Overheard on the PA system while shopping at Market Basket this morning:
"Attention Market Basket shoppers: Please check your carriages. If you're pushing one that doesn't have your groceries in it, please take it to the customer service desk. Thank you."
I wish I had seen this happen firsthand.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Super Bowl Redux
Quickly, since I just got home and I'm tired:
Congratulations to the Giants. It was a great game that went down to the wire. I'd like to blame the loss on the guy at my Super Bowl party who had too much to drink and turned into a total dick by game's end, but in reality the Giants made a couple of more plays than the Patriots and often times that's the difference.
Still, I'm blessed that all four of my teams -- Patriots, Red Sox, Celtics and Bruins -- have won world championships in my lifetime and that doesn't change with the loss.
Every year is unique. Nobody knows what injuries the Patriots will have contend with, or who will be back or acquired next year, but I feel like the Patriots have a future and I'm excited about that.
Congratulations to the Giants. It was a great game that went down to the wire. I'd like to blame the loss on the guy at my Super Bowl party who had too much to drink and turned into a total dick by game's end, but in reality the Giants made a couple of more plays than the Patriots and often times that's the difference.
Still, I'm blessed that all four of my teams -- Patriots, Red Sox, Celtics and Bruins -- have won world championships in my lifetime and that doesn't change with the loss.
Every year is unique. Nobody knows what injuries the Patriots will have contend with, or who will be back or acquired next year, but I feel like the Patriots have a future and I'm excited about that.
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Super Bowl XLVI Prediction
You may have heard there’s a game Sunday night – Super Bowl XLVI. And my Patriots are involved.
They’re playing the Giants. It’s billed as a rematch of Super Bowl XLII, when the Giants won 17-14 and spoiled New England’s shot at a perfect season. And for Boston and New York fans, it is a rematch. However, these are two different teams. None of the four players who scored touchdowns in that game – Laurence Maroney, David Tyree, Randy Moss and Plaxico Burress – are involved in this game (in fact, Burress is the only one who’s even still in the league). Only 15 Giants and 7 Patriots on the active rosters played in that game.
Every year I make a Super Bowl prediction. I think these two teams are evenly matched and I wouldn’t count anything out. Both teams have their strengths and weakenesses.
Because this is an even-numbered Super Bowl, the NFC-representative Giants are the designated road team. So I’ll begin with them:
THE CASE FOR THE GIANTS
THE CASE AGAINST THE GIANTS
THE CASE AGAINST THE PATRIOTS
THE CASE FOR THE PATRIOTS
They’re playing the Giants. It’s billed as a rematch of Super Bowl XLII, when the Giants won 17-14 and spoiled New England’s shot at a perfect season. And for Boston and New York fans, it is a rematch. However, these are two different teams. None of the four players who scored touchdowns in that game – Laurence Maroney, David Tyree, Randy Moss and Plaxico Burress – are involved in this game (in fact, Burress is the only one who’s even still in the league). Only 15 Giants and 7 Patriots on the active rosters played in that game.
Every year I make a Super Bowl prediction. I think these two teams are evenly matched and I wouldn’t count anything out. Both teams have their strengths and weakenesses.
Because this is an even-numbered Super Bowl, the NFC-representative Giants are the designated road team. So I’ll begin with them:
THE CASE FOR THE GIANTS
· Their playoff push this year has emulated their Super Bowl XLII run with eerie precision.
· The Giants will be wearing their white uniforms again, just like they did in Super Bowl XLII.
· Giant WRs vs. Patriot DBs is an exploitable mismatch (and Hakeem Nicks missed the regular-season matchup between the teams).
· The Giant defensive line has historically had success putting pressure on Tom Brady.
· You can’t spell “Elite” without “Eli”
· Big brother Peyton will be watching, and the Patriots aren’t too popular in Indianapolis. The stadium crowd will be dramatically skewed in favor of the Giants. This could be a de facto home game for them.
THE CASE AGAINST THE GIANTS
· The Giant defense has given up 23.11 points per game (439 points in 19 regular-season and postseason games). No team has given up that many points or PPG and gone on to win a Super Bowl (The 2006 Indianapolis Colts yielded 425 points and 21.25 ppg on their way to winning Super Bowl XLI).
· On Saturday, the Giants Web site briefly announced that "the Giants are Super Bowl champions" before someone quickly took it down. Bad karma.
· No 7-loss team has ever won a Super Bowl, and no team has ever sustained a four-game losing streak during the season and gone on to win a Super Bowl.
· You can’t spell “Eliminated” without “Eli.”
· No team has ever been outscored during the regular season and gone on to win a Super Bowl (though if you include their playoff wins the Giants are now +36 in point differential).
