the White Sox and it still drives me into fits of mumbling and under-breath talking. If theres one team in sports I despise over all others it's the Packers. That will never change. Stems from my childhood. Irrevocable damage. After the Packers, it's the Wisconsin Badgers. Raised a Michigan fan, went to Minnesota, and Badger fans are often Packer fans. Guilty by association. After the Badgers, its any intramural softball team with a team name such as "Winning Team", "Champions", or "Future Title Holders". It's always sweet when they are ten run ruled by the third inning. After arrogant softball teams, it's the White Sox. This mainly stems from them winning the World Series in 2005, A.J. Pierzynski, a former Twin, being the cheating bastard that he is, and them being a thorn in the Twins side every single year. No team in the AL Central consistently challenges the Twins every year like the White Sox do. The Royals haven't been good in years. The Tigers had one good season recently and look to be on the decline again. The Indians are up and down seemingly every year. Only the White Sox seem to hang around every year and make a pest of themselves. Losing 1-0 to them in the playoff was soul crushing. The Twins barely put up a fight. Thankfully the Rays made us feel better by beating the Sox in Chicago. Watching A.J. stare out of the dugout at the Rays celebrating their victory was a perfect way for the White Sox season to end.

I'll watch some of the remaining playoff games and root for the Rays to pull off one of the most unlikely seasons in recent baseball memory. Ten straight seasons of losing followed by a World Series win would be pretty astonishing. Much of the luster, though, is gone. I love baseball and will be interested to see what happens. Just not that interested. Now comes five months of offseason wheeling and dealing. 2008 was a good year for the Twins and Brewers. 2009 should be even better. Time to hibernate. Wake me when it's March.

The Whole Enchilada

After 162 games, the AL Central Division title is still up in the air. The White Sox beat Detroit yesterday to pull even with the Twins and force a one game playoff tonight in Chicago. The odds are against the Twins as playing away from the Metrodome has been difficult. The Twins went 2-7 against the Sox at U.S. Cellular Field. All of those games occurred during the first half of the season when the Twins were a different baseball team. Livan Hernandez was still in the rotation giving up seven hits an inning. Our designated hitter was Craig Monroe. He compiled a robust .202 average and .274 OBP before being cut. Mike Lamb was playing third base. He will be best remembered for the great lumberjack beard he grew while riding the pine. Carlos Gomez was the leadoff hitter while Denard Span and Alexi Casilla were down in the minors. It's a new team walking into The Cell that walked out in June after a four game sweep. Those games are a distant memory and the Twins only need to think about the sweep they just pulled off last week against the Sox. Expect a dramatic, wild night in the Windy City. Hopefully Ozzie Guillen will have some new expletive filled quotes in the paper tomorrow. Good things happen when Ozzie's drops some f-bombs.

CC Sabathia is the best pitcher in baseball. 26 years of agony are over because of his left arm. For the first time in my life I get to watch the Brewers in the playoffs. 2:00 tomorrow afternoon, Game 1 vs. the Phillies in Philadelphia. Sit in front of a TV, grab a beer, a sausage, and enjoy the ride. It might not happen for another quarter of a century.

Inner City Pressure

Getting away from the Twin Cities for a weekend is glorious. Between the constant noise, stifling traffic, and shear number of narcissistic, self-centered people roaming the streets, its nice to get a break from it all. It's even better when that break involves golfing at one of the premier courses in Wisconsin. Just outside of Hayward, a quaint little city with only two thousand residents, lies a superb course nestled in the beautiful Wisconsin countryside. Designed by Pete Dye, one of the best course designers in golf history, Big Fish Golf Club is the best golfing experience to be found in Northern Wisconsin and one of the best bargains in the Midwest. Golf is horribly expensive. There are numerous items one has to pony up some money for. Clubs, balls, tees, gloves, green fees, cart rentals, beer, novelty club covers, goofy hats that come with a free bowl of soup, etc. Playing a decent course can easily cost someone near a hundred dollars for eighteen holes. Big Fish is of the quality that it could charge that much. If Big Fish was in a suburb of the Cities, it could easily cost near a hundred dollars. Thankfully it is instead situated near Hayward where things move a little slower and cost a little less. Eighteen holes and a cart costs a man only fifty nine dollars. If I was in better shape, wasn't lazy, and didn't want to drink, I could have paid forty two dollars and hoofed it all afternoon. Getting to play one of the top new golf courses in America for that rate seems almost criminal. That's why after our round on Friday we went back for seconds the next day instead of playing nearby Hayward National. We could have saved some money and played a lesser course, but when high quality golf is available at a cheap price you have to take the opportunity. I surprisingly didn't embarrass myself on the course with nine hole scores of 49, 51, 51, and 50. For the first and probably only time playing a serious round of golf in 2008, I was pretty satisfied. Big Fish, I hope to be seeing you again next year. I'll be ready to get the hell out of this concrete jungle and relax myself on the fairways, watching the colors of the Wisconsin wilderness slowly changing.

