When Lou Piniella was a player for the New York Yankees, he once flung his batting helmet in the dugout in anger and grazed the head of his manager Bob Lemon.
 

 “But that was a ricochet,” said Piniella’s Yankees’ teammate Fred Stanley, defending his buddy.  “It bounced off two things first. It was not an all-out assault.”
 

Just the same, Lemon started wearing a helmet in the dugout after that, just in case.
 

Piniella, now the manager of the Chicago Cubs and two years removed from his last serious temper tantrum when he kicked dirt on the shoes of the third-base umpire (who acted all offended as if somehow this was unexpected), finds himself in a little bit of an awkward position.
 

This week alone, Piniella has had two players ejected and two take their bats to the new drink dispenser in the dugout as if it was a giant orange piñata. These incidents shockingly did not involve Milton Bradley, a player who once had to be physically restrained from running up to his team’s TV booth in full uniform to yell at a broadcaster who said he lacked self control.
 

On Wednesday, Piniella’s pitcher, Carlos Zambrano, put on a show that had one Internet outlet calling it “one of the top meltdowns ever,” strong words in a sport that boasts more babies per square inch than your average daycare center.
 

 Zambrano, arguing a call that, naturally, was incontrovertibly correct, was thrown out of the game by the home plate umpire and responded by trying to throw out the umpire. When that didn’t work, Zambrano threw the ball into the outfield and then proceeded to attack the Gatorade dispenser.
 

Piniella raced out of the dugout to help restrain Zambrano, which is required of all baseball managers when one of his players is seriously disturbed, but Piniella could barely contain the giggles as he watched Zambrano give the ump the heave-ho.
 

It’s hard for Piniella to act all self-righteous when one of his players acts like a two-year-old, since he was the poster two-year-old as a player.
 

But now Zambrano faces a suspension, which means that just as he’s maybe returning to form after a stint on the disabled list, he will be on the bench again. 
 

Every sport has its goofballs. Hockey has its goons. But there is still a certain honor there that is not present in the seemingly more dignified sport of baseball. I am watching Wednesday night, as the Chicago Blackhawks line up, as hockey tradition dictates, and shake hands with the Detroit Red Wings after their overtime loss in overtime sends Detroit to the Stanley Cup Finals against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
 

Like they’re taught in pee-wees, they go down the line saying, “Good job,” to opponents who only minutes earlier tried to rupture their spleens.
 

Hockey is, well, charming as hell.
 

The Red Wings refused to touch their conference trophy after their victory, because they didn’t touch it last season and they went on to capture the Stanley Cup.
 

That’s a tradition as well. You don’t touch something as trivial as a conference trophy in hockey, you barely look at it, because it’s not the big one, the Stanley Cup, the one that demands your full respect and attention.
 

The Penguins touched their conference trophy, though. They put their fingerprints all over it, even carried it around. Why? Because they didn’t touch it last year and they lost to Detroit in the Stanley Cup Finals.
 

How do you not love this sport?
 

Baseball players don’t shake hands with their opponents. They act like babies and beat up drink dispensers and reduce their managers to those parents you feel sorry for in preschool when their kid is the biter.
 

You suspect Piniella will handle things. He’ll explain to Carlos why it’s wrong to try to throw the umpire out of the game and to swing your bat in the dugout.
 

And if that doesn’t work, Piniella can always start wearing a helmet.

The dream job.

More than once over the last few weeks, I have been told that I had that. And I’m not always sure how to take it.

I suggested to a female sportswriter friend that it seemed like it was maybe sexist. As in, “You should be grateful for having a job so seemingly great, being a woman and all.” I asked her if she thought male sportswriters were told the same thing.

Good friends tell you the truth. They also support you when you’re being irrational. I have a guy friend who, whenever I would launch into any complaint, would say, “OK, so what do you want me to say here?” and then give me a multiple choice of responses.

It’s kind of along the lines of asking your husband or boyfriend, “Does my ass look big in these jeans?” Even “No” is not a good answer if you don’t say it the right way or quickly enough.

But my female friend told me the truth, that I was basically an idiot. Women sportswriters do not throw around the “S” word lightly. We save it for when we really mean it, when it really applies. Otherwise, it just diminishes the real examples.

“No,” she said, “I don’t think it’s sexist. And yes, I think male sportswriters are told that all the time.”

I wonder if male sportswriters are as careful in responding as I’ve always been. For example, when someone tells you how lucky you are to be a sportswriter, they really don’t want to hear about the deadlines or travel problems or athletes who treat you like spittle.

And I never tell anyone about the time I nearly neutered a monk.

