Hey Hey! Holy Cow! It's Baseball Time!\nTo give you an idea of how incredibly pumped I am for this 2004 baseball season, let me say I hate exclamation points. I think they're overused. My previous 24 columns contained a total of four exclamation points, and two of those were in the one I wrote about the Cubs during last year's playoffs. For those of you scoring at home, that's seven Cub-related exclamation points out of nine.\nMonday is Opening Day, marking the end of an agonizing 182 day wait since Game seven of the National League Championship Series. For five and-a-half long months, my fellow Cub fans and I have waited for this season, tortured by thoughts of what-ifs and endless replays of the disaster that was Game six. But that will all be over soon. It's springtime, and it's a new season.\nI know what some of you "Cub fans" are thinking. "Wait a second? They play baseball in April? Are you sure? 'Cause, uh, I didn't buy my Cub hat until September." Yes, there's baseball in April. Amazing, but true. \nAll ribbing aside, this column represents a terrific opportunity for those of you who jumped on the bandwagon late last year, because I am inviting all you "Cub fans" to experience an entire season of Chicago Cubs baseball absolutely free. After just a few short months, you'll be so thrilled with the joy of following the Cubs I guarantee you'll want to stick around for the rest of this season and many seasons to come.\nBeing a Cub fan is not easy, though it may sometimes look like it is. A common misconception about Cub fans is that we don't care how the team does as long as we have fun. Certainly there are people who go to Wrigley just to have a good time. I will not deny that. But true Cub fans -- and there are many of us -- care deeply about the Cubbies. We are Chicago fans, and Chicago fans are among the most loyal and die-hard of all fans.\nTo see us having fun at Wrigley and assume we don't care about the game is absurd. We were all devastated by the ends of Games six and seven. Drinking couldn't even cheer me up after that series. I just went home and went to bed.\nRemember, we have not been to a World Series in 59 years. That's too much pain for any fan to bear. If we wore our feelings on our sleeves, there would be no real Cub fans left. We would've all died years ago from self-inflicted head bashings into walls.\nI have a great deal of respect for true fans of any club, because I know what true fandom is about. What makes the Cubs special is not that we embrace losing, but that we embrace life. We get through the painful years by enjoying what we do have -- a team we love, a team that loves us, a great ballpark and the knowledge that when the Cubs finally do win another World Series, it will be sweeter than anything we've ever imagined. Being a true Cub fan is about learning to appreciate what you have rather than dwelling on what you don't.\n So to my fellow Cub fans and all of you coming aboard today -- and it had better be today and not September, since you've been warned -- I say to you, go Cubbies, and I'll see you in the World Series. That's right I said it, because you know what? Curses are for losers.
THANKS FROM THE JOHN: To the good people at Renaissance Rentals, who were handing out free barbeque and pops in the stadium lot last week.
