They say that 90% of the game is half mental. Figure that one out. It's pretty much why I hate equations.
But whatever it means, whatever everyone thinks it means, is that mind takes precedence over matter. In the case of sitting in an apartment that's dipped to, I don't know, forty degrees, when it's 20 outside, you'd better have a good head on your shoulders.
But that's just 90% of the deal. Or 50%. I'm confused already. But the other 10% (50%?) is all about preparation. Any unrounded fractions that remain are not rounded up nor down - they're execution - but that's a whole different chapter.
Preparing for a Stupid Bowl requires one to scheme for the frigid winter air like a wily old defensive coordinator figuring out how to attack a prolific offense. Picture Jim Johnson up for 20 hours a day for a full week, figuring how to bring every blitzer possible, from every angle possible, with every delay possible and in every gap possible to thwart the Patriots last Sunday night.
(I know I pictured Jim Haslett at right, not Jim Johnson. It was intended. Jim Haslett scares me. He's a former linebacker. He admitted to steroid use when he played. He's always angry. When a call goes against the Rams and he and HC Scott Linehan are arguing with officials, Linehan always has to drop his arguement to pry Haslett away and steer him back toward the sideline. It's like Linehan is the wife and Haslett is the half-drunk belligerent husband getting in a fight at their 8-year-old's soccer game. She's got him by the arm going, "it's nothing...drop it...let's go..." and he's screaming at the coach who won't play his kid that he's going to fuck him up. When he gets on one of his players, most seem genuienly scared of him. At times last year, I was waiting for Haslett to rip the helmet off of someone and run out on the field in slacks to decapitate someone because the Rams couldn't tackle. I don't know if he's that crazy, but I can envision him biting a side judge ala Mike Tyson when they miss an offensive pass interference call or something. It's so funny because he's a skinny blonde headed guy who's alwasy bright read. If you've ever seen a glass blower make a bottle or vase or something, Haslett gets that shade of red/orange right when they pull the glass out of the fire. Jim Johnson is an old man who reminds me of someone's grandpa. This is a way better picture, believe me.)
Anyways...Stupid Bowl - preparation. Here's a checklist of must-have items:
A comfy pair of shoes. Slippers will not suffice - not tight enough on the foot. Also, they're a trip hazard.
Several pairs of very thick socks. Or, twice as many pairs of really thin ones.
At least 3 pairs of soft, warm flannel pajamas. In addition to pretending you're a ninja or Chuck Norris, they are very comfortable. They can also be worn almost as longjohns underneath jeans when the crisp autumnal air really bites into you. However, as little heat escapes through the legs, they should be satisfactory on their own.
A box full of too-small t-shirts. These are great under t-shirts of regular fit. Layering works best if the articles of clothing are of different size. Your "base" layer clings to you like a fat chick squeezed into a tube-top. Your regular t-shirt fits comfortably over that, and.....
5-10 hooded sweatshirts. These are preferable because of the hoods. When things get really nasty, right before you crack, you put the hood up, cinch it down with the drawstrings and sit motionless on your couch under a cover.
A box of long-sleeved shirts. Cotton based, not those sheer little dress shirts. Sweaters are preferable - they'll provide the warmth and comfort of the hooded sweatshirt and allow you change things up. Regular long-sleeve polo knits or sweatshirts also work fine. I'd avoid 3/4 length sleeved shirts, though. Bare skin is a bad idea.
A good stocking cap or two. Cap only, those full ski masks will get too warm. The cap goes great without a hoodie, but also works well in tandem with a hoodie. It's a real team player.
Motocross gloves. I don't know what kind of fabric these are, but they've got a little padding and thickness to them on the back of the hand, while being thin enough in the fingers and palm to allow you to do routine things without much inconvenience. Weightlifting gloves are out because they're cutoff, leather gloves are too heavy - you'll just sweat in them and they're stiff, and those big puffy gloves are extemely warm, but you might as well wear oven mitts.
An entire coffee station. Hot cocoa is too high in calories and fattening. Coffee is the way to go for the caloric-minded, and, bonus, when you're about to slip into a cold-induced coma, the caffeine will keep you just out of it. You're going to need a nice 12 cup coffee pot, minimally, and preferably one that you can set to start brewing at a particular time. So right when you walk in the door from work, you can change into your Stupid Bowl uniform and go right to a hot cup of joe. Depending on your tastes and preferences, you may need a LOT of creamer. I've gone through five and a half quarts of creamer this month. November has been tough.
So there you go. The elements of a winning Stupid Bowl team. If you have all those tools and can get into the right frame of mind, then maybe, you too can shave $8-14 per month off of your electric bill for an extra month or two in the winter. That's two to three beers at a reasonable pub.
I have the 'Boys. Barely. I've underestimated Brett Favre all year long.
This weekend's picks: San Diego Tampa Bay St. Louis Jacksonville Houston Carolina Washington NY Jets Minnesota Philadelphia Denver Cleveland NY Giants Pittsburgh New England
My winners keep winning. That would be the Mafialligators and The Seedy Underbelly. My losers keep walking somewhere. Not on the wild side, but further and further from playoff relevance. That's where.
Mafialligators Pulled off a miraculous victory here. Entering Monday night, I was up by about 25 points. My opponent was starting Ben Roethlisberger, who's been a top 5 QB all year and who was projected for about 65 points. I had Pittsburgh's kicker and the significantly injured Jesse Chatman. Thanks to lightning and about a foot of rainfall, Big Ben failed to cover and the only points Pitt scored all night came from my guy's right foot.
I'm up to 8-4 now and have clinched a spot in the championship round of the playoffs. As a bonus I knocked off the guy who was in third place, bumping him down to fifth and occupying third myself. In the last week of the fantasy regular season, I get a very favorable matchup with the last place team. I'd like to hang on to 3rd place so I face the 2 seed in the first round, not the one. In my prior match up with this upcoming team, I won 346 to 290.
The Seedy Underbelly Have clinched for a long time. Following another victory to push my record to 10-2, I now have a slugfest with my co-#1 for top seed entering the playoffs. Two games to go, impossible for me to finish lower than #2. All that's on the line is bragging rights, really. Since opening the season with a loss, I've gone 10-1 here. My only loss was that win that Yahoo screwed me out of, by less than a point, in week 8. Impressive, even I must say.
Richard Simmons' Wig I would've officially stopped mentioning this team by now if not for one thing. My mission now is to help Pat. This week, we have a rematch. I plan on helping him get the easy "W" by rolling out as many injured guys and backups as possible without cutting loose the talent I've continued to hoard to keep off of other people's rosters.
Here's what my lineup will probably look like: QB Marc Bulger, doubtful (concussion) WR Brandon Stokley WR Plaxico Burress, questionable (ankle) WR DJ Hackett, out (ankle) RB Brandon Jacobs, out (hamstring) RB Rudi Johnson TE Greg Olsen K Jeff Reed DEF (leaving empty)
Half of those guys won't play. A quarter will try to play and won't do much. The other quarter will probably be totally healthy....and ineffective. This group includes guys like Stokley (3rd wide receiver, 4th option in passing game for Denver), Rudi Johnson (terrible history against Pittsburgh), and Greg Olsen (Bears suck).
Merry Christmas, P-dog. Topple the evil empire.
Illinois Transients Took a hit this week. Lost and fell to 6-5. Dropped from a tie for third down to fifth thanks to a tiebreaker. That would put me just out of the championship round. Tough blow at this point of the season. I've got two tough, but winnable games to conclude the season. I beat both of my remaining two opponents pretty handily earlier in the season, but that was then.
NFL Picks After a promising 3-0 start on Thanksgiving, I slipped on Sunday and finished 8-5. That puts me at 11-5 on the week and 120-53 on the week.
NFL Picks: Thursday: Green Bay (won) Dallas (won) Indy (won)
These three games were all pretty easy picks. The only tricky one was that GB-Detroit game. You never know which Lions team will show up. Anyways, I'm 3-0 on the week and now 109-48 on the season. That's good for a 69.4% winning percentage. 70% would make me happy and 74% or higher would be fantastic. I still might get there.
Sunday: Cleveland Jacksonville Tampa Bay Seattle Kansas City New York Giants New Orleans Tennessee Denver Arizona San Diego New England
Monday: Pittsburgh
Stupid Bowl 2007: I think it dipped down into the high teens last night. I want to make a very inappropriate joke here, but I think I'll abstain. It was like 22 according to my truck thermometer at about 11 last night. It's actually not that bad in here right now, it's around 50. What is today, the 24th? I'm thinking records could fall this year. I can do this standing on my head.
Watching The Nightmare Before Christmas. Just had some coffee and peppermint mocha. Delicious.
8:49 in and we've just finished our second song. Is this a musical? What the hell? Haloween Jack (from Diamond Dogs??), The Pumpkin King leads Haloween Twon through Haloween every year, but he hates it. We get it. Let's move the plot along.
13:59 - Jack has stumbled upon Christmas town or whatever its called and promptly breaks into the thrid song of the movie...already.
29:00 - fourth song of the movie. This sure has gotten old fast. Faster than "Beef: It's What's for Dinner," "Yada, yada, yada" and "That's what she said" jokes.
This past weekend was the 2008 Miss Illinois USA and Miss Teen USA pageants in Chicago, IL. I took off Friday and Monday to make a big four-day trip up there to support B-town’s own Callie Sears. This is a really crappy picture. We weren't allowed to use flash photography.
Friday morning was spent making Final preparations. I bought a new 60 quart cooler at Wal-Mart. I bought 2-20 packs of Bud Light longnecks at Corral Liquors. I iced down the beer, a bottle of rum, bought some coke, and a bag of mini-3 Musketeers for the trip. I packed a variety of wardrobes, unsure of the pageant dress code and what the weather might be like in the windy city. I got $300 cash out of the bank. I reformatted my iPod and charged up my phones. I made sure I had plenty of batteries and tape for the camcorder and digicam.
I rendezvoused at Danielle’s for some quick chow with Pat and Danielle. Then we hit the road for the four hour or so trek north. Sirius satellite radio was made for road trips like this.
We got into Chi-town around 10:30 and settled into the Hyatt-Regency at McCormick Place. We were not far from Lake Michigan and about a mile from the new Commisky, smack dab in the middle of south Chicago. A very large portion of South Chicago is a hellhole, and we were just close enough to it that we couldn’t wander the streets in relative safety. So Pat and I did some damage to the cooler and ordered a pizza delivered around midnight. Pat invited one of his college buddies over. We hung until about 2am when everyone made Pat throw his friend out.
Sleeping accommodations were a disappointment. It was a two queen bed room that we were splitting with Pat’s older sister, Adina, and her husband, Matt. We had planned on having a “Danielle Sandwich” in our bed – me (5’10”, 230) and Pat (6’3”, 220) smothering Danielle (maybe 5’4”, 110). As you might imagine Danielle was less than amused by this. As far as I know she only expressed concerns over being crushed to death, but I have to figure that she was afraid of being part of a gangbang or something. Pat ended up tossing and turning, forcing Danielle over onto my side of the bed and me right off the edge. I spend 2am to 3am with my hip on the side of the bed and my head and shoulder on the nightstand, contorted into an “L” shaped sleeping pattern. This proved tricky to try to sleep through, even with the fatigue and booze. So I decided to crash on the floor. I then spent 3am to about 4am unable to sleep because Pat and Matt snored like….I don’t know. You remember the monster in Earnest Scared Stupid? I think it snorted a few times during the movie. Imagine that multiplied eight times over. For at least an hour. Non-stop.
