August 2007 Archives

Whenever there is a free concert by a band with more than five Top Ten singles within 60 miles of Omaha, one of my rules is I have to go. And while concerts at the Nebraska State Fair aren't technically "free", because you pay $6 to get into the fair, its close enough to count. So with that in mind, we drove down to Lincoln to see Joan Jett and the Blackhearts perform at the open air amphitheater.

With or without Continental, it was a rockin' show. Dick and Nicole accompanied me on the trip, and we braved a twenty-degree temperature drop from the time we exited my car until the time we got to the amphitheater.

Last week, I indicated that I was a bad golfer who hadn't played in over two years. I was worried about embarrassing myself at this weekend's tournament. Those fears were unfounded; In fact, our team won the damn tournament.

I have the trophy to prove it. How the hell did this happen? After the jump, I'll explain.

Saturday morning, I had to wake up at 5:30 AM to get ready and be on the road by 6:15. Harlan Iowa is just over an hour from Omaha, and I didn't want to be late for the pre-tournament breakfast at 7:30. I got running late, and didn't get out of Omaha until 6:31 -- driving the speed limit would have gotten me there at 7:49 according to the navigation system in my car. I got there at 7:28...you do the math as to how fast I was driving.

There are certain things that just seem "right". Ordering a greasy bacon and cheese omelet from a small-town diner just seems right. Actually, most places in Omaha don't even have a straight bacon and cheese omelet on the menu. Oh, you can get one with 900 vegetable pieces in it, but I've never seen just a straight-up bacon and cheese omelet on any menus. Needless to say, I enjoyed it immensely. 32 people sitting around tables in a small-town diner, eating greasy food. That's good times.

I started writing this blog in June of 2004. In that time, I've had my golf clubs out exactly once. One time. Once upon a time, I used to play golf quite a bit, though I was never very good. I could usually hit a good tee shot, 175-225 yards pretty consistently, and straight. My fairway game was on the bad side of not good, my short game was awful, and my putting was criminally heinous. On the whole, I was a lock to shoot 95-100 on a consistent basis. In other words, I wasn't good.

Ah, putting. Son of a bitch, I can't putt to save my life. Never have been able to. When I was 8, my mom stopped going on our family golf outings because it was too frustrating to watch me hit a great tee shot (for my age) and then putt six times. Miniature golf is hell to me. I can remember dates in high school where miniature golf was involved and...never mind.

Growing up in Fort Dodge, I never played the nice courses in town, because the nicer the course, the snootier the players. Municipal city courses are where real people golf. Country clubs and private courses are where people who are serious about their game play. I've golfed a fair share of those courses, and I can't say I've ever had a good time. I've played a TON of public courses, and I have a million stories from them.

The course we grew up playing in Dodge was called Sunkissed Meadows, a Par 3 course built along the banks of the Des Moines River on the site of what used to be a ghetto-esque neighborhood. I bet I played that course hundreds of times in my youth.

I'm not going to say that you shouldn't allow some people to be in your Fantasy Football league. I'm not going to say that. I will say that someone took Michael Pittman, the 54th ranked wide receiver, in the second round. There's stretches, there's sleepers, there's bad picks, and then there's picking the 171st best player with the 24th pick.

Her reasoning? He looks hot in those bronze jersey pants that Tampa Bay wears. Like I said, I'm not going to say you shouldn't allow certain people in your league. I'm not going there. I'll just say that a guy would not make that pick, or at the very least, if he did, he wouldn't use that reasoning. Just sayin'.

As for me, I had the 10th pick overall. But you don't win your league in the first round, you win it in the 12th and 13th rounds. Any moron can draw the first pick and take LaDainian Tomlinson or Stephen Jackson. But can you pick value late in the draft?

I took Deuce McAllister and Drew Brees with my first two picks. Then I went running back heavy with Marion Barber III, Michael Turner and Mike Bell. T.J. Houshmanzadeh, Lee Evans, Northern Iowa alum Mike Furrey, and Matt Jones round out my receiving corps. Jeff Garcia is the backup QB. Jason Witten of the Cowboys is my TE. And my second Bronco pick, tight end Tony Scheffler, was a steal in the last round. I do have the Vikings defense.

