October 29, 2006

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                                               BOO!

   

  And a Happy Halloween to everyone!!!  I am SOOOO tired!  We went out Haunted Housing last night (me and DH, SIL and BIL)...hit 3 of 'em.  SO much fun!  First one was the best...no huge productions, just good old fashioned scare the bejeeepeers out of you "boo" kind of stuff. Done by Backstoppers...money went to a GREAT donation there.   Second one stunk majorly...grumpy people, starting in the parking lot!  There was an empty spot not 20 feet from the entrance, we park there, and the attendant comes and slams on our window telling us to move, that's not where he told us to park...where he wanted us to park was in the next row, just a little farther away.  No big deal, I can see if we all needed to come in and park in rows, but the rows were already there...guy was just on some weird "I'm the king of the parking guys, bow before me" trip.  But their house/hay ride was incredibly lame...lots of fog, to the point where you really couldn't breathe too well, and the people were just not into it.  Not worth the money, that one.  Last one was in downtown St. Louis...scaryville already, by the way.  Started off with the guy hollering at all of us in line, "if you touch the workers, you WILL go to jail.  If you touch the props, you WILL go to jail.  If you fall 'cause you're being stupid, we WILL point at you and laugh, THEN call 911, and it will be slow, for we are in the middle of St. Louis."   Nice.  Their's was more of a production...props WERE excellent...not so many scares, looked like something Disney would do, haunted wise.  SIL was a haunted house virgin, if you will.  Never stepped in one a day in her life.  We let the workers all know it too...so she got the treatment in a big way.  SO much fun!!!!  Though next year, we will skip Silo-X (the second one).  Anyway, we didn't get home and in bed until about 3 a.m.  THEN I had to sleep all by myself...dh had to go back into work, daylight savings time and archaic hospital computer systems and all that.  Kids were at my sisters staying the night, so I was ALL ALONE.   At night.  After haunted housing.  I didn't sleep well. 

  Jess also went to her first haunted house last night...done by the junior high 8th grade class, trying to raise money for their trip to DC...wanted to go with her, but sis and her older ones went, leaving her littlest and my littlest with a baby sitter at my house.  Jess said it was SCARY.  Then, apparently, they went to my sis' house and watched Signs.  My sis said Jess may need to sleep with the lights on for a few nights, at least. 

  Things have been busy, here.  Been a bad xanga poster.  Been a volunteer nut, lately, it seems. Tuesday morning I went and helped with stuffing goody bags for the kindergarten classes.  Reminded me why I don't typically get involved with PTO stuff...they can get a little catty.  Not my cup of tea.  Also been helping the church with their Pumpkin patch quite a bit...not really any time to myself lately.  Besides working out, of course...can't stop an addict, ya know.  Also tried that Flylady thing.  And still trying...last week, just couldn't manage hardly anything they asked me to do, so have a list for everything I've missed to do.  The list is pretty daunting, however, which I'm pretty sure defeats the purpose. 

  Jess got her report card on Friday...I'm SO proud of that girl.  7 A's, 1 B.  The B is in P.E. They take a lot of written tests in there, about rules and who won what when...no one really cares, honestly, 'cept the jocks...so no worries.  But she pulled a 3.8 GPA.  And got her Mat7 test scores back too...scored post high school in more than 8 things, and nothing below10th grade level...that's m'girl!!!  Every time we get a good report card like that, I SO want to go throw it in that 4th grade teachers face, SO bad.  Stupid teacher. 

  Need a prayer for my kitty, Kiya.  The one in the pics with Chako...she had an appt. on Monday...she has a lump about the size of a pencil eraser on her chest...I had thought this was just an old age bump like my mom's dog used to get...not so.  They aspirated it a little bit, and the cells suggest abnormal activity there.  I'm not willing to call it cancer yet...she goes in next Monday, the 7th, for a teeth cleaning, and while they have her out, will remove the lump and send it out for a biopsy.  They'll also go ahead and give her a chest x-ray, to make sure nothing has spread, if it IS cancer.  Folks, I can NOT lose another kitty to this.  And not so soon to Chako.  I can't.  She seems healthy, no weight loss, still acts like a kitten (she's 15).  So I really think everything will be OK, right?  Right. Sigh.

  I need to go clean out my car.  It's a gorgeous day today, finally, after what seemed a week of rain, and my car is AWFUL.  So...have a great week, ya'll, and hopefully I'll have time to get on here this week too!!!

  Oh yeah...ahem...

   

  

  All in the Cards: St. Louis wins World Series

  Updated: Oct.28, 2006, 3:55 pm EDT

  ST. LOUIS (AP) -- Favored by few, the St. Louis Cardinals used an unlikely cast of characters to win their first World Series in nearly a quarter century.

  Jeff Weaver dominated, David Eckstein drove in two runs on balls that didn't leave the infield and the Cards took advantage of another wild throw by a Tigers pitcher to beat Detroit 4-2 on Friday night and won the Series in five games.

  "I think we shocked the world," Cardinals center fielder Jim Edmonds said. "It's an unbelievable experience."

  Jed Jacobsohn/Getty ImagesJeff Weaver allowed just one earned run over eight innings in the clinching victory of the World Series for the St. Louis Cardinals.

  Manager Tony La Russa's Cardinals had just 83 regular-season wins, the fewest by a World Series winner, and nearly missed the playoffs after a late-season slump. But the Cardinals beat San Diego and the New York Mets in the playoffs, then won their first title since 1982 by taming a heavily favored Tigers team that entered the Series with six days' rest.