Without a cover and with a single pillow (I would steal more during the night) I ended up sneaking in a few hours of sleep.
Saturday
Most of Saturday morning was spent kicking around the hotel. We bumped into Victoria Davis, the reigning Miss Teen Illinois USA. Luckily, I would later find out she was 18, so all those creepy thoughts that sprung to mind about two seconds after meeting here were perfectly ok, at least in my mind. We saw a few of the contestants in the lobby or on the elevator. Around noon, the five of us ventured north, closer to downtown. An eight minute cab ride was thirteen bucks. Matt, who grew up just south of Chicago said you’d normally tip them a couple more bucks, but the guy just wanted to get rid of us. Everyone agreed that was probably because I harassed the cabbie. His name was Hussein Yamin, or Yamin Hussein, I don’t know which name is his first and which is his last. With the four of them piled in the back, I was in the front. I asked the guy if he’d ever seen the movie Collateral. He replied that he had not. I told him it was about a cabbie who picked up a guy who turned out to be a hit man, and the hit man made him drive him around from hit-to-hit, detaining him against his will, putting him in harms way, and threatening to kill him too. The cabbie chuckled. I think I also asked him if he’d ever hit a vagrant and kept going or witnessed a street murder, but they guy wasn’t really talking to me after my first set of questions.
We walked around the streets for awhile, looking for a place to eat. We found a great little Italian place called the Italian Village or Village Inn or something. It seemed like just the type of place that you’d see in the Godfather. Quiet, cozy, great food – authentic Italian cuisine, and they even had real Italians working for them I think. They definitely weren’t American.
We got back to the hotel for the 2:30 Miss Illinois pageant. We were sitting in about the fourth or fifth row to the right of the stage. It was a pretty good view. They had some sort of bassy techno-bullshit music pumping through the loudspeakers that got me psyched up. All hundred or so girls came out at once in their dresses. Pageant requirements called for a white or red dress, or a shade of red, such as pink or something. Some favorites of mine were immediately apparent. Not even at college had I seen a collection of hot broads like this. Not all in one place, not in this sheer volume, not in sexy little dresses and all made up. I was in awe.
Then came the swimsuit competition.
In between typing that last sentence and this one I just stopped and giggled for about four minutes thinking about it. So I was blown away. My system was overloaded. Whatever was going on underneath all the lights and up on the stage in front of me was too much to process. I mostly just grinned like an idiot throughout the swimsuit portion of the competition.
The girls came out in alphabetical order. A line of about ten stretched across the back of the stage. Their name was announced and they marched from rear stage left to front stage right, across to front stage left, back to front stage center, then exited stage left. I made it up to the “C’s” before I became overwhelmed by the whole scene. The girl was Ashley Coffman. She looked to be about 5’10 with a sleek perfectly toned body – like a jaguar, beautiful skin tone, long blonde hair, a tight firm little ass and a large B or small C cup. She was wearing an angelic white bikini. I thought she looked like Carrie Underwood, only with bigger, wider, sexier eyes. She didn’t have a big cheering section, so after the initial announcement and her first couple of maneuvers on stage, the cheering died down and it was pretty quiet as she moved to her left to exit the stage. It was at this time that I, rather loudly, started cackling like an idiot. She was just that fucking hot. Danielle, sitting to my left stated up at me like I was mental. Pat, to her left, has seen this reaction before and was red with laughter.
The show went on I guess…I don’t know…I think my mind left the planet there for about an hour. There were a couple of downright fugly chicks, a couple that were really overweight, and a surprising number that had cottage cheesy thighs. Some chicks admitted to weird stuff in their bios. One said the most daring thing she’d ever done was being involved in street racing, which is, last time I checked, still totally illegal. One girl said Oprah was her idol because she’s so great or some horseshit.
As I would later recollect, here were my “winners”:
Ashley Coffman –
I’ve already described her in some length. Don’t know what else to say other than she was a clear #1 in the swimsuit portion. This opinion would later be confirmed on Sunday when she received a special award for her “performance” in the swimsuit competition. With a couple days since to fantasize about it, I’d put her at 1b overall, the second member of a little trio I like to call the "Tri-Perfecta."
Jelena Kostic –
In between spacing in and out during the Saturday night of the portion I have one other solid memory. It was the evening gown portion. She’d already caught my eye in the swimsuit ceremonies. Then she’s prancing around in this black dress and the announcer douche is reading her bio. I’m sitting there, mouth hanging open, head cocked to one side, slobbering on myself when he gets to the last part of the bio. She had walked back to center stage and was getting ready to spin and walk off. As almost a throwaway, in a very offhand manner, Jim Donovan goes, “Jalena wants you to know that she has an identical twin sister.”
I lost it. I emitted this very high-pitched hooting noise twice, long and drawn out, then transitioned right into a hearty laugh. I clapped extra loud and for a sort of inappropriate amount of time, right into the announcing of the next girl’s name. Pat and Danielle cracked up to my left and I swear Jelena looked right at me hooting and clapping as she walked off the stage. I still rank her 1a and the President-For-Life of the "Tri-Perfecta."
Amanda Motz –
I don't remember if her name was Amanda or Tiffany. Those two don't even sound alike, so I don't know what I'm thinking. She was kind of short too, but had a real sexy smile. Her evening gown was also one of those that tied up around her neck and was tapered that way, so she showed off a lot of side boob. After the Saturday evening thing, there was a one hour meet and greet in the lobby (the girls were sequestered from all outside people all weekend, except at designated times). Her and her family were hanging around in the same area as we were with Callie. She kept looking at me. I can’t tell what was up with it. It could’ve been because I kept staring at her, hoping that sideboob would feature a nip slip or something. It didn’t, but on Sunday, my hand to god, I swear she too was looking right at me from stage. I was wearing my motorcycle jacket and had a couple days beard going on. I sort of looked rugged. Maybe she digs bad boys. I still have her ranked at number 1c, making her the third and final member of the council of the "Tri-Perfecta." Yes, I'm going to beat that catchphrase right into the ground.
Stephanie Houlihan – I walked out the revolving front door of the Hyatt with her on Sunday night and said ‘Hi’. She’s sort of a fidget. Very short. But she had a rockin’ little bod and cute, long curly blonde hair. She looked alright in the swimsuit, but I loved the red dress she wore. It was skin tight and very long. She pulled it off. I think, subconsciously, she reminded me of an uber-cute Hooters waitress I had one time and left a $40 tip for for no real legitimate reason.
Jamie Something – She had a sort of Paris Hilton look to her. Very petite, tight little body, same shaped head/jawline and nose. Short blonde hair. She was from Carrier Mills. Carrier Mills in down by Harrisburg, Bum Fuck Egypt, as that part of the state is otherwise known. I’ve been to Carrier Mills – I got super messed up there for my senior trip in high school. Its total population is about fifty-five people. I found it hard to believe a major piece of ass like this could come from the middle of nowhere. If I had to guess, I would’ve presumed the gene pool to be much too cluttered down in that neck of the woods to produce a specimen such as this.
Saturday Night
Getting dinner in Chicago is impossible before 9 o’clock without a reservation. By this time, Pat’s mom, dad, grandma and younger brother were in town. Pat, myself and Joe trekked out to a seedy looking neighborhood for more beer and snacks. We lived through that and ended up ordering pizza again and everyone filed into one of the three rooms we had and watched Forrest Gump and Armageddon. Since there were 12 people and nine different conversations going on in one little room, I went back to my room to watch tv in peace. Despite a poor night’s sleep on the floor I wasn’t ready for sleep at 9pm, and this would later present a problem.
Matt, Adina, Pat and Danielle came back to go to sleep around that time. Me and Pat were like, “this is stupid, it’s 9pm on a Saturday night in Chicago AND the final competition tomorrow isn’t until 5 pm.” They were going to bed all early, were going to wake up with nothing to do and nowhere in particular to go. Me and Pat decided to drink – a lot. But we got kicked out of our own room, so our party had to hit the road. Or, in this case, the next best thing – the hotel halls and elevators.
It started with a flurry, but quickly came to a screeching, albeit momentary, halt. Pat, the manufacturer of some funky assed-gas all weekend long, got in the elevator, let one rip, and promptly announced that he had, “a turtle head poking out.” This required him to go back to the room and move his bowels. Upon smelling the odor he emitted from his rectum, I told him he should, “get a veterinarian to check on that dead animal he had up his ass.” This caused him to spit beer all over the elevator. We went back to the room, Pat crapped, and I explained to the lazy gang why we were back so soon.
Eventually we got going pretty good. We developed a nice little routine. Get a beer, wander into the elevator, get off on a floor, wander around, get back on the elevator, go down to the lobby, sit there watching all the people having a late-night dinner or drink at the bar, and when we were down to the last couple of swigs in our bottle, work our way back up to the room for another. This process led to a few interesting encounters, in no particular order:
Jim Donovan - a newscast personality from Philadelphia, Jim is the winner of several local Emmys. I don’t know if he reads the news or what, but he seemed to have the stupid humor, dumb charm, and vapid personality of a weatherman. He was a real fucking dick. I had stolen a placard from the second floor ballroom table where the pageant was held earlier that said “Reserved for Chaperones” and put it on the table in the lobby where we were drinking. Jim Donovan walked by a couple of times and me and Pat yelled out to him. I think I yelled, “Hey, Jim Donovan” and Pat yelled “Nice job, buddy” or something. It was totally innocuous. But Jim Donovan is an asshole. He kept walking like he didn’t hear us. There was an encounter on Sunday night which I'll cover later.
Victoria “Tori” Davis – Miss Teen Illinois USA 2007. She was adorable. It was hard to gauge her age, but she was built like a brick shithouse, so that was alright for me. I’ve since found out that she’s 18, but that doesn’t explain why she was out at midnight walking around the hotel toward the bar. Something fishy was going on. Anyways, she walked by once and we whooped and hollered and she gave us a little wave. I think we ran into her once while we were staggering around, by the elevators, and talked to her again. I went upstairs to get my camera for a picture with her, but we didn’t run into her again the rest of the night.
I stole a fork and knife off of a hotel room tray. I leaned the knife up against someone’s door. I don’t know why, but this cracked me up. I put the fork across the light fixture in the hallway. This too amused me to no end.
I ended up taking a leak and putting the “Reserved for Chaperones” placard across the back of a toilet in the first floor bathroom.
While trying to break into the pool afterhours, we found some towels in a stairwell and stole six extra towels for our room. This was a great find, as there were only officially two people booked in our room, so we kept running out of towels.
We spent a good half an hour going from floor to floor removing all the privacy tabs from people’s doors and moving them to another door.
On the second floor, where we had entered into the ballroom, Pat found a minifridge full of tiny bottles of soda and water and swiped a Pepsi.
In the same spot, were some sandwiches that were wrapped, but still…they had been sitting out since the Teen pageant ended, probably seven hours or so. That didn’t stop Pat from taking a bite out of each one, then strategically “stashing” them. One was hidden in a potted plant. One was thrown up onto a support beam on the third floor balcony where everyone could see it but only someone with a very long pole could get to it (even then, they’d have to knock it all the way down to the lobby. The third was wedged in between a handrail and a glass partition. It’s been a few days and Pat still hasn’t come down with food poisoning.
We went up to the 33rd floor trying to find the roof to launch a couple of beer bottles onto a parking garage about thirty floors below. But I think the roof access was only through a maintenance door that was locked.
