I’m On The Lamb, But I Ain’t No Sheep Trash Talk
Hey, what do ya want for nuthin, rubber biscuit? We did Blue Brothers last week. That was awfully right and proper. And this week we are gonna go back to some deeper roots. Keeping in the blue theme, some early Blue Oyster Cult with I’m On The Lamb, But I Ain’t No Sheep.
First up, because I’m up and it is what’s on right now, is the Singapore Grand Prix. Qualifying is just getting underway on CNBC, and it is spectacular. Singapore is the only true night race in the circus tour, and Marina Bay Circuit is amazing all lit up. It is also a very competitive circuit for drivers, which at this point means Red Bull and Ferrari stand a fighting chance. In fact, Sebastian Vettel won the race in 2015 in the Ferrari, his fourth overall win at Marina Bay. Fernando Alonso is also a multiple time winner, though is unlikely this year as the McLaren Honda is still off the pace from the front of the grid. Coverage of the actual race is on NBCSN and starts off at 7:30 am EST Sunday. If you like F1 at all, the Singapore is must see TV. Oops, Vettel had a small shunt, and isn’t going to make it out of Q1, thus will be starting well back on the grid tomorrow. That hurts.
The Cubs win, The Cubs win! Their division anyway, and did so quite early. There, that is the extent of Emptywheel’s baseball coverage.
On to the gridiron, the Jets actually looked pretty good in thrashing the Bills Thursday night. But, by the same token, the Bills just don’t look very good, so it is hard to get a real bead on the Jets, but they may have a very good team if Fitzpatrick keeps playing like that. The Bengals at Stillers should be excellent. Cinci think this is their year, but no way Big Ben does. Expect the same old result, i.e. a Pittsburg win. Cowboys at Skins is interesting because I am fascinated by Dak Prescott. Is he for real? Other than that though, two middling teams at best, so blah. Same question applies to Carson Wentz as the Iggles take on the Bears. Marcy’s Kittehs though may be for real, and they host the still rebuilding Titans in Detroit to try for the key 2-0 start to the season. I say Detroit gets it. Kansas City goes down to Houston to play for all the barbecue. These are both pretty solid teams, and the one with the best QB play will emerge 2-0. Can Brock Osweiller get it done? This rates a pick em in my sports book, we shall see! Pack is in Minnesota to open the Vikings’ fancy dan new stadium.
On the college front, unlike last week, there are several top match ups. Alabama is down at Ole Miss. Saban and the Tide have lost two in a row to the Rebs and Chad Kelly will be trying to make it three. Kelly by the way, is the nephew of Hall of Famer Jim Kelly. Florida State visits Louisville, so obviously I will be rooting for the Cardinals. Ohio State is at Oklahoma. Somehow the Sooners are still ranked number 14, but don’t think that will be the case after today. Colorado is horrible as usual, and will be an easy meal for the Michigan Bradys. The other top 20 matchup to watch is the Domers hosting the Spartys from Michigan State. It is in South Bend, so the Irish have a chance. Frankly, neither team, despite their reputations, has looked very good yet, so this is a pick em.
Well, that is it for this week. As a parting shot, if you want a few laughs, I live tweeted closing arguments in an….um….amazing trial earlier this week. The case involved a yoga instructor who got an amazing boob job, and then a little tipsy at a seriously wild bar mitzvah party at her boss’s house. Here is a good backgrounder from the Washington Post.
And here is my Storified live trial coverage, and I think you will find it much superior to the stale WaPo work! This really was a pretty hilarious trial, even though it was quite serious for Lindsey Radomski. She is very nice, and I am glad she was acquitted, that was the right verdict.
So in the end, who were the “boobs” out in Arizona? The lawyers? The “victims”? The DA? The “lady”? From what I’ve read, no one came off that well. America—ya gotta love it.
Um, no. BBQ is not to be trifled with, and folks in KC would prefer that folks in Texas keep that stuff they call BBQ to themselves, and not inflict it on folks who know and appreciate the real thing.
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The local coverage of last Sunday’s come-from-waaaay-behind Chefs win over the Bolts has been quite something. The KC Star’s deadtree story on the game featured a huge photo of what some began calling “Caveman Alex Smith” giving a shout that the Star also used to lead their video of post-game comments from the players. True Believers point to this game and say “Alex Smith has finally arrived!!1!” while realists note that the Chefs defense didn’t particularly catch fire until injuries caught up with the Bolts.
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On the college front, this is my favorite part of college football: Rice Marching Owls Band Performs Baylor Scandal-Themed Halftime Show, which included a rendition of “Hit The Road, Jack” in the “Starr formation” to honor Ken Starr. Gotta love it.
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Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to figure out what’s going on the grill today and how many hours it will need to linger there to reach perfection.
