Good morning or good evening, wherever you may be, across the nation and across the world. It is just past 4:00 a.m. in "The City."

The current temperature is 68° under cloudy skies. Our overnight low will be 61° The sun will rise today @ 7:21 a.m. and set later @ 8:00 p.m. The NWS is forecasting an increasing chance for showers late tonight into Friday mornin, with a 30% chance for isolated T-storms this evening, that will morph into over 90% by early Friday morning.  Today's high temperature of 71° will be six degrees lower than Wednesday. Once again, STWD will not be happy with the thunder that caused her to spend much of Wednesday in the upstairs hide e hole. 

There is also another of those Small Craft  Advisories in effect from 8:00 p.m. this evening until 5:00 p.m. Saturday. The National Weather Service in Grand Rapids is forecasting winds ...Southeast to 30 knots tonight veering west by Saturday. Waves from 3 to 5 feet are likely. A Small Craft Advisory means that winds or waves are expected to produce hazardous conditions to small craft. Inexperienced mariners...especially those operating smaller vessels should avoid navigating in these conditions.

Somehow, the 77 - 68, tied for 2nd place in the NL Central Cubs, fell into two ties last night, the first for the Wild Card and the 2nd in their division, as Cole Hamels couldn't overcome a lack of run production by the Cubs as the 68 - 77, 4th place in the NL West Padres scored four time en route to their 4 - 0 victory.

The Cubs made another announcement yesterday, announcing that Jason McLeod will become senior vice president of player personnel. Will that make a difference? I don't know, but I hope that he, Jed Hoyer, and Theo Epstein can shake up a team that needs serious shaking up. Today @ 3:40 p.m. EDT, the Cubs and the Padres will close out their series as Yu Darvish takes the mound.

My beloved, 76 - 70, 3rd place in the AL East Red Sox, lost to the 57 - 89 Blue Jays last night, 0 - 8, as that unnamed Red Sox pitcher was unable to stem the tide of losses. The Sox and Clay Buchholz will take on the Blue Jays again tonight @ 7:07 p.m. The Sox are quickly falling out of the Wild Card race. Sigh.

The 43 - 100, 5th place in the AL Central Tigers were rained out in their game against the 95 - 51, 1st place in the AL East Yankees last night, as the rain that fell on most of Michigan also fell on Detroit. The Tigers and the Yankees will play two today, beginning @ 1:10 p.m. followed by the second game. Of course, nothing will make the Tigers a contending team this season.

We had a mostly lazy day yesterday. We collectively set up the new TV in the downstairs bedroom as I waited for my soy curl jerky to bake in the oven. We then took a short walk with the fur-children. Later, we stopped in at JWs and then home for a dinner of vegan Toona casserole with sliced portabello mushrooms that tasted great. See the pic below as supplied by our Senior Staff Photographer.

Mmmm Good!

I cleaned up the dinner dishes after I awoke in the media room around 2:30 a.m. this morning. Ginger was asleep in Mary's chair and when I woke up, she asked to go out. So, I went down with her, let her out, and then emptied the dishwasher and cleared away the other pots and pans from dinner.

Tonight, we have tickets for a concert @ Seven Steps Up in Spring Lake. Our attendance is dependent upon the weather. Otherwise, no watering of the vast gardens is or will be required. Ciao.