Joe Growl-aur

Jim Rantz showed up Monday -- it was "Got it at a Thrift Shop Night" at the game -- and they were giving things out that they'd gotten from Goodwill.

One of the items was a large stuffed sheep. The fan that received it, had a blast with it and was holding it up and shaking it throught the game. It was one of those spontaneous things that was brilliant.

Anyway, they were saying the sheep is going up on myspace.com as "Miracle Sheep" etc, etc. etc.

And of course I told the staff that I thought the sheep was brilliant.

In any case, I come in tonight and the staff had a very large stuffed golden teddy bear for me, which Andrew delivered with his little son A.J. following behind, eyes all a goggle.

The sheep was about 5 pounds, the bear is about 15 or so. It's going to be a bit tougher to animate him. But that's okay, I needed some exercise in my life.

Anyway, I really didn't have an agenda for tonight but several of the GCL boys showed up and I thought I'd go sit with Jim, just to weird them out. However, that's when I got waylayed with the bear. And the boys were leaving at that point.

I go and say hi to Jim anyway who looks at the bear and says "Don't bring that to Gulf Coast League tomorrow."

Hadn't really planned on it, but it will likely still be in the front seat of the car.

After I went back to to my seat, one of the bat boys came to talk to me and then well...

We tried to come up with names for the bear. Now, I believe I've got a Miracle T-Shirt that will fit him and the Miracle hat I bought at the yard sale this winter is a couple of sizes to big for me, but I should be able to tack it onto his head at a jaunty angle.

Anyway, later, I was talking to Chris our concession guy, and he said "How about 'Miss-A-Bearicle'?" which is a play on the mascot's name. I said no and added that I thought it was a boy bear in any case.

"Well, what does he like to do?"

"Come to Miracle games, obviously."

"Then I think you should name him Joe Growl-aur."

So Joe Growl-aur it is. Now all I have to do is find a little mitt for him.

Once I get him dressed, I'll post pictures.

And open up a myspace.com account for him.