-Baseball Update: Twins stand 1.5 games back of the White Sox with five remaining. Tonight and tomorrow will make or break the season as the two teams square off in the Dome. Laura and I will be there tonight for our last Twins game of the season. Lets end on a high note.

The Brewers stand one game back of the Wild Card leading Mets with five games to play. After a dramatic win against the Pirates last night, the momentum should be with the Brewers. All they can do is win out and hope for the Mets to falter. It's been a tough September for the Brewers but they can erase the bad memories with a solid final week. It's hard to do but we all have to be Cubs fans tonight and tomorrow. And then never again.

-I'm a sucker for cheesy horror movies. Some people like romantic comedies. Others like slapstick comedies. I like horror movies. With that said, I thoroughly enjoyed Prom Night, the recent remake of the 1980's slasher movie. It has cheesy dialogue, bad acting, and the characters do everything a smart person wouldn't do. Yet it is entertaining as hell. If you like horror movies, check it out. If you like Made of Honor, you have awful taste in movies. I am a movie snob and elitist. I make no apologies for it.

-Take that Europe! We are better than you at golf! A southern boy named Boo who did the Happy Gilmore dance shellacked some of your top players. He can't even speak proper English. Beating the British, a great American past time.

-Arsenal top of the Premier League by one point over Chelsea and Liverpool. That was specifically for you Karl.

Optimism Waning, Pessimism Rising

Who fires their manager with only twelve games remaining in the season? Only the 2008 Milwaukee Brewers in the history of baseball. After starting September by losing eleven of fourteen games and falling into a tie for the Wild Card with the Phillies, the Brewers decided to relieve Ned Yost of his managing duties. After managing the Brewers through 150 games to a 83-67 record, the Brewers didn't trust him to lead the team for twelve more games. Once again, Yost managed 150 games! ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY. With so little left in the season, Yost should have gotten the opportunity to motivate his team, finish the season strong, and hopefully take the Wild Card. It will be interesting to see how the players react to the firing. Perhaps Yost was well liked by his players and his firing will motivate the players to go on and make the postseason for their fallen manager. Or the firing will completely demoralize the players and the team will crumble with out their beloved manager. I'm hoping that the team did not have a strong liking for Yost and his sacking will enable the team to finish strong. If the Brewers fail to make the playoffs, the firing of Yost will be questioned for a long time. It will not be easy for the Brew Crew as they play the Cubs six more times. CC steps onto the mound tonight and needs to have the best outing of his short Brewers career. The Brewers have never made the playoffs during my life. End the collective misery of Brewers fans everywhere and finish the job that Ned Yost won't be allowed to do.

That other baseball team I like is still hanging around the AL playoff race but also find themselves in a precarious position. The Twins trail the White Sox by a game and a half having played an extra game. If we give the Sox a win in that extra game, the Twins stand two games back with twelve remaining for both teams. As I've written before, the Twins can't be farther back than two games when the Sox come to town on September 23rd. Therefore we all need to be Yankees and Royals fans this week as the Sox visit both teams. The Sox are ripe for a losing streak. After having games postponed on Friday and Saturday due to rain, the Sox played a doubleheader on Sunday. They immediately had to fly out to New York to play last night and lost. The Yankees are in the midst of their final homestand at Yankee Stadium. They will play their hearts out to close out the stadium on a positive note. They do not have a day game on Thursday so they will not leave New York until late Thursday night, hopefully making them tired for their opener in Kansas City on Friday. The White Sox also have the headache of figuring out when to makeup a game against the Tigers. All of these issues could compound and cause the White Sox to crumble and be ripe for a sweep when they visit the Metrodome. Optimism, it's a wonderful thing. I can delude myself into thinking crazy things.

