Just looked at the front page, and cripes I have been emo today. I think it might be because I think I am getting a cold.
Boise State v. Va Tech is on. As much as it pains me, I’m rooting for the Hokies, because I can’t take any school that has a blue football field seriously.
jwb
That’s ok. The comments have been filled with crankiness too. Unfortunately, I don’t think the commentariat can claim we are collectively coming down with colds.
Steeplejack
__
Amen to that. Plus I think it gives me petit mal seizures, so I can watch only in short stretches. That and self-medicate with rum and tonic. Not an issue tonight, thankfully, but I am still self-medicating to be on the safe side.
MikeJ
Uh oh. One of the night shift commenters is an alum. Y is gonna be pissed.
inkadu
The blue field must be a hyperlink to a pyramid game on Geminon.
Or maybe they just made it blue to be able to blue-screen green grass onto it.
jeffreyw
Mmm…
jeffreyw
Mmm..mm…
jeffreyw
Yay! Got teh iPod to pair with the bluetooth headset. I can haz wireless.
Mark S.
I really love Netflix streaming. Watching Tyson right now.
Steeplejack
Oh, fuck, is that Musburger’s voice I hear coming from the TV?! Hell to the no. Cato, bring me a rum and tonic every 15 minutes until I pass out, and then one every 20 minutes after that.
And I don’t think those Hokie uniforms are any better for my nervous system than the blue field would be.
Brian S (formerly Incertus)
@Mark S.: There has been nothing so damaging to my productivity as Netflix Streaming, especially now that I have it on my phone too. I watched the Ken Burns Civil War series in 3 days with it, and have rewatched 2 1/2 seasons of Babylon 5 (I don’t recommend it) in the last month or so.
Corner Stone
@Brian S (formerly Incertus): I liked Babylon 5, for what it was.
Corner Stone
Damn Wrigley Field, that’s why I’m cranky.
Corner Stone
I don’t think Va Tech has the horsepower.
jharp
What do you have against Va. Tech.?
Ohio State is tops for me, then the Big Ten, then the WVU, Pittsburgh, Va Tech. part of the NCAA.
Va Tech has been tough for years.
Brian S (formerly Incertus)
@Corner Stone: It just didn’t hold up well, and it’s a little too eager to pound away at you, for what it’s worth.
Corner Stone
@Brian S (formerly Incertus): Yeah, it was a little more hokey than I would’ve liked.
I may stream some of it, as it’s been a couple years since I’ve seen any of the episodes.
Strandedvandal
Goddamit VT, beat those bastards! I cannot stand it if I have to listen to those arrogant Smurf pricks for another year tell us how they should be national champions.
Phyllis
Musberger makes me stabby.
DecidedFenceSitter
Whereas I’m rooting for Boise simply because a good friend is a Hokie.
Brian S (formerly Incertus)
@Strandedvandal: The possibility that the national championship game could be potentially be Boise vs TCU is the only thing that can make me the slightest bit interested in college football.
Steeplejack
@Phyllis:
Word, sister.
Dee Loralei
I’m rooting for Boise State, underdogs and all that. And yea, even though they kicked the collective asses of my beloved Sooners that was still one of the best football games I’ve ever seen. So, I have this really weird and odd respect and liking for the Broncs.
ETA: And as the 17-0 score shows, so far I picked the right team to root for.
But yea, you have been emo today.
I’m not going to worry about polls for another few weeks until I see what Obama and Plouffe have in store for election season. Today’s speech was a heck of a good start. Though I may have to pie filter a couple of the gloom and doom brothers who comment here.
And as an aside, google the “Chill the fuck out, I’ve got this” ,pic of Obama from 2008 and use it as your wallpaper til Nov 3, okay John?
Strandedvandal
The Donkey fans here are by far, the most arrogant, self righteous dirtbags I have ever experienced. I loathe BSU, I loathe their Smurf blue/Prison Jumpsuit orange colors, I loathe their Smurf turf, I hate their fans, I hate their announcers, I hate their stadium, it’s unhealthy. Of course, I am a Vandal Alum, so that probably contributes to the hatred a tad.
stuckinred
UGH.
Steeplejack
@Strandedvandal:
Idaho Vandals? Cool name.
Yutsano
Word Press ate my comment. FYWP. Not gonna retype, just gonna say I’m still alive and GO BRONCS!!
@Steeplejack: The coolest thing about the University of Idaho is the town it’s in, which is eight miles from where I finished university and a really neat place. The second coolest is their Jazz Festival. But then you come across their most famous alum and I can’t help but giggle.
