World Series time

Baseball good!

Maus and Wyatt gave me a 5-hour furlough on Friday so I could get down to Safeco for my first post-baby ballgame. Maus even gave me a $50 Mariners gift card to spend! ($10 of it went to beer; I dropped the rest in that kids' shop by the play area in center field. Of course.)

Great to be back at the park after a 3-month hiatus. The Ms lost, thanks to a Sheffield grand slam (which Kenji, bless him, negated last night with one of his own), but the highlight of the evening was the announcement of Ichiro's 5-year contract extension, which brought the house down. (The Ichiro highlight reel set to OK Go's Here It Goes Again takes the prize for best clip montage I've ever seen at Safeco.)

Plus, Seattle's only 3 back in the AL West and 2 back in the Wild Card. Momentum!

The other highlight of the week is the return of VH1's World Series of Pop Culture. This is worth watching just for the fantastic team names: I Y Jake Ryan. Ronnie, Bobby, Ricky, and Mike. Fra-gee-lay. They're Real And They're Spectacular. Carlton Banks Dance Academy.

Sadly, all the best-named teams have already been eliminated from this year's tourney except for Fra-Gee-Lay. But Maus and I are having a grand time coming up with pop-culture team names of our own:

• They Got The Mustard Out
• Nobody's Listening Anyway
  (or Juuust A Bit Outside)
• They Mostly Come At Night Mostly
• The Regal Beagles
• The Screaming Vikings
• Bought, Sold, and Processed
• Physics Club Banquet
• Baby Fishmouth
  (or Don't F*** With Mr. Zero)
• Fifty Bucks, Grandpa
• Zero Point Zero
• Those Aren't Pillows

We could keep spitting these out all day. We often do.