What Would Thoreau Say?

Three hours before game time Clemente Bridge leading to PNC Park is packed with people, most of whom are probably at their first game of the year, drinking Bud Light.   Bud Light.   Like having sex in a boat-f-n’ near water.   How do people drink that stuff?   I give the Pirates credit for trying to create a Wrigley-ville type atmosphere with bands playing in the closed streets.   They aren’t there yet but there are a few bars and lots going on before the game most of which we wouldn’t even sniff at in Wrigley Field, like people dressed as pirates with eye patches, three cornered hats and peg legs.   If these guys showed up in Wrigley-ville they would probably be found somewhere in the middle of Lake Michigan by the third inning.   Though my Cubs have tried a mascot or two, and they have a stupid bear named Clark (for Clark and Addison the intersecting streets for Wrigley Field) they realize we will probably behead him if he shows up in public so...

HERE'S AN OP-ED I WROTE FOR OUR LOCAL PAPER AFTER YOGI BERRA DIED.... When you grew up in New York in the 50’s and 60’s you rooted for one of the major league teams at the time in that area:   the Giants, the Dodgers or the Yankees.   There was no such thing as switching loyalties and God forbid you should even whisper that you might have sympathy for one of the other two.   To do so was to cause a firestorm of derision from your friends.   This, in NY at that time, was absolute treason. When you greeted new kids you met on the playground, someone perhaps who had moved into the neighborhood, you did so with only one question:   “Giants, Dodgers, Yankees?”   The words clearly a question of importance and the answer all you had to hear to determine if the new friend was indeed to be a friend or foe.  And if the poor kid happened to come from Boston or St. Louis and had the guts to say he still rooted for the Red Sox or Cardinals, it might take t...