  After closer Adam Wainwright struck out Brandon Inge for the final out, the ballpark erupted. Wainwright raised his arms in triumph, catcher Yadier Molina ran to the mound and the pair bounced off toward second base, where they were joined by teammates running out from the dugout and the bullpen.

  "I don't think anybody in uniform didn't do something in the postseason. Everyone did," said La Russa, whose uniform number -- 10 -- now matches the team's World Series titles. "The defense was great. The pitching was great. Timely hitting. The best bench I've had in a long time. They just refused for us to lose."

  Minutes later fireworks filled the sky above the ballpark.

  Eckstein, the 5-foot-7 shortstop who had four hits in Game 4, was the Series MVP.

  "No one believed in us, but we believed in ourselves," Eckstein said.

  On a cold Midwest night more suitable to football than baseball, the Tigers made two more errors, raising their Series total to eight -- three by Inge, the third baseman, and a record five by their pitchers. Eight of the 22 runs allowed by the Tigers were unearned, the most by a team since the 1956 New York Yankees against Brooklyn.

  While the Tigers tossed the ball to the tarp, the Cardinals were mostly crisp, with the notable exception of right fielder Chris Duncan, who dropped a fly ball just before Sean Casey's two-run homer in the fourth put Detroit ahead 2-1.

  St. Louis came right back to take a 3-2 lead in the bottom half as pitcher Justin Verlander threw away a ball for the second time in two starts, and Scott Rolen added a big run with a two-out RBI single in the seventh off reliever Fernando Rodney, extending his postseason hitting streak to 10 games.

  It was the Cardinals' first title since 1982 and the first for the NL since the 2003 Florida Marlins. La Russa, who led the Oakland Athletics to a sweep in the earthquake-interrupted 1989 Bay Bridge Series, joined Sparky Anderson (Cincinnati and Detroit) as the only managers to win Series titles in each league.

  It marked the first time since the 1912 Red Sox at Boston's Fenway Park that a team won the Series at home in a first-year ballpark. And the Cardinals (83-78) almost didn't even make it to the postseason. They had a seven-game NL Central lead with 12 to go but lost eight of nine before recovering to finish 11/2 games ahead of Houston, the defending NL champion.

  Minnesota, in 1987, had set the previous low for wins by a Series winner, going 85-77.

  "The team that wins a world championship is the team that played the best," La Russa said.

  As the Tigers failed in their bid for their first title since 1984, their season ended with Kenny Rogers rested and ready with no place to pitch. Rogers, who threw 23 shutout innings in the postseason, was saved by manager Jim Leyland for a possible sixth game Saturday in Detroit.

  Weaver, cast off by the Yankees three years ago after a World Series flop, allowed four hits in eight innings, matched his season high with nine strikeouts and walked one before Wainwright finished for the save. St. Louis pitchers held Detroit to a .205 average (33-for-161) over the five games.

  Verlander gave up three runs -- one earned -- and three hits, recovering from early control problems to give the Tigers a decent effort.

  After a daylong rain, the weather cleared about two hours before gametime. Still, it was 47 degrees when play began, and a brisk wind made it feel that much colder. But the wintry conditions didn't dampen the enthusiasm of the 46,638 mostly red-clad fans.

  Verlander, throwing up to 100 mph, was wild in the first inning, walking the bases loaded and throwing two wild pitches. By his fourth batter, Jason Grilli was warming up in the bullpen, but Verlander escaped by the thinnest of margins, needing 35 pitches to get through the inning.

  Elsa/Getty ImagesDavid Eckstein was named World Series MVP.

  He walked Duncan with one out, threw a wild pitch, then walked Albert Pujols. With a 2-0 count on Edmonds, pitching coach Chuck Hernandez came to the mound. Edmonds fell behind 3-0, then flied out after Verlander worked the count full. Following another wild pitch, Verlander walked Rolen, and when he started Ronnie Belliard with a ball, catcher Ivan Rodriguez went to the mound.

  After fouling off a 3-2 pitch, Belliard hit a grounder up the middle that Carlos Guillen just got to in time to make an off-balance throw to first, beating Belliard by less than a step as Casey scooped the ball on a bounce. Verlander yelled and whipped his arm across his body excitement.

  But St. Louis went ahead in the second, after Molina looped a single to center leading off, took second on So Taguchi's bunt and third on Weaver's groundout. Eckstein hit a smash, and both the ball and a chunk of his bat headed toward third. Inge dived and grabbed the ball as it went over the base and then, even though he had plenty of time, rushed his throw. It bounced and went up the line as Molina scored. Eckstein was given a hit on the play and advanced on the bad throw by Inge.

  Weaver held the Tigers to two hits in the first three innings. With one out in the fourth, Magglio Ordonez lofted a fly to right and Duncan, calling off center fielder Edmonds, allowed it to kick off his glove for a two-base error.

  Casey sent the next pitch into the seats down the right-field line for a two-run homer that put Detroit ahead. Then it was the Tigers' turn to make a key mistake.

  Molina and Taguchi singled with one out in the bottom half and Weaver bunted back to Verlander. He had an easy force at third, but sidearmed the ball and it bounced past Inge for an error that allowed Molina to score the tying run and left runners on second and third. Eckstein followed with a grounder to shortstop that drove in Taguchi for a 3-2 lead.

  Duncan had another adventure in the fifth, letting Casey's catchable two-out fly drop behind him on the warning track for a double. But Weaver struck out Rodriguez on a checked swing.

  Pujols turned in the niftiest play, sprawling to snare Placido Polanco's grounder to first leading off the seventh, then making a one-bounce throw from his back to Weaver covering the base.

   

  Basically, they kicked butt. 

                                                                     

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