Shirley, you jest. Texas BBQ brisket is the best BBQ!
Objection! Assumes facts not in evidence.
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And I’ve got the evidence here all over my fingers.
Testify!!!
“Florida State visits Louisville, so obviously I will be rooting for the Cardinals.”
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Bmaz is a very very happy camper, then. On the other hand . . .
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“Colorado is horrible as usual, and will be an easy meal for the Michigan Bradys.”
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It’s only the end of the first quarter, but the Bradys are down 21-7. The Buffalos are 10 of 12 in passing with 164 yards and no INTs. I guess what they say is true: there is no D in Michigan.
Having attended Boulder for graduate school, I feel fairly good about CU’s chances of blowing this game.
As a Cubs fan and a Fighting Journalists alum, I understand this sentiment in the depths of my soul. Sure, the Cubs have clinched their division and have the best record in baseball, but I’m still nervous about the playoffs. A century of “wait til next year” teaches you that there is no lead so big that it cannot be blown.
If the playoff started today: 14 games remaining
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Baltimore at Toronto, winner plays Texas
Cleveland at Boston
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San Francisco at New York, winner plays Cubs
Washington at Los Angeles
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Not sure if I’ve got this right
Gawd, BMAz, that WaPo article on the trial was from Boring McBoringtown. I mean, really, They managed to make spellbinding testimony into something as interesting as wallpaper paste. Last week while the testimony was going on you were emailing out quick synopses from the courtroom, and I was on the interstate on a long drive. I was pulling over at every rest stop I could find just to read the latest you’d sent. And it was hilarious. I just wish the transcript would be cheaply available because everyone would then get to read the gyrations lawyers have to go through to put in their proofs, or make their defenses. And wet themselves from laughing so hard.
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Bloopie – the boobs in AZ were the town prosecutor who took this case AFTER the grand jury refused to indict and the prosecutor who made it into a 7 week Via Dolorosa for the jurors. To a lesser extent, the judge, who appears to have studied at the Lance Ito School of Advanced Jurisprudence and taken to heart those lessons. There were video feeds and I have to say I can’t recall having seen worse-tried case on the government’s side
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Speculation is that, after a couple more weeks of Fat Rex ramming their franchise into the ground, the fans of Buffalo will stuff him and his brother with enough beef on weck* to put them into imminent danger of bursting, then roll them over Niagara Falls. No barrel. That, or in a couple of years after they are fired Fox Sports will hire them for a show in which they will cruise the country in a tour bus to check out the tailgates at different pro and college stadia, hilarity ensuing. Special guest appearances by Gronk.
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I hear there is considerable worry in NE that Gronk is soft. And also that some guy “Andy from San Diego” (I think) who’s been calling in to Bahstan sports-talk is really Biebs, bored out of his skin being a multimillionaire with an international supermodel wife and nothing to do but lift and eat vegetable concoctions said wife likes to cook.
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King Roger the Clown finally got around to disciplining the guys who concussed Cam Newton. Wow. Has he hit anyone else lately?
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Antonio Brown might replace Ryan Lochte on Dancing With The Stars.
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I, for one, would love to see King Roger’s reaction if, after a TD, the O-line of the team scoring would get together in the end zone and do a Rockettes-style kick line dance. Or the receivers. Doesn’t matter.
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Stillers look good, but Cincy is tough.
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James Harrison was vindicated, AGAIN Roger, when he picked off Cousins Monday night to keep Washington from getting even a tiny bit closer.
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* While it’s subject to a lot of speculation elsewhere, I think I know the origin/etymology of the Buffalo favorite “weck” bread. I was in Stuttgart, Germany a while back and stopped in a bake shop in the Bahnhof to get some munchies. They had a large number of fresh rolls there, in addition to the sweet stuff I’d come for. They called them “Weck”. Elsewhere in Germany they might be called “Brotchen” or, in Munich and Bavaria, “Semmeln”. All of them the local takes on what we call a Kaiser roll. But Brotchen are round or a little oblong, crusty outside and soft inside, and only good the day they’re baked. (Except for Roggenbrotchen, made with rye, which are usually a bit rectangular and last up to a week.) Semmeln are round and soft inside with minimal crust and last more than a day but less than a week. Weck, OTOH, are crusty outside and chewy inside and, most important of all, shaped like an American football.
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Explained.
It made my mouth water just to read your comment.
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Back in the day, I was an exchange student in Germany, and Brötchen was a staple at breakfast with thinly sliced Speck. When I got home to the US, I went looking for good Brötchen and came up sadly empty. Over the years, I’ve managed to find a few places that sell them, but they are far and few between — and as you say, you have to purchase them the day you want them.