In a 16-team league, that's a surprisingly decent team. I couldn't believe the number of mistakes other people were making, including taking kickers in the third round. The difference between the best kicker and the 18th was just 30 points -- 2 points a game. And you turn down a running back or a receiver to take a completely interchangeable part like a kicker? Nice. I'll just take your money now, because you won't be winning.

You bet.

As I mentioned earlier this week, Loverboy put on a good free concert at the Iowa State Fair on Saturday. As Paul Harvey says, Now the rest of the story.

Our pal Continental Frutiger had been excited for this concert for a while. Unfortunately, Hurricane Dean and its desire to destroy their Cayman Island house put a kink in those plans. No matter why he wasn't there, we had to give him a bad time, of course. So after the show, we got permission (read: we took it) to take the "Loverboy" placard from the "Who's on Stage" sign. This, coupled with a "Stu Stavies for President" button that we'd made at the CNN booth and a Loverboy notebook we'd made during our last batch of hand-made 33-1/3 Notebooks, made for a nice busting of chops gift.

We left all three items in the mailbox of his office on Sunday. It took until Wednesday for him to respond, and when he did, it was one of thanks, not the snark I'd expected. But that's not the best part of the story.

I talked to Nicole, whose floor we were supposed to crash on before she got sick from the heat, and whose dad was working security for Switchfoot. He told us it was a great gig, because not only did he get $7 an hour and get a free t-shirt, he got to hang out backstage. There was to be a party that night with kegs of beer, and he'd brought a bag of pretzels to contribute. He has a great 8-to-5 job, and just works fair security for something to do...and to bring pretzels to a keg party backstage. As you can tell, he's a helluva good guy.

It seems Loverboy outdrew Switchfoot 2 to 1, probably because it cost $28 to see Switchfoot at the grandstand and it was free to see Loverboy...and also because nobody can name that one song that Switchfoot has. So when the fair realized the huge crowd that was gathering at the Loverboy concert, they pulled some of the force off grandstand duty and moved them to Loverboy duty. Her dad was one of them, and he was Mike Reno's personal security guy after the show.

This is where I get upset. After a few minutes to allow the crowd to disburse, Reno came back out and signed autographs. I'll let Nicole take the story from here.

If we'd stayed a bit longer, the stage placard could have been signed "To Stu Stavies...Sorry you missed the show. Sincerely, Mike Reno". Oh, and if we had, we might have seen her dad and got to go backstage. Ouch.

I may not win my league this year, or even finish runner-up as I did a year ago, but I can guarantee you this much: I will have the best designed Draft Kit materials in the board room. This much I promise you.

Do you know how I know this to be true? Because I used Rosewood and Minion, and that's how you win design awards.

Honestly, I find the whole "Guy who takes his Fantasy Football team too seriously" phenomenon to be hilarious. You know this guy. He's the guy who spends 8 hours a week scouring the waiver wire for an addition to his team; the guy who talks a little TOO much smack when he wins, and who pouts a little TOO much when he loses; and the guy who  makes fun of you when you draft a kicker before the last round.

I have slightly little room to talk, seeing as I spent four hours typesetting War Room cheat sheets for my team, when everyone else will just go to Yahoo Sports or ESPN and print off the generic (and poorly designed) PDF files with similar content. But how in the sam hell can I be expected to make the correct picks when I'm staring at pixellated logos, irregular column widths and (gasp) Arial Black? Right.

Still, last year with a minimum of time commitment I finished second in the league. This year I'm continuing to rail against the Establishment with my team name, which you might have noticed on the materials above. Most people have rather ridiculous team names, and all of them think they have the cleverest name ever. All of them. I know, because I was one of them last year. I won't tell you what it was, because its too embarrassing, but suffice it to say their home city was "Cloud City" and their mascot was a certain swashbuckling gentleman who lost his ship years ago to a smuggler in a card game.

To stick it to everyone who thinks they have a clever team name, I named my team, succinctly, "Cleverly Named Team". Nice. You bet.

With the 10th pick, I'm going to need the power of Rosewood and Minion to help me overcome not drafting LaDainian Tomlinson and Stephen Jackson. Rosewood will not fail  me. If it does? At least I'll have the best-designed materials at the board room table.

