Don't say I didn't warn you but ...........

Oh but where to start? I am not at a loss for words, but rather a loss for a starting point. Once I get an actual amount of momentum going, I am quite sure that a steam of consciousness will follow allowing me to fill up the page, so to speak.

I guess I could pick up on my last real entry, not the blog saying I was going to do a blog, but the one before that. I kind of left everything hanging in the balance, unless people followed along in the comments to the entry. I would request an appearance of Peabody and Sherman and the Wayback Machine,

 but I imagine by now they are resting comfortably in a retirement village in Florida, just biding their time and waiting for the end to come.

Anyway, when I last left the blog, I had mentioned that I had two fantasy football games in progress, one in yahoo and one in the bar league. I was winning both, but both games were relatively close. As it turns out, I ended up losing in the yahoo league, Adrian Petersen ended my hopes of a fantasy title there, I am now relegated to the 3rd place game. In the bar league however, which I find more important because it involves money as opposed to pride (try buying milk with pride, just doesn't work all that well) I held on for a 6 point win, meaning this weekend will be for the league championship. Regardless of how it turns out, I will end up making money this year, but the difference between 1st and 2nd place is $93 dollars, so there is a definite fiscal advantage to winning as opposed to being the runner up.

Some things I didn't touch on, not that I meant to ignore them, but just didn't think about it at the time were the hockey league and the office pool. Well, hockey was pretty much a bad week for me, going 2-7-1 as I did, I have once again fallen out of the top 6 and reside in 7th place. and the overall record has fallen to 45-49-16 after 11 weeks of play. I am thinking now might be a good time for me to get all pouty and stuff so that I might increase my chances of winning. After all, it seemed to work in the office pool, so maybe it will work with the hockey team as well. Yeah, about that office pool that I moaned about a few weeks back, saying that I really didn't have a chance because there wasn't enough time left in the year for me to catch up, we are dow to the last two weeks of the season for picking games, and I am now just two wins behind first place. I went 10-6 last week, which was tied for best in the entire pool, so I gained a little ground, more so on the ineptness of my competition than me displaying a vast array of intelligence far surpassing my corporate counterparts.

I should note that I think I had my first bout of Alzheimer's this evening. It was quite shuddering at the time, but I have regained my wits for the time being. As most of you know, it is not uncommon for me to take afternoon naps, usually between jobs, but once you establish that pattern, it becomes hard to break, even when I only have to work at one place of employment. Wednesday was the last time I had doubled between both places, but after getting off of work Wednesday night, I came home and as I am want to do from time to time, I hopped on the computer before bed. Mind you, I got out of work relatively early, about 12:15am or so because business has died down with the college students away. I spend most of my shift cleaning stuff, scrubbing the dishwasher, wiping down walls, cleaning burners off of the stove, just basically bullshit tasks to keep me busy and collecting money. Anyway, I get home and decide I will work on the newly released pogo badges on Wednesday. The games this week were Canasta, Aces Up and one of my choosing, plus an additional Aces Up badge that I am working on from the premium level of badges. thus by playing that game I was accomplishing two tasks at the same time. I settle in and begin playing Aces Up, the weekly badge being to remove 2000 cards. Given there are 52 cards in a standard deck, if you win the game, it takes roughly 40 hands or so to complete the task, so I set about getting that done. I finished it, and saw that the Canasta badge was to score 25000 Canasta points. Each game of Canasta is to 5000, so it basically means if you beat your opponent or the computer 5 times, you'll have the badge. Me being the antisocial sort that I am played the computer. Plus is the added fact I can almost always kick the computers ass, I figured how long could 5 games of canasta actually take? It didn't seem like all that long and sure enough I had completed task number two, leaving just the challenge of my choosing as the only badge I needed for the week. I sorted through all of the challenges that I haven't completed, hoping to find one that I would be rid of in relatively short order and I see one for Candy Cruncher 2, which is get exactly 250 tokens once in a jackpot spin. To get a spin, you must complete 3 consecutive boards in the game, so I make a deal with myself that I will play for one spin, if I get it fine, if not, I am calling it a night and grabbing a quick couple of z's before work in the very early morning. Well, I got the badge on my first spin, so now I am all happy, all three weekly badges done in one evening's worth of work, but when I looked at the clock, it was approaching the 4am hour, which is just about the time I roll out of bed to get ready for work at 5am. So instead of sleep, I just plodded off to the shower and began the morning ritual that results in keeping dozens of Pittsburghers entertained via their radio. I roll into work Thursday morning and immediately head for any sort of high caffeine beverage that will keep me awake. I think I put down for large mugs of the stuff prior to the radio show starting at 9am, thus keeping my eyes sufficiently pried open for the course of the show. Next up was Christmas shopping. As much as my body was saying "Matt, find a bed and sleep!", reality was saying "Matt, tomorrow is the last day you see Lynn before you both go on vacation, you need to buy something!" Damn that reality, damn it to hell. I had to make a slight detour to my apartment, to pick up some cash for my shopping extravaganza. I figured I would get Lynn's gift, Sam (her son) his present and if I saw anything for my mom and her husband, I would get that as well. I had planned on getting Sam The Simpson's movie, since he collects the TV seasons on DVD, but consulting with Lynn beforehand alerted me to the fact that someone else was already getting it for him, so that plan was out. Instead, I opted for the Transformers movie, though I don't know if he will like it or not, I don't have much of a bead on his interests. Lynn I had a pretty good idea of what to get, I know she is a fan of 24, but that she became a convert after the fact, so finding the first season on DVD seemed to be a no brainer on the "Matt you are so freaking cool scale" as it would allow her to watch episodes that she missed. I also tossed in a corkscrew set, seeing as how I know she likes an occasional glass of wine, this had the stand and pourer and everything with it. Go me on being two for two on the cool gift ideas. By the time I make it back from the shopping extravaganza (I also picked up some gifts for my mom and her husband, including some really cool bamboo placemats for the dinner table for just $1.99 each @ Bed, Bath and Beyond, a store I could just get lost in I might add), I realized that not only haven't I slept, I haven't eaten either. So first order of business would be the acquiring of nourishment. I was going to stop in at the place I work, but they had a crowd in their for the Steeler game, as it was a big night in sports for our little hamlet yesterday, and a productive one to boot.