The cou de gras of the evening took place on the third floor. First we decided to take our pictures next to all the changing rooms where all these fine young lassies ran back and forth in high heels to strip down to nothing and put on evening gowns or swimsuits. Then we decided to steal the signs posted on the doors. When we got back to the 22nd floor where our rooms were, we decided to post one of the Miss Teen signs on Pat’s dad’s door. We took the double sided tape and put it up and posed for a few pictures. By then it was about two in the morning. We went back to the room for another round and were pleaded with to stay. I had to run back and rip the sign off.
I would've paid money to see Joe's face when he walked out of his room in the morning to find that it was apparently doubling as a changing room for 15-19 year olds.
Yet again, I was left to sleep on the cold, hard floor. But this time I stole some spare blankets and pillows from the other two rooms we had access to, so I built myself a nice little nest.
Sunday Morning
All weekend long, Matt, our de facto "Chicago expert" kept telling us how this McDonald's down the street would take 45 minutes to jog to and back, an hour to order and get the food. He said we didn't understand how long a Chicago block was. It reeked of hooey. Is it really all that different from a city block in any other metropolitan area? Come on. Pat and I decided to prove them wrong. For starters, after all the beer drinking I wanted to go for a run. Secondly, I didn't want to be cooped up in the hotel all morning. Third, everyone really wanted some sort of breakfast, and no one was prepared to ante up $12.99 for the hotel food (2 eggs, toast and sausage or bacon - and that was the cheapest breakfast platter). So we decided to jog down there.
As you might expect, Matt was way off. We could've walked there in ten minutes, but we ran and it was maybe three minutes. We had eight breakfast sandwiches and some pancakes and were back out in front of the hotel within ten minutes, and we did mostly walk back. Seein as that we didn't have any money riding on the bet, we had to gloat in some way. So, in plain view of our collegues up on the 22nd floor, we stopped and ate a sandwich apiece right in the courtyard by the hotel. That took about three minutes. Then we wandered around and laid on concrete blocks and raced up stairs like in Rocky to kill another 5-8 minutes. I hope this doesn't spoil any of the movie I'm making, but here's a sneak preview of how that scene unfolded:
Eventually, everyone got to eat. The food was still lukewarm.
Sunday afternoon was spent wandering the city, down my the river, in "the loop" as it's known. It was alright, a little blustery maybe. We passed this crazy street performer as he was painting himself silver to match his mannequin outside of the Apple store. I don't know what was going on.
We ended up having lunch at the ESPN Sportzone. It was alright too. Bears fans are assholes, and on their hundred shiny flat panel HDTVs, guess which game was being shown on most of them? It took every ounce of restraint for me to not stand up, extend my middle fingers and rotate in a circle.
Sunday Night
The Big Finale set me back $35. But it was money well spent. I stood in line for about an hour and a half. While waiting I wished good luck upon the girls as they walked by. Most of them ignored me. That dickhole Jim Donovan walked by. I made sure he'd hear me this time. I hung my fist out, popped up a thumb and encouraged Jim to, "bring his 'A' game tonight." I meant it strictly as encouragement. He just kept going. I know from his not-so-witty stage banter that he's not deaf. And Seton Hall, his alma mater, apparently doesn't accept total idiots according to their website, so the only conclusion I can draw is that Jim Donovan must be some kind of asshole or something.
I weaseled my way up to the third row just to the right of the stage. I also remembered to bring my camera, hence all these wonderful photos you're seeing. The whole gaggle of girls came out again and they cut down the field from a hundred or whatever to sixteen semifinalists. Two-thirds of my "Tri-Perfecta" (Coffman, Kostic, Motz) made it through. Ashley Coffman was the lone casualty. A travesty. A real shame. She was robbed, which in a way, means the whole audience was robbed too.
With the 16 semi-finalists, they repeated the same process as the night before: parade around in swimsuits (pic 1, pic 2), then evening gowns. In between was a bunch of baloney about the reigning Miss Illinois USA. Then the third cog in my Tri-Perfecta got her vindication: they handed out awards for outstanding performance in each phase of the competition. Ashley Coffman got one for swimsuit and so did that Jamie from Carrier Mills.
Most of the winners were ladies I had ranked in the upper echelon. I have a real eye for this sort of thing. Unfortunately, I lost that piece of scrap paper so I don't remember most of their names. Anyways, they cut down the semifinalists to five finalists, which included no one I was that crazy about (Pic 1, Pic 2). They asked them each a question, paraded them all around one more time, took them off stage to tally the voting, and had some sort of filler again. I don't remember, I'd lost a little interest at that point.
After crowning a winner, I realized we were sitting about four feet behind 2006 Miss Illinois.
Right after the pageant ended, Callie came out and hung out with everyone for awhile. I formulated a plan for Pat to stick a tag off of one of the chairs on his brother's back that said "Special Guest." I drew it up and he executed it. People were taking pictures with Andy's back for like 20 minutes. Everyone kept coming up to him and telling him he was a special guest. Eventually he figured it out, but only about 18 minutes later than he should've.
IN CONCLUSION
This was an awesome experience, and I wasn't even in the damn thing. I would most definitely go back next year. I would even like to officially manage a girl or two. Or three. I have a great eye for dresses and hair and all that crap, and I'm not even gay. I would get a better camera before going back next year. But I've taken maybe ten vacation days in the last eight years. I'm like Cal Ripken Jr. - an ironman. But this is something I could definitely pencil in every year. Some people go to Europe every year, or the Carribean. I want to be the person whose annual vacation is to the Miss Illinois USA pageant. I liked almost getting kicked out of the hotel. I liked hitting on all the contestants I came in contact with, even the sixteen year olds from the Miss Teen Illinois pageant. I liked drinking heavily and riding an elevator. I could get used to all of that in a hurry.
For, like, the fifth time in the last six years. At least. Me and Pat just got done doing a little pre-turkey day celebrating. I can almost taste that succulent turkey. Callie was back in town from her competition in the 2008 Miss Illinois USA pageant. That update is still forthcoming....it's up to 3300 words and about six pages. I hope to post it sometime this week. We'll see. I've gotta get some frickin' sleep for the Trapshoot tomorrow.
NFL Picks I hit that Denver pick on Monday night, upping my record to 14-3 for the week and 106-48 on the season. Fairly impressive, but the two or three weeks prior have put a hurtin' on my shiny winning percentage. Still, .688 is nothing to sneeze at.
I'd post my picks for this week now, but goddamn if I'm not drunk and can't quite remember how to log in to my work email to look them up. For yet another week, you're going to have to take my word on who I picked.
The Wig The Wig are in last place. In my head I just played the trombone music from The Price Is Right after a contestant loses. Waa-waa-waaaa-waaaa. (Jersey accent) What are you fucking look at, punk? Ain't nuthin' to see here.
Let's move on.
Mafialligators The Gators have clinched a playoff spot. I've earned the prestigious little '*' in front of my team name in the standings. This is misleading. It only means I've clinched a playoff spot. It could be the 8th overall playoff spot, which would be last in the consolation round. Consolation is Latin for LOSERS BRACKET. There's a little grammar lesson for y'all. I don't want to play in the "Consolation Round." I'm in fourth place and have a match up with the third place team. He's got about a 60 point projected lead on me, so I'm going to need the following players to become stricken with food poisoning: Carson Palmer, Terrell Owens, Brian Westbrook, Jason Witten. Maybe John Madden can deliver them some bad Turducken.
The Seedy Underbelly I've also clinched a playoff spot here. Think I did that two weeks ago, can't remember when it was and if I've mentioned it. It's going to take an epic collapse for me to not make the championship round, and that ain't happening. Although I am concerned about my running back situation. LDT is playing for a head coach who's an idiot and refuses to consistently feed him the ball. Brandon Jacobs may or may not have a serious hamstring injury. Reggie Bush can't run the ball, has a dinged knee, is coming off a concussion, but luckily, they still throw 12 checkdowns a game to him.
Illinois Transients Tied for third, as predicted. Tough match up this week against the guy who beat me by about .20 points in Week 2.
This week had the potential to be very, very rough. I had to rush through my picks on Thursday, and then didn't get a chance to tweak my fantasy rosters on Friday, Saturday or Sunday.
The Picks: I was so busy this week I didn't get a chance to recap last week's picks. I went 8-6, bringing my record to 93-45. I split on the upset picks, so my season record with those was 6-7. You're going to have to trust me on this weeks picks because I didn't have the opportunity to post them Friday morning.
The Pick....Outcome Seattle....win New York Giants....win Tampa Bay....win St. Louis....win New Orleans....loss Pittsburgh....loss Philadelphia....win Dallas....win Green Bay....win Cincinnatti....loss New England....win Cleveland....win Indianapolis....win Minnesota....win Jacksonville....win
TOTAL 12-3 Season total: 105-48
Still pending: Tennessee @ Denver
Richard Simmons' Wig Teams 3, 4 and six - all teams that haven't clinched playoff spots all lost this week. That was positive. The negative is most of them lost to other 3-7 teams I was tied with. I cannot win this week. So just eyeballing this thing....I should wind up in dead last after this week. Goodbye, playoffs!
Illinois Transients The top four teams, including me at #3, all won this week. We're finally starting to see some separation now. Us top four are all two games over .500 now, one team is one game over the waterline, and five others are all sub-.500.
The Seedy Underbelly Still tied at the top of the heap. I won, beating the third guy in the standings. Me and "D2WIN" are still on a collission course for top playoff seed. We play the last week of the regular season. Getting that #1 seed will probably be huge.
Mafialligators Probably took a loss this week. That's the way it's looking. I was in third place and there are two teams behind me that could usurp me from playoff positioning - both won. So I'm in a tie for third place and one game out of tie-breakers deciding if I'm in or out of the championship round.
I was planning on maybe writing this around December 1st, but it seemed silly to write an update that I couldn't just wing. I'm done writing research papers unless I'm getting paid. And then Yahoo molested me (again) and in a moment of clarity I came to a paradigm decision: "Fuck it."
Why not?
Last weekend, I was walking through Schnucks with Pat and bought some Peppermint Mocha coffee creamer because it reminded me of these sloppy peppermint cookies my dad used to make at Christmas made with crushed candy canes. Four isles down I was looking at some Jim Beam Egg Nog wondering if it could possible taste like anything other than pancake batter or vomit. Then, driving home, I passed a house that already had their yard filled with trinkets and reindeer bullshit. Pat said they put it all up, literally, the day after Haloween.
So let's go. Everybody aboard the Polar Express. Let's get stupid. Everyone run the gaudy, shiny garland around their house fifty times. Plug in your blinking lights. The kind that would make sin proud. Let's hang candy canes and stupid manger ornaments off of everything we can get a plastic hook over. Let's pencil in our plans for Black Friday. Let's get bombed on rum and ginger ale and watch festive christmas movies. Here's my top ten.
11. That Episode of Seinfeld where George's parents celebrate "Festivus." This one isn't a movie or special, but was too good to not mention. The scene where George's dad (Jerry Stiller) describes why/how he created his own holiday is golden. George's dad got in a fight years ago over a doll (for an 11-year-old George), beat the other guy up on Christmas Eve, then, in a moment of reflection, decided something had to change, the search for the perfect gift every year was too much, and created his own holiday, Festivus. It's catchphrase: "A Festivus for the rest of us!" It's celebrated on December 25th. Instead of a tree, there's a large metal rod (tinsel rubs him the wrong way), and before dinner comes the "Airing of Grievances," where the family sits around telling each other how they've disappointed them during the past year. Hysterical. Just too much.
