Bandwagon forecast: 72 degrees, breezy, sunny

I wasn’t entirely forthcoming with an earlier post where I said the male obsession with “the game” is a bit tedious.

I have a tendency to be a fair weather fan when it comes to Chicago teams making it to post-season play, which we all know ain’t too often. So most of time, it’s true, I don’t give a hoot about sports.

I caught pennant fever a couple of years ago during the playoffs when the Cubs made it within five measly outs of the World Series.  The fever was so bad; I was actually hanging on every pitch of every game during that series. I read the Sports page. I wore a rally cap and drank Old Style. I could even commiserate with actual Cubs fans on subjects such as Dusty Baker’s insistence on keeping his pitchers in until they reached their pitch count, regardless of how the game was going.

It wasn’t all fun and games though. I learned that drinking while you have the fever can produce an incredibly awful side effect: near-blinding beer goggles. That’s probably something guys learn early on, I guess.

Now with the White Sox in the post season, I have what I can only describe as low-grade pennant fever. I’m just lukewarm—the other night I read the paper intermittently while watching the game.

I’m not sure why I’m not as into it as I was with the Cubs. I have lived south of Madison Street for eight of my last nine years in Chicago. And if the Southside would ever attempt to secede from Chicago, I would have no problem taking up arms against the citizens of Lincoln Park and Wrigleyville. I rarely drink on the North side, and except for a couple of friends up there, what do I care?

I guess pennant fever is like many illnesses. You get a bad case of it once and you develop immunity.