I am Cookie Monster

I have a weakness. It is either because I'm fat, I lack willpower, or I have a tapeworm. My problem is that it is absolutely impossible for me to not eat any type of food that is put out for everyone to "share" at work. This morning, one of the ladies that worked here brought fresh baked chocolate chip cookies. The fucking things were still warm. It really wasn't even a fair. I've been at "work" for about four hours now, and have eaten 4 cookies, which is somewhere in the neighborhood of 25% of the total available cookies. Mathematically, there was about one cookie per person, however, at least a quarter of the employees are women on "diets", so they probably won't eat any. There are still like 2 cookies left. My main competition for those last two cookies is one of my bosses, who has had at least 4 today himself. I may just have to slit his throat when nobody is looking, for those last, delicious, cookies.

Color Blind

I'm going to start out by saying two things. 1) This could potentially be a bad idea to write about. 2) I don't think this makes me racist, and I'm going to go ahead and assume that more than 50% of the 4 people that read this blog have thought these two exact things.

Last night, I was watching the #19 St. Mary's-#13 Gonzaga game (until I fell asleep at halftime). I swear that I've seen St. Mary's play at least 3 times in the past two years, and was pretty sure I knew what Australian sophomore PG Patty Mills looked like. I guess I hadn't paid that much attention, because last night I realized that he wasn't white. I guess I must have just assumed he was white for various reasons. 1) He's Aussie, 2) His name is Patty Mills, 3) He plays for St. Mary's, 4) He is a three point gunner, 5) I guess I've never seen a picture of him. Either way, I was surprised to find this out. This is like the reverse of Bill Simmons's "Reggie Cleveland All-Stars".

If you hadn't seen the game between #2 Duke and #13 Wake Forest on Wednesday night, and I told you that a guy that hailed from Cheyenne, Wyoming hit the game winning shot, your brain would've almost automatically assumed the same thing I thought about Patty Mills. Instead of the name/school/position/nationality assuming skin color, it was his home town. This isn't to single out Wyoming in particular. It could've been Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, South Dakota, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont or Green Bay, Wisconsin and I would've guessed the same thing.

I'm not sure of my point other than it is interesting what one's brain imagines a person looks like based on stereotypes.

IN OTHER NEWS:

Does anyone REALLY fucking believe that fucking Italian citizens can't tell the fucking difference between Pizza Hut Lasagna and real Italian Lasagna? Fucking fuck. I absolutely refuse to ever think about eating that shit based on principal. I guess real Italian pasta is served out of a fucking tin foil pan. I GUESS I can buy that some dipshit New Yorker's could concievably believe it, although definitely not people that have been to a fancy Italian restaurant. Someone that lives in Green Bay could think that, because alot of people here feel that Olive Garden is the standard against which all Italian food should be judged. I'm going to go out on a limb though, and say that Pizza Hut falls somewhere between Chef Boyardee and Olive Garden. I just don't get it. The claims are ludicrous. Now they are claiming people can't tell the difference between their greasy ass delivery pizza and gourmet Italian pizza, which is miles beyond stupid. The commercials that Pizza Hut is throwing onto the American public are somewhere in the range of diet pill commercials in terms of believability. I bet Italians would be even more pissed that Pizza Hut gathered a bunch of people to pretend they couldn't tell the difference between fake pasta and real shit. I don't know why this pisses me off so much.

Reason #17 Why I hate Joe Krabbenhoft

Really Joe? What the fuck were you thinking man? This pick is perfectly legal until he turns his elbow into the Purdue guy. I say he should get suspended for it...


OMG THIS IDEA CAME FROM WWW.JSONLINE.COM, NOT ME, THE ONLY REASON I THINK KRABBENHOFT SHOULD BE SUSPENDED FOR THIS IS BECAUSE I HATE HIS GUTS

One More Thing

Did anyone else catch the story about Brian Butch and his "pro" basketball career? He's playing China, scores 22 in his first game, is a nationwide hero, then is held to 3 in his second game and is FIRED!?!?!?!? That is a fan-fucking-tastic story. Brent Musberger and Steve Lavin are one of the top three broadcast partners on the planet. Along with Gus Johnson and anyone and Bill Raftery and anyone.