10. How The Grinch Stole Christmas (1966) I almost went with Scrooged, Bill Murray's adaptation of A Christmas Carol, but it couldn't elbow it's way into this talent-packed top ten. There's not a whole lot to say about this one. Classic premise. Disgruntled, scrooge-type character, trying his darndest to ruin everyone's Christmas, has a sudden change of heart, ends up making everyone's Christmas. I remember liking the Grinch's cute little dog when I was little.
9. A Christmas Carol (1986) Of the 800 million remakes of the 1934 Charles Dickens original, this is my favorite. George C. Scott is icy-cold as the hermit-like Ebeneezer Scrooge (whereas Bill Murray was a sort of overtly flamboyant in rebelling in other's misfortune). The visits from the spirits were the most realistic, no gimmicks, no hokey joking, just a good re-telling of a classic story.
8. Home Alone (1990) You'll notice a sort of nostalgia kick as we get deeper and deeper into this list. I don't know what it is. Maybe all these new Christmas movies really suck. Maybe I don't watch them with the same fervor that I did when I was a kid who couldn't sleep on Christmas Eve. Whatever it is, I still like Home Alone. This was released in 1990, back when Joe Pesci still had a career and Macauly Caulkin was a cute little kid, not someone who shared a bed with Michael Jackson. The premise is kind of silly, but the hijinks are amusing enough to keep you in your seat. In hindsight, the unintentional comedy ratings are off the scale. John Candy and his touring funk band (or whatever it was) driving home on Christmas, a mother who took off for a week and left her 8 year old behind at home hitching a ride with them? Come on, how'd they ever write that?
7. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989) John Hughes was on quite the Christmas-themed roll in 1989 & 1990. '90's Home Alone was his goofy handiwork, and this one is his equally goofy 1989 creation. All the traditional plot elements are here. A goober-like head of family who insists, for some reason, on having a big, happy family Christmas. Disgrunted kids. Supportive, but doubtful wife. Embarassingly weird/odd family members coming in for the holiday. The hunt for the perfect tree. The spectacular failure of the ceremonial lighting of the house. Chevy Chase made this film. He absolutely carried it with his simple, average joe character who just wants everyone together and cheery for Christmas.
6. Elf (2003) I had very low expectations for Elf when I first saw it, it looked so gimmicky and stupid. But like a retarded puppy, you start feeling sorry for it and you wind up thinking it's the most adorable thing ever, even when it's peeing on the carpet.
The cast seemed like an odd coupling. James Caan and Will Ferrell? Sonny Corleone and the guy who played cowbell in Christopher Walken's most famous SNL skit? Somehow it worked. The early part of the movie is funny, with Ferrell outgrowing the tiny confines the regular elves live and work in at the North Pole. His wide-eyed, child-like take on everything about the big city and the way it treats Christmas is endearing. The one lasting memory I have from this is the scene where Ferrell meets the department store Santa (Artie Lange) and starts shrieking, "It's not the real Santa! It's not him! He's not the real Santa!"
5. Frosty the Snowman (1969) Bumbling snowmen. Magic hats. Talking rabbits. Evil professors. Hitching a ride as a stow away under a train. Campfires in the middle of the woods. This one had it all. Growing up, I had a VHS tape of many of these older movies. Frosty was very good, not quite great, and one of those things you could watch at least three times a year between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I like how Frosty was sort of an idiot. He keeps yelling "Happy Birthday!" all the time. He talks like someone with a speech impediment. I didn't realize this one was as old as it was.
4. The Santa Clause (1994) This was Tim Allen in his prime. A cocky ad executive accidentally kills Santa, slips on the coat and puts on like a hundred pounds over the next 8 months. My lasting memory from this one is when he's at his doctor and the doc says something about putting on a little weight, then he jiggles that prothstetic and goes, "A little! Ya think?"
It was fun watching Tim Allen go from denying and trying to hide that he was turning into Santa then completing the metamorphisis and becoming the man. Also, this one gets bonus points from me for having Peter Boyle in it.
3. A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965) A classic, no other way to put it. I had written a few notes on it, but one person on imdb.com already summed it up perfectly:
A Charlie Brown Christmas is probably the most unique Christmas film you can find. It's different because the Peanuts gang seem melancholy and introspective much of the time. I mean, do kids really worry about the commercialization of Christmas?! Nevertheless, the special really speaks to adults and probably older kids, and keeps you thinking after it's over. It has a very good message, and the music, while also melancholy, sticks with you for a long time afterwards. You could probably play a few notes of their "Christmastime" song, and I'll immediately picture this film. This movie should definitely become part of anybody's holiday collection, even if it's only to stand out from the other material.
The music is what I was going to mention. The whole thing isn't about Christmas per se, it's the search for meaning in Christmas, and the weepy, drifting piano that keeps popping up seems as dreary and gray and a late December evening sky. This is one of those Christmas films where you don't immediately go into another Christmas movie after watching it. You turn off the tv and sit quietly. Maybe you do something else, go bake cookies, whatever, but something about it hits you hard and true and you can't shake it. Very powerful in a subtle way.
2. Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (1964) A little on the goofy side, but still sweet and has a great message about everyone being accepted and loved on Christmas. Burl Ives was a great narrator. The interaction between Yukon Cornelius and Hermey was great. Misfit Island and all the broken toys was sad, but in a good way. The first thing people say is how dated the claymation animation looks now, but I like it, even after all these years. It's vintage. It's beauty is it's simplicity, too much glossy production value distracts you from the story and the message.
Yukon: This fog's as thick as peanut butter! Hermey: You mean pea soup. Yukon: You eat what you like and I'll eat what I like.
1. Bad Santa (2003) When I sat down and decided on the premise of this list, I immediately knew that this one would be my number one. I didn't have a reason at the time, but after writing all the other capsules, I think that I like this one because of the rejection of what what Christmas has become. The shopping malls, the large frenetic crowds, the departments store donkeys and little people and fake Santas, the phony Christmas cheer....this movie gives the finger to everything every big Times Square marketing and advertising firm has turned Christmas into.
If Santa and his elves were real, you sort of have to think that they would be as bitter as Billy Bob Thornton and his little elf co-conman. Bratty kids, stupid trendy toys - one is never enough...it's like Christmas has been beaten and raped.
This one earns the number one slot because of the way it pushes back against modern commercialism, while still clinging (barely) to the whole goodwill towards men and all that stuff. I could make a top ten list of my favorite moments in this film alone. In fact, I'll probably re-watch it over Thanksgiving and list my favorite moments.
So that's my two cents on Christmas Movies/Specials.
Sure as food going in your mouth and a turd coming out of your ass, just like the sun rising in the east every morning, Yahoo has fucked me out of a win, AGAIN.
I just logged on to Yahoo, went to the Cheap Beer League and there it was: *Eagles, 8-2. I was actually amused for a second. I wanted to see how, exactly, they decided to screw me this week. I went to the Players tab, click on Stat Corrections, and flipped back to week 10. Nothing. Not a single correction entered. I don't know if they're coming or if there were really none this week.
Now I was getting perturbed. If you're going to bend me over and pull a win out of my ass, at least lube me up. Show me the evidence of how I'm getting violated. So I went to my opponents Team page, clicked on Week 10 and saw that Nate Clements scoring line had been amended: 5 solo tackles, 1 assist, interception........and one Pass Defensed. There it is. 0.75 points for a phantom pass defended. Just enough to cover the 0.48 lead I had on him.
6PM - It's almost a foregone conclusion. It took ten weeks, but I finally won all four of my leagues in the same week. The closest game is going to be my Richard Simmons' Wig team, but a point adjustment overnight changed me from clinging to a 3.23 point advantage to a 5.48 buffer. This is reason to exhale. Barring a very active game from Nate Clements, I'll take a colossal step towards the playoffs.
More on that league later.
Mafialligators I have a fifty point cushion heading into tonight's game. I have Nate Clements while my opponent still has Shaun Alexander. Word is that it's been pouring in Seattle, and will continue to pour at game time. This would favor a low-scoring affair, played mainly on the ground. This would be good for keeping Nate Clements from any big point earning interceptions. I've never rooted for a man to pull a groin, but I'm doing just that tonight. No way Shaun Alexander scores more than 10 points. I think he's been averaging about two for the last six weeks or so. Hard to find a bigger disappointment than that guy.
Full-Fleged Heroes: Jesse Chatman, Derrick Johnson Chatman had about 150 total yards and has been doing his best Ronnie Brown impersonation since the injury. His 24 points here tied for third highest on the squad and was 10 better than expected of him. Derrick Johnson was second highest scoring (to Jay Cutler) at 27 points. He had 11 tackles, an interception and a forced fumble. He was 13 points better than projected.
Unsung Heroes: Ernie Sims, Dwayne Bowe Sims has been one of the better defenders all year long. Normally good for around 10 points in this league, week in and week out, his 18 was a little suprising considering how much Arizona figured to pass against a weak Detroit secondary. Bowe put up 26 points, when he was only expected to produce 11 as he continues to assert himself in that KC offense.
New Record: 7-3 It looks like the top two teams are going to fall, which will put me back into a tie for second place. The two teams right behind me look like they're going to keep pace, so it's key to pull this one out. One note: Larry Johnson is saying he has a broken bone in his foot. The Chiefs are saying it's a bruise and playing coy. It's hard to sort through this info, but when the player himself is saying his foot is broken, I'm not believing whatever smokescreen the team puts up. I can't afford to keep him and see how this plays out. I dumped him in favor of Selvin Young. Young's still going to struggle, but Henry should be getting suspended any day now and I'm not wasting space on Johnson. If he plays again this year, it will be very late in the season, during the playoff weeks, and he has some great matchups then. But he'll be rusty and the team will have fully turned to Brodie Croyle by then. It's just really tough to hold onto him and ride out the storm. I'm handicapping myself now, and really, for what payoff in the end?
Illinois Transients I'm up 135.89 to 97.90. Everything I said on Friday or Saturday held true. He still has Nate Burleson to play tonight, but he's not covering a 37 point deficit.
Heroes: Ben Roethlisberger Big Ben just keeps going and going. He lobbed three TD passes, and scampered for one on the ground.
Unsung Heroes: Can't pick one here. So many guys had good games and exceeded their projections by a nice little margin. Chris Henry had a solid game. Reggie Bush didn't get much yardage, but playing with a bruised thigh and minor concussion, gutted out a TD and two 2pt conversions. Heath Miller quietly keeps catching almost a TD a game from Big Ben. Kevin Jones had a rushing TD and caught 8 passes out of the backfield.
New Record: 5-4 I came up with a big win by thumping the guy directly ahead of me in the standings. There's still a ridiculous bunch in the middle of the pack in this league. Luckily, I'm back on the top of it.
The first place team is 9-0 and the second place team is 6-3. Then comes the cluster. There were five 4-4 teams, and four played each other. The other lost to the undefeated team. I'm going to be 5-4 and tied with another guy, but I've got the tie-breaker because I've scored about 40 more points on the season. There there are the three 4-5 teams. As long as I stay in the top four and get into the championship round, I think I'm going to make some noise. My team looks better and better each week.
The Seedy Underbelly I'm up 227.62 to 136.20. My guys are all done, while my opponent rolls with Matt Hasselbeck, Marcus Trufant and Julian Peterson tonight. Those three should put up anywhere between 35 and 50 points, so my 91 point lead should hold up.
