The number of porn starlets who wear crosses and, better yet, crucifixes is alarmingly high. A friend tells me of a production he saw where one starlet wore a “WWWJD?” bracelet.

Priceless.

The Cubs have now won their third straight series against a very good team, pulling to within only a half game of the Cardinals for second place. They certainly aren’t blowing anyone’s socks off, and Grudzielanek’s going down will hurt, but the Cubs do seem intent on staying in the hunt for a while longer yet.

Additionally, the Cubs’ destiny is to a great degree in their hands. They have 14 games against the Astros and Cardinals in August and early September, after which they play a string of sub-.500 teams to finish out the year. If the Cubs can win those series against the Astros and Cards it will be their division to lose in September.

And if they make the playoffs, with the strength of their starting pitching, anything can happen. Anything.

In other good news, the White Sox are still in second place.

But I finally finished the Internet.

Whew!

Baby, don’t hurt me.

Don’t hurt me, no more.

Check out this link, which I came across while doing some work-related research. Do you remember when it seemed like every other Web page around was this ugly?

My favorite part is the random pictures of the guy’s grandkid at the bottom of this otherwise insurance-related site. You’ll have to scroll down for a while to get to them since pretty much everything is on one page.

It takes me right back to 1994.

Really, I don’t expect much out of life. In many ways, I’ve got far more than I deserve: a loving wife, friends and family, a good job, a sense of humor.

Honestly, I don’t even expect or insist that the Jarvis el stop be clean. The smell of urine is, if not one if its charms, at least one of its defining features.

But I don’t think it is too much to ask: Please, no shit on the stairway.

I found, and rather studiously avoided, a big pile right on the landing between the two sets of stairs on my way back home from the Cubs game Tuesday night.

What’s the thought process that results in this? I understand that when you gotta go, you gotta go, and if you’re homeless it’s probably tough finding a place that will let you use their bathroom. But is the Jarvis stop so devoid of traffic that taking a dump right there on the stairway is as serene as a corporate honcho’s private bathroom?

What happened to doing it in the alley, behind a dumpster? Or in the bushes in the park?

By the way, I thought briefly of telling the station attendant about the matter, but I didn’t, mostly because I couldn’t be bothered but also because I didn’t want to be the one to deliver the bad news. Who wants to be the guy who has to inform someone that shit-cleaning has just been added to his nightly roster of duties?

I expect, at least, that some kind soul might return the favor to me someday.

Both the Red Sox and the Cubs won two out of three from the first-place teams they’re chasing — the evil, evil Yankees and barely dislikable Astros, respectively.

Of course, things are looking a lot brighter for the Red Sox, who with the win went 20 games over .500. The Cubs, on the other hand, pulled themselves up to .500, period. And whereas the Red Sox lead the AL wild card race by two games, the Cubs are five and a half back in the NL.

Additionally, the Blue Jays seem to have faded in the AL East while the Cubs would still have to leapfrog the Cardinals to hunt down the Astros.

And, oh yeah, the Cubs play the very hot Giants and Diamondbacks this week. Yippee!

Juan Cruz, who admittedly struggled at the beginning of last year as a starter and earlier this year as a reliever, showed today why he should replace Estes as the Cubs’ fifth starter.

Replacing the injured Mark Prior in the rotation, he pitched six very strong innings against an outstanding offensive Astros team in the juice box and only gave up three earned on four hits while striking out five.

Can’t Estes be a long man or a spot lefty out of the bullpen? Dusty Baker has said he’s not playing the slumping Choi more often because the Cubs are trying to win now, not develop players.

In other words, it’s not part of Dusty’s well known pattern of preferring veterans over younger players. Playing Karros right now probably is the right move, considering how hot he is.

But after today’s performance by Cruz, there’s no reason for Baker’s continued devotion to Estes and 6.00 ERA. We’ll see if he’s serious about “winning now” or if that’s just rhetoric used to stand by the trusty vets he so dearly loves.