During last week's Denver-San Francisco preseason game on Monday Night, Dick Herculanum and I went out to the bar to watch the game. He's a big Broncos fan. Anyway, during the first half, I noticed the following graphic come up on-screen:

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I introduce to you the newest running back for the San Francisco 49ers, Number Double-Zero, Name Lastname! Weighing a robust 000 pounds, the veteran of X seasons was the 1997 Rookie of the Year. But despite the notoriety that comes with winning such a prestigious award, no photo of him exists. In fact, Name Lastname is such a mysterious fella that he not only has a Question Mark Face, the Niners refuse to allow their logo to be associated with him. Instead, he uses a player-specific logotype which is typeset in -- you guessed it -- Rosewood. With a drop-shadow to boot!

All kidding aside, this is clearly just laziness on the part of the graphics guys and gals in ESPN's truck -- or someone with an itchy trigger finger who hit ENTER before the graphic was complete. Either way, its hilarious, because you never see these type of mistakes in a big budget nationally-produced television program.

Incidentally, if you're wondering why I waited until a week later to post this, I just got around to Bluetoothing the photo off of my cell phone.

You bet.

Despite what my esteemed colleague Mr. Continental Frutiger would have you believe, the Iowa State Fair is not lame. Unless eating various meats on sticks, seeing a lifesize Harry Potter carved from butter, and making "Cliff Glypha For President" buttons at the CNN booth are lame, in which case I will promptly apologize.

When we talked Continental into going with us this year, we admittedly had to use his favorite band in the world as bait -- Loverboy was to play a free concert on the last Saturday of the fair. His excitement was such that he told people for weeks about how awesome this show was going to be. Then he found out that we planned on actually, um, going to the fair.

"Just so you understand, I can't sacrifice my entire Saturday to the fair. By the way, have you been to fair lately? Because its still as lame as its always been."

I replied harshly. "I've been to the fair every year since I was six months old. Its one of my guilty pleasures."

He replied with just one word: "Ouch." Pretty sure he felt embarrassed for me, but that's an emotion he needn't feel. I happen to dig the Iowa State Fair, and I don't care who knows about it.

A buddy of mine emailed me a bunch of photos from Vikings training camp in Mankato about two weeks ago. I looked through them, and they were nice shots; its easy to forget how close you can get to the players at training camp. The photos brought back memories of family summer trips to Mankato -- including the time my brother and I met Tony Dungy, then the defensive coordinator for the Vikes, at the Super America gas station down the street from the fields. Also shook hands with Denny "Take a Knee" Green, and since this was before he earned that nickname, we were cordial.

But I digress. Yesterday I was downloading a couple of the photos so I could purge the message from my email client, and I noticed something strange about one of the photos.

In case you don't know, the Viking player is the guy in purple. Where are his legs? And his arms?

I immediately fired an IM off to the guy who'd sent me the photos, asking if the Vikings had some cyber-receiver in camp. Their receivers sucked last year with Randy Moss gone, their receivers still suck this year, so the only thing I can assume is they've decided to create a BionicSuperMegaReceiver made from parts of lesser receivers. Clearly as this photo illustrates, its not done cooking yet. Probably need to go back in the oven for another few.

I suppose it could just be a really, really cool angle. In fact, that's probably exactly what it is, but its so much more fun to pretend otherwise. Three thoughts:

1. This photo is like viewing the Vikes 2007 season through the eyes of their clueless head coach, Brad Childress. "I'm not sure what the hell is going on here, but whatever it is, its not good."

2. Wait, Halfy from South Park is real, and he plays receiver for the Vikings now? I would have always figured if any South Park character became real, had football talent, AND signed with the Vikes, it would be Towlie. Because of his penchant for street drugs and lake cruises. Never mind.

3. What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs in a lake? F'd.

You bet.

Monday night, we were out at the bar watching the Broncos/49ers preseason game, and I casually mentioned the fact that I'd noticed Best Buy was opening at midnight so people could buy Madden 08. The first 50 people in the door got a Madden Nation t-shirt. Dick Herculanum asked, "So you're going to wait in line, right?" I told him no.

I could only imagine a line of 16-year old punks waiting in line for hours, hoping to buy Madden for their crappy Xbox 360. As I explained to him, I planned on just going out over my lunchhour on Tuesday and buying it. What kind of dork waits in line to buy a video game at midnight, just to say he was the first one to get it? Not me.