Yesterday saw the Steelers play the St Louis Rams. The Steelers entered the game tied for first in their division at 9-5 with the Cleveland Browns, but they hold the tie breaker, having beaten Cleveland twice this year, so a win would go a long way to helping their playoff chances with just two games to to go. Pittsburgh won, 41-24, meaning that they can clinch the division title with a win next week, or a Cleveland loss in either of their last two games. They can get at least a wild card spot if Tennessee loses, so they have definitely improved their chances at the post season. It is often said that to wish someone luck they should "Break a leg", well I can't speak for how much luck is involved in that sentiment as technically my championship game in fantasy started with that contest, my opponent had Torry Holt from the Rams, who got him 5 points. In my wisdom, I opted to play Willie Parker this week, thinking that he leads the NFL in rushing and for the first time in three weeks he will be running in good conditions, as the Rams play indoors rather than out in the elements. What should happen on Willie Parker's first carry of the game and my first play in the fantasy championship game? He breaks his leg. Luck, we will have none of that here.

The Penguins also played last night, winning against Boston in a shootout 5-4. The game was most memorable not for the way it was played but because for the first time in his young NHL career, Sidney Crosby actually dropped the gloves and got into a fight. I don't mind the drop the gloves stuff in hockey, I am not in favor of the cheap shots that take place, and I mean you Chris Simon, but the actual two guys getting under each others skin though the course of a contest until they finally just square off mano y mano, I don't mind that at all. Makes for good TV.

So where was I? Yes, at one point I was looking for food. Okay, so I decide that I am going to just order from Larry and Carol's, the pizza place I used to manage back in the day, rather than make something to eat. I ordered a steak wedgie and fries, and since it would take about 15 minutes to make, I meandered over to my watering hole to pass the time and watch some of the game while it was cooking. For those that don't know what a "wedgie" is, it has nothing to do with the cook picking his underwear out of his ass, but rather it is a medium pizza dough lightly cooked, and then the meat of choice and cheese is places on half of it, in this case grilled steak, and then the empty side is folded over it, creating a semi circle of goodness and it is placed back in the oven to brown the dough. When it comes out of the over, then you open it and add your requisite toppings (for me that was lettuce tomato and onion), close it and you are done.

While the cooking of the food was taking place, I was waching the first half of the Steeler game on one TV, while on another the Pitt basketball team was playing at Madison Square Garden against the Duke Blue Devils. I have mentioned previously in the blog that the basketball team was off to a good start, they entered last night's contest with a 10-0 record and were ranked #11 in the country, but Duke was also undefeated at 10-0 and they were ranked #6, and early on i didn't look good for Pitt, as I had heard from some friends that Pitt was down 14 points in the first half. Well, as I settled into wait for my food and enjoy an alcoholic beverage, someone says that Pitt and Duke are in overtime. I look to the TV monitor and they did in fact come back and the game was just entering OT when one of Pitt's starting guards, Mike Cook would land funny on a drive to the basket and end up tearing his ACL, ending his season. Not a good way to start overtime. Still Pitt was managing to trade baskets with Duke despite being shorthanded, then freshman starting center DeJuan Blair fouls out of the game. Again not fortuitous as Blair was having a monster game for Pitt, racking up 15 points and 20 rebounds. With about 16 seconds left in the OT and Pitt trailing by 2 points, they bring the ball up court and with less than 5 seconds left, Levance Fields hits a step back three point shot and Pitt upsets Duke 65-64.