Classic

I think I've finally figured it out. Bob Sanders must be an assistant coach for the Badgers. That is the only logical explanation for why the Badgers have begun to remind me so much of the Green Bay Packers in that they are incapable of holding a lead late, or winning a close game.

Like last year when the Packers were the best 6-10 team in the NFL. The Badgers are the best 12-8 team in the NCAA. They could be 18-2 right now if they won every close game they played.

I think the part that bothers me the most was THAT was the shot that Bo Ryan called a timeout to get? A left handed floater, in traffic, from a freshman? If you are going to have someone drive to the basket, why not just let Trevon Hughes finish what it appeared like he was going to do before Ryan called the time out? It sure looked like he was breaking his man down off the dribble. I'll take my chances with the 7th year junior taking that shot all day. But if you are calling the time out, couldn't there have been a play drawn up for Nankivil, who out of the blue turned into Brian Butch and was 5-5 on threes? Or Landry, who has a pretty decent mid-range? I don't have a problem with Taylor taking the shot necessarily. I thought he did a really good job running the offense, and has some explosiveness and athleticism that nobody else on Wisconsin has. He was probably a little too eager in the last minute or so on the trigger, and that is probably because he hasn't played many crunch time minutes. My big problem was the lack of a playcall, and the horrible shot selection.

I still think we'll be OK. Need to finish up 7-3, which is doable.

CU is a mere 11 game winning streak away from a possible at large as well after the win last night.

What a Dick.

State of Basketball

After two brutal losses yesterday, and the nearing of midseason for UW and Creighton, I think it is a good time to take stock in where they are as teams, and what their postseason prospects look like.

UW
Record: 12-7 (3-4) 8th in Big Ten
RPI: 23
BBall State Ranking: 45
Best Wins: @ Virginia Tech, @ Michigan
Worst Losses: @Iowa, Minnesota
Outlook: The Badgers are in about as a good shape as is possible considering they have lost 4 straight for the first time in 11 years, and are in 8th place in their conference. RPI wise, they are in good shape because their losses have mostly been losses to tough teams (UConn, Texas, Marquette, Purdue, Illinois). Of course, we haven't beaten anyone all that good either. And we've done nothing in the last two weeks to lead me to believe we are going to magically turn this slide around either.
What they need to do:
1) Finish 7-4 in the Big Ten.
2)Win three out of the five between: Purdue, Illinois, Ohio St at home, @Michigan St., @ Minnesota.
3) Get to the semifinals of Big Ten Tourney.
That would get them to about 20-12, which should get them an at-large.
What will happen:
Badgers go 8-3 the rest of the way, and get in.

Creighton
Record: 15-6 (5-4) 4th in the Missouri Valley Conference
RPI: 59
BBall State Ranking: 66
Best Wins: New Mexico, Dayton, DePaul, @ St. Joe's, @ Bradley, @ Evansville
Worst Losses: @Arkasas Little-Rock, UNI, Drake, @Wichita St.
Outlook: The Jays have been maddeningly disappointing this season. Probably the most talented team in the Valley, but super inconsistent. Also, they get dominated on the boards, and if they don't hit their shots, they are fucked. The Valley has been a bloodbath for everyone this year, and they still have a shot at winning the conference, but more likely than not, it will be a one bid league.
What they need to do:
1) Win out in the Valley (9 straight), to finish 14-4
2) Also win the Bracket Buster game
3) Get to Arch Madness title game to finish 27-7 overall.
4) Pray
If they manage to rattle off 12 straight, they have a shot at an at-large bid.
What will happen:
CU finishes 21-10 (11-7), but wins Arch Madness for the Auto bid.

