unclevlad

Never was a big fan of Valentine's but that's in part because it's the 2nd worst candy holiday...those being Halloween, Easter, and Valentine's. (Christmas has its share too, but it's got a lot of other things going on.) Halloween, of course, runs the gamut. Its bad candy is candy corn, but hey, the mini bars are often ok. Probably because we're so used to them. Easter is the WORST because its top candies seem to be Peeps (the ultimate abomination, IMO), "eggs" where the filling is too often hideous, and the worst of the worst milk chocolate...like chocolate bunnies and the like. Christmas has a lot of this junk too. Valentine's...the hearts are bleah. And they're ubiquitous. Plus, the standard commercial boxed stuff like Russell Stover or Whitman is just BAD, and it gets hawked even more than jewelry. (No, I don't intend to track down the number of hours of commercials for those 2 product categories.) Actually, thinking about it, Christmas tends to bring out more somewhat upscale to upscale stuff. I remember...ages ago...one local store got boxes of Tobler mixed chocs...and they were generally good. Not great, not fresh enough for that, but good. Went on sale after Christmas too, so I....overindulged a couple of those years. And for a few years, that store carried tortes and chocolate yule logs. Haven't seen them in probably 30 years.

But maintaining that control is a major part of their jobs. So we're basically agreeing. It's not the X's and O's very often...sometimes, tho. it may or may not be recruiting. It may be not being able to remain sufficiently in touch with the program as a whole. Trying to analyze why is impractical from our vantage point; too complex, too individual. So I went the lazy route and didn't even try. 😁

But by the same tpken, he did come back onto the field. Also watched the play on YouTube; it got rolled. He also walked off...limping, but walked off. That very likely caps the severity. The draft combine starts March 1st...so that's 2 months to recover. Even if it's a slow healer...high ankle sprains can be, as I understand...he can still attend and talk to the coaches there, and throw at the school's pro day. So unless it's more serious than it looks to be, it shouldn't hurt his draft position that much. And hey, he's considered the #1 QB prospect, which means top-3 draft position almost certainly. Even if he slips to 2nd or 3rd QB in the draft, that's still typically mid-1st...and 8-digit rookie contract.

Actually, I've heard speculation Bill may do that. He does turn 70 in April. Not like he has anything to prove, or needs the money any more. He's not one for personal goals, I wouldn't think, but he'll have a good chance at reaching 300 wins next year. He's at 289 right now. IF he decides to stay for a few years....? Shula's 328 isn't completely out of the question. Brady, who knows. I think it'll be like Elway and Peyton...and Favre to a point. Their last seasons were pretty sharp roll-offs. Barring injury, ya gotta think he'll be back for one more year. If Arians leaves, he might also retire...but there's no reason to expect that in the short term, either. Saban actually turned 70 in October. College coaches can stick around forever, but...I hope he doesn't duplicate Bobby Bowden and Joe Paterno. I think both of them hung on too long. The schools couldn't fire them for football reasons, but for whatever reason, their teams slid for *quite* a few years before their ultimate departures. I think OSU and Utah stole the offenses from the Sugar Bowl teams. And just as I write that, Baylor goes for a 4th and 2 to open the 2nd quarter, and gets *stuffed*.

Yeah, but that's you in Ohio, getting hit with campaign ads for Ohio candidates. (Please note my extreme restraint in not using a more accurate term.) I'm in New Mexico, getting ads for Pennsylvania. ARRRGHHH!!!! That said, I don't *believe* I've seen any from Ohio during the Rose Bowl. The situation is a tad different...there were 3 games going on in the morning slot, and of them, the Outback Bowl is the least prestigious. It's NOT part of the New Year's Six. So that suggests that a) ads were probably less expensive b) slots were more available c) the money would be better spent, because a higher percentage of the viewers would be in their target I don't see a third world war in my lifetime; I wouldn't preclude one in the latter part of the century, tho, if climate change's impacts become more widespread and more serious. That'll raise the desperation level to where it's more plausible. That said, I do see a *possible* second Civil War before then. Not likely, but possible.

