Good morning or good evening, wherever you may be, across the nation and across the world. It is just past 6:00 a.m. in "The City."

The current temperature is 61° under clear skies. Today's high is forecast to reach 77°, under mostly-sunny or partly-cloudy skies. I never can fugure out what the difference is between partly-sunny and partly-cloudy. There is no precipitation in the forecast until Sunday with a 60% chance. The sun will rise today @ 7:28 a.m. and set tonight @ 7:48 p.m.

I heard the morning passage of the train in the RSTL @ about 10:00 a.m., but I was too lazy to get up and look. Later, @ 12:55 p.m., Ginger and I watched the northbound end of the run as MMRR locomotives #2025 and #2019 passed by towing 14 CHCs, three DBTCs, and one DWTC.

We took the fur-children for a walk after more reading of our shared non-fiction book yesterday afternoon. We walked to the library to return a book, using that as a short enough distance for STWD and not nearly long enough for Ginger. Alas, we had some errands to run, so that had to suffice.

We stopped at our local Restore™ store for some sundry things and then went across the street to the local big-box home center for some lumber and paint to complete some fall decorations that should look nice on the porch of the manse.

Then it was off to The Camera Store in Muskegon where Mary was able to get the lens cap for her new camera. This cap protects the lens in a way that the previous small ring could not, a full cover versus nothing.

Then it was time for a stop at Stan's before we headed home to our angry fur-children's dinner as well as our own.

We watched some TV news over dinner and then some game shows. That's before I made the mistake of coming up to the media-room to watch as the 82 - 70 Cubs squandered a chance to take over the top position in the Wild Card race following yesterday's loss by the Nationals to the Cardinals. The Cubs lost the game 2 - 3 to the Reds. In addition, that win by the Cards and the loss by the Cubs added another game to the ledger in what is now a regular season with only 10 games left to play. The Cubs are 3 games behind the Cardinals.

The Cubs open a series tonight @ 7:15 p.m. EDT against the 1st place in the NL Central Cardinals as Kyle Hendricks tries to regain the momentum the Cubs lost to the Reds. The Cubs miss Anthony Rizzo and Javier Baez on both offense and defense. The Cubs have seven games left against the Cardinals, with four @ home in "The Friendly Confines" and three in St. Louis @ Busch Stadium, sandwiched around three games against the Pirates in Pittsburgh.

My 79 - 72, fading fast and in 3rd place in the AL East Red Sox, were thumped by the Giants last night, 3 - 11. Jeff Samardzija was overpowering for the Giants, while Jhoulys Chacín couldn't get anyone out for the Sox. This afternoon's game @ Fenway features the pitching of Sox ace, Eduardo Rodriguez versus the Giants Madison Bumgarner @ 1:05 p.m.

The Tigers, well, they are the Tigers and they lost to the Indians, 1 - 2 last night in spite of a terrific performance by losing pitcher, Spencer Turnbull. At 7:15 tonight, the Tigers send 3 -12 Dan Norris to the mound versus 11 - 3 Mike Clevinger for the Indians. Wait til next year!

Tonight we are planning to go to the library for a presentation on a book entitled MI Bad, Robbers, Cutthroats, & Thieves in Michigan's Past and Present, presented by the author, Tom Carr, @ 7:00 p.m.

I hope to get started on those fall decorations too. I'm not sure what Mary has in mind. So much to do, so little time. Ciao.