My cousin went to High School every day.  I know you are saying, so did I.  But you are wrong.  She went every day.  Every single school day.  180 days, for 4 years straight.  720 straight days of school!  I taught high school.  In my 18 years there, not one student EVER had perfect attendance for even 1 year, never mind 4!  God, didn't she ever need a mental health day?  We teachers need them all the time.  We justify that if we didn't take them, conveniently on Yankee Opening Day, we might go ballistic and honestly tell the students what we actually thought of their work.  And what would that lead to? Depression and anxiety in the hallways. Xanax being popped like M&Ms. People crying in the bathrooms.  Oh, wait, that was the teaching staff.  Better for all of us to keep quiet and let all the students think they're brilliant.  This should be the motto of all education.

I once had a teacher who worked for me with quite a similiar and impressive record.  He called in sick after every single Jets home game.  I admit, I wasn't too swift.  It took me 4 years to catch on, and then only because I showed up in his room to observe him teaching.  There I sat in the back of the room, pen and clipboard ready to go, when one of his students turned to me, laughing and said, "You think he's here?  Jets at Meadowlands yesterday, lady!  He's probably sleeping it off in his car on the turnpike."  God, I felt like such an idiot.  How could this 14 year old figure it out so quickly, and not me, Ms. ooh I have a clipboard?  But, then again, I'm not a real fanatical Jets fan.  Now if he was out during every Boston vs. NYY series, I would have immediately picked up on it!  NYY vs. Seattle, would have have been a stretch though. Probably because I am always exhausted from those west coast trips. MLB should make everyone play games on east coast time for my convenience.  But I digress.  I do that a lot.

Baseball is a sport that values these consececutive records and numbers.  Don Mattingly played in 8 consecutive games hitting at least one homerun in each.   Cal Ripkin has the record for most consecutive games played at 2,632.  Tom Seaver has the record at 10 for most consecutive strike-outs.  But many of us have our own personal records.  Some fans claim they have never been to a losing game.  I think @Amandarykoff on twitter, and now of ESPNW, holds the record for attending the most Mitre starts.  (Not something anyone is trying to top her at). 

I believe though that I am the holder of the most bizarre consecutive Yankee record of all time.  A title I wish I did not hold, but for some reason, was thrust upon me.  Good, bad or ugly, it is to say the least extremely unusual and worthy of a plaque somewhere.  Maybe not in monument park, but somewhere well visited.  The wall next to the garlic fries stand, or the ladies bathroom.  My acheivement is almost embarrassing, yet noteworthy.  I have seen many things at Yankee Stadium.  Wins, losses, games that should have been won or lost.  I've seen the bizarre, such as  balls thrown into the stands when there was only two outs, people dressed in Red Sox gear when they are not even playing, and burgers, fries and drinks costing $60! Oh wait, that is just Yankee Stadium prices.  But by some bizarre coincidence, twist of fate, or divine providence, I had, **hides face under pillow** NEVER seen Jorge Posada catch a game.  No, not just in 2010, or 2009, or 2008.  I mean EVER! As in Never Ever, Ever, Ever.  The Never Ending Story Ever. From 1995 to 2010 I had seen Jorge Posada catch 0 times. Zero!  ZERO! Not one out, not one inning. Its like God had banned me to some eternal damnation with every backup known to mankind. 

Seriously, how the hell does this happen?  Its not like the guy is a B-lister.  He played in over 100 games most seasons.  But for some weird reason, every time we had tickets, he didn't catch. I have seen him DH, but I needed to see him catch to remove this curse.

And what a curse it was.  In the beginning, I didn't think it was an issue.  It took me years to figure out something was weird!  I mean, I have never seen a game where Jeter wasn't playing SS.  Big deal, he plays like every game.  (Though just once I would like to see a game where I'm not sitting by the girl holding the "Marry me, Derek" sign who squeals every time Derek touches the ball.  He's touching the ball honey, not you.  Sit down and have a beer.)  Then how did I get on the Posada absentee list? Its not like he was on home instruction. OK, I don't get to go to a lot of games.  I was pregnant for two seasons!  And the last thing I thought to be doing during those 9 months was waddling around the stadium looking like Orca.  Yes, I did look like Orca....Orca pregnant... having twins...while smuggling watermelons...and beachballs...while puking her guts out.  Nice visual, I know.  Climbing the Yankee Stadium stairs was not on my to do list either during pregnancy.

And there were the toddler years.  Lucky to make 1 or 2 games a season there.  Diapers and formula and sitters are expensive.  I was too tired to watch most of those games on TV, never mind drive to the city. Ugh!  The thought of lugging my giant diaper bag around Yankee Stadium was unbearable.  I didn't know if I would even be able to get through security to get into the stadium.  Imagine that checkpoint as you enter.  Me emptying 6 hours worth of baby and toddler gear out of the "diaper" bag.  I know you all want to be the poor schlub standing behind me in that line.  And where would I heat those bottles?  Excuse me, Mr. Hot Dog Guy, could I warm my bottles in your steamy sauerkraut?

But its not like I never went!  And as the kids got older, we went more and more.  Yet it was one bizarre occurance after another. In 2009 my kids thought Molina was starting catcher.  In 2010, my kids listed Cervelli as  the starting catcher, with Moeller as back up.  (Yes, my kids can name the NYY starters, and yes there are pop quizzes and unannounced tests on the subject.  Along with coloring pages, word searches and crossword puzzles.  I have to put my teaching education to use somewhere!)  