While watching the Cubs lose, I saw a promo for a new Fox series starring Luis Guzman, whom you may remember from such films as … every movie you’ve seen in the last two years.

A P.T. Anderson regular, Guzman is the definitive character actor (e.g., he’s not conventionally handsome) who’s now starring in a TV sitcom called “Luis” this fall.

According to Fox’s press release, Luis is “the proud owner of a Spanish Harlem donut shop and the landlord of the building it’s in. But a dream is only a dream, and you’ve got to wake up sometime. He wakes up every day … to a cast of characters that includes an obnoxious elderly Irish woman who lives in a rent-controlled apartment; a Chinese delivery boy …” and so on.

It looks lame, but hopefully Guzman will make a little dough before it gets canceled so he’s got plenty of time to get back on the big screen.

When are you truly a fan? When the artist’s mediocre or spectacularly bad output is just as fascinating to you as his high points.

This is why, to we pathetic souls enamored of one Bob Dylan, the children’s choir on his version of Kris Kristofferson’s “They Killed Him” or Bob’s double-tracked version of Simon and Garfunkel’s “The Boxer” — to achieve the effect of a duet, you see — is just as fascinating as Al Kooper’s organ on “Like a Rolling Stone” or the clicking of Bob’s buttons against the base of the guitar on the long-unreleased version of “Idiot Wind.”

Which is why I’m so excited to see Bob’s new movie, “Masked and Anonymous,” which he supposedly co-wrote with director Larry Charles and has been receiving scathing reviews all around.

For example, in a column called “Bob Dylan Undone” in The New York Observer, Ron Rosenbaum writes:

In this case, the kindest thing I can say is this: Bob Dylan needs a friend. It’s painful (and a little cruel) to say, but that was my chief reaction to having seen Masked and Anonymous, not once, but twice.

Yes, I’m sure he has plenty of “friends” — all the people who told him his new movie was brilliant in concept and execution: “Don’t change a thing, Bob.” All the professors and poets who shamelessly sucked up to him with their praise. I’m sure they were really good friends. (And I’m sure there are some hardcore fans who will find the film fabulous.)

Maybe what I’m saying is that he needs a different kind of friend, the kind who could say to him, for instance: Don’t you realize how incredibly vain your pose of humility in this film makes you seem? Don’t you realize how silly it is to call your character “Jack Fate”? Don’t you realize that you’ve made several lifetimes’ worth of brilliant music? (Only a couple of instances of which are on the soundtrack.) You don’t need to make a painfully pretentious film that does nothing but diminish the respect the music deserves.

It should be fun! Even better — or worse — than “Hearts of Fire.” A man can only dream.

The Cubs’ trade for centerfielder Kenny Lofton and third baseman Aramis Ramirez may help the Cubs in the short term, though it’s hard to tell how much.

While Lofton’s definitely stronger than Tom Goodwin in center, he doesn’t come close to replacing Corey Patterson’s team-leading offensive contributions. He and Ramirez together barely approach Patterson’s statistics before he went down with the torn ACL.

Ramirez is young and may yet develop into a great player. He is signed through 2004 so who knows? Maybe he’ll be The Next Santo everyone keeps praying for.

The trade certainly makes the Cubs better now than they were before, but I highly doubt it’s good enough to get them the division title. The Cubs offense is still anemic and Shawn Estes can’t seem to get past the fourth inning, so that’s an automatic loss every five days.

The final word on this trade will come when we learned who the player to be named later is. If it’s another B-level prospect like pitcher Matt Bruback, then whoopdedoo. If it’s something more, I’ll be sore.

The “win now” focus is just fine, but I just don’t think there’s much to be said for this team. It’s at .500 now and has played worse than .500 for most of the season. I don’t see how it has merited any great investment.

With their nucleus of pitching talent, the Cubs have lots of time to win. Time may be all they have.