So I'm waiting in line just before midnight at Best Buy Monday night, and the line was 100 deep. I was the oldest person in the line by about eight years. This did not mean I didn't find it amusing when a group of 17-year olds were hood-surfing in the parking lot while they waited. Hood surfing. Nice. This brought about the best line of the night, including earlier in the night at the bar.

A dude known only to me as "#19", a black guy about 20 years old wearing a Vince Young jersey, announced disgustedly "Man, you white people is WACK." Nice.

I promised you four stories from Saturday, and now I deliver. The stories get progressively shorter as they go, so don't worry.

I. Continental Frutiger was hosting a BBQ that night -- a BYOB (Bring You Own Brewskies) and BYOM (Bring Your Own Meat) BBQ. I drove way the hell out of my way to Fareway's full-service meat department, because while Hy-Vee is great for every-day stuff, you can't beat Fareway for special occasions. Likewise, you can't beat the selection at the Hy-Vee Liquor Store, so I went there for the beer.

I selected a 12-pack of Michelob Ultra bottles, on sale for $9.99. At the Liquor Store, there aren't check-out lanes, just a counter that the clerks stand behind. When I checked out, a lady roughly the same age as my mother waited on me.

You know what, I meant to write all about the weekend, but guess what: it was 190 degrees and I wound up playing F-ZERO on the Wii Virtual Console for hours on Sunday. Here's a funny note that may only interest me...

The last time I turned on my Wii was May 19. Honest to Jeebuz, May 19. (There's a log screen you can check). I'm on the run so much that if I'm home, I'm usually working out or working on my book or one of the 9000 other free-time projects I'm knee deep into, most of which are for paying clients and as such I cannot discuss them here.

You might be wondering why I bothered waiting in line to buy a Wii for myself on my birthday if I never play it. $300 is some decent coinage for something that serves as an elaborate paperweight on top of my HDTV. That has always been the problem with me and video games, dating back to the NES. I say I'm going to play, but I always find something "active" to do instead. When I was a kid, it was riding my bike to a ballfield to play baseball or football or shoot hoops; when I was older it was to go hang out downtown and blast music out of massive subwoofers in a vain attempt at attracting ladies; and more recently, its going to the bars or going to the gym. The original PlayStation was the system I probably played the most, but that was only because its heyday overlapped with my time in the dorms in college, and what the hell else does a 19-year old college student do except play video games?

You might also be accusing me of robbing someone who would actually play the Wii multiple times a week of the privilege of owning one, seeing as retailers still can't keep them in stock. Frankly, that's not my problem.

Besides, Madden 08 comes out for the Wii on Tuesday, and once that comes out, I fully envision a scenario where I have to ice my shoulder from throwing hundreds of passes a day. Because to throw the ball, you use the Wiimote and, well, make a throwing motion. And because I know myself too well, that I would allow things such as going to the bars, working on websites for paying clients and jumbotron videos for a collegiate sports team, and going to the bars, I planned for this scenario and took evasive action by using some of my 4 weeks (!) of vacation time to get Friday afternoon off work.

And what will I be doing? Playing Madden on the Wii, because I can. That console may have had a two-month hiatus from use, but it will get quite a workout this week. You bet.

Tomorrow, the story of a woman my mother's age hitting on me at Hy-Vee, a Kearney-like story involving Hypnotiq shots and my stomach, a story of three guys judging a breast contest where the most stunning fact is that Glypha was NOT one of the three guys, and the story of milk going bad. You won't want to miss any of that.

A 14-inch piece of Ten-Gauge wire embedded in your tire? Believe it. Over my lunch hour, I was driving along with the sunroof open, listening to "Appetite For Destruction" at a loud enough volume to get the subwoofer pumping, when all of a sudden a god-awful clank sound appeared in my car.

I immediately turned the stereo off, and listened to what the car was telling me. It sounded like the tire was about to explode. Like the wheel was sheared and perhaps dragging on the ground. Or something.

So I pulled over, and despite wearing dress pants, I climbed under the car. What I saw surprised me. A 14-inch long piece of wire was sticking out of the tread on my right rear tire. Ten gauge, it looked like. That's thick wire, and as the tire turned, it flipped around and smacked into the exhaust system on the bottom of the car -- thus the clank sound.

My hope was that it had not actually punctured the tire, but was maybe just stuck in the tread. As I began to pull it out, the sound of air escaping was audibly recognizable. Crap. I popped the trunk, got my toolbox out, and grabbed the wire snips to at least cut off most of the wire so I could get to a garage without the wire flipping around like a second hand on a clock. Unfortunately, the wire was so thick I couldn't cut through it.