And then suddenly I realized, this curse was about me, not Jorge.  Every Posada injury was my fault!  I was positive!  2008 shoulder surgery!  My fault, I had tickets for a few days after Jorge was injured.  2009 sore finger. My fault, I had tickets shortly after.  2010 broken foot. My fault, I had tickets.  Concussions, my fault!  Sore Neck, my fault! World Hunger, my fault! Stock market collapse, my fault! Earthquakes, Volcanos, Tsunamis, my fault! I needed to end this and end it quickly before armegeddon or the black plague occurred.  Or worse, they put Pena in as emergency catcher!

In 2010 things came to a head.  I realized we were coming to the end of the road.  Jorge's days as starting catcher were coming to a close, and  I needed to end this dreaded streak, or at least make some money off of it. I began to think of ways I could extort money out of this situation.  I could threaten to buy tickets unless Jorge sent me a check.  I pictured my extortion note reading, "put $9,999 into my checking account or the baseball gods will attack you mercilessly".  It might have worked too, except I couldn't figure out how to get Jorge the extortion note, or my bank account number.  Not that Bank of America would let him make a deposit into my account.  I have a hard enough time making deposits into my own account.  I can't understand why they won't take my money? And $9,999 was nothing!  Less than one game's salary.  NYY probably spend more than that a month at Starbuck's. Hell, Jorge probably spends more than that at Starbucks every month. 

I was going to tweet Jorge's wife my demands.  For some odd reason she follows me on twitter.  Would you follow the woman responsible for the maiming and injuring of your husband? She must not know all those injuries were my fault! Poor Laura.  The wife is always the last to know!  But I couldn't figure out how to condense my extortion request into a polite Tweet utilizing the 140 character limit.  And multiple tweets seemed rude. I didn't want to be rude.  I was an extortionish, not impolite. So I just abandoned that idea.

OK.  Extortion wasn't going to work. As the season wore on, my desperation to see Jorge catch grew exponentially.  I began make up scenarios where I would send brownies laced with sleeping pills to Cervelli, Moeller and yes, even emergency back up Pena.  I was taking no chances!  But how could I ensure that Jorge didn't eat any of these brownies?  I mean, my brownies are legendary!  Triple chocolate!  No nuts.  Lots and lots of chocolate decadance.  I don't think even Girardi could withstand the lure of my brownies.  I still wonder if they had made Andy an offer including my brownies, if he might have relented and come back. I'm working on a special recipe with Captain Crunch to keep CC from opting out.  I Tweeted the press corp for help in delivering the brownies.  I asked them to just leave specially wrapped brownies where the catchers hang out.  But for some unknown reason, the beat writers declined to bring drug laced brownies into the clubhouse. 

I was on Twitter for over a year, before I ventured to break the embarrassing news to my Yankee friends, who could not believe it.  Every injury thereafter became my fault.  Every time Jorge did not trot onto the field, my timeline filled with "Are you at the game?".  My last regular season game was labor day weekend, 2010.  And no, Jorge did not get to catch, again.  And Yes, the sign girl sat near us AGAIN! Of course the whole AJ drama didn't help.  And, as you can guess, not seeing Jorge means I saw a lot of AJ.  Maybe I should have extorted money from Brian Cashman to produce a few more Ws, or just sent AJ those "special" brownies.  Maybe I was AJ's problem last season, too?

But, as the fates would have it, when all was thought lost, I answered a text from MLB giving away tickets to playoffs games.  I'm a sucker for these contests.  I mean, I have unlimited texting and spend half my life waiting for kids to finish their activities, so why not?  I couldn't believe when I won 4 tickets to the October 20th playoff game.  I anxiously waited to hear the rotation, praying for my last chance to undo the curse, to break the longest streak in MLB history! Even when it was announced it was a CC game, I was still nervous.  The yankees needed to win.  Could they survive me sitting in the stands?  Would even just having the tickets cause broken bones, injury, war, famine and pestilence? I watched batting practice that day from RF section 105.  This was the longest and tensest batting practice of my life.  Would Posada survive?  I gave twitter updates "no one is dead yet!"  Knowing my dubious record, no one on my Twitter feed was amused. 

So, yes, I did get to see Jorge catch that night! It was a great game. Swisher and Cano hit homeruns. The Yankees won, Jorge caught.  Saw CC and CJ Wilson pitch!  Andrus got picked off at 2nd base, and we fans made those stupid antlers at him.   I got to go to a playoff game, and I brought my husband and kids with me.  We over paid for food.  We overpaid for parking.  We carried blankets we didn't need on a beautiful warm fall night.  No one got hurt.  No one died.  I didn't have to drug anyone with brownies. And the curse was broken.  The streak was over.  I saw Jorge Posada catch the last game of 2010, the last playoff game for the  NYY, and Jorge's last game as starting catcher for the NYY in Yankee Stadium. It was a magical night.  And actually, both of my streaks were broken.  For the first game since 1995, I saw Jorge Posada catch, and didn't sit near that girl with the "Marry me, Derek" sign.  My claim to fame is now in the record books.

I wonder where the Steinbrenners are going to put my plaque?