And BTW I started college at Boise State. Would have stuck around but folks ran out of money.
stuckinred
@Steeplejack: Can’t use the pump cuz the Vandal stole the handle.
stuckinred
@Yutsano: Lewis and Clark?
Crashman
Boy this game is making me long for real football. Can’t wait till Thursday.
Strandedvandal
@Steeplejack:
Thanks. I like it, seems to fit.
stuckinred
@Crashman: Yea yea blah blah.
Corner Stone
@Phyllis: Where’s my knife? What if I feel stabby?
Yutsano
@stuckinred: Washington State. L & C is thirty miles south in Lewiston.
MikeJ
@Crashman: West Ham v Chelsea isn’t til Saturday.
Corner Stone
BTW, good God SnorgTees…really?
stuckinred
@Yutsano: Ah, I knew an Aussie whose son played hoop at LC.
Crashman
@MikeJ: I see what you did there.
4tehlulz
They field may be pathetic, but their ability to troll the BCS is second to none.
Go Boise State.
Yutsano
@stuckinred: It attracts a few international students for sports. EXCELLENT baseball program. My cousin got a scholarship there but gave it up fo a girl. I still give him grief for that. He could be in the minors now, instead he’s a nurse.
Steeplejack
@stuckinred:
Somehow I should have known that would be coming.
Wouldn’t it have been cool if U.C. Berkeley had changed their team name to the Weathermen back in the day?
stuckinred
@4tehlulz: whatever that means
Steeplejack
@Strandedvandal:
No, I meant their name. Your name, meh. >^..^<
stuckinred
@Steeplejack: Or the Banana Slugs!
Svensker
Revis signed, so some things are good. Other good things are a really good restaurant in Toronto with reasonably priced pub food. Delish liver with hand cured bacon that was to die for. Sigh.
Not thinking about bad stuff tonight. Sufficient unto the day…
Mr Stagger Lee
It is very grating for the fans in the Pacific Northwest, that the best football team is not located in Oregon and Washington, but Boise, Id. Hell even the She-hawks will probably suck.
Then again it grates the snobs in Seattle and Portland that the best basketball team in the Pacific Northwest is located in Spokane. Go Zags(Well the Seattle Storm is Good)
Strandedvandal
@ Yutsano
I had some good times @ WSU
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
…and just like that, it’s like I’m not even American. Because of teh football. And my intense dislike for it.
Sigh. I’ll see y’all in January.
stuckinred
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther: The Super Bowl is in Feb
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
@stuckinred: SEE?! I’m a stranger in a strange land!
Actually, just before I hit “submit” I thought: Wait. February? February. I think it’s February! And then I thought: “Ah fuck it. You hate football. If it’s not January, you’ll just be proving your point.”
Omnes Omnibus
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther: I felt that way about American Idol conversations.
stuckinred
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther: Hey, there was a month of World Cup conversations this summer. Just pick and choose, seems to me there will always be sports and critters up in here.
Steeplejack
Peeking kitteh icon test: ^..^
ETA: Underscore no work. Oh, well. This not too bad. Whisker fail on previous.
Mister Papercut
@Strandedvandal: Sorry, Stranded, as a Hokie I could’ve told you this would happen. These big, high-profile games are to VT as rakes are to Sideshow Bob.
stuckinred
Pound the rock Hokies.
stuckinred
@Mister Papercut: We were up there for the SC game a few years back.
Corner Stone
Yikes.
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
@stuckinred: Oh, I was joking really. I meant I was bidding farewell to the entire country, not just Balloon Juice. And I can hardly do that, as it would involve abandoning my children and my mortgage. The courts frown on both, I’m given to understand.
stuckinred
Shit
stuckinred
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther: Gatcha!
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
@Omnes Omnibus: And yet…. One is somehow allowed to duck AI conversations without anyone acting like there’s something wrong with you. People just seem genuinely flabbergasted by my distaste for football.
Now, if it were futbol, I could take it much better! But alas, that’s over for now.
Mnemosyne
@Yutsano:
Ironically, he’s probably making more as a nurse than he would in the minor leagues. I’m a frickin’ secretary and I make more than most minor leaguers.
Less glamorous, though.
stuckinred
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther: Hell I live in Athens Georgia and most of the people I hang with hate football. They are all artsy and shit and way above such dalliances. I don’t care if people like it or not but the whining about it is what I dislike. If you don’t like it don’t watch it I sez.
Yutsano
@Mnemosyne: Oh yeah, I know mino leaguers don’t make jack. But he was good. Really really good. Awesome pitch control and a really sneaky slider. He made his choices though and I think he’s happy with them.
Alice Blue
OT a bit, but President Obama was quoted as saying “They talk about me like a dog” in his speech today. Wonder if he knows that’s also a lyric from the Jimi Hendrix song “Stone Free”?
