I'm sitting here procrastinating, reluctant to put fingers to keyboard, watching SportsCenter on ESPN. They're doing a story on rabid fans and their plans for the afterlife. They've profiled some fans having their ashes spread on an English football pitch, others being buried in a special area next to the stadium, and a line of MLB-themed caskets and urns. There's a 40-year old in a Yankees T-shirt sitting in a dank little room full of Yankees memorabilia with the Yanks urn on his lap.
I'm not one of those guys. I have a couple 2005 T-shirts, one (replica) Jersey (no name or number), one Sox hat that I don't wear anymore and a few thousand baseball cards '88-'90 in my closet. I'm a Sox fan, obviously, but I don't wear it on my sleeve. In fact, there are plenty of people who have no idea that I run this site or that part of the reason I don't wish to discuss the latest reality show fad is that I was busy watching one of the 150 Sox games a year that I'm able to fit into my schedule.
I don't know exactly where I'm going with this, but I think my initial point was supposed to be about perspective. I think I have it. I can't always be sure, but I think, as obsessive as I am about the Sox--and you have to be obsessive to write about them for 4 years for essentially no benefit--that I keep it within the realms of the clinically sane.
There are times that I just need to vent or take a few days off, and I've never hesitated to do either.
That being said, I think I'll refrain from writing about this past weekend's thrashing at the hands of the Cubs. I was already tired of the Cubs-Sox hoopla when I was asked to provide some quotes for a Chicago Tribune story on "whether both teams’ good play so far this year will affect the fans’ sense of rivalry."
I never responded--I rarely respond to anything that hits my inbox--Somehow I doubt the traffic gained from my single 'I don't really care about the Cubs. They're just another team.' comment would have been worth the time and effort of moderating the trolls it would no doubt attract. I'm sure the Powers That Be at SBN won't appreciate reading this, but I have no intention of making this the biggest Sox site on the net.
I want to have a site that I don't have to babysit. And it should be filled with the best and brightest the White Sox faithful has to offer. So, my gift to you this Monday morning, an SSH-free day. He'll be back tomorrow, but I thought it best for all of us if we had a day to decompress in his absence.
You're welcome.