OK, waiting for Sarah to finish up, so some observations.

* First, thanks to James for his info on the Quest, the cartoonish Brit that populates CNN's international version. JQ, I expect an impersonation at TrashMasters, regardless of whether you had to do one for the CNN Christmas party or not.

* I'm still not sure what Manny was complaining about with that pitch that sparked the bench-clearing. I'm sure he was looking for an excuse, but he could have done better. Heck, he could have let Clemens plunk Kevin Millar, who seems just crazy enough to throw his bat back or something.

* Oh, and while it's nice to see Don Zimmer acting spry, he should perhaps stick to mall walking and hitting fungoes. That or he and Johnny Pesky should be given time for a battle royale during the seventh inning stretch.

* Part of the problem with trying to find baseball information here is that we're fighting against qualifying for the 2004 European soccer championship and the Rugby World Cup. That and the Gaelic football season has recently ended, and there are a lot of managerial changes. Though I'm sure if that all wasn't going on, they'd find something else to report on rather than baseball.

* The whole Governor Schwarzenegger thing got a lot of coverage, including one CNN guy trying to make it out as a new social movement for the US relative to anger at politicians. It was funny watching the expert he was talking to tell him repeatedly that it wasn't. You can only hear "not really" so many times before you start thinking that the anchor should start moving on.

* I've started Neal Stephenson's Quicksilver, only about 100 pages in. So far so good, though I've been reading in fits and starts, so I've not really been able to get into it. I'm sure the flight back will provide ample opportunity.

* I'm still not quite used to my wedding ring. I play with it a lot, which pisses Sarah off when it involves removing the ring from my finger (I've been doing this thing where I take it off, flip it, and put it back on). It may even be that my ring is too big! Probably not, but it does seem to move around quite a bit (though it never makes to slip off).

* And while I'll comment more on this when I get back, both Sarah and I are at a point where if we don't see another chip (french fry to you) again, we'll be OK with it.