Needed Hoisin sauce for the duck, which meant of course that I had most of the bottle left over. Some time later, I got a lamb leg...called semi-boneless. Easy enough to break down, but it left some awkward sized and shaped chunks. So, hmmm....ok. Cube it up to fry with onions and mushrooms. And...what else...hmmm... Balsamic vinegar Hoisin Sauce Soy sauce In equal parts, I believe. With some olive oil...and next time, probably a dollop of sesame oil, since the duck called for that too. Think it helped getting everything to emulsify together. Toss the cubes with this, let that sit overnight in the fridge. Yum! Since then...Christmas Eve is rib roast night, which means a ton of leftovers. That means, slice as thin as feasible...maybe chop down to bite sizes if needed. Pan fry up some bread, while just heating up the beef. With this sauce atop. MMMM..... Gonna do this often, I suspect. One of the local markets now regularly carries some shaved beef...lean, raw, finely sliced, great for sandwiches like this. NOT very expensive, especially given the price of decent cuts these days. They also have shaved rib meat, but that actually doesn't work as well. It's too soft, a little too fatty, to shave well; it clumps up, and you want it to fall apart.

Well Saban has to retire at some point...

What a very depressing way to start the new year. Watching bowl games, like many of us, right? Started with the first one, which happened to have Penn State. Lo and behold, there's an ad playing while I'm not watching per se...about "opposing unconstitutional vaccine mandates." ARGH!!!! NOO!!!! Later on, there's another seriously ReTrumplican candidate's ad. These are for *Pennsylvania* Senate races. So far both have run twice. Oh god, it's gonna be a long year, isn't it?

This is old news. The guy actually died in May, and I remember seeing the story back then.

About 20 minutes til the chile drops here. (Yes, it's a local event, but hey, the area's home to some of the best chiles in the world.) So it's time to sign off, maybe step outside for a bit...it's not very cold, still 43F...and say goodbye to the year. I'll leave everyone with the best I can manage... May the new year fail to live down to your fears...

So... My time, it's 10:25 pm. Just poured my New Years libation; this year, it's an Ommegang Three Philosophers, Blueberry-Coffee. It's a blend of a Belgian quadruple and a cherry ale...in this case, with additional flavors from the coffee and blueberry. First sip, it's quite interesting, but I think I preferred the wine barrel version. Ah well. So this is taking the place of writing in a journal. It's the end of another year, and time to think back. Which is good to do, even if I don't want to remember much. Because in some ways, this year was more painful than 2020. 2020 had the inevitability of a runaway train. We knew it was gonna smash us. With Trump still in power, once we heard that the coronavirus had escaped China...it was going to be a brutal year. And it was. But this year has shown that we're on course and racing down the Niagara River, swept up in the current. While, OK, if Trump was still in office, the engine would be going full throttle as well, the best we can do is get the engines shut down. We can't get out of the current because such a large percentage of us are fighting any move to direct the boat out of midstream. And others are sabotaging the boat. Where last year was hard and draining, this year has been more about depression and despair, at least for me. Covid is starting a bigger surge than ever...because so many people fought so hard to make sure it became completely rooted in the population. Democracy and the rule of law are at great risk. Climate change is wreaking havoc *now*...more intense storms, serious heat waves particularly in cool zones. Crop losses. The Western drought is only getting more severe. (Side note...we actually got 0.6" of rain today. That tripled the 4th quarter total.) And we have proven to be too narrow, petty, and self-centered to get anything much done, at least here in the US. The Congressional Republicans have shown for years that they're just fine with the ship flying over the falls...because short term profits and stock prices are all they seem to recognize, and things like clean up, pollution limits, etc. might damage that. Then the Democrats are held hostage to the coal mining industry and Joe Manchin. Virulently anti-democratic voting legislation is trying to lock down several purple states to try to make them red states...like Arizona, which would normally be considered red but obviously wasn't red enough for them. And there's grave concern that the Supreme Court may only, IMO, toss out the most rampantly egregious. If they can't agree to block implementation of the Texas abortion law, then we need to be very, very worried about what they'll allow. And...I think a lot of it for me is, I allowed myself hope. And in so many ways, stupidity, or greed, or authoritarianism have blossomed, and crushed it. That can't get better because too many people view anti-vax/anti-mask, or the election issues, or the like, to be the desired outcomes. So the fracture lines just continue to get wider and deeper, and the ability to adopt sufficient policy shifts to make a difference becomes less and less viable. I stand a decent chance to see 2050; my father's older now that I would be at that point, by a couple years. Things won't collapse completely before then, probably, but I suspect smaller-scale, localized violence will be MUCH more common. What starts as racial violence may well grow into any "non-normal" situation. It's hard to say this, but the institutional blind eye for a lot of police abuses will only grow. More Matthew Shepards. More Pulses. MANY more Marjorie Stoneman Douglases, as early alienation becomes more commonplace. Greater income and opportunity disparity; the American Dream may become unreachable unless you can connect to someone who's already made it. And that's why this year's hit more. Last year showed promise of a light at the end of the tunnel. This year shows the brakes don't work.