Now I go get my food and plod into my apartment. Till I finish eating it is approaching midnight and I do manage to sneak in a few hours of sleep, not nearly enough but some and head back to work for 5am this morning. Lynn and I did our gift exchanges, she got me a $100 gift card to Best Buy and dark chocolate covered espresso beans (so I can be more wired than I am) and after completing some production work at the station and gathering up all of my stuff (I took wrapping paper to work and wrapped her gifts prior to the show) I made it home this evening and fell into my bed around 4pm. When I woke up is when I had the Alzheimer's moment (there was a point to this remember, or are you suffering from it as well?) as for the briefest moment I literally could remember anything. Not the hard stuff, like the quadratic formula (x is equal to the opposite of b plus or minus the square root of b squared minus 4ac all divided by 2a)

but simple stuff like my name. I literally knew nothing for a moment, then pieces started falling into place, and I start panicking that I am not ready for work and it's 9, not realizing that it is 9 in the evening versus 9 in the morning, or the fact that it is Friday and I don't work Saturday mornings. It was like someone went all Etch a Sketch on my cranium while I was sleeping, and when I woke up it was a completely clean slate until I started redrawing the preexisting lines. Scary stuff, hope that doesn't happen again.

This is why I actually did a quick entry saying that I was going to do an entry, I would never have had the time to write all of this down at work, and some of it has happened since I mentioned I would be blogging anyway, so in essence, it is even longer than I thought it would be.

Kudos to the funniest headline of the morning.

Not so kudos to finding out that this came in second it the quotes of the year. Second? I demand a recount. Next time I criticize my own typing I just have to remind myself that I have never used the line "everywhere like such as" in any way, shape or form. Is that a prepositional phrase that we never covered in English class?

Speaking of voting, Lynn read another story about the horrors of voting machines and how they can be tampered with during the show today. It is not often that I disagree with her, but this is one of those instances where I did. The article basically said that the state of Ohio can't speak to the security of touch screen machines so they are planning on switching to optical scan machines. Meanwhile Colorado said the optical scan machines are no good either. To all of this I said balderdash so to speak. Basically any system of voting can be tampered with, regardless of how "secure" it is. I brought up the fact that the '60 election between Nixon and Kennedy there were allegations of election irregularities in Chicago that may have cost Nixon votes. Do I think Nixon actually won? No, but the idea that we are trying to build a scapegoat for everytime an election is lost by saying the system was fixed doesn't do us any good either. For as much as people want to say that the current voting machines can be hacked, I asked anyone who could in fact hack a machine to call the show. Having a bunch of techies sit behind closed doors and try to figure out a way to break into a machine is one thing, the practical application of that ability by most of the people that work the polls on election day is quite another. My call for tech support received no replies, as I expected, then again maybe I should have called India for that. The funny thing is this is all fallout from the 2000 election, and guess what kids, electronic machines had nothing to do with that. You really want to know why John Kerry lost in 2004? He was a fucking awful candidate!!!!!! Given how unpopular Bush was in 2004, I could have run Lamb Chop and gotten 175 electoral votes and probably won at least two of the debates.

I do need to add to my change meter as well, not a lot mind you, just 7 cents, but as the meter approaches its two year anniversary on the page, it now sits at $33.55.

Check that, while looking for a link for the funny headline, low and behold another appeared. The military parlance of a target rich environment is officially in effect.

Anyway, lastly we do have an Asshat to give away from last week. The winner and new Asshat champion is Mitt Romney, for his long winded speech on religion the other day. Being a Mormon means you always have to say you are sorry in Republican circles, so there is Mitt talking about his faith during a press conference. The thing is, I would have had much more respect for him if he would have just shown some stones and said my faith is a private matter and to be honest, it is none of your damn business, but instead he decided to pander to the James Dobson set of the Republican party, all but begging for there votes by showing he was Christian enough for them, even if he was a Mormon. I don't know if his effort will win him one vote in Iowa, but it will win him an Asshat on this blog, so congrats Mitt, job well done.