I jacked the car up, removed the tire, and put on the Donut. Then I took the tire with its newly-added accessory wire to Jensen Tire which was on the way back to the office. The guy working the counter was incredulous. "How the hell did you get THAT wedged in there?"

To be fair, the sight of a 14-inch piece of ten-gauge wire protruding from a tire is not an everyday sight. Thank God for that, because its damn destructive. Pissed me off.

You bet.

Tuesday night at volleyball was not a good night. We lost two close, hard-fought games to a team made up of some of Gilby's coworkers, and forfeited the third when two of our players collided, resulting in one player needing six stitches to close a gaping wound just between her eyebrow and her eye. Frankly, as much as we tend to play overly-aggressive and collide, I'm shocked this hasn't happened before. Anyway, our concern for our fallen teammate led us to stop play for ten minutes while we all chipped in to care for her.

One guy took her glasses inside and washed the sand and blood off them. One lady ran and got an icepack and some towels. A couple of others kept her company. I entertained the little kids to keep them from bothering the adults. This seems like the perfect job for me, doesn't it?

After we got her into a car and off to the hospital, I headed out to meet my Dad for dinner at my house, as he was in town on business. Which figures because as I was walking, I was approached by a girl to sub on their 7:30 team. Alas.

At some point, the rumors need to stop. At some point, people will stop paying attention and no longer care. At some point, they need to just go off into the sunset and leave their classic albums as our enduring memory of them, not the ridiculous state of the band now. That point is not yet here. Van Halen is (sic) going on a  50-city arena tour with David Lee Roth this fall. I still say Mr. Insanity Eddie Van Halen will decide he can't co-exist with Roth and come up with a lame excuse to call things off again before any shows are played. Lets just say I'm not holding my breath.

Van Halen without bassist Michael Anthony is NOT Van Halen. The VH brothers do not sing at all (except for the train-wreck "How Many Say I" which Eddie sang on Van Halen III...oh wait, that album never happened?), and on practically every early VH track, Anthony was the harmonizing backup vocalist behind Roth. Eddie's fifteen-year old son on bass and backup vocals? Riiiight. The first time he tries to sing "Jamie's Cryin'" or "Runnin' With The Devil" he will take a dump in the middle of the stage.

That said, they're still my boys and if they're close to Omaha, I will be there. Without a doubt. At any price.

Here's their best video, in terms of Over-The-Top acting. Roth himself is like Eddie Murphy in The Nutty Professor before Eddie Murphy was in The Nutty Professor, playing multiple characters in the same film. But Alex as a Native American, Eddie as a Cowboy and Michael Anthony as a Samurai? Midgets kidnapping a lady, threatening to sacrifice her? Good times.

It rained a crazy amount on Monday, so much so that the streets in front of my house were temporarily turned into steams with fast-moving currents. So it shouldn't have been a surprise that Monday night, as my "friend" Sarah and I ate at La Mesa, the ceiling occasionally dripped onto our table.

Don't get me wrong, it wasn't a big deal. In the two hours we were there, I bet it dripped 12 times, or once every ten minutes. Give or take, more or less, pick your cliche. At first, it was at the edge of the table. But with each successive drip, it moved closer and closer to my plate and my lap. This was all very amusing to me.

Some people would have demanded a new table, particularly if they were, as I was, at dinner with their "friend". As you know, I'm not some people. I'm me. And I turned it into a running gag, feigning a horrified look each time it crept progressively closer to me. Didn't matter how serious the conversation was at that moment, I broke in with a low-key brand of physical non-verbal humor.

The piece de resistance was when I attempted to guess where the drip would land next, and position my margarita glass to catch it. So very juvenile, so very funny. Seriously, this was junior high school cafeteria stuff. And it was a fantastic psychological examination for a first time out, because if she found this as amusing as I did -- and I found it pretty damn amusing -- she might just be worth keeping around for a while.

And if she can correctly identify why the conclusion of Carl Weathers' new Old Spice commercial is currently the most shockingly hysterical advertisement on television? Well then, I think we may have something. (Because you're my readers, I'll give you a hint: Happy Gilmore)

The verdict is still out on that. You bet.