CASINO NIGHT RECAP:
They gave us $5,000 each in fake money. Only blackjack and poker. At one point I was up to $64,000 playing blackjack, but got bored and lost it all in 2 hands. It would be pretty tits to ever have enough money to play as recklessly as I did with the fake money. I'm far to conservative to ever to this, so I will never get rich, or lose $64,000 in 30 seconds in real life.

Non-Football Weekend

It really, really sucks that there is no football on this weekend. I guess I will just have to live with what is actually on today. There is Wisconsin at #21 Illinois on ESPN. There is Creighton hosting Drake via stick figures going to back and forth on the computer screen. UW will lose by at least 10. CU should win, but they have been so Jekyll and Hyde this year, it wouldn't surprise me if they lost.

Tonight, we have my wife's "holiday party" (yeah, it is almost February). It is going to suck balls. This will be our third one at this company, and the last two are awful. The people are boring. The booze are not provided. It is being held at the place where we had our wedding reception, The Riverside Ballroom in Green Bay. For those who were there, you remember that their all you can eat chicken dinner is prepared in heaven and flown down on a chariot made of chocolate and feathers, and driven my seventy brown eyed virgins. In other words, it is really good. Of course, her stupid fucking company is not having the chicken dinner. They are having some other fancy ass food. I'm sure it will be fine, but it is not chicken dinner. The one change this year is that they are having one of those gay, corporate "casino nights". I'm not really sure what it entails, but I'm guessing they have some table games set up, and they give you some fake chips, and you must win some prize for having alot of chips. As I'm hoping to end this night as quickly as possible, I plan to take all my chips, go to the roulette wheel, and put everything on black. If I lose, great, if I win, great. I don't give a shit.

RANDOM RENTAL MOVIE REVIEW:

I can to the decision that I am finally going to get Netflix. We don't rent all that many movies, but last night we decided to head over to Blockbuster and get a couple. We rented 2 Blu-Rays and it was more than $10 for 2 fucking nights. You've gotta be kidding me. Meanwhile, as long as you don't care if you only have one movie at a time (which, to be honest, is plenty at my house since I don't really have time to watch anyway) it is only $8.99/mo, PLUS you can watch a bunch of shit online for no extra charge.

Last night we rented "Step Brothers" and "Righteous Kill". I had heard good things about Step Brothers, even though it looked fucking retarded. I'll probably watch it again to make sure, but right now I will give it 3 1/2 stars. But if it is anything like most Will Ferrell movies, you have to watch it like 3 times to appreciate it. I didn't get to "Righteous Kill" yet, but it looked OK. It was about 20 years too late to get DiNero and Pacino together, but whatever.

Vegas, baby?

OK, I'm back.

A rather uneventful trip in terms of Vegas excitement, but a successful trip nonetheless. I'd like to do a clever and witty rundown of events, but I'm simply too lazy.

Overall, I won around $300. I won about $600 the first night, which is always great getting ahead right away. Worm dominated the first night, winning around $1500. I went out to vegas with $1300 and returned with $1000.

Fuck you Juice and your prediction of me lying around in Vegas like a sack of shit. Granted, I have done that on more than one (or two) occasions, but not this time. I made it to about 5am the first night. As I opened my eyes at around 11am I did not have a headache and thought all was good. Well, all wasn't good. Three of the four of us (Worm got back around 9am and didn't join us) wondered over to OSheas for food. All I could eat was half of my Subway five dollar foot long. That is a bad sign. We stopped in at the Mirage sports book only to find out the Mirage now makes you place bets to get drinks. Fucking gay. That was the main reason I loved their sports book so much. As long as you were sitting there you got drinks. Now you need to either bet on a horse race to get a drink ticket or, get this, bet $250 on a single sporting event. 250 FUCKING DOLLARS. If you need a drink ticket that bad and you lose the bet, that better be the best drink you've ever had. Anyways, I was really put off by this development because the Mirage sports book is awesome to watch a game at and I was really looking forward to watching the conference championship games there on Sunday. We decided to find a new venue.