Heroes: Shayne Graham, Derrick Johnson Graham accounted for all of Cincy's scoring in a 21-7 victory. That was seven field goals! And, as mentioned, Johnson had himself one helluva day for an IDP.
Unsung Heroes: Stuart Schwiegert, OJ Atogwe, Marques Colston After disappointing for much of the year, Schweigert looked more like he did last year by registering 8 tackles from his safety spot. OJ Atogwe played well in the Rams secondary with three solos and an assist, but it was his interception that put him a tad over his projections. Colston has been the hottest receiver in the league the last month as the New Orleans passing game has found life. He didn't find the end zone, but Drew Brees is looking to him almost every play and he chipped in with 129 receiving yards.
New Record: 8-2 It's been a high-stakes game of heads up poker for about a month now, and neither me nor the other guy have blinked. Although I did get HOSED out of a victory. Me and my co-numero uno are both now 8-2 and have a match up looming in a couple of weeks, right before the playoffs. We both should clinch a spot this week, if I'm looking at this right, although the seeding will likely be determined by that late-season clash of the titans.
Richard Simmons' Wig 8PM - We're almost through one quarter and Nate Clements has one point, so my margin is now 4.48.
9:14 - Halftime is here, and Clements is up to 1.50 points. I'm going to be very careful not to say anything here, because I'm just superstitious enough.
A couple of things aren't helping me this week.
If I hold on, I'm going to jump over one team, Fresh, and into seventh place, all by my lonesome. This is where I could've used some help.
For starters, Pat and his Shockers could've done me (and himself) a big solid and won this week, but that's not going to happen. Pat would've been alone back atop the league, but more importantly for me, Millerlites, the team he's poised to lose to would've fallen to 5-5, instead of 6-4. A second break I could've caught would have been if Milwaukee's Best would've beaten Jackrollers. That would've left Jackrollers at 4-6 with me and Milwaukee would've improved to 7-3. Basically, what I need to happen is for the teams at the top, that I have no chance of catching, to win out and beat up on the teams in the middle of the pack.
But that's not happening. The more lower teams upset the top teams, be bigger the middle of the pack gets, which means the harder it will be for me to squeak in. Not only is is harder for me to leapfrog some of these middling teams, but if it comes down to one big cluster, I'm going to have a hard time winning any tie-breakers. When I lost, I lost bad, and I've lost a lot already this year. I didn't have any of those games where I lost 105-100 or anything, I got my butt kicked in a lot of 85-52 type games.
9:35 Starting the third series of the third quarter and Clements has already picked up anther tackle. This should put him at 2 points on the night, and my lead at 3.48.
M@TH$RF#CK&R!!! Nate Clements just had an interception. That's two more points and my lead is down to 1.48 points. Three more solo tackles and I'm fucked for the season.
10:02 - Nate Clements registered an assited tackle. Lead down to .98 points.
10:13 - Clements with a solo tackle. Lead now .48. I'm hoping for the game to be called due to lightning now. I do a wicked rain dance. You should see it.
10:31 - San Fran had he ball for about two minutes before punting it away. 6:01 to go, score is 24-0 Seattle. My advice: run the fucking ball up the middle. Don't get cute, don't pass, don't run to the outside (toward Clements), don't do anything other than pound it up the middle.
10:37 - Seattle ran the ball five straight times before the drive stalls on 4th and 7. San Fran takes a timeout with 3:01 to go. Seattle will probably get the ball back once more, and by that time, they should be in kneel-down time.
10:45 - San Fran stalls out, turns the ball over on downs at the two minute warning. First play out of the break is a Matt Hasselbeck -1yard kneel-down. This is repeated twice more.
BOOYAH!!
Nate Clements final line: 5 solo tackles, 1 assisted tackle, 1 interception.....5.00 points. That leaves me with a 0.48 margin of victory. Hoo-rah. Phew. I was pacing around here for the last two hours, nervously twitching and trying to distract myself by lifting weights and playing video game poker. But it's all over and the chase for the playoffs is still on. I'm one game out of the playoffs with just one team standing in front of me and four games to play.
A tall, rugged man dressed in black stalks into one end of town, his six shooters hanging off his waist. He walks slowly and with a purpose. The townsfolk scurry out of the street, some retreating to their porches while others seek shelter behind locked doors and peer out from behind the edges of their windows.
Through the cloud of dust they've kicked up, the stranger lurches deeper and deeper into their quiet little town. He peers out at them from under the brim of his dusty old hat. A menacing grin seems permanently stamped on his face. The corners of his mouth are pulled back, pursing his lips into a snarl. Overhead a crow shrieks.
It's high noon on the prairie, and when a stranger like this crashes your town, there's bound to be trouble.
The man, Simmons is his name. He stops in the center of town square and slowly turns his head to each side to survey his new domain. As his tilts his head, scars are apparent from previous battles. Wherever this man has been, his travels have not been pleasant.
He stands there waiting, head launched forward, hands hanging at his sides, hovering just over his weapons. He stares straight ahead waiting for a worthy adversary to come forth. The town seems dead, it's still with unease. The only sound is the creaking of the old town windmill standing guard over the center square. Even it seems intimidated by this unwelcomed guest.
From the opposite end of the strip, a brave soul emerges. It's a man named Leach and as far as the locals are concerned, this is his town. Leach struts confidently toward the stranger, prepared to run this riff-raff out of his quiet little settlement. As he draws nearer, the stranger lifts his gaze, and Leach stops dead in his tracks.
"You," he says flatly.
The stranger doesn't move and doesn't speak, he just keeps burning holes through him with his stare. Leach grits his teeth and stares right back.
"Ok, let's settle this once and for all." The two men remain frozen in their stances for what seems like an eternity.
At last, Leach yells out, "Draw!!!"
The two men clutch for their pistols and a blaze of gunfire rings out. The sound echoes and amplifies between the buildings on each side of the street. Their duel seems to draw out in slow motion. The stranger moves slowly forward in long strides, both arms out in front of him and each gun flashing in alternate bursts. The town hero Leach strafes to the right, ducking low and rips off his own shots.
Leach staggers and drops to a knee. He's been hit, and judging from the way he gasps for air, the damage is severe. The stranger continues forward barring his teeth and scowling. His fingers continue flashing across his triggers with the speed of light.
Click. Click. Click. Click. Click.
His chambers are emptied. His arms fall slowly to his sides and he looks down upon a wounded Leach. Puffs of frilly white smoke hang in the air, and each breath of oxygen is rich with the scent of gunpowder.
"Gotcha again," the stranger growls.
Leach, still down on one knee, chuckles a nervous laugh and drops his head. It's unclear where he's been hit, but his right arm hangs and his pistol in that hand lies muzzle down in the dust. He slowly raises his left arm to point his firearm in that hand at the stranger. His coordination is faint and the weapon bobs and weaves in circles as Leach struggles to keep it fixed on the stranger.
"Not quite," he murmurs. "I still have one shot left."
-------------------------------------
That little gem of literary greatness I just made up pretty much sums up the match my Richard Simmons' Wig team had today. Facing off with the league leader, I'm up by 3.23 points (89.69 to 86.46). It was quite the shootout. However, victory isn't mine just yet, as he still has one guy yet to play. That guy would be Nate Clements, cornerback for the San Francisco 49ers. He's "projected" to get 3.82 points in tomorrow's Monday night game.
In real life, the last time they played, Clements had six solo tackles and an assist. That would've been good for 3.25 points. In fairness, the last time they played, San Fran was better, so it was more of a game and Seattle was still passing late. Seattle was also all kinds of banged up in their earlier meeting. I'm thinking that Clements will be in that 3 to 3.25 range, so this game is going to be heartbreak for one of us. I'll just have to wait and see how it goes.
I updated my media playlist (see left) overnight. I've almost got too much garbage in this one playlist, but I'd rather have too many choices than not enough. FYI, I'm listening to "Radio Nowhere" by Springsteen. I don't know what his new record sounds like as a whole, but I like this song.
Culinary Note Of the Week: I saw this Peppermint Mocha coffee creamer at Schnucks the other day. It sounded good (too good for coffee) so I bought a bottle of it. It's to die for. Delectible. I could pull fifty positive adjectives out of my arse right now, and I would still try to find ways to compliment this product.
On with the show!
It's week 10 which means a couple of things in your standard 10 team fantasy football league. For one, every ying-yang who's been riding Tom Brady and/or Randy Moss is finally getting a dose of reality this week with the Patriots on bye. Secondly, we've now been through the entire rotation once, so we're starting over again. This could be good or bad. Some of my teams got off to hot starts and others stumbled out of the gate against these foes.
Richard Simmons' Wig (3-6) Opponent: The Eagles (7-2) Previous Outcome: Win Projected Outcome: Loss (80.04 - 84)
This game is uber-important for myself and Pat, as he and this guy are tied for first place. I handled him pretty well in Week 1, but much of it was luck. Steven Jackson and Cedric Benson both were atrocious and actually cost him points. Now, I know this guy, and he's pretty sharp, even though he's Canadien. He works on researching and developing weapons and explosives for the government. But he's starting a few guys I would avoid this week.
As for myself, I was absolutely saved by Plax Burres and his three TDs in week 1. Going up and down our lineups, I like all of my guys' match ups. That's not to say that they're any better than any of his guys, but there's not a ton of potential for this to blow up in my face. Conversely, he's got plenty of "plus" match ups himself, but some suspect ones.
A couple of side notes: After I cut Kevin Curtis lose after back-to-back lame weeks to start the season, this guy is the one who picked him up. It paid off large in week 3, but Curtis has been pretty inconsistent since then. If I win a close one, I can't imagine how much I will revel in seeing him stuck with my trash. Secondly, I had a guy working me hard a few weeks back for a Patrick Crayton for Brett Favre deal. At the time, Crayton was about the fifth best WR over the last month or so, and I had Bulger coming back soon, so I passed. The guy eventually swapped Favre to this guy for Larry Fitzgerald. Favre has been reborn this year, but I don't regret it. I'd be thin without Crayton, and I've had what I believed to be good QB matchups almost every week. It's just that guys I plug in at QB keep getting hurt or blowing for no reason. So if I pull this one out without having made that short-sighted panick move, then I'm way better off. For the record, I'm trotting out Bulger again. What modest success I've had this year has come with him at the helm, and I really like his match up this week.
The Seedy Underbelly (7-2*) Opponent: Big Bass (5-4) Previous Outcome: Win Projected Outcome: Win (232.75 - 211.94)
That asterisk is just to remind you how Yahoo bamboozled me.
This guy has had a solid season, he's been hanging tough most of the time. This is just the type of oppenent that you can't disrespect or overlook. Sure, I'm favored by twenty or so, but if you don't do your due dilligence during the week this is just the type of game you lose by forty points. I really fear his running backs this week, Adrian Peterson and Kevin Jones. He's got a solid collection of defensive guys, a lot of home run threats, guys who play defensive back. They could end up with a handful of tackles for just a few points or a handful of tackles and an interception or something for large points. If a couple of these guys go off, I could be hurting.
I'm not crazy about two of my match ups here. Brandon Marshall playing against KC is number one, because of the uncertainties at QB, and a good KC defense. But Denver has had trouble running and they're probably not going to be leading much, so they should have to go to the air. The second is LDT against Indy. Sounds crazy at first blush, but Indy has unreal speed on defense, and although they're still fairly weak against the run, they have improved. If they get too far behind, that could take a few touches away from LDT, and from what I've seen of the Chargers defense, I don't know what to expect. Their weakness all year long has been against the pass - not good playing a Peyton Manning team. But last week they looked horrendous against Adrian Peterson. Now a lot of that was AP, but how much exactly?
