Good morning or good evening, wherever you may be. It is just past 5:00 a.m. in "The City."

It is also a rainy morning in "The City." In fact, we are experiencing another of those gully-washing rain storms that seem to have passed us by all summer, but which are now becoming more frequent. Go figure.

Later this morning, after the sun rises @ 7:42 a.m. and well before it sets @ 7:26 p.m., the moderate rain will switch over to T-storms by the early afternoon. STWD will once again not be happy. That forecast from the NWS also calls for a high temperature of 59°. Not to worry though, as the week progresses, we'll see high temperatures in the mid-60s up to the mid-70s on Wednesday with only a 20% chance for showers until those T-storms reappear on Friday with a 100% probability!

Well, yesterday was an exciting day in sports. If you are a long-suffering Bears fan, the Bears looked solid as they soundly routed the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 48 - 10. Second year QB, Mitch Trubisky, tossed five, no that's not a typo, five TD passes in the 1st half, and six overall for the game. Tarik Cohen also looks like he is the"Real Deal" at least for now, as he returned kicks/punts, ran from the backfield, and caught passes. In short for a game that I had to follow on the computer, it was a great victory as the Bears went to 3 - 1 atop the NFC North.

Sadly, the Detroit Lions came off of their win over the Patriots last week with a loss to the Dallas Cowboys, 24 - 26. Penalties proved the undoing of the Lions, as the zebras tossed flags like they were confetti. The Cowboys looked mortal, not like "America's Team", but they got the job done as the Lions fell to 1 - 3 and the Cowboys improved to 2 - 2.

Back to life itself. The Cubs tried valiantly to win the NL Central with a convincing 10 - 5 win over the Cardinals. Sadly, the Tigers were no help, as they fell to the 2nd place in the NL Central Brewers, 0 - 11. That win forced the Brewers and the Cubs to play a rare 163rd game today @ 1:05 p.m. EDT. Jose Quintana will take the mound to try to give the Cubs the division championship and make the Brewers the Wildcard team. Or, it could go the other way. Guess where I'll be @ 1:05!

By the by, there will be a record 2nd 163rd game in the National League, between the Dodgers and the AZ Diamondbacks, this afternoon. The Dodgers routed the Giants, 14 - 0, while the D'Backs trounced the Washington Nationals, 12 - 0. to end the season tied for the division lead in the AL West.

As long as I've mentioned the Tigers, they have a lot of questions to answer. They finished the current season with the same record as last year, 64 - 98. Yes, their farm-system is better stocked than last year, but they did that with some great trades. The Tigers have few trade possibilities left on the Major League™ team this year.

The Tigers and GM Al Avila now have to decide if Nicholas Castellanos is in their long-range plans, or if he has more value being traded to acquire more prospects. Castellanos will be a free-agent after next season, so his value is probably at its peak right now, following his conversion from 3rd base to right-field and his solid offensive numbers of a .298 batting-average, 23 home-runs, and 89 RBIs. There are more players in the farm-system now that should be able to contribute in the next few years. Like the Cubs, it is another wait til next year off-season.

My beloved Red Sox soundly defeated the Yankees yesterday, to notch their 108th win, 10 - 2, en route to the AL East division championship series. The Yankees are the Wild Card team in that division. They Sox can now wait a few days to begin their series on Friday against either the Oakland As, or the Yankees following their Wild-Card game on Wednesday.  Phew!

I accompanied Mary to the mall to get some new sleep-wear and other things yesterday. Naturally, the mall was sparsely populated by customers in this internet age. Oh well. We stopped @ Stan's Bar and Grill on the way home. Since we didn't eat lunch until nearly 2:00 p.m., Mary had time to make a great pizza for dinner. Lunch was sandwiches of that quickie vegan beest that Mary had made the day before. I didn't much like the flavor as it had an overpowering amount of cumin. This iteration of beest is not, repeat not, a keeper.

Today, we have that rescheduled veterinarians visit for the fur-children @ 11:30 a.m. STWD will need a couple of Benadryl™ tablets about two hours prior to avoid any negative reaction to the flu-shot booster. We had thought about walking, but the rain and the intrepid weather dog's advancing age, mean that we'll be driving.

Otherwise, not much is in tap for today. Ciao.