One of these teams has to make the playoffs. It has been the best baseball season of my life and it would be heartbreaking and bad for my mental health if neither team makes it to October. If you don't want to see me in pain throughout October, you will cheer for the Brewers and Twins. The joyfulness I will feel if both teams make the playoffs will be so powerful that it will radiate out in waves and make all the people within a mile radius happier. Cheering for my teams won't just help me. It will help all mankind.

Slowly Slipping Away

Over the past week, the Twins finished their arduous fourteen game roadtrip with a shellacking in Toronto. The Twins needed to win two of three in Toronto to finish five hundred on the road trip. They were swept and finished 5-9 on their travels. Somehow the Twins found themselves only a game and a half out of first after the roadtrip. Coming home to play the underachieving Tigers and the always awful Royals, the Twins were primed for a good homestand and a chance to regain first in the central. The homestand started well with a win on Friday night. It turned out to be the highpoint of a painful weekend for Twins fans.

Saturday afternoon was going splendidly. Laura and I found a new couch for our living room, we rented a U-haul for Sunday to pick it up, and our rearranging of the apartment was going smoothly. We took a break to watch The Wire (Best. Show. Ever.) and the last couple innings of the Twins game. When we switched the Twins game on, Scott Baker was throwing a gem, allowing only two runs through seven innings with a low pitch count. Going into the eighth inning, the Twins held a 4-2 lead. Not an insurmountable lead, but one I felt confident in handing over to the bullpen. Baker came out for the beginning of the eighth and left after recording one out and putting a man on first. Dennys Reyes, the lefty specialist, came in to face Curtis Granderson. His only job was to get Granderson out and his day would be done. His third pitch to Granderson was hit over the baggy in right field for a two run homerun. With the game tied 4-4, Matt Guerrier came in and preceded to give up another two run homerun. By the time Jessie Crain finished off the Tigers in the eighth, the Twins were losing 6-4. The game ended that way as the Twins couldn't muster any runs in the eighth or ninth. The weak bullpen was on display again wasting a quality outing by a starting pitcher. It was a bad loss, but the Twins had a Sunday matinee date with the Tigers to win the series.

Sunday afternoon was stressful. The new furniture we bought wouldn't fit through our doorway. We took the door off it's hinges and pushed with all our might until the couch slid into our apartment. It was quite the battle and there are scars on the walls to commemorate the struggle. After dropping off the U-Haul we needed to sit down, relax, and crack open a beer. We made it back home at the beginning of the sixth inning. The Twins were leading 4-2 and Glen Perkins was still pitching. As soon as we sat down and got comfortable, things went to hell. Perkins was knocked around and the Tigers scored three runs to take the lead 5-4. Organizing the apartment seemed like a better idea than watching more of the game. I'm still a terrible jinx and I figured not watching the rest of the game would work in the Twins favor. My optimism was soon crushed as the Tigers added on two more runs in the top of the seventh. My optimism was finally put out of its misery in the bottom of the seventh when Morneau and Kubel drove in only one run with men on base. I knew not to expect a comeback with the feeble bats of Punto and Gomez coming up. The Twins lost the game 7-5 and lost the series, a poor homecoming after such an ugly roadtrip.

The Twins stand two and a half games behind the White Sox for the division title going into tonights game with the Royals. The Wild Card is out of the question as the Red Sox have been white hot lately and hold a sizable cushion over the Twins. After the three game set versus the Royals the Twins hit the road once again for a ten game road trip. They play winnable games against the Orioles and Indians, but face a tough test with four games against the Rays. After the roadtrip the Twins return home to face the White Sox and Royals for three games each to end the season. When the White Sox come to town, the Twins can not be more than two games back in the standings. It is hard to demand a sweep of the White Sox, but that will be necessary if the Twins are more than two games back. I have faith in the Twins and will continue to be optimistic. It has been a great season that has gone above and beyond my expectations for this team. If they make the playoffs, it will be a great achievement for a young team and a great sign for the future. If they don't, we'll run Jessie Crain and Matt Guerrier out of town with pitchforks and torches. We'll run Crain all the way back to Canada.