· The Giants have battled inconsistency all year. They’re hot right now, but you never know which Giant team will show up. The same team that beat 15-1 Green Bay and 13-3 San Francisco also lost to Philadelphia-with-Vince-Young-at-QB, Seattle and cellar-dwelling Washington (twice). No team has ever been swept by the last-place team in its division and gone on to win a Super Bowl.
THE CASE AGAINST THE PATRIOTS
· The Patriot defense has given up 401.50 yards per game (7,227 yards in 18 regular-season and postseason games). No team has given up that many yards or YPG and gone on to win a Super Bowl (The 2009 Saints yielded 6,998 yards and 368.32 ypg en route to winning Super Bowl XLIV).
· The Patriots didn’t defeat a team with a winning record until their AFC Championship victory over the Ravens. Even one of their playoff wins was against a team that ultimately finished 9-9 (Denver).
· Nobody knows how Rob Gronkowski’s ankle will hold up.
· The Giants have beaten New England twice in a row in agonizing fashion. They could be in the Patriots’ heads.
· The Patriots (in the persons of Tom Brady and Bob Kraft) have been on the cover of Sports Illustrated the past two weeks. This will be the true test of the SI cover jinx.
THE CASE FOR THE PATRIOTS
· This will be the 13th Super Bowl in which the teams also met in the regular season – the Giants beat the Patriots 24-20 in Week 9. Interestingly, the team that lost the regular-season matchup has the upper hand, going 7-5 in the Super Bowl rematch (and the losing regular-season team is 5-1 in the last six).
· The margin of victory in eight of those 12 regular-season previews was seven points or less. In those eight contests, the team that lost the regular-season game is 7-1 in the Super Bowl.
· Patriot TEs + WRs vs. Giant LBs + DBs is an exploitable mismatch.
· Anastasia the Balloon-Popping Dog picked the Patriots. (Anastasia begins her antics at 9:40 of the link.)
· Nobody outside of New England is giving the Patriots a chance to win. The Patriots play best with a chip on their shoulders. Nobody outside of New England gave the Patriots a chance to beat the Rams in Super Bowl XXXVI, either.
So, basically, all this shows is that one team will defy history and do something no Super Bowl champion has ever done before. Nothing would surprise me in this game. I can envision the Giants kicking the shit out of the Patriots. I can envision the Patriots kicking the shit out of the Giants. I can see one team taking control of the game early in the second quarter and not looking back en route to a 17-point victory. And Tom Brady and Eli Manning have both quarterbacked Super Bowl-winning drives, so if either has the ball, down four with two minutes to play.
But I’m a Pats fan. In a game that could go either way, I have to go with my heart.
Patriots 32, Giants 27.
Photographs
I'm not good at taking photographs.
I can successfully snap a picture. That's not the problem.
The problem is that I take so few pictures that I lose touch with the technological nuances of a camera.
Today I took out my digital camera and tried to snap some pictures, the first photographs I've taken with it since July, when I decided to take a picture of my novella. Some of you may be aware that there's a game tomorrow (check my blog again in about 12 hours for more on that), and I felt like there might be an opportunity for pictures.
But when I turned the camera on, I got a message that said, "Error: Please take out battery out, reinsert and try again."
So I did. And it worked. Except I got that annoying red "your battery is about to die" light flashing. This started a mad dash of me fumbling through my drawers trying to find the charger.
I have chargers for a lot of things -- my cellphone, my Bluetooth, my laptop. But I can't find one for my camera. I'm simultaneously ripping my place apart and cursing myself. "You always lose shit, Phil. Now you're gonna have to buy a new camera."
After I've pulled out all my drawers and duped them onto the floor, I look next to the microwave and there are some loose papers that I put there one day back in October or so. They haven't moved since. I dig underneath them, and....
...there's my camera charger.
Success! I plug it in. All is well. Photos are taken.
A good omen, I hope.
I can successfully snap a picture. That's not the problem.
The problem is that I take so few pictures that I lose touch with the technological nuances of a camera.
Today I took out my digital camera and tried to snap some pictures, the first photographs I've taken with it since July, when I decided to take a picture of my novella. Some of you may be aware that there's a game tomorrow (check my blog again in about 12 hours for more on that), and I felt like there might be an opportunity for pictures.
But when I turned the camera on, I got a message that said, "Error: Please take out battery out, reinsert and try again."
So I did. And it worked. Except I got that annoying red "your battery is about to die" light flashing. This started a mad dash of me fumbling through my drawers trying to find the charger.
I have chargers for a lot of things -- my cellphone, my Bluetooth, my laptop. But I can't find one for my camera. I'm simultaneously ripping my place apart and cursing myself. "You always lose shit, Phil. Now you're gonna have to buy a new camera."