Occasionally, I think to myself that I'm really, really extraordinarily nuts. Like sometimes, planning out every second of every day and knowing exactly what I'll be doing six days from now -- nay, six weeks from now -- doesn't sound too bad. These thoughts usually come at 5:30 am on a Sunday morning, an hour into a 3-1/2 hour drive from Lake Okoboji en route to a Board of Directors annual planning retreat.

That's right, I left the Lake which is about a half hour from the Minnesota border at 4:30 am Sunday, heading straight for Springfield, Nebraska for a full day of planning and discussion with my fellow board members of the local graphic design professional organization. I got to Omaha just after 8:15, and with no time to run home, went directly to Springfield.

Sounds crazy, right? What's even more crazy is that I wasn't planning on being in Okoboji, it just so happened that I was invited to go at the last minute (like, the night before), it sounded like a good idea, so I threw some stuff in my car and went. These are the things you do when you're spontaneously idiotic like me. Also, driving 3+ hours in early morning darkness.

I left Omaha and Kevin Garnett is still a Minnesota Timberwolf, the Vikings had two great running backs, and the Twins were in the midst of the pennant race. I come back, and none of those things are still true.

On Tuesday, Garnett was traded to the Boston Celtics, which, when combined with the ref-in-with-the-mob scandal, adds further proof to my theory that the NBA is more exciting in the off-season than it is when there are actual games. The NBA has long been more interesting off the court anyway, like a reality show without the scripted nonsense and preening camera-hogs. Oh, wait. Anyway, the Woofies were damn near irrelevant and without the presence of one of the five best players in the league, they are now unwatchable too. Good luck with that.

On Wednesday, Johan Santana, The Best Pitcher In Baseball, <a href="http://www.startribune.com/179/story/1336318.html">lashed out at the Twins</a> for their failure to bolster the team for the stretch run:

<blockquote style="font-style: italic;">These were Johan Santana's words Tuesday after the non-waiver trade deadline passed without another trade: "I'm not surprised. That's exactly how they are. That's why we're never going to go beyond where we've gone."

The Twins acquired two minor league prospects for Castillo, saved $2 million in payroll and did nothing to bolster this year's chances. "It's not just about hope," Santana said. "In a realistic world, you have to really make it happen and go for it.

"You always talk about future, future. ... But if you only worry about the future, then I guess a lot of us won't be part of it," Santana said.

The two-time Cy Young Award winner wasn't smiling.

"Why waste time when you're talking about something that's always going to be like that? It's never going to be beyond this point. It doesn't make any sense for me to be here, you know?"</blockquote>Ouch. What the hell is that all about? Johan, look. You're 11-9 this year, and in your last start -- three days after those statements -- you pretty much stunk up the joint and lost. It was the only game the team lost all weekend. Quit your bitchin', or else you know what? You can go take your $200 million and pitch for the Yankees, and I'll laugh hysterically and roll on the floor of my house in joy when your freaking arm falls off. Don't believe me? Ask Chuck Knoblauch how it worked for him when he crossed me.

After finishing second in the MVP balloting, he demanded out of Minnesota, went to the Yankees, and eventually forgot how to do that simplest of things: throwing the baseball. The best defensive second baseman in the game was banished to the outfield, had hot dogs thrown at him in a return game to Minnesota, and was out of the game at age 34, a once Hall-Of-Fame career over too soon. This is what happens when you piss me off and cross my Twins. For you own sake, I beg you: shut up and pitch.

Ah yes, and Adrian Petersen and Chester Taylor were both injured on the first day of training camp in Mankato. Remind me again why I continue following the Vikings? Loyalty, you say? Because it will just make it that much better when they finally win?

Here's the thing about loyalty. I was a die-hard Twins fan when Ron F'n Coomer was their All-Star representative, because Ron F'n Coomer was their best player. Ron Coomer? The guy hit like .260 with 18 homers...and he led the team. For ten years, they sucked and yes, it did make it that much better when they starting winning again. That's dedication, that's loyalty, sure, but I knew -- I KNEW -- that the Twins would win again. I no longer know if the Vikings will win. In fact, I'm pretty sure Coach Brad Childress is the guy who was sent to coach the team and finally convince me to give it up. I just don't know if I can take another season of 1935 offensive offense (1 yard and a cloud of dust x 3, then punt, play defense, hope to win 6-3).