🤠 Happy 9 to 5 Day. The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is honoring Dolly Parton with a special day of live music, presentations and special country music artifacts.

• Gov. Mike DeWine and First Lady Fran DeWine will be in attendance.

☀️ Today's weather: Sunny, with a high of 67 and a low of 57.

🎂 Happy early birthday to our member Mary Worthington!

Today’s newsletter is 1,084 words — a 4-minute read.

The Dawg Pound is gearing up once again for the most exhausting four hours of the week.

Why it matters: Cleveland plays its home opener at 1pm Sunday against the Carolina Panthers, meaning the emotional roller coaster known as Browns fandom is back in town for another season.

If you go: Plenty of tickets are still available, starting around $80.

• The game airs on Fox.

If you're heading to Huntington Bank Field, we have a pretty good idea how your Sunday will go:

☕ 8am: Cautious optimism. You wake up remembering the Browns are 1-1 after beating Tampa Bay last week.

• Despite a tumultuous offseason, hope remains: The Browns are tied for second place — and technically last place — in the AFC North.

🍺 10am: Confidence rising. The Muni Lot is humming. Someone hands you a beer. You check the schedule and start wondering whether 10 wins is really that crazy.

🚀 12:55pm: Unbridled optimism. Three NASA jets roar over Huntington Bank Field.

• The Browns haven't lost a home game all season. The Super Bowl remains mathematically possible.

🏈 1:08pm: We're so back. Cleveland picks up a couple of first downs.

• Head coach Todd Monken is an offensive genius. Deshaun Watson has figured it out. You text your friends something you'll regret later.

😬 1:47pm: Uh oh. Carolina converts on third-and-12.

• A man three rows behind you begins loudly explaining the Browns' defensive scheme to everyone within 40 feet.

😡 2:32pm: Existential crisis. A promising drive ends with a sack, penalty or inexplicable third-down play.

• You question franchise decisions dating to approximately 1999.

🎺 2:45pm: Temporary distraction. The Ohio State marching band performs at halftime. Everyone feels better for 12 minutes.

🙏 3:37pm: Bargaining. It's a one-score game in the fourth quarter.

• "Just win this one," you whisper. All previous complaints are withdrawn.

🎢 4:05pm: Euphoria or despair. The Browns are either 2-1 and clearly playoff-bound or 1-2 and it's time to examine the 2027 NFL Draft.

• Either way, you'll have plenty of time in traffic to think about it.

Carolina Panthers fans descending on Cleveland have a hometown connection to help plan their weekend.

State of play: Chef Rocco Whalen, who operates Fahrenheit restaurants in both Cleveland and Charlotte, shared his favorite Cleveland haunts with Axios.

🍕 Start on Lorain: Whalen recommends Visible Voice Books, a "book lovers' paradise … where Harvey Pekar would have camped out." Then enjoy eats along the burgeoning new west side corridor, including Cent's Pizza and The Judith.

🌮 Head to Gordon Square: "Brunch at Astoria with Chef Cory, and wash it down with a few cheese selections from the best in the business, cheesemonger Tom," advises Whalen.

• Follow it up with the "amazing tequila selection and serious street tacos" at Blue Habanero.

☕ Then go east: Grab a cup of Rising Star coffee and wander Lake View Cemetery, where John D. Rockefeller, Eliot Ness, Alan Freed and President James A. Garfield are among the permanent residents.

• Whalen calls it "one of the most exquisite backdrops in Cleveland."

After the game

🗿 Officials announced this week New York for-profit art collective MSCHF ("Mischief") would not be moving forward with a controversial public art installation on the lakefront.

• Cleveland dodged a bullet, writes art and architecture critic Steve Litt. (Ideastream)

🪧 About 200 workers at Cleveland Clinic Lutheran Hospital began a strike Wednesday after failing to reach an agreement on a new contract. (Cleveland.com)

🦪 The owner of La Ville Lumiere in Edgewater plans to open a New England-style oyster bar and a Naples-style sandwich shop in adjoining spaces this fall. (Cleveland Scene)

👋 Sam here. The best thing I drank this week was a liter of Warsteiner at Sachsenheim.

Why it matters: In all likelihood, it'll be the last big mug of German beer I'll enjoy at the cultural hall in the Stockyards neighborhood.

• Due to mounting debt and a laundry list of urgently needed repairs, including a new roof, Sachsenheim plans to close on Sunday.

Catch up quick: The stone building on Denison Avenue has been a home away from home for Transylvanian Saxons since the early 20th century, hosting weddings, concerts and other events on its multiple floors.

• In more recent years, I've known it as an ethnically flavored neighborhood tavern, with a popular Taco Tuesday night and a wide selection of European drafts.

State of play: I ventured there with my wife and a few pals this week to bid it adieu.

• We barely managed to find a parking spot on premises.
• The interior bar was shoulder-to-shoulder, packed with patrons at the dinner hour who clearly had the same idea we did.

A Lederhosen-clad brass band was arriving on the patio, gearing up for an evening of jaunty live music.

🍻 What's next: If the midweek crowd is any indication, Sachsenheim may have to order a few more kegs to last through the weekend.

Taylor Swift releases "Cleveland!" today, a bonus track on the expanded "The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore."

Time will tell how it stacks up against Swift's other city-oriented songs. We've ranked those below:

💂 5. "London Boy" — A cutesy tourism guide to seeing London with your boyfriend.

🍎 4. "Welcome to New York" — Swift's energetic, if somewhat generic, love letter to the Big Apple.

🇫🇷 3. "Paris" — The joke: It's barely about Paris. Swift imagines a relationship so consuming the couple might as well be hiding out there.

👋 2. "So Long, London" — The brutal counterpoint to "London Boy," as a city once synonymous with love becomes somewhere she has to leave behind.

🚦 1. "Cornelia Street" — The superior New York song, where the city becomes inseparable from a relationship and the fear of losing it.

🏖️ Bonus: "Florida!!!" — Not a city, but fans are already speculating about its connection to "Cleveland!" thanks to those conspicuous exclamation points.

Go deeper: Every Taylor Swift song ranked, from worst to best

🚊 Sam has never been to Atlanta and is excited to ride MARTA at the Axios Local annual retreat next week.

🎧 Troy is putting a 2000s-themed playlist together for the retreat in Atlanta.

• "Peace up, A-town down!"

This newsletter was edited by Tyler Buchanan.