| | | Editor's note: After fracturing a few fingers in an awkward sky-surfing landing last week, Wheeler is back at the keyboard. We received an e-mail from him Friday morning and decided to pass it along again. A word of warning: always wear a helmet.
Chapter 33
... in which our hero saves a dreamy Anna Kournikova from herself
I don't refuse drinks to many people. That's Lore's overall policy. Direct from my manager Stu Getzler.
After I've refused someone a drink, Stu almost always sits me down and gives me a talking to. Until I point out that the person who I wouldn't serve was so drunk already that he couldn't walk over and tell Stu anything. Most likely couldn't stand either.
But I refused to serve Barry Bonds last night. He wasn't drunk at all -- he'd ordered a club soda.
Still, I have my principles.
Bonds comes in when the Giants are in town losing to the Dodgers about as many times and ways as they can find. We all see Barry make one great catch on TV, but he spends most of the series standing at home plate wondering why the baseballs he has been hitting into the seats are suddenly being caught by the infielders.
"I'm in a lousy mood, Wheeler," he says when he comes in and takes a seat an hour or two after being whiffed by Jesse Orosco, who me and my buddy Puker
call the ugliest relief pitcher in history.
|  | | Barry Bonds has decided that he'll hit 42 homers this season -- and not one more. |
"You're going through a streak, dude," I say to Barry. "Everybody has streaks. There can't be a world without streaks."
I'm trying to cheer Barry up, which as everyone knows is a harder challenge than pitching to him. So I say, how about we go online with this guy I know
who lives in the White House and play a computer bass fishing game. Barry loves computers. I call him the cyber slugger.
But Barry tells me he's not bumming because he's not hitting homers. In fact, he's glad he's about to hit No. 40 so early, and that so many people are
comparing his pace to Mark McGwire's. He lets me in on a secret -- he's decided to stop at 42 for the rest of the year, basically stop hitting home
runs on purpose. It's the best way he can think of to tell fans and sportswriters to screw themselves.
"The real reason I'm depressed," he says, "is I don't want to have to go to the All-Star Game. I'm going to claim I'm injured." He takes out his cell
phone to dial the number.
That's when he orders a club soda.
That's when I refuse him.
That's when Bonds goes to Stu Getzler to get me fired.
"Mr. Bonds here claims you won't serve him what he's politely requested," Stu says to me through his clenched teeth when he walks over. "I think you better have a good explanation to offer Mr. Bonds and me for why."
"There's no kid in America," I say, "who doesn't dream of making the All-Star team. And there's no kid in America who'd ever dream of not going."
"You're a big dreamer, that it, Wheeler?" Bonds says, looking at Stu and wondering how come I haven't been fired yet.
Now Stu has a problem on his hands, because even Stu Getzler has dreamed of playing in the All-Star game, and it's hard for him to take Barry's side.
Besides, whoever said, "The customer is always right," didn't work in a bar.
I say to Barry, "You just have to play in the All-Star Game."
"What's the last real dream you had, Wheeler?" Barry says, laughing at me.
I make him a deal. I say I'll tell him my dream, if he'll promise to play in the All-Star Game.
"Only if I like your dream," Barry says.
|  | | Anna Kournikova is a bit depressed by her victory drought. |
I love a challenge. So I tell him the dream I had last night. I'm kite-surfing up near Topanga Beach. It's night. There's a full moon shining
on the water. I'm cutting 25-mile-an-hour moves along the coast, jumping 20 feet out of the ocean. It's killer.
Then I look up and see a tall, blond woman in a white nightgown standing on this rock above the water. She's framed against the mountains. I see that
it's Anna Kournikova. For some reason I can tell she's about to jump. So I surf over there to see what's wrong.
"There is no reason to go on any longer, Wheeler," Anna says. "My foot isn't healing. My ranking is dropping. I have become a joke. People think, 'Oh, she
is beautiful, she makes millions of dollars showing herself off, her sports bra, her stock market advice. They don't realize how much this hurts me. I do
not care if I am beautiful. I would gladly be as ugly as Betty Stove, if I could win one tournament."
"Really, Anna?" I say, sitting on my board and bobbing in the moonlit waves below her.
"Well, maybe not," she says, after giving it a second thought, "but I am still hurt."
So I help her down from the rock and put her on my board. And we take off.
The kite is up there in the wind. And Anna's in front of me as we surf across the ocean. I'm holding onto her real tight. And I surf all the way to
Wimbledon and let her off at the stadium.
"She goes out and wins the tournament and then we get married," I say to Barry. "Her parents like me, too. And we go to a lot of clubs."
Barry and Stu finish listening to my dream, and I can't tell at first what Barry thinks of it.
Finally, he puts his cell phone away.
"If I promise to play in the All-Star Game," he says, "will you give me a club soda, Wheeler?"
I'm happy to pour.
Next week: In Chapter 34, our hero straightens out Roger Clemens.
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