With apologies to Carl Sandburg, I am NOT a fan of Chicago.

Apparently my beloved Cardinals agree with me. What is it about the Windy City that has rendered the Cardinals zero-for-Chicago this year? I can handle losing to the Sox better than I can losing to the Flubs. Good grief ~ let the Cardinals come to town, and the underachieving, Lee-less Small Bears think it's 1906 again when they won 116 games. A lot can change in a hundred years.

Anyway ~ except for some fun times with Pammy and Mark, Chicago isn't on my list of favorite places to be. I will always remember the crude and rude fans at Soldier Field when Pammy and I attended a Cowsboys/Bears game. The vocabulary of most of them was limited to nasty four-letter words directed not only at Cowboys and their fans but also at some of their own kids who didn't do so well in a punting competition at half time. Broken beer bottles littered the dark and dismal path from the parking lot to the stadium, and when we finally returned to the car, a Bears' fan was tinkling on our car.

Give me good ol' Southern Illinois any day. Yes, America, there are parts of Illinois that aren't Chicago. Thanks be to God.

And go, Cardinals!