Gametime approaches. My deli is laid out (pickles on the right…knife for the mayo…where the hell is the dip?), the feast is already underway. Zsu Zsu and her damn head cheese. I with my smoked Virginia ham and Wisconsin Braunschweiger. Plochman’s mustard please, damn the Grey Poupon.

I am inching the volume up on the WBBM hometown radio broadcast. Let’s see if they can synch up the radio with the TV today. It actually varies from week to week. Jeff Joniak, Bears homer announcer, tells people to turn down the TV and listen to the radio broadcast instead. I would be more than happy to oblige (the prospect of Joe Buck doing a football game – a BEARS football game – causes my knees to knock and my hands to palsy) except there is something really disconcerting about hearing the play unfold on the radio before the ball is snapped. There have been times when the delay was 5 seconds or more. Clearly, WBBM techies must do a better job.

My cat snowball is curious about Zsu Zsu’s brain food. She sniffs it suspiciously and refuses the offer of a treat. Uninvited, she begins to lick the knife that I used to spread the brauncschwieger. Ah! That’s more like it! Why do you bother with that crap when you have perfectly good food here, she asks with an imperious look that both melts the heart and chills the bones.

My theory about cats is simple; they were left behind by the Olympian Gods to keep an eye on us. And to rule us. Man’s relationship with cats has been one long nightmare of being preyed upon. One of the earliest homo sapiens fossiles is that of a young boy with two holes in the middle of his skull. The holes match exactly the canines of a leopard. The beast leapt from a tree or rock and buried his teeth in the youngster’s head, dragging him away to his doom. This image must be hardwired into our brains. This is why domestic cats engender both awe and fear. Unlike dogs, cats have no problem looking you right in the eye and staring you down. And in that look, we always wonder what they are thinking.

I decided long ago that they had only one thing on their mind when they stare at us like that: Lunch.

Coach Lovie is being interviewed. He sounds confident. He always sounds confident. Therre isn’t a coach in the NFL being interviewed today who doesn’t sound confident. Except maybe Dennis Green of the Cardinals. He probably sounds depressed. Or mad.

Given the way his season is going, I wouldn’t be surprised if his assistants didn’t have him on some kind of hari-kari watch.

Good news. Looks like speedster wide receiver Bernard Berrian will play today. That should stretch the field for Rex “The Wonder Dog” Grossman and perhaps open the underneath a little more for tight end Desmond Clark.

Zsu Zsu wants to change the channel and turn down the radio. She wants to watch the end of this stupid chick flick on Lifetime. I quietly but firmly told her that this was out of the question, that 16 Sundays out of the year there will be no interruptions, no arguments, and no changing the channel to chick flicks on Lifetime.

Now that I’m in the bedroom watching the rest of the pre-game, I think I’ll finish this little pre-game warmer upper. I wish the damn game was web simulcast with the WBBM call of the game overdubbed. Oh well – give the net a few years. Anything is possible.