Everyone complains about the former but I think it's the latter that's the more emotionally charged issue. And not so much directed at them, but they object to money going to things they don't like. Maybe it's space, or the arts, or some of the weapons systems. That said, it's possible that the tax inequities are becoming a greater grievance.

Football never ends. It occasionally goes on holiday for a bit. Speaking of never ending, the bowl season doesn't end tomorrow...not counting the title game which is separate to me. No, there's one more. The world renowned TaxAct Texas Bowl is Tuesday. Oh. Ah. LSU vs. Kansas State...makes my heart pound. Apparently the sports books were taking bets on the championship game at halftime...considering the dismemberment going on, I suppose they weren't really going out on a limb. Line is Georgia -1.5.

About the only good news. From WorldOMeters: almost 2.5 million new cases in the US in the last *week*. By comparison, a year ago, the highest was a bit under 1.8 million. US hospitalizations have exploded as well: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/current-covid-patients-hospital?country=USA And note that this spike probably does not fully reflect the explosion of new cases; I doubt there's been enough time for that. (Especially given that there've been literally a million new cases *yesterday and today*.) Worldwide, daily new cases hit almost 2 million *today*. Dec. 28th was, it looks like, the first day to ever surpass 1M, at 1.3M and some. Almost 1.9M today. Stay home this New Year's, folks...or with a group of friends you can trust to be vaccinated, and hopefully to NOT BE IDIOTS. I know it bites; I want this over too. But this spike is like nothing we've faced to date. We can hope it won't last, but for now...? With the typical drinking (heavy) that goes on? Not a chance.

I came to that conclusion from the Wikipedia article. It helps that I believe you have to *work* to find it now, so it should be an easy resolution to keep. But...wait...does that make it a New Year's Resolution????? Noooooo................

A liquor store or a gas station?

I take it you're trying to be written out of the will? Honest to gosh, I never knew this existed before your post. But in my defense, it was only shown once, and I was in the dorm at the time, with no TV. But this is Wikipedia's section about its critical reception: So....yeah...this is what you show your mother-in-law....not your mother.....

Which is why I don't think it was justice. He spent the last, what was it, 22 days in the hospital. Resources are greatly strained as it is. I am of the opinion that...while it's extreme, it is possible for someone to forfeit his right to be considered human. Granted, determining who should have this kind of authority, and the grounds under which such a penalty could be applied, would be massively problematic.

He probably has minions for that. I mean, all those people who want on the show...what's the point of being the host if ya can't leverage that???

Hey, watching Patriot misery is second only to watching Cowboy misery. But hey, they were only looking at football. Most miserable sports fans? Cubs. They're in physical PAIN, it seems, when they have some success because they've become so accustomed to embarrassing failure. You could say the same for Mets fans, but they've only had a couple decades of it...not a century.

In hockey, the IIHF cancelled the rest of the world junior hockey championships after 3 games had to be forfeited.

The latter is supposed to be news? You could ship some of that rain down here. My favorite local weather site (it reports a rain gauge in real time) has station records going back to 2007. This is the driest 4th quarter of the year in that period...0.3" so far, altho Accuweather's hourlies show a fairly high chance of precip early Friday morning, and possibly more Friday night. WeatherBug gives higher chances throughout the day, so, hey, maybe il'll amount to something. And it'd be a fitting way to send this year out. Interestingly, the temp forecast is VERY pleasant, considering...low Friday morning around 40ish, high around 50ish. So, cloudy and wet. The kind of day that makes me wish for a fireplace, but it wasn't an option on the floor plan I went with. I like those days occasionally, and they're VERY rare down here.

We're in the wrong gig, people. Like, seriously wrong? Steady work? 40 years. Great pay? Oh my yes. 8 digits nowadays. Great hours? How about working 4 days a month? Occupation: game show host. Or hostess. Pat Sajak just "didn't* celebrate 40 years as host of Wheel of Fortune...and some fans were upset that the show made no mention of it. Some people, methinks, need a life. Vanna White...39 years. Annual salaries listed...Sajak, $15M. White, $10M. Reported net worths in the $70M range for each.

And what's worse is people don't realize what we're circling or where it will end up. As major an issue as the pandemic is, it's not the #1 problem.

One of the last, best links to the old NFL. The only reason Belichick is generally considered the GOAT is because Madden couldn't continue with the air travel; without that who KNOWS what he'd have done. Oh, and then all he did was win the sportscaster Emmy.......16 times. I got tired of him eventually, but hell, as long as his career was, that was inevitable.