This is the one team I'm not sure about. Sure the record is spiffy, but I started the season losing back-to-back games to two teams, including Beaver Eaters, that have not fared well. I then ripped off six straight wins thanks in large part to some clever bye-week maneuvering and a few lucky match ups.
Now, I'm without the services of Larry Johnson for an undisclosed amount of time. I dropped Shayne Graham and added Priest Holmes, as KC had a very, very favorable rushing matchup from here on out. But I'm handcuffed carrying two backs for one gig, and this is a league with just two bench positions - not a format to be carrying around a handcuff player. Basically, one of the two kickers I start each week is my lowest scoring player, usually. This week, the difference between Holmes and Graham in projected scoring is about eight points. Over the next three weeks, it was about twenty three. And for all remaining games, it projects to about a forty to fifty point difference. I have plenty of options at RB, but I could be playing with one arm tied behind my back if I roll with an empty K slot.
My opponent here is one of those lucky Moss owners, so he'll be without him. He also starts the dreadful Phil Rivers and Shaun Alexander. I'm not crazy about Maurice Jones Drew this week either, but this league counts return yardage, so he'll still salvage points there. Other than that, he's got a bunch of ok-to-good match ups across the board, nothing that really scares me. And that is what really scares me. There's a 10 point difference and he's got just ok match ups. What if a couple of his guys explode? Then I'm in trouble. It's not as if I don't have bad situations of my own. I'm starting Kevin Curtis here. I've got Brian Griese against Oakland. I've got Braylon Edwards against Pittsburgh. Deion Branch is still questionable, and he plays on Monday night, so I can't do anything about it if he's a gametime scratch. I've got Dwayne Bowe against a Denver secondary that I don't know what to make of now.
This one could be interesting. A win this week, along with the right combination of outcomes for those teams behind me could lock me into a playoff spot already. I doubt that exact combination comes up and I can't worry about it. I just have to win this week and let the chips fall where they may.
Due to this league starting a week late, I'm not yet into the repeat portion of the schedule. But this is a HUGE game nonetheless. My opponent currently occupies the fourth and final slot in the championship round. Yes we are tied, but because he's scored about 18 points more than me on the season, I'm relegated to fifth place, not fourth.
For the record, I won some games big earlier this season, and on a couple of Monday night games, with victory already assured, I benched some players. So the technicality that has me in fifth place not fourth, is in and of itself a technicality, if you want to get technical. The projected outcome here has me winning by about fourteen points, 133 to 120. But looking at his roster, I'm not all that impressed. Favre has a good match up. Derrick Mason is ok. Steve Smith....could be playing with his fourth string QB under center, so that's not so good. Shaun McDonald is just ok. Joe Addai is very good, Priest Holmes is a good play, Jeff King....see Steve Smith. Nate Burleson as a flex guy is a stretch.
So I'm not impressed. He'll be lucky to hit that 120. I could envision myself coming up slightly short of my 133.73, but I can also see myself up around 150. Furthermore, he's also set himself up to cannibalize himself. He's starting Brett Favre, hoping to get the 37 or so points someone at Yahoo has projected for him. He's also starting Green Bay kicker Mason Crosby, hoping for the 5.18 points from him. But he's also starting the Minnesota defense. One of those fantasy entitites is going to feast on the other. He's not setting himself up for a win-win scenario. If he's intentionally done it to insulate himself against a lose-lose scenario, then he's playing it safe. I've been there and done that...it's a bad road to go down. It always spells trouble.
So that's that. I'll be at the folks' house doing laundry and catching up with my pets in the morning before getting down to the nitty-gritty. If I still have a couple of Bud Lights in their 'fridge I might even raise a cold one to the fighting men and women of our country in honor of Veterans Day.
The November chill cutting into my place is unmistakable. Winter has come a knockin'. I'm gearing up for my annual Stupid Bowl, a month long duel pitting me against the elements. Man vs. Nature. It's just me seeing how long I can go without turning my heat on. Two years ago I think I made it to November 21st. Last year it was November 28th, and I'm claiming a technicality on that one. I seriously though a pipe might freeze and burst. I didn't crack.
Anyways, this new place seems draftier, so it's going to be the toughest Stupid Bowl yet.
The competition is fierce, but the training is minimal. I must have eight boxes of clothes that are either too big or too small from my weight fluctuations over the last four years or so. All you have to do is layer, really. And all the stupid things my dad complained to me about when I was younger and wanted them to turn the heat up now make way more sense. Cold feet? Put some damn shoes and socks on. It is winter. I always blamed him for having poor circulation and being immune to minor chills, but it's just common sense. Maybe, living in a temperate zone such as this, we aren't meant to walk around in shorts with no shirt on in January, even if we are in the comfort and safety of our own homes.
And besides, I drink too many margaritas to waste unnecessary pennies on my utility bills.
The only time the cold is a problem is getting into and out of the shower in the morning. That sucks. But most of the time I wear a t-shirt or two, and a sweater or a hooded sweatshirt. I have an old pair of Pumas that I use as house shoes that I wear most of the time.
I've been clicking off some milestones lately. I posted my hundreth post on this silly thing. Don't know if that's an accomplishment or not. I'm leaning towards 'no.' My truck just flipped over 28,800 miles. I'm averaging about 9600 miles per year, far below the national average for commuters. It helps that I'm no longer in school and could hit my office with a rock and three throws.
I just added an embedded audio player. You might've noticed it to the left. Maybe I'll add some other playlists or tweak that one. I don't know. Maybe I won't. Ashes to Ashesis definitely my favorite Bowie song of all-time.
I've been listening to those songs as I type this and this is a version of China Girl I've never heard before. I'd swear it's about 20 seconds longer than the original album version. Let me consult my David Bowie encyclopedia (The Complete David Bowie by Nicholas Pegg). I made it through the first 356 (of about 650) last fall and I've had it on my couch to finish this winter.
China Girl Writing Credits: Iggy Pop, David Bowie Appears on: Let's Dance (side A, released May 1983)
"Originally produced and co-written by Bowie for Iggy Pop's The Idiot, 'China Girl' would go on to become a huge international hit for David when he re-recorded it for Let's Dance six years later. Iggy Pop's original, a flop single in May 1977, later appeared on David Bowie Songbook. It's markedly tougher and less poppy than Bowie's version, and Iggy's angrily growling vocal makes better sense of the lyric's forebodings about cultural imperialism and despoliation. "My little China girl, you shouldn't mess with me, I'll ruin everything you are," Iggy warns, before raising the old 1976 Bowie/Pop chestnut of Nazi delusion: "I stumble into town just like a sacred cow, visions of swastikas in my head, plans for everyone..."
All these elements are there in Bowie's Let's Dance version, but the addition of an Oriental guitar motif and cute backing vocals (the original has none of that "oh-oh-oh-oh, little China girl" stuff) softens the genuinely sinister side. It was Nile Rodgers who devised the guitar riff, and he tells David Buckley that playing it to Bowie was "the most nervous moment I had in my entire career...I thought I was putting some bubblegum over some great artistic heavy record. I was terrified. I thought he was going to tell me that I'd blasphemed, that I didn't get the record and I didn't get him, and that I'd be fired. But it was exactly the opposite. He said it was great!" It's a testament to Rodger's judgement, and to the sheer melodrama of Bowie's belowing vocal, that the Let's Dance version remains a tremendously effective slice of hardcore pop, delivered with gusto and forming a cornerstone for the album's underlying themes of cultural identity and desperate love.
The lengthy album cut was edited for release as the second Let's Dance single, peaking at number 2 in June 1983 while The Police held the top spot with "Every Breath You Take". In America it made number 10. The great talking point of 'China Girl' was David Mallet's MTV-award-winning video, shot back-to-back with the 'Let's Dance' clip in Australia in February, and featuring an actress called Jee Ling. "She was a lovely girl," Bowie said later. "I went out with her for awhile. After the shoot she became a girlfriend of mine." Of the video itself, he explained that it was "a vignette of my continuing fascination of all things Asian. One thing that I'd been surprised by when I was in Australia was the large Chinese population...so I based this whole piece of work around that particular community."
It goes on and on and on, but I'm tired of typing. It does appear there was a single version, so I don't know what this one is.
I just listened to "Heroes" - it's from the Freddy Mercury tribute show circa 1992. I don't know what's up with that version of The Man Who Sold The World. That shit is outta here.
I love that live version of The Passenger with Iggy. And Bowie doing Hurt with NIN is awesome. I have that Nine Inch Nails dual VHS video collection of the video. It's funny. Before that gig that recording is taken from, Trent Reznor is sitting around talking to Bowie, one of his (and the rest of the bands) biggest idols. In the middle of chatting, Bowie looks at then-NIN drummer Danny Lohner and says something like, "you look exactly like Brad Pitt" in that British accent of his. Lohner does; he's almost a spot-on impersonator, and apparently he hates this, because he laughs it off, waits about eight seconds and gets up and walks out of the room. It was sort of funny. Maybe you have to see it. It's funny in an awkward way, how he waits such a ridiculously short period of time before saying how he should be going. Like, where's he going? They're backstage waiting to go on.
Not crazy about this particular live version of Five Years. Rebel, Rebel is the album cut. Ditto for Sufragette City. Don't lean on me man cause you can't afford the ticket! I have no idea what exactly that means, and I don't want to think about it. It might ruin the song. I just like the premise of Bowie pretending to be sympathetic to the women's lib movement to pick up chicks. Sounds like a plot line for George Costanza on an episode of Seinfeld.
Ziggy Stardust is the original version. I don't know what this version of Space Oddity is, but I'm liking the stripped-down sound. Sounds like Bowie is singing 12 feet from the mic in a big empty room, though. Starman sounds original, and as good as ever.
Keeping it simple this week. My pick is in bold. If it's in bold and red, then it's an Upset Pick.
Sunday, November 11th
St. Louis @ New Orleans Buffalo @ Miami Jacksonville @ Tennessee Cleveland @ Pittsburgh Philly @ Washington Atlanta @ Carolina Denver @ Kansas City Minnesota @ Green Bay Cincinnatti @ Baltimore Detroit @ Arizona Chicago @ Oakland Dallas @ New York Giants Indianapolis @ San Diego
A couple of Tuesdays ago, Pat mentioned to me he was going to watch House. I threatened to cause him physical harm if he ruined anything about it (season 4) for me and he cowered away like a scared puppy. I then added how I was afraid the season might be sucking anyway, and he scoffed.
"Since you don't watch a second of it, what proof do you have of that," he asked.
Simple. I do watch commercials. I try not to, but sometimes I can't run out of the room quick enough. And based on the two or three different commercials I've seen for this season's first four (?) eposides, I have a subliminal fear that when I scurry out to buy season four on DVD sometime next August, I will be purchasing a mildly palatable form of excrement.
And I base all of this one one, simple, immutable, undeniable truth. Two words: Olivia Wilde.
She's beautiful! And she's pretending to be a doctor this year. Maybe it's a med student, I don't know, again, I don't actually watch the episodes on their air dates. But she walks around a hospital in some authorized capacity with her own sterile white lab coat and black stethescope.