OK, so he may not have been a monk. But a man of some religious persuasion and I shared a limo from the airport once, and I broke the cardinal rule of limo riding or really any moving-vehicle riding, which is:  Do NOT get up while it is moving.

In my defense, I was merely trying to give the driver my credit card in order to get a little bit of a headstart in getting out of the limo when it arrived at my house. Of course, I did this at a toll booth, which is not technically a stopping point. But also in my defense, it had been an arduous road trip, I was at an advanced stage of pregnancy and there was some urgency in expediting the proceedings, if you get my drift.

As I retrieved my card, the driver inconsiderately started moving again, thereby throwing me toward the back seat, where my co-passenger was sitting, minding his own business.

For those of you who don’t know what happens to a pregnant woman’s fingernails when she takes prenatal vitamins, let’s just say they are not unlike lethal weapons. This can actually be a wonderful and beautiful thing unless you’re being thrown into a perfectly innocent monk inside a limo.

I’m not exactly sure where I violated him, but it was apparent he was in great pain, bent over and nothing I said could either restore his power of speech or keep the limo driver from laughing.

You see what the driver knew that I did not, was the destination of the other passenger. He had been wearing a coat, thus hiding his identity until we pulled up to his stop, which happened to be a monastery.

He was very nice when he got out of the car, whimpering a goodbye and nodding as I apologized for the fortieth time. I asked the driver if the man could have really been a monk and between hysterics, he assured me that he was, adding some other really unfunny remarks.

Now I’m sure you’re saying, “But this could happen to anyone, not just someone with a dream job as a sportswriter.”

And I would have to agree.

So would my co-passenger once he stopped whimpering.

Being out of work gives you time to reflect, to ponder, to –as former Bulls coach Phil Jackson once said of himself — think deep thoughts, such as why Mr. Spock got such a raw deal with the bad haircut.I was outnumbered this weekend on a trip to the movies and so I found myself at Star Trek.  A boy movie. And a geek movie, at the risk of offending all geeks who might possibly stumble across my blog on their way to a Trekkie website or convention or something. As someone who is neither a stereotypical female moviegoer nor a stereotypical female, for that matter — i.e., I include Diner, Caddyshack, Dirty Harry, Scarface, Goodfellas, Stripes, Cool Hand Luke, The Longest Yard, and pretty much every other prison movie among my favorites – I was not pre-disposed to disliking this movie.And I did like it, on some level, which I will share in a moment. I would promise that I won’t ruin the plot of Star Trek, but frankly, I am not capable as I don’t really know what happened except there were more explosions at the end and more beaming up of people, and Spock still had his bad Vulcan haircut.I do not in any way want to suggest that I, nor any other woman, lacks the intellectual capacity to understand a typical guy movie such as this one.  This one was easy compared to others of its ilk. Star Wars? My daughter Amanda and I somehow thought we could stomach that one with her father and brother. But we bolted out of the theater about 10 minutes in, and ended up sitting through the final hour of a movie in which we did not recognize a single actor, couldn’t tell you the title or the plot line. But it was infinitely more enjoyable because – and this I do remember – it a) had humans in it and b) took place within a time period of 10 billion years from today.In the interest of societal and cultural significance, I believe it is important to delve into why men and women differ so dramatically when it comes to movies. Perhaps I should disqualify myself because as I previously disclosed, I am not your typical woman. Also, as I perused a list of “top 10 chick flicks,” according to “O” Magazine, I found myself instantly annoyed with the clichéd “chick flick,” expression and I discovered that I couldn’t stand most of the movies on the list.I mean, The French Lieutenant’s Woman, The English Patient, and four others made before 1947? I was bored just reading the list. Where was Pretty Woman, Terms of Endearment, When Harry Met Sally . . ., Steel Magnolias, Dirty Dancing,  A League of Their Own, Titanic?But once again, I digress.I think about why a man – and for the sake of a specific example, my husband Rick – could not sit through, say, Terms of Endearment, without audibly groaning,  but he could and has, sat through Legally Blonde. Many times.And why did I literally sprint out of Star Wars but I sort of liked Star Trek?Could it possibly be because my husband has a not-so-secret crush on Reese Witherspoon (after once catching him pausing just a little too long while flipping past Legally Blonde 2, it wasn’t that hard to figure out) and I thought the guy who played “Captain Kirk” in Star Trek resembled a young Brad Pitt?I have no real aversion to explosions or your typical movie gore. I mean, Scarface is so bloody, it becomes humorous. Maybe I like it because I resent being pigeonholed or left out in the same way I resented not being allowed to play Little League as a child. But in the same way my husband watches the end of Titanic and yells angrily — each and every time — for Leonardo DiCaprio to grab the piece of wood that Kate Winslet is using as a floation device while I weep over the tragedy of it all; I watched Star Trek and all I could think of was why Spock’s mother, being human and everything, allowed him to have that haircut.In the end, we accept our differences, embrace them.Men focus on the superficial. Women have feelings.And we both like to look at the beautiful.There, that was easy.

