July 31, 1908: Cubs win 4th straight, bribing a troublemaker, and marrying your celebrity crush.

The Cubs won a close game against Boston behind the bat of catcher Johnny Kling. Also, a troublemaker is bribed, and marrying your celebrity crush.

The Cubs are rolling right now, winning four in a row and seven of their last eight. Granted, all of those wins came against two of the weakest teams in the NL in Brooklyn and Boston, but a win is a win. Also, this road trip is about to get a lot tougher with Philly, New York, and Pittsburgh to follow tomorrow's series wrap-up with Boston, so all the more important that the Cubs win the easier ones first.

Today it was the bat of catcher Johnny Kling that led the way. Batting out of the eighth spot in the order, Kling knocked out three hits, including the go-ahead home run in the seventh inning that gave the Cubs the lead for good. By the way ... the left field wall at Boston's South End Grounds was a ridiculously shallow 250 feet, so that certainly helped Kling out today when he knocked this one over a fence that was borderline Little League distance.

I went deep(ish)

Here's how pathetic the Boston Doves were in 1908 ... despite this absurdly short porch in left field, their team leader in home runs only tallied THREE dingers all year. If those field dimensions still existed in Boston today, I think David Ortiz would just start batting right handed and would probably still crank out 25-30 home runs.

The Doves had their chances all day long, putting runners on base in every inning except the 9th, but Orval Overall managed to work out of jam after jam to hold down the victory. Johnny Evers returned from his three game suspension for yelling at the umpire and picked up two hits on the day.

He also picked up a nifty little bribe from manager Frank Chance, who offered to buy him a $60 suit at the end of the season if he could keep himself from getting suspended again. So we'll just have to wait and see if the hothead can keep his mouth shut for the next two months!

In other news, let's talk about marrying your celebrity crush. So ... start thinking about that dreamy person who just popped into your head when I brought this topic up. For me (currently at least), I'm smitten with lovely British singer Ellie Goulding.

Hi ... I'm Ellie

She's a cutie pie, plus the British accent thing totally does it for me. That said ... I just don't think it would work out between us. I'm sure she's a lovely woman, but she's also a vegan. Meanwhile, I went to the butcher earlier today and picked myself out a two-inch thick USDA Prime bone-in ribeye that I'm going to gnaw on tonight like a starving wild animal. Something tells me episodes like this would put a damper on my marriage to the lovely Ellie.

I also enjoy me some Demi Lovato, but her sobriety ... while totally admirable and respectable ... conflicts a great deal with my total lack of sobriety. So yeah ... I don't think our lifestyles would match up very well. But hey, it's fun to dream about it anyway, right?

Amazingly, sometimes this dream actually comes true and people end up marrying their celebrity crush. In 1908 a young man by the name of S.D. Liebermann read a book called "My Book of Prayer" by a woman named Muriel Strode. Sounds like a sexy book, eh? It's about the equivalent of "Zero Shades of Grey" if Im guessing.

Well Mr. Liebermann liked the book so much he started marking his favorite passages, and then managed to meet young Muriel and a budding romance began, which culminated on this day in 1908 when they were married. He married his celebrity crush!

OK ... now I'm aware that "celebrity" is a little bit of a stretch to be calling some lady we've never heard of who wrote a book none of us have ever read, but I needed to figure out a solid excuse to put a picture of Ellie Goulding in this entry, and it TOTALLY fulfilled that goal. Mission accomplished! In fact, here's one more!

OK ... now you're creeping me out there blogger boy!

In summary ... the Cubs win puts them at 55-36 for the year. Pittsburgh also won (which I swear it feels like they always manage to do this on Cub victory days), so the Pirates' lead remains just a half game. Fifth and final game of the series against Boston is tomorrow as the Cubs look for the clean sweep.