Last time I remember her she was Micha Barton's lipstick lesbian lover on season 2 of The O.C. (not that I ever watched it or anything.....really....stop laughing). She was great at it. Totally believable. Gorgeous girl, operating a little rock club/bar on the beach in a ritzy part of Southern California, falls for a the similarly appealing daughter of a well-to-do Orange County family. I'm totally buying it. In fact, I'm replaying my memory of their kiss in my head right now. And now. And now. And....now again. She was also in something called the Black Donnelly's that looked stupid from what I remember and was mercilfully cancelled after 13 episodes.
Now I ask you this: How often have you been unable to be treated by a littany of regular 'ole docs, specialists and other highly trained people, and been sent to see a world renouned specialist of Diagnostics, who has an assistant that looks like this?
I don't know what that pose is, but it works for me. Unlike the believability of House. The show is already stretching plausibility awfullly thin with so many english-speaking doctors. Now FOX is going to snow job us with a woman who could've taken the easy path into any form or walk of life, but chose eight-plus years of medical school and an internship working for one of, if not the biggest wackos to ever hold a medical license? Puh-lease. My bullsnot meter is going off.
I also feel that devotees of the show will recall episode four (I think) of season one. Cameron was already playing the emotionally needy, insecure doctor. She began questioning why she was chosen for one of the most prostegious fellowships in the nation. Here's how it went down:
Cameron: Why did you hire me?
House: Does it matter?
Cameron: Kind of hard to work for a guy who doesn't respect you.
House: Why?
Cameron: Is that rhetorical?
House: No, it just seems that way because you can't think of an answer. Does it make a difference what I think? I'm a jerk. The only thing that matters is what you think. Can you do the job?
Cameron: You hired a black guy because he had a juvenile record.
House: No...it wasn't a racial thing. I didn't see a black guy, I just saw a doctor with a juvenile record. I hired Chase because his dad made a phone call. And I hired you because you're extremely pretty.
Cameron: You hired me to get into my pants!?!
House: I can't believe that that would shock you. It's also not what I said. No, I hired you because you look good. It's like having a nice piece of art in the lobby.
Cameron: I was at the top of my class!
House: Yes, but not the top.
Cameron: I did an internship at the Mayo Clinic!
House: You were a very good applicant.
Cameron: But not the best.
House: Would that upset you, really, to think that you were hired for some genetic gift of beauty instead of some genetic gift of intelligence?
Cameron: I worked very hard to get where I am.
House: You didn't have to. People choose the paths that gain them the greatest rewards for the least amount of effort. That's a law of nature, and you defied it. That's why I hired you. You could've married rich, you could've been a model, you could've just shown up and people would've given you stuff - lots of stuff - but you didn't. You worked your stunning little ass off.
Cameron: Am I supposed to be flattered?
House: Gorgeous women do not go to medical school...unless they are as damaged as they are beautiful.
So there you have it. All summed up nice and succincly in a wonderful House-ism. Gorgeous women do not go to medical school. However, now digging deep into their bag of plot twists and story lines here in Season 4, the powers that be producing House would have you to believe that at least TWO (2) gorgeous women DID go to med school and both wind up working at the same hospital. Here's "Doctor" Cameron if you're unfamiliar.
I mean, what are the odds? If part A of the hypothesis is correct, then the odds of two middle-to-upper crust models going to medical school is possible, but still a statistical longshot. But the chances of two such models, going to med school, making it through, and working for the same doctor at the same hospital (in NEW JERSEY NO LESS!) must be mind-bogglingly astronomical. Let's say that two girls who could be supermodels did make it through med school. Wouldn't at least one of them want to work in...I don't know...Miami? There's not a well-respected doctor with an opening available in South Beach, where she could pursue her modeling career on the side?
All I'm saying is that, based on commercials alone, it's getting awfully hard to watch the show and not come away with the scent of Hollywood B.S. wafting through your nostrils.
Consider this my open letter to David Shore - step up your game sir!
The Seedy Underbelly With a 215.44 to 157.18 victory, I move one step closer to cementing a playoff spot. The Underbelly are now 7-2 and remain tied for first place. It would be inappropriate for me to NOT mention how I got fucked over two weeks ago and should be alone in first with a 8-1 record and riding an 8 game winning streak.
This week I added Marques Colston. Can't believe he was still on waivers after that 120 yard 3 TD day two weeks ago. With Chad Johnson having a neck sprain and the Bengals self-destructing, a suddenly hot Colston is a well-timed pickup.
THE BAD
Mafialligators Clashing with the team I was tied for second with, I came up short (285 - 376). The good news here is that the team behind me also lost, so I slip to third, but I don't have to worry about any tie-breakers or any stupid reason I might slip out of the championship tier of the playoffs. I'm now 6-3.
Larry Johnson is out for at least a week, possibly more, and this comes at a terrible time for the Gators. Over the next six weeks he has an insanely favorable slate of run defenses. Jay Cutler is also out for at least this week, although his injury seems rather minor. It looks like I'll be playing this week with a Losman & Patrick Ramsey or Losman & Brian Griese platoon at QB. Needless to say, this isn't fitting of a team in third place. It's not going to strike fear into anyone.
To rectify this, I've begun shopping offers to the three last place teams. My targets: Marc Bulger, Matt Hasselbeck, Jon Kitna and Peyton Manning. I think I have the most realistic shot at Bulger. His owner is in dead last, by two games to boot, and with Cutler being shelves for the short term, I'm hoping his owner is frustrated enough to dump him. His offensive line is in no better shape, but he is healthy, may not have a running game with S-Jax's status in flux, will be playing from behind and still has a round with NFC West opponents Arizona, San Franny, and Seattle remaining, along with Cincy. All pretty mediocre defenses.
Illinois Transients I had a hunch to start Phillip Rivers last week. I was thinking 250 yards and three TDs, while I suspected Roethlisberger might go for 220 and 2 TDs in a nasty match up with bitter divisional rivals. I couldn't have been more wrong. Rivers took a dump and Roethlisberger couldn't have had a more perfect first half (200 yards, 5 TDs, no turnovers). In fairness, Phillip Rivers had an entire second half to continue to blow, while Roethlisberger tweaked his knee and left early with his team still up 35-7.
So the outcome for the Transients, as you can imagine, mirrored this poor decision. I lost 124.88 to 135.34. Rivers gave me 12.71 points, whereas Big Ben would've given me 41.86 had I started him. Might've made a difference.
So here I am, first team in the consolation round as of right now. There's an 8-0 team, a 5-3 team, then five teams, myself included at 4-4. I'm the third highest scoring of those five, putting me in fifth place because of the first tie-breaker of total points scored for the season. No only would I also be 5-3 had I done my normal thing and rolled with Roethlisberger, but those 41 points would've helped pad my stats should I ever need them for one of these tie-breakers. Just a dumb decision all around.
THE UGLY
The Picks I went a pitiful 8-6 this week. That's what I get for doing my deep thinking on such a violent, masculine sport while watching a Richard Gere movie. My season stats are now 85-39, and I'm now 5-6 on upsets after flopping on both counts this week.
Richard Simmons' Wig The Wig looked pretty good entering Monday night being up by about sixteen points. My opponent's only real threat to produce many points was the aforementioned Roethlisberger, and I sort of had insurance against a big game from him by having Hines Ward in my lineup. Roethlisberger went off, Ward didn't do anything and my opponent blew past me in the point. The final score was 78.40 to 88.79.
I'm now 3-6 and still, somehow, mathematically alive in terms of playoffs here. It helps that the playoffs are pushed back a week, giving me an extra game, and that it's an expanded playoff format accepting the top six teams into the championship round.
One item of note here, I cut Travis Henry loose. He had a magnificent first four or five weeks, but has done squat since. Let's recap. Up until week 5 he was leading the league in rushing yards, but was disappointing mightily by only finding the end zone once. Then he tweaked a knee and an ankle. Then he tested positive for dope. Then he injured his ribs. Then he had a bye. Then he missed a game with the ribs. Then he came back and re-injured his knee.
Notice that in the last five weeks or so, he's done nothing of note that was football-related. His court date is Nov. 16th I believe, so he may only have one or two games before (inevitably) getting suspended for a year. I have no expectations for him over these next two weeks. He faces a fairly stout KC defense this week, if he's even healthy, and a very tough Tennessee defense on Nov. 18th, if he's even still active by then.
I'm hoping one of my opponents picks him up on name and/or hope that he can beat his legal rap. This will accomplish a couple of things. First, they'll have to waste waiver priority. Secondly, hopefully they start him and he disappoints for them the same way he has for me, causing them to lose and me to pick up a game.
Before I go, it just wouldn't be right to mention another week where the Wig didn't get hosed by their QB. This week it was Jay Cutler. Cutler, as I've mentioned hurt his leg on the first drive of the game. He finished with about 42 yards passing. That was good for 0.40 points. Since this seems to be a recurring theme, I've built the little table showing exactly how pisspoor my QB production has been this year. The proof is in the pudding:
(table removed, see following post)
Now that seems pretty damn bad. It's certainly frustrating to see a single digit number, sometimes negative, as your QB's production. It's maddening. But how big of a difference has it made on my season? Is the QB the main reason I'm two steps up from the cellar? Or are there deeper problems here? I'm glad you asked:
(table removed, see following post)
So there it is. With average QB play on a week-to-week basis, I'm 4-4 instead of 3-5. The bottom line is when I'm winning, I'm winning big, regardless of my QB play. And when I'm losing, I'm losing big. This would seem to be indicative of my original opinion of my draft - that I reached on the majority of my picks. As a result I'm left with a team of inconsistent players who can all either go off one week or roll over the next. Usually, it's a mixture meaning I'm lucky to top 70 points. Still, being 4-4 right now would put me on the fringe of the playoffs instead of having to jump over 3 teams to get in.
8:51 AM No, I'm not so hungover that I think I'm on some other planet which I've named Inspiron 9300, although that would be a kick-ass name. That's actually the make & model of my laptop here, which is nearly restored to it's pre-fubar state. I still have some little things to do, but the renovations are right on schedule.
This morning I'm surrounded by three cats and getting my iTunes library back up to date. I forgot to save my playlists or backup my music library before the move - all I did was copy the original files - so all the formatting on much of the stuff was lost. I'm meticulous about my music library. Each album has to have the cover art downloaded and affixed. I have to have the name of each album, the year of release and the track number as well. So I'm working my way through the library doing that. So far I'm down to Billy Squire. I'm listening to "Rock Me Tonite" (the video that single-handedly killed his career) while making sure the album art for his greatest hits compilation is in each of the songs' files.
I have over 6000 songs in my library. And I'm on the B's. So I should be done around.....2009. I'll have this back up to requirements by 2009.
I actually have more music, but not all of it is on here. Right now I'm only showing 5926 songs, 16.2 days on no-repeat, non-stop music and about 26.29 Gigs of music.
The time change is screwing with me so I'm just going to sit here, sip some coffee and let my laundry run. If I fall asleep, then so be it. As I work, I think it'll be fun to update with what type of garbage I'm wasting so much harddrive space on. I put the odds at 5:2 that 75% of it is trashy 80's or heavy metal. Let's do it every ten minutes.