Pedaling away in spin class this morning, and when I wasn’t thinking about possibly hurling, I was considering how fame can ruin people.
 

I’m not sure how exactly I made this jump from queasiness to Kris Allen and “Jon & Kate, Plus 8.” But oddly, I have been feeling sorry for the whole bunch of them.
 

Maybe it is because I have seen fame relatively close up. And I have observed how, in this country, the more famous someone becomes, the harder, seemingly, they must eventually be brought down. In a broad sense, the profession in which I have made my living has been largely responsible for this.
 

I’m not referring to athletes so much. Other than the really big names/steroid users, most athletes can live fairly normal lives without worrying about showing up on the cover of the National Enquirer.
 

Sure, they have to deal with being interrupted at dinner with their families, and I’m sure that can get tiresome.
 

But frankly, that seems a pretty small price to pay for the salaries most of them earn. And after their careers are over, most can retreat back to living even more normal lives paying for their own meals, making reservations for dinner and no doubt craving the attention they may have complained about before.
 

I remember when the Chicago Bulls were winning championships in the early 90s, their young reserve center Will Perdue told me he used to enjoy going to one place in particular for lunch because afterward, the waitress would not merely give him and his teammates leftovers in a goody bag. She would bring several shopping bags to their table loaded with bags of bagels and desserts.
 

At 25, 26, I’m sure he thought this was not that unusual, and that he would walk out of restaurants with giant bags of extra food forever. Maybe he even thought we all walked out with enough stuff to stock a small food pantry, though I think he was smarter than that.
 

He’s also lucky because he got out unscathed.
 

After Kris Allen was named the winner of American Idol earlier this week, one of my friends remarked casually that his marriage was over. Here was this adorable 23-year-old man with his adorable wife, who were hugging each other minutes after the biggest moment of their lives, and all across America, people were shaking their heads and lamenting that their marriage would soon be in trouble.
 

OK, well maybe not all across America, but at least in all the cynical sections like the one where I apparently reside.
 

It’s not that the pessimistic among us assume this apparently upstanding guy will suddenly become unfaithful. It’s just that the sheer volume of attention and scrutiny and yes, guaranteed aggressiveness from female fans, is sure to put added pressure on the marriage.
 

He went from a college kid to a celebrity of huge proportion in a matter of months, arguably even weeks. And his life is no longer his own. While that will undoubtedly bring with it more money than he could have imagined making a few months ago, as well as a career he apparently dreamed of having, you know it will also come at a cost because it’s not just about plying your craft. And you wonder if it will all be worth it for him in the long run.
 

Same thing with Jon and Kate. When my daughter and I first stumbled across TLC and a show called “Jon & Kate Plus 8,” four years ago, it was like our own private discovery. No one was watching the network, much less this little reality show about a Pennsylvania couple who had twin girls and infant sextuplets.
 

In a matter of a few weeks, my daughter Amanda could differentiate between all the kids by name. In a few months, I was considering writing to Kate and telling her that if she needed a babysitter or summer girl, I had the perfect one.
 

I loved Kate. She was totally together and organized and smart and funny, even when she was losing her mind and her husband was annoying her and her life was out of her control. Her husband Jon was cute and funny also, sweet but no pushover, took as well as gave back to his wife during the daily little sniping that all couples without eight children do.
 

And then you hear that Kate is being savaged in the Internet for being so bossy and nasty to her husband. And Jon is photographed at a college party with female co-eds and again, with a younger woman with whom he has been accused of having an affair, all of which he has downplayed and denied.
 

When the show started, Kate said she allowed cameras to invade their lives because she loved the idea of having this amazing video diary of her children since she clearly no longer had time to do it herself. And yes, you knew they were being paid, though you never thought it was enough to radically change their lifestyle given their modest home and the way they lived.
 

You surely didn’t resent them.
 

But then they moved into a huge new house on 30-plus acres of land, Jon quit his job, Kate’s sniping seemed a little harsher as her little life expanded more with books and speaking engagements and yes, fame. 
 

