Multiply 365 Day 38 - Post game

Well the title of the last blog entry pretty much begat the title of the current blog entry.  And both of those entries can mean only one things, since the last time I wrote a game of some sort took place.  And for those that either read the page or are even somewhat aware of their surroundings, then you know that that particular game was in fact the Super Bowl.  I have a secret to tell you, I didn't watch it.  Not that I didn't have it on, I had the game on my radio, but since I don't have cable for me to tune in the game would have involved a Twister like process in order to get the signal in my apartment.  I know what you are thinking, don't you usually watch the games on the web?  Well yes, yes I do.  Except the two sites I usually visit for streaming sports, atdhe.net or channelsurfing.net, were both shut down by Homeland Security for violating broadcast copyrights.  I am glad that Homeland Security stepped in, after all, if you can stream the Super Bowl on the web then surely the terrorists have won.   Not that that is all Homeland Security was up to, they also spent part of the week cracking down on people selling NFL merchandise that was not officially sanctioned by the league.  

     The game itself was okay, not great but not terrible.  The Green Bay Packers defeated the Pittsburgh Steelers 31-25, which made for a great sociological experiment today in Pittsburgh, as plenty of people had taken off expecting to celebrate into the wee hours only to be vastly disappointed, creating a somber atmosphere in the city for those few people that bothered to venture out.  Honesty point #2, I wasn't all that upset about the outcome.  There are some teams that, after growing up here for 41 years now, that are just rivals and teams you could never really get behind.  The Packers just aren't one of those teams.  There is nothing to really hate about them, hell the fact they were the first franchise to have the balls to kick Brett Favre to the curb actually earns my respect.  And while it wasn't the best played game, the Steelers turned the ball over 3 times, and each one led directly to a Packers touchdown.  Yet with 2 minutes to go the game's result was still very much in question, which is really about all you can expect of a game like this.  

     But there were other things underway besides the game in my household.  I decided to try an experimental lasagna.  That is, I wanted to do a couple of things I don't normally do, just to see what would happen.  So instead of the normal cheese and ground beef variety lasagna I am prone to make, I replaced the ground beef with soup meatballs.  One of the advantages of my little Italian store on the corner is that while they sell heat and eat meatballs for things like spaghetti, they also sell the smaller ones for stuff like wedding soup, which would be perfect for my experiment.  To add to the mix, I diced up one white onion, one green pepper and slide a package of mushrooms and tossed them all in a bowl.  I then mixed in some garlic and oregano with the vegetable mix and tossed them so that the spices would mix all through the veggies.  I went ahead and boiled off the lasagna noodles and started by putting a layer of sauce in the lasagna pan.  This is a trick I learned that helps keep the doodles from sticking to the pan, and a layer of sauce first.  Then it was a layer of noodles, more sauce, the veggie mix, the mini meatballs and cheese.  For cheeses I used shredded provolone, mozzarella, asiago, parmesan,   I repeated the process until the pan was full, which didn't take as long as one would think with that much stuff between layers.  Turns out with that much stuff it drastically altered the cooking time.  Perhaps I should have sauteed the veggies first to soften them up a bit, because normal cooking time did not cook the veggies.  It ended up taking an additional 20-30 given how packed it was, but man was it worth it.  I ate two pieces and was completely stuffed.


     It was better that I didn't watch the game anyway.  Christina Aguliera was scheduled to sing the national anthem, which would be fine if she could have remembered the words.  Silly that, a song with words in it.  Maybe next time she will hum.  And from what I understand the halftime show with the Black Eyed Peas was not much better.  From what I saw on Youtube it could best be described as like a bad cover version of Black Eyed Peas.  Given there is no such thing as good Black Eyed Peas, that just means it is a bad cover of a bad band.  It is okay though if a band butchers their own music, what was worse was that they let Slash be part of it, having him on guitar while Fergie took her hand at destroying "Sweet Child of Mine".  

    Oh well, there is always next year provided there isn't a work stoppage.  Until then it is hockey season.  And I am perfectly fine with that.