After I've pulled out all my drawers and duped them onto the floor, I look next to the microwave and there are some loose papers that I put there one day back in October or so. They haven't moved since. I dig underneath them, and....
...there's my camera charger.
Success! I plug it in. All is well. Photos are taken.
A good omen, I hope.
Friday, February 3, 2012
Hole in the Wall
The folks who punched a hole in the wall with my new sleeper sofa came back to finish patching it up yesterday.
They had started work on it one night last week, but it was getting late and they needed to return the van back to the warehouse and I didn't want them hanging around after, say, 9pm anyway. I get a little antsy when I have strangers in my place at night. I was also starving, and I didnt want to eat dinner around them because it would make them hungry, and then they might try to corece me into making them dinner.
We tried to schedule a date to finish the job, and we had some fits and starts but we couldn't make it work. Also, I was stating to suspect they were trying to get out of finishing the job. So when my landlord swung by to finall check out the damage and pick up the rent check, I used that as an opportunity.
He was pretty laid back about the hole. But someday I'll move out of here and I don't want to have to pay for repairing the wall when I leave. I texted the dudes and told them he was pissed and was about to call the furniture store if they didn't come back to finish the job.
They showed up Thursday and finished patching. I'm much more relaxed now. Now I don't have to entertain them anymore, or make them dinner.
They had started work on it one night last week, but it was getting late and they needed to return the van back to the warehouse and I didn't want them hanging around after, say, 9pm anyway. I get a little antsy when I have strangers in my place at night. I was also starving, and I didnt want to eat dinner around them because it would make them hungry, and then they might try to corece me into making them dinner.
We tried to schedule a date to finish the job, and we had some fits and starts but we couldn't make it work. Also, I was stating to suspect they were trying to get out of finishing the job. So when my landlord swung by to finall check out the damage and pick up the rent check, I used that as an opportunity.
He was pretty laid back about the hole. But someday I'll move out of here and I don't want to have to pay for repairing the wall when I leave. I texted the dudes and told them he was pissed and was about to call the furniture store if they didn't come back to finish the job.
They showed up Thursday and finished patching. I'm much more relaxed now. Now I don't have to entertain them anymore, or make them dinner.
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
The Painful Act of Super Bowl Scouting
In anticipation of Sundays Super Bowl, NFL Network the last couple of nights has rebroadcast Patriots-Giants games of the past.
Tuesday night the network rebroadcast Super Bowl XLII, in which the Patriots took a 14-10 lead over the Giants with a Tom Brady-to-Randy Moss touchdown pass, only to have the Giants score with 35 second left to spoil the Patriots' shot at an undefeated season and win 17-14.
Wednesday night the network rebroadcast the regular-season matchup between the two teams, in which the Patriots took a 20-17 lead with a Tom Brady-to-Rob Gronkowski touchdown pass, only to have the Giants score with 15 seconds left to win 24-20.
Needless to say, both nights I switched the channel after the Pats' go-ahead score.
Thursday night NFL Network will rebroadcast the Pats' 38-35 win in the final weekend of the 2007 that clinched their 16-0 regular season. At least I won't have to worry about changing the channel tomorrow night.
Tuesday night the network rebroadcast Super Bowl XLII, in which the Patriots took a 14-10 lead over the Giants with a Tom Brady-to-Randy Moss touchdown pass, only to have the Giants score with 35 second left to spoil the Patriots' shot at an undefeated season and win 17-14.
Wednesday night the network rebroadcast the regular-season matchup between the two teams, in which the Patriots took a 20-17 lead with a Tom Brady-to-Rob Gronkowski touchdown pass, only to have the Giants score with 15 seconds left to win 24-20.
Needless to say, both nights I switched the channel after the Pats' go-ahead score.
Thursday night NFL Network will rebroadcast the Pats' 38-35 win in the final weekend of the 2007 that clinched their 16-0 regular season. At least I won't have to worry about changing the channel tomorrow night.
Late Discovery
As many of you know, I had a little fiasco a couple of weeks ago when the movers came with my sleeper sofa. One of them came back to plaster the hole in the wall but he still needs to do some touch-up work.
Today my landlord called me.
"I just got your note. Is everything OK?" he asked.
He just got my note, dated to weeks ago to the day.
One thing I've noticed about my landlord: he has a way of letting mail pile up.
He'll be stopping by late to inspect the damage. We'll see how this goes.
Today my landlord called me.
"I just got your note. Is everything OK?" he asked.
He just got my note, dated to weeks ago to the day.
One thing I've noticed about my landlord: he has a way of letting mail pile up.
He'll be stopping by late to inspect the damage. We'll see how this goes.
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