When I saw her on the cover of People Magazine with scandalous headlines last week, I had to blink a few times, like I was seeing my sister or my neighbor. Such is the nature and attraction of reality TV that we are drawn to it by the very intimacy I felt with perfect strangers. It’s goofy. Now the two are splattered across dozens of magazines and tabloids, not to mention the entertainment shows, their marital status up for grabs, and with the first episode of Season 5 upon us, it’s enough to consider actually watching it live.
 

OK, I think I’ve been out of work long enough.
 

But seriously, I actually just went to the TLC website to see what’s up – telling myself it was all in the interest of good, solid reporting – and they had a little preview of what’s to come. 
 

“It’s the best thing and it’s the hardest thing that’s ever happened,” Kate said of the show and her newfound celebrity.
 

“We have to live in the public now,” said Jon. “I’m happy our show is popular but it’s hard being on this side of the camera. We don’t have any privacy at all. . . . That’s tough for me. I can’t be Jon. I have to be Jon and Kate plus eight.”
 

I was riveted. Again, I am not proud of this. But when Kate said, “We can now never go back,” I felt for the woman.
 

I wanted her new kitchen. But I felt for the woman.

Took an early-morning power walk today with my friend Shari in which we walk really fast unless, a) Shari is waving to a passing car driven by someone she doesn’t know; or b) we forget to walk really fast because c) we’re talking about something important like how long Shari would last living in a jungle.
 

This was not idle chit-chat. This was a current events topic initiated by the news story broken exclusively on the Today Show this morning that Patti Blagojevich, wife of disgraced Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, was taking her husband’s place on the NBC reality show, “I’m a Celebrity . . . Get Me Out of Here,” set in a Costa Rican jungle.
 

Rod had been barred by a judge from appearing on the show – which I’m not entirely convinced isn’t filmed on a backlot in Burbank – because it would take him out of the country when he might need to be proclaiming his innocence on more talk shows.
 

Patti said she hoped that being on the show would put to rest her profanity-spewing image caught on federal wiretaps.
 

This would not be my first concern as I would surely begin swearing like a sailor the minute I stepped off the plane and discovered we were filming during the rainy season and that I would have nowhere to plug in a blow dryer, which, come to think of it, may have been Rod’s reason for backing out.
 

Patti said she was doing this to support her family during these tough economic times, made tougher, no doubt, when your husband is no longer able to ply his trade trying to sell the President’s vacated Senate seat or shake down companies with state business for campaign contributions. Allegedly.
 

And so I posed the question to Shari: What would she be willing to do to support her family?
 

“Anything,” she said. “For my family? Oh my God, absolutely anything.”
 

“So, you’d go to the jungle?” I asked
 

“Oh, definitely,” she said, adding for effect, “I’d even eat worms.”
 

“No, you wouldn’t,” I said, remembering that she was once grossed out by the prospect of using a shared yoga mat at the ‘Y.’
 

“Oh no,” she said proudly. “For my family? I’d eat bugs, worms. I’d climb mountains.”
 

“Would you eat a squirrel?” I asked and instantly knew I got her.
 

“Well, no, because, you know, I don’t eat meat,” she said thoughtfully.
 

“Shari, the bugs and worms wouldn’t go that far,” I pointed out. “And, incidentally, the bugs and worms are technically meat too, I think.” 

“Oh, I wouldn’t eat worms,” she said, forgetting her earlier proclamation. “But I’d do anything else.”
 

“Would you kill a squirrel or a rabbit or some animal they have in Costa Rica?” I asked.
 

“Sure, I could do that,” she said.
 

“Not with a specially equipped dart blower that would put the bunny to sleep,” I pointed out, watching as her expression turned markedly less tough. “With a real knife.”
 

“A knife?”
 

I could tell I had her.
 

“Yes, Shari,” I said, going in for the proverbial kill. “A knife. With real blood.”
 

“Well, I don’t know,” she said, weakening.
 

“You wouldn’t last five minutes in the jungle,” I said. “They’d bounce you out of there in the first episode.”
 

“But I’d form alliances,” she said.
 

She had me there. She would be great forming alliances. In a day, she’d have the women a tight, united pack. Sanjaya and John Salley would be begging for mercy. Of course, on Day 2, it’s quite possible her women’s group would be arguing over who would have to kill the squirrel and Shari would have squared off with the super model who is supposedly meaner than Patti.
 

No matter. By now, Shari was bored with our conversation, so I had to quickly segue to the movie with Robert Redford and Demi Moore called “Indecent Proposal,” the one where Redford’s character offers a million bucks to Moore’s character and her husband, played by Woody Harrelson, to have Demi spend one night with Redford.
 

“A night with Robert Redford?” Shari said, when I reminded her of the movie.
 

We weren’t talking worms anymore.
 

And she didn’t have to answer.