There are no asterisks in spring

But you kind of expect that level of ignorance from somebody who lives somewhere that there is no Major League Baseball.

You get an asterisk after the end of the season when there's something noteworthy about a new record like a longer season or a postitive test for steroids or something like that.

Speaking of record-breaking baseball performances, true trivia: Mark McGwire's dad used to be my dentist.

Be a glutton for punishment: Read the strip

Bruce Tinsley, please don't talk about the Cubs

There are some things that I believe very strongly in. Two of them are that the DH rule is the product of Satan, and that you should cheer for the baseball team from the city of your birth for the entirety of your life. This means that when I have kids, they'll be raised to be Dodger fans, even though I'm a Cubs fan.

So as a dedicated Cubs fan, let me just say, Bruce Tinsley, you have no right to talk about my team. Just by acknowledging their existence in passing in a poem with no discernible meter, you make me feel like I need to take a shower.

And there's a reason people don't, as a rule, talk about sporting events in comic strips: By the time the strip hits print, nobody cares. The exception that proves the rule, of course, would be the Get Fuzzy strips about the Red Sox winning the world series.

But when it comes to college bowl games, come on, two weeks later, no one can remember who played in which one, let alone who won. People are busy worrying about more important things, like the NFL playoffs.

And speaking of the NFL playoffs, even though I'm Chicago-born and bred, I'm not rooting for the Bears. I will boycott them until they get rid of that abomination that they've desecrated Soldier Field with. It's fugly. And evil. L.A., meanwhile, has managed to lose not just one, but two teams in my time here, so now I just don't really pay attention to football at all. But that's OK, baseball season begins in just over two months.