Thanksgiving Day Weekend!

Often translates into Haas Thanksgiving Football Weekend!

The day after Thanksgiving is usually the day of the Backyard Brawl between Pitt and West Virginia but with the Mountaineers running off to the Big 12 (or 13? Or 14?) and Pitt leaving for the ACC next year, the future of the Brawl is uncertain.

Nonetheless, there was football on Friday when the East Carolina Pirates and Marshal Thundering Herd both suffered from defensive amnesia.  The battle in Greenville, NC resembled a cross between tennis and basketball and even went into overtime.  In the end, ECU won by the incredible score of 65-59.

Saturday saw Pitt host not West Virginia but the Scarlet Knights of Rutgers.  Pitt got the win, 27-6 and improved their record to 5-6.  A win over South Florida would put them at .500, which is better than I thought they would do.

On Sunday, Canada had her Super Bowl.  The hometown Toronto Argonauts dismantled the invading Calgary Stampeders 35-22 and the Grey Cup gets to stay in Toronto...until next year.

Then my Steelers stank worse than rotten turkey, loosing the ball eight (!) times and handing Cleveland (!!) a 20-14 victory.  The Steelers are not the same without Big Ben.

Since the UFL fell apart and the Las Vegas Locos are no more, I replaced them in my football continuum with the Carolina Panthers.  The Panthers, suffering through a bad year, walked into Philly with a 2-7 record, harassed the Eagles on their home field, and walked out with a 30-22 win.

3-1 this year and the cats, yet again, stole food off the table.  Of course, I would have given to them anyway but they are not that patient!

Happy Thanksgiving!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Running around the block

I was running around the block this afternoon around twilight.  Sunset is an interesting time...there is something magical about it.  In NC, the sky turns almost orange.  In Pittsburgh, I remember looking up at a gray sky and seeing the sun poke through and turn the sky orange and then red before vanishing.  In Canada, you see the same thing but then (in Spring and Summer), you see the Northern Lights.

Dusk, or twilight (not to be confused with that horrible vampire/werewolf movie), is a good time to look back at the day and to think about tomorrow.  Fortunately, it is Saturday, so I don't have to think too much....it hurts....LOL

America rewards failure...

I remember a screaming headline in a British newspaper after the 2004 election that shouted "How could 50 (or 60?) million Americans be so stupid?".  After the election last night, I find myself wondering the same thing. Even more depressing is the fact I would have asked that question no matter who won.

Still, gas prices are horribly inflated, money is being printed out of thin air, and unemployment is still too high, and there is the looming specter of the "fiscal cliff" that neither party seems to be interested in avoiding.  So why would Obama win?  The counter question is, of course, would Romney have done anything different.

Those questions are going to be answered one way or the other fairly soon.

I don't have a lot of faith in our government.

I hope it proves me wrong but I don't see it happening.

Happier post next time---I promise!

At least the election phone calls are going to stop.

Fencing with the GRE

I took the Graduate Record Exam today to try and improve my all ready impressive verbal score of 80%.  Despite a computer that crashed twice, I did quite well--80% AGAIN!

It is a great score but I was trying to aim higher.  Willie Parker immediately came to mind and suddenly I understood how he felt after his second Super Bowl.

In Super Bowl XL, he ran for nintey-three yards, seventy-five of them coming on the longest run in Super Bowl history.  Three years later in Super Bowl XLIII, his statistical contribution was 20 carries for 53 yards.  What did not show up on the stat sheet was the fact that he carried the ball for the hard yards, the third and two an third and three that kept drives going.  He did not score against Arizona but his team still won the game, which is all that mattered.  Still, you would like to score a touchdown.

It did not happen but Fast Willie Parker got a second Super Bowl ring.  Not bad for an undrafted free agent! 

Today I did not push my 80% verbal score higher but it was still a great score.

Like Willie, I recognize it as a win even if I did not get to the endzone.

A win is a win is a win.