9:00am The Bloodhound Gang - I'm the Least You Could Do
9:10am Bush - 40 Miles From the Sun
9:20am Catherine Wheel - Waydown
9:30am CKY - Sporadic Movement
9:40am Corey Hart - Sunglasses at Night
9:50am Cracker - Take Me Down to the Infirmary
10:00am Cyndi Lauper - True Colors
10:31am I dozed off for awhile and woke up with Tanner sleeping on me. Time to set the fantasy rosters:
Illinois Transients QB - Phil Rivers WR - Kevin Curtis, Santonio Holmes, Patrick Crayton RB - Reggie Bush, Kevin Jones, Earnest Graham TE - Heath Miller K - Rob Bironas DEF - Washington
Projected Outcome: Win, 123.21 - 106.88
Mafialligators QB - JP Losman, Jay Cutler WR - Kevin Curtis, Braylon Edwards, Deion Branch, Calvin Johnson, Anquan Boldin, Dwayne Bowe RB - Joseph Addai, Larry Johnson, Kevin Jones TE - Eric Johnson, Tony Scheffler K - Shayne Graham, Jeff Reed DEF - Philadelphia, Washington IDPs - Nick Barnett, Chris Hope, Jermaine Phillips, Nate Clements, Kirk Morrison, Ernie Sims
Projected Outcome: Loss 352 - 361
All-Star Football QB - Jason Campbell WR - Chad Johnson, Brandon Marshall RB - Ladainian Tomlinson, Reggie Bush TE - Chris Cooley K - Shayne Graham DEF - Tennessee IDPs - Demeco Ryans, Ernie Sims, AJ Hawk, Gerald Hayes, Bart Scott, Stuart Schweigert, Sean Jones, Adrian Wilson, David Thornton, Morlon Greenwood
Projected Outcome: Win, 211.58 - 157.36
Richard Simmons' Wig QB - Jay Cutler WR - Hines Ward, DJ Hackett, Brandon Stokley RB - Reggie Bush, Clinton Portis TE - Tony Scheffler K - Jeff Reed DEF - Washington IDPs - Anthony Henry, Chris Hope, Nick Barnett
7:41PM, November 2nd I'm pissed at Yahoo right now. They took away one of Brian Urlacher's assisted tackles from last week, costing The Seedy Underbelly a victory. Instead of winning by less than a point, I now lost by less than a point. Worse, I fall back into a three way tie with the two schlubs I consider realistic threats to my crown in this league. Instead of being one game up on one of the guys (whom I demolished) and two up on the other guy (whom I thought I had narrowly defeated), I'm now interlocked with these two dummies and technically in second place because of tie-breakers.
This has a very Bush vs. Gore 2000 Election feel to it. I won initially, some pencil-necked geek did a recount and threw out some of the tallies, and the other guy chalks one up in the Win Column. One measly assisted tackle. In 2000 Election terms, that's like the votes of 4000 black registered Democrats, tossed right out the window. Poof! I just lost a game because some dickhead re-watched the game film and snapped his fingers.
Besides steaming about that I've decided to blow up my laptop and start over again. But instead of using the right Windows disc, I used the wrong one, screwed up my reformatting job of my hard disk and so now I have to use Killdisk to reformat the reformatting. The I have to hope the other disc I have is the right copy. I've been doing that since about 8am this morning. I've now had about 22 cups of coffee. My knees feel like sponges from running. My right ankle feels like it has a bone chip in it and my shins just throb all the time. Even more fun, the Office Manager resigned, the Loss Control Manager is about to crap out a kid, so Mr. G.M. here has to step up and do the work of 2.5 people. If that sounds like it sucks ass, it's just the beginning - I was already doing the work of at least 2 people with my I.T. and Compliance responsibilities.
I have but one hope, and I believe it was Jesus who coined the phrase: Salvation Through Delegation. I'm pawning work off on my underlings like a rapper throwing fat bodyguard entourage members out the back of a plane when it's too heavy to take off. And I made work buy me a phone, so I'm cutting $65 a month out of my own expenses.
Approx. 10:45 PM, November 2nd Three reformats and a Windows install later, we're going the direction of being back in business. Now I've got to download all my drivers and transfer them to my computer.
12:06 AM, November 3rd I got the drivers put back on, established internet connectivity, and am updating Windows. It'll be doing that for the next three hours. Callie just called me, semi-wasted, and told me I should come watch Pat pass out on some concrete landscaping in downtown Alton. This was Pat's last day at his old job; I think him and some guys cut out of work at 1pm to go drinking. That was 11 hours ago. After I got Callie to hand the phone over, Pat's slurred speech pattern pretty much confirmed this timeline. I think he said he was going to the boat to gamble. I tried to talk him out of this - the last time we started out casually drinking and then decided to turn it into a "big night" we both dropped mad cash at strip joints. I don't think it worked, but I tried to steer him clear of the boat.
12:15 AM, November 3rd Caffeine high wearing off, so I danced around my office flailing my arms to "Come On Eileen" by Dexy's Midnight Runners. Aside from Howard 100, Big 80's (Channel 8) is my favorite station on Sirius Satellite Radio. Speaking of Stern, they just concluded what was probably my favorite week of radio since about 1999 or 2000. I feel this way mostly from Artie and Sal constantly squaring off. I'm with Artie; Sal IS a dick. He's psycho, hence his inability to hold a job for more than five years.
How many fiddle players does a band really need?
12:28 AM, November 3rd We are living in a material world and I am a material girl. Updated done downloading, installing IE7. This tends to take an unusually long period of time.
12:50 AM, November 3rd Fuck it, I'm calling it a night. I just caught myself singing along with George Michaels ("Faith"). That's a sure sign that I've been awake too long. It's probably been about 19 hours I've been awake. I didn't eat breakfast, I had a reheated piece of pizza for lunch, the same for dinner, I've been gorging on coffee and snacking on peanut butter cups off and on. I've pushed my body far enough. I'm aborting my updates, killing this here work laptop and going home.
I sat down to start working on my picks and looked at my record last week. 8-5? And I wrote that I was moderately ok with that? Baloney! I need to get angry this week, as if I were playing a real sport here.
But I was also hungry, so first I had a bagel and flipped through some movies I've burned recently. I'm watching Unfaithful. I really just wanted to see some tits, and I know Diane Lane has hers out a few times this movie, but it ended up making a good segue for this post.
I'm six minutes into the movie. It's the windiest, trashiest street ever. And we've already seen a panty shot!
Why does this movie make me so angry? I don't know. I think it has something to do with a suburban super-MILF becoming a homewrecker with some stupid Mexican or something. Maybe he's Italian, I don't know, his accent is silly. Richard Gere works hard all day long, he's tracking stocks, the man has a lot on the line. And this fucking book dealer/painter/boxer wanna-be with his stupid hair, four days growth and beady eyes ends up tagging her.
I seriously think I'd be ok if she were doing one of Richard Gere's Wall Street buddys in a bathroom stall. Maybe not. I think this movie makes me angry because it's stupid. The whole thing is contrived. I hate it. Here's the fucking picks. As an added bonus (Halloween treat?) I'll rank my belief in the picks with a series of fists, based on how hard I want to hit the skivy immigrant guy. A five-fist pick is absolute certainty. A one-fist pick means don't bet the farm on my pick.
Washington @ New York Jets The move to Kellen Clemens is a plus for New York, but I don't know if he'll give them that much of a boost right away. Washington just got their tails kicked, so they're looking to kick some ass themselves. Just like movies about the mob. The boss calls one mid-level guy in, chews him out, smacks him around, and then the mid-level guy goes out and smacks around his underlings because he's pissed. Winner - Washington, Four Fists
Green Bay @ Kansas City KC is a narrow favorite. Green Bay is coming off that emotional Monday night win in Denver. KC is an equally difficult place to play, but at this point, KC is probably better than Denver by a hair. Damon Huard had the bye week to get healthy and it was another week for Larry Johnson to look over his shoulder and decide to get his ass in gear. Winner - Kansas City, Three Fists
Arizona @ Tampa Bay It remains to be seen if Kurt Warner is going to have that contraption on his arm. Last we saw him he was gutting out a solid day with one arm against a very respectable Washington defense. Is Tampa Bay any better? I'd say they're on a similar level. Tampa Bay is home, they're favored by about a field goal and I can see their offense having modest success against Arizona's defense. UPSET SPECIAL - Arizona, Three Fists
Carolina @ Tennessee Carolina will have David Carr at QB. He's looked so bad that at this point the re-animated corpse of Vinny Testaverde is probably the better option at QB. Winner - Tennessee
San Francisco @ Atlanta This is a game where you'd say both teams are probably due for a win. I want to take San Fran, but Alex Smith's recently separated shoulder had significant swelling after last week's game and Frank Gore is questionable. Atlanta may be equally bad, but at least their offensive players are healthy. This one is a crapshoot, but I guess I'll take the bad home team over the bad road team. Winner - Atlanta, One Fist
Jacksonville @ New Orleans Winner - New Orleans, Four Fists
Denver @ Detroit Detroit is favored by a handful of points, which I think is crazy. This is one of those classic AFC/NFC match ups that people underestimate. They've seen just enough NFC teams hold up well against the AFC, so now they get crazy. Jon Kitna is still a bible-thumper who hasn't thrown a touchdown in three games. UPSET SPECIAL - Denver, Three Fists
Cincinnati @ Buffalo This seems like a game that Cincy should win, given their pleathora of offensive talent. But Cincy is too busy self-destructing. I don't get how everyone thinks that Chad Johnson is the reason that Cincy is giving up so may points per game. Winner - Buffalo, Two Fists
San Diego @ Minnesota AP meet LDT, LDT, AP. It's the who's who of NFL running backs summit in Minnesota this week. Hope they stay away from Lake Minnetonka. They're so who's-who that they don't even need to use their full names. Unfortunately, these two might not be the top story in this game - both run up against stout run defenses. But there are plays to be made through the air, and San Diego is going to make way more plays. Winner - San Diego, Five Fists
Seattle @ Cleveland This could turn into a shootout. Cleveland is going to roll with Anderson, Edwards, and Winslow, while Matt Hasselbeck finally has a full complement - Deion Branch, DJ Hackett, Bobby Engram and Nate Burleson are all finally together in the lineup. That, along with Shaun Alexander's sudden inability to run the ball, would seem to indicate an inclination to pass. Winner - Seattle
New England @ Indianapolis The game of the frickin' century, la-de-da. The 7-0 Colts play hosts to the 8-0 Patriots. I'm not one of those ninny's to accuse New England of running up the score. If you can't defend them, then why should they lift their starters at halftime, or the start of the fourth quarter? The Pats are yanking their guys at the right time, seven or eight minutes left in the game. They have to know what it's like to play into the fourth quarter with feeling if they're going to make a run in the playoffs. Despite my siding with them on that, I still hate the Patriots. I like Indy, it's a great little big city, their personnel from management down to the back-ups are first class people and I want them to win. But New England's looked too dominant. I don't know how you pick against them. Winner - New England, Five Fists
Houston @ Oakland Even if Daunte Culpepper tries to lose this game for them, Oakland's defense is going to carry them. Winner - Oakland, Three Fists
Dallas @ Philadelphia Philly is too up and down to trust them in a big game. Winner - Dallas, Four Fists
Baltimore @ Pittsburgh Baltimore is coming unraveled. Pittsburgh is getting healthy. This one won't be close. Winner - Pittsburgh
I accept complaints, tips, topic recommendations, endless praise, heterosexual porn between people more attractive than myself, Visa, Mastercard, checks, and money orders. Please, no Canadian coins.
Preparing for a Stupid Bowl requires one to scheme for the frigid winter air like a wily old defensive coordinator figuring out how to attack a prolific offense. Picture Jim Johnson up for 20 hours a day for a full week, figuring how to bring every blitzer possible, from every angle possible, with every delay possible and in every gap possible to thwart the Patriots last Sunday night.
So there you have it. The fat lady is doing vocal exercises in anticipation of the immenent demise of Richard Simmons' Wig's season.
