Yesterday was all about the escape from Dayton. After our meeting, we raced to the airport. Check-in there yielded not the requisite two boarding passes, but rather two promissory notes. The first one was quickly converted to a boarding pass and off we flew to O’Hare. There we found our connection oversubscribed. With some trepidation, we waited in line, while the wait listed passenger’s names scrolled across the big screen. Finally our turn came. From an array of preprinted passes the attendant picked one for each of us. We were going to Saint Louis. Apparently everybody wanted to go to Saint Louis that night. Three of us ended up in the last row, on the prop-line, me with the window seat. I had a great view of the engine cowling as we flew over Busch Stadium last night.

The heat was on when I arrived home, Anne was on the couch and the score was already two-to-two, but I knew that already. I had no car radio, but I did have the Sporting News app on my iPhone. Last night’s game was tame, maybe even boring compared to the previous night’s game, where the Rasputin Cardinals just would not die. Now they are the World Champions. The franchise now has eleven such titles, for 11 in ’11, more than any other team save one, those damn Yankees. Tomorrow there will be a parade; Saint Louis always loves a parade. It will love this one better than most. I went to the one in 2006; this one should be just as good. Even though the parade is not until four, we’ll bike downtown, just to avoid traffic and parking hassles. We’ll bring lights along for the return run. Unfortunately, we have to wait until the Rams lose. It is the polite thing to do.

I have not heard a peep from my brothers, since the early innings of game six. Admittedly, I was a bit gruff then, but I and the Cards were in a bad place. Now that the matter is settled, I want to test the depth of their Ranger fandom. I’m pretty sure that last year they rooted for the Giants over the Rangers. I suspect that they are not so much pro-Rangers as they are anti-Cardinals, or closer to the point, set against me. I call it sibling rivalry. When Chris actually lived in Texas, Anne, our boys and I would visit for the holidays. Uncle Chris would challenge the boys with the declaration that Dallas is better than Saint Louis. This taunt would of course elicit the desired Pavlovian response; at least the boys were acting appropriate to their ages. I eventually would step in and then things would begin to escalate. In the eighties Dallas-Fort Worth had a lot of things going for it. It was a happening place. Saint Louis had longevity going for it. It was a city when Fort Worth was just a fort and Dallas no more than a small town. Saint Louis also had baseball. ’85 and ’87 were both pennant years and also our sons’ birth years. Both Anne and the Cardinals delivered those two years. Sibling escalation eventually led to Saint Louis being pitted against the entire state of Texas. It is hard for one small Midwestern burg to beat an entire state, especially one as big as Texas, but we did. Saint Louis is better than Texas!

Anne and I biked in the Park today. The fall colors are really starting to show themselves. I’ve been working a time-lapse photography project involving our new tree. It is really starting to autumn blaze. I hope to show it soon. We got 17 miles. We have a biker party tonight. The euphoria that has captivated Saint Louis should be on full display tonight.