Omnes Omnibus
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther: You could try learning one or two things that happened over a weekend of football and then saying “Did you see that pass interference call against Atlanta? Buncha BS.” People think you took part in the ritual and leave you alone.
My wife is European and had no interest in sports when I met her. She is now an avid Packer fan. This is not just something she does to humor me; it began that way, but it caught her interest. She still has no interest in other sports.
stuckinred
@Yutsano: Andrew is a trainer for the Washington Bullets now. His old man and I were in school together at UGA and he was a trip. The dude knew more about 50’s American Rock and Roll than anyone I have ever met. He fixed up a junk car and drove from Georgia to Idaho to see his son and go to Graceland. A real Digger.
stuckinred
Aite Hokies, drill em.
Omnes Omnibus
@Alice Blue: Probably.
Bill H
@Dee Loralei:
Underdogs? AP has them rated #3 to VT at #10.
BCS has them rates #5 to VT at #6.
Nobody has VT rated higher than Boise State, so how are they underdogs?
kommrade reproductive vigor
Cole, you just need some strigidae in your life.
[ht – The Rumper Room]
mr. whipple
Today? Dood, you’ve been emo for weeks.
Time for people to start punching goopers in the neck.
freelancer (itouch)
@mr. whipple:
Can we start with these guys?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFerRGB7nYM&feature=youtube_gdata_player
mr. whipple
@freelancer (itouch): Fuck yeah.
stuckinred
@freelancer (itouch): It’s those smart mouth bitchez that need an ass whippin.
Omnes Omnibus
@mr. whipple: @freelancer (itouch): I concur.
morzer
If anyone would like to see and hear Obama’s Milwaukee Labor Day speech, you can find the first part here (and get the rest of the sequence as well):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYPuQBSYSUE
Dee Loralei
@Bill H: was hoping no one would call me on it after I realized my mistake and it was too late to edit. Oh well, I’ll hang my head sheepishly.
stuckinred
@Dee Loralei: For what it’s worth I thought they were an underdog all along.
Mark S.
@Mnemosyne:
Yikes! I didn’t know they made that little.
A lot of MLS guys make about minimum wage. I’m sure they all loved seeing Beckham cruise into practice in his Ferrari.
MikeJ
@mr. whipple:
You didn’t punch them in the carotid artery. You’re as bad as Bush! /firebagger
MikeJ
@Alice Blue: Every day of the week he’s in a different city.
MTmofo
What ’til you see the field for Eastern Washington
http://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images?_adv_prop=image&fr=yfp-t-892-s&va=eastern+washington+red+football+field
Go Broncs!
More importantly, Go Grizzlies!
Alice Blue
@MikeJ: They talk about the clothes he wears, but they don’t realize they’re the ones who’re square.
Turn me loose, baby …
befuggled
To be honest, I’m a big football fan but if I know someone doesn’t care I just try to remember not to bring it up around them. I hope they show me the same courtesy with American Idol or whatever the hell that Jersey show is.
stuckinred
GO HOKIES!!!!!!!
Mister Papercut
@stuckinred: Well I’ll be damned, there may be life in these Hokies yet.
stuckinred
@Mister Papercut: Ol Mo is a bitch.
Now for a real gut check.
Steeplejack
Damn, that was a good run. As 71-yard off-tackle runs go, that is.
Mister Papercut
@stuckinred: Well fuck my life.
stuckinred
@Mister Papercut: Plenty of time.
Corner Stone
Wow. Really bad overplay.
stuckinred
Looks like Tulsa and ECU!
ChrisB
OMG what a fucking horrible penalty.
stuckinred
@ChrisB: Doesn’t really mean much. Not nearly as much as this hammy might.
Yutsano
And that will start the fourth quarter.
And I’m debating how much my parents will kill me if I download FireFox on their laptop. This running over the margins shit is just annoying me to no end.
MattR
@Yutsano: Just make sure it is not the default browser and then delete the icon of the desktop. They’ll never know.
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: Jack up the security level to high or turn off active scripts. It is supposed to work. I understand it might kill the reply button though.
stuckinred
@MattR: Yea, like when I was in high school and drank all the beer in the fridge. I just put the cans back upside down (this was pre-poptop) until I could replace them! They never knew.
Yutsano
And just like that the officials decide who the winner will be before the fourth quarter is even over. Lovely.
stuckinred
@Yutsano: Baloney, he wasn’t down and wasn’t called down.
Mark S.
Bullshit call.