Getting to the point, we made it back to the room where I proceeded to upchuck. I could have preserved a lot of energy by simply throwing my sub into the toilet.

We made our way to three casinos I had never been to - Palms, Rio and Gold Coast. At the Rio we made a great discovery. They're sports book doesn't require you to make a bet to get a drink. This was a big relief. We spent the entire day there on Sunday. I was absolutely certain the Eagles were gonna win, so I lost that bet. On a side note we got word from Schmock he wanted to place a bet on the Cards. Somewhere in the correspondence with Schmock confusion took hold. Worm thought Schmock wanted $40 on the Eagles. So when we got a "u bet!!!" text from Schmock after a Cardinal touchdown we knew something was wrong.

The second game provided me with one of my all time favorite sports betting Vegas moments. My top moment ever was the double reverse flea flicker Steelers vs Bengals the game Palmer hurt his knee a couple playoffs ago. This year, the Palamalulululululu pick for a TD was AWESOME!!! I bet a hundy on the game and came away victorious. But since I bet a hundy on the first game the championship games were a push. But still a great time. Nothing is better than a full day at a sports book.

A lot of funny shit happened (Worm doesn't snore, he makes creepy sexual noises instead) but most were of the "you had to be there" type. I was out and about all three days, so Juice's prediction was wrong. I also won money, debunking another Juice prediction.

Fuck Juice. Fuck him right in the butt.

I have 50 bucks on the Super Bowl right now. I have the Steelers (-7) and the over (47). I also placed about $200 on some future bets (Stanley Cup, Daytona 500, NBA Championship, World Series).

Time for Juice to figure out a date. I will not take part in planning another trip but I'll try to make it.

T.V. Bukkake

I'm not going to sit here and lie to you and pretend like I didin't skip watching the Badgers lose last night. I'm not proud of it, but there are certain occasions where you have to miss out on one of the 70-ish collegiate basketball games that my preferred teams play a year, in order to spend other quality time with your television. Last night was one of those nights. True, I had to suffer through American Idol. But there is always something pretty funny that happened, like last night when the really hot formerly signed singer chick told her "story" about how she moved out to L.A. by herself at age 16 to pursue a singing career, which was promptly followed by me making 30 straight minutes of adult entertainment jokes, and me saying "not in my eye" a whole bunch of times, which is great.

But after American Idol was the two hour season premier of the best show on television (at least in the top 3) "Lost". Fucking love that shit. I am convinced that when the entire series is done, I still won't know anything. This is Season 5, and I have no fucking clue what anything that has happened in the last 4 years had to do with anything. But enough crazy shit happens to keep you coming back every week. Charles Widmore is an evil ass dude. (not as evil as Lance Armstrong). Tune in next week as a fucking dinosaur eats Hurley, and Ben reveals he is actually a llama.

I would also be remiss if I forgot to talk about "24". You know a show is going pretty well when an hour seems far too short to get a fix. I have no idea how that FBI chick is going to manage to escape being shot, thrown in a ditch, covered in plastic and buried alive. If it was Jack Bauer, I wouldn't bat an eyelash, but if this chica gets out, they may be laying the groundwork for a spinoff where she is the new Bauer. She has already done some highly illegal/reckless shit to either get information, or track down a lead. And in an age without CTU, the FBI considers what she has done "torture". Not that I think a show with her as the main character would be any good.

Bear's Dream Come True

Now we have two years of watching him slowly eat himself to death! Seriously though, not a terrible deal for the Brewers, and it buys them some time to ship him off if they feel like it. Alot better than the $12 mil they had on the table before last year. Instead of costing them $36 mil, he will have cost us $18.67 mil. Not too shabby.

Surrender to the DARK SIDE!!!!

I was unaware that Lance Armstrong was actually Emperor Palpatine the entire time. How am I supposed to sleep after seeing this picture?