Carlos Zambrano wasn't even born when Milt Pappas threw the last Cubs no-hitter in 1972. The 27-year old is just the third pitcher from Venezuela to accomplish this momentous feat.

Zambrano was visibly tired in interviews moments after the game (Oh yeah, the Cubs beat the Astros 5-0). But Carlos suggested it wasn't the game itself that winded him but rather the celebration on the mound afterwards when his teammates mobbed him and they all started jumping up and down in unison.

Astros fans may insist on an asterisk placed beside this one. The game was technically a home game for Houston but with complications caused by Hurricane Ike, Major League Baseball moved the game to Miller Park in Milwaukee, a stone's throw from Wrigley Field. Consequently the park was filled with Cubs fans.

The no-hitter is even more amazing considering how hot the Astros were coming in to the weekend. They are contending for the Wild Card in the National League, having the best record since the All-Star break in July. Even after the loss yesterday, they are just two games behind the imploding Brewers and the momentum-gaining Phillies.

We Cub fans are also scratching our collective heads because Zambrano was hurt, had missed a start with a sore rotator cuff and had pitched horribly in his last five starts or so. Did his 100+ pitches aggravate the injury? That's what the Cubs and their fans will be watching closely now. As Zambrano himself said after the game, the World Series is the only thing that counts now.

Saturday Night Yawn

SNL had their highly anticipated season premier on Saturday. Ratings were high as expected as the election season is so highly charged right now with Sarah Palin's entrance onto the world stage. Add recent Olympic phenom Michael Phelps as host and we were all expecting a great show.

Except for the home run opening sequence that featured Tina Fey as Palin (separated at birth?) and Amy Poehler as Hillary Clinton, the show was simply not funny. Phelps is no Peyton Manning but the primary problem I believe was in the writing. The sketches just seemed to lack that creative comedic edge that has sustained SNL for a generation. The game show skit that lampooned home schoolers as a bunch of idiotic right-wing extremist religious buffoons was droll at best and downright offensive at worst. But forget how insulting it was. SNL has always been on the cutting edge of social commentary. The main crime in this and every other sketch was that they were simply not funny. New head writer Seth Myers better go back to the drawing board and come up with some better bits if they want to continue getting good ratings.

Or maybe I'm just getting old.

Bones followed up their disappointing 2-hour London premier with an episode last Wednesday about a man found dead in an outhouse. A fitting metaphor on so many levels. A whole hour of poo and sex banter, fortunately they never intersected.

The producers seem to be obsessed with sex this season and if they don't stop it, they will lose one of their most ardent fans. TW doesn't let me watch Two and A Half Men because of the relentless barrage of sexual content and it's why she abandoned Grey's Anatomy in their first season. Bones is her show not mine, especially now that Zack is for all intents and purposes a fading memory.