LiberalTarian
The season is changing, John Cole is getting a cold … or allergies. I am probably not the first to mention it to you, but maybe you should try going cold turkey on dairy for a while, see if it helps. I’m telling you, when I cut dairy out of my life I also got rid of a lot of the allergy meds–it was that influential.
It just isn’t a sign of good health to get this many colds and have so many problems with allergies. Yeah, yeah, I know, shut up. I learned when I was 40 that dairy and gluten were not my friends–it’s made a huge difference in my health to give them up. Just think about it.
You might check with an allergist about dander, too … there are shots for that you know, you don’t have to give up your animals.
frosty
@stuckinred: In case no one beat me to it, that was UC Santa Cruz, which was cursed by banana slugs dropping out of the trees on to the students.
MattR
@stuckinred: That late hit call was a bit of a gift.
freelancer (itouch)
Damn.
ChrisB
Hokie faithful stunned into silence.
But I hated that late hit call on Va Tech.
Mister Papercut
What was that about the officials determining the winner?
MattR
@Mister Papercut: Given the way Boise moved the ball, that penalty probably helped VT in the long run by giving them more time to respond to the Boise TD. Even with that last sack, this game feels like OT. (EDIT: Or not)
frosty
@stuckinred: Heh. Won’t work here. I buy bottles.
frosty +4 and wondering why there’s only one more …
stuckinred
@Mister Papercut: What horseshit, not as bad as the offensive interference call in the SC game but still. . .
Mister Papercut
@MattR: Of course, there was no excuse for VT not to convert the first down on their possession up 30-26 (bearing in mind, though, that we have quite possibly the world’s worst OC).
Yutsano
@Mister Papercut: Heh. You are welcome to find my lack of faith disturbing. Incidentally the Boise State QB lives only 20 miles from the town my parents live in.
Oh and GO BRONCS!! I could handle this as a rematch for the title game. :)
Mister Papercut
@Yutsano: Well, see, we would have to make it through the ACC unscathed. Based on what I saw tonight, I am not optimistic about those prospects on the whole (silly Hokie fans, clock management is for kids!).
I am nothing if not a realist. I’d love to be proved wrong, though.
Honus
@jharp: “Virginia Tech has been tough for years” VPI is 1-22 against top 5 teams, and has only ever won one BCS game (against Cincinnati) They have been grossly overrated for years.
Wordsmith
@Steeplejack:
It’s been blue since I went to BSU for a couple of semesters early on in the ’80s. Big deal, it ain’t. At any rate – they did win this evening. And I can’t stand football.
Wordsmith
@Steeplejack:
Karma, dude.
Honus
@Bill H: The oddsmakers favored them at game time. Bt that was probably a function of the VPI hordes betting on their team.
Steeplejack
@Wordsmith:
Karma, dude? How ’bout reply fail. Way to attribute Strandedvandal’s comment to me.
gene108
The more I talk to people, the more I realize there’s high-stakes pissing contest going on between business and the Obama Administration and Democrats in Congress.
Business has decided every paranoid thought they could have about Obama raising taxes or passing more regulations, i.e. changing the way businesses have to operate (changing regulations may not always make things more efficient, but they will always require time for businesses to figure out what they need to do to be compliant with new laws, which causes a certain level of uncertainty), will come to pass, so businesses have decided to horde cash and wait till 2012 and hope Obama loses, before they start investing again.
The voters have decided they’ve had enough of job insecurity, declining wages and deteriorating long term job prospects, so the Obama Administration responds to them by “getting tough” with business.
Any attempt by the Obama Administration and the Democrats to work with business, will be seen by liberals, who already view the Obama Administration and Democrats as corporate whores, as further proof of their corporate whoredom and gives liberals a sad, which may make more liberals stay home in November, thereby hurting the Democrats election prospects and egging the Democrats to “get tougher” on business.
Any attempt buy business to realize what they have been doing for the past 30 years, which has led to more economic stress on the average American, isn’t going to happen because the Obama Administration hurt their fee-fees by talking about greedy Wall Street bankers and insurance companies.
At some point, somebody has to realize they aren’t helping matters by pissing on each other, but that’d take a level of maturity, I think neither group possesses.
Businesses have to acknowledge greed isn’t good, while politicians have to acknowledge every pet idea they have floating around in their heads doesn’t need to become a law – think of the crap Ben Nelson or Joe Lieberman pulls out at the last minute, when they hold legislation hostage – or that passing temporary stimulus bills to appease voters doesn’t address the problems of uncertainty faced by American workers.
I just don’t see anyone stepping up and even identifying the problem of why so many people are on edge and working on a mutual solution to solve the problem. In the end, those of us hoping for an economic recovery are just left out in the cold, while the rich and powerful piss on each other.