In the hotel in Stuttgart, the breakfast buffet had a good dozen different kinds of bread and rolls. One of the more outstanding was a very local favorite, the Laugengeback. This was basically pretzel dough shaped like a Brotchen then sprinkled with a bit of large-grain salt and a cross cut in the top. Then baked to a dark brown crust which was soft AND chewy inside.
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Or you could get Butterbrezeln. These were a dark-crusted soft pretzel split horizontally like you would a bagel, then buttered and reassembled.
Just the idea of an “Ode to Evel Knievel” makes me misty-eyed. http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/daredevil-rockets-over-snake-river-canyon-ode-evel-knievel-n649791
Gronk out, Pat’s in?
‘Boys and the ‘Skins, “two blah teams”, about says it. It’s worth watching to see how Prescott does. If he continues good and learns, Romo may be history, one break too far. Just like RG3 is done at Cleveland, but he was never willing to learn.
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Breeland got torched by the Steelers. When you go back and look at it he had two bad plays all game, for the rest he was right there and it was all the Ben and Antonio show. D Hall was consistently a couple of steps short of helping Breeland. The squawks about not playing Norman man on Brown ignore that Norman made his bones playing left corner zone for Carolina. And speaking of bones, Breeland made his defending Bryant so that should be an interesting matchup.
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‘Skins D line got whupped, and may again. They’d call “pass” and Steelers would run and vice versa. Gotta disguise it better than that. Hope Alfred Morris has a good game to help the ‘Skins understand what they kicked to the curb. Will Cousins get his mojo back? Two blah teams, but it may be a game worth watching.
It’s weird, I often find anymore that games like this are just as interesting as the big ones, just because of the dynamic, like you say. As much bad as I say and feel about the NFL as a corporate entity, the league as a whole really is amazingly compelling top to bottom just because of this factor.
The football per se is excellent, and the TV presentation of the games is excellent. It’s the League that is littered with horrible human beings.
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I think I have recovered from the lung damage from our high altitude seats last night in the Swamp. We did have a very pleasant breeze up there and just watched in awe as McElwain strode halfway across the field calling out North Texas for their cheap shot that took out our QB (late hit right on the side of the knee, very ugly on replay). The backup, a graduate transfer from Purdue, seemed fine for the quarter and a half he had, but his real test will come next week in Knoxville. I’m thinking that if WR Calloway is back, the Gators will be fine and Tennessee will be crying for another year.
Whoa, check out this dude’s BBQ rig tailgating at Foxborough today
Meanwhile, there’s this from Michigan yesterday.
re the Chevy racing engine grill, if you’re going to do something you might as well do it right.
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Garop won’t be back today.
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Like I said in one of our warmup preseason trash sessions, Brissett is an unheralded Cam Newton type. Garop had better get healthy quick, lest he wind up the Wally Pipp of the piece.
Uh oh, Jimmy G is down and out. The rook, Jacoby Brisset on for the Pats.
Not to worry, the Patriots will survive and thrive. They always do. That’s what makes it so easy to cheer for them–you know that you’re going to be rewarded in the end, and you that will feel good about yourself that you picked the right team to cheer for. It’s a no-lose situation.
Patsies’ D giving a good imitation of a sieve.
And Justin Bieber was photographed getting hammered in the main tent of the Oktoberfest, which opened yesterday.
Cinci got totally and completely screwed by the refs on that fumble call. Knee was clearly down.
And the Chefs of early 2015 are back, wherein they lean on their kicker for their offense. Santos was 4 for 4, but 12 points wasn’t quite enough to beat a similarly anemic bunch of Texans.
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I didn’t see the game, but I’ve heard the moaning about it already.
I’ve heard from some Texans that it was glorious!
Latest reports say Jimmy G out for six weeks
Stillers win.
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Smiles.
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I don’t give a f’ck if the Bungles got “screwed” on a call. This is merely one step by the Football Gods to straighten out the Bungles’ bad behavior in years past. Only fitting it was James Harrison who forced that fumble.
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Vindicated.
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Again.
“The Pittsburgh version of poutine”. http://www.post-gazette.com/life/food/2016/09/16/What-s-new-on-Heinz-Field-menu-Franco-s-sausages-15-fries-pork-on-pork-sandwich/201609160085
I have to go there and eat. Because it exists.
So has BillBel called Brett Faaaahvre yet? “You got a game or three left in the tank, Ol’ Geezer?”
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Or would it be the other way around? I could see Brett reaching for the phone as soon as he saw Garoppolo hit the turf, with his whole speech ready” “Hey, Coach — I see you might need an emergency QB.” But the phone goes straight to voicemail, as BillBel is on another call. It’s with Peyton Manning, who called as soon as he saw Kiko Alonso aiming for Garoppolo.
Matt Flynn is the guy that has the experience with the Pat’s system.