Click images for desktop size: "Look Deep" by Unknown My puppy and I are really back to normal; CONSTANT BICKERING.
Wouldn't have it any other way.
She is still too protective of me but she's settled in nicely.

My housemate has decided to get a new dog. His passed away about 6 months ago. She was a good girl.
I went to the pound with him a couple of times. I thought almost all the dogs were pretty special for one reason or another. He picked two, went and spent time with each of them in these little visitor "cells". Then we took the big step of taking my puppy to meet his final choice, a male rottweiler mix, somewhere between 6 months and 9 months old. He's a handful.
My puppy didn't like him. She wouldn't, especially when I'm around. It will be fine. She's been around fosters and other dogs most of her life. She'll bully him and then decide he's worth playing with. The point of the meeting, in my mind, was to make sure he didn't try and savage her. My puppy thinks she's a great fighter but . . .
I managed to talk the person showing us the dog to let us take them both on a walk around the property. It went well, I thought. We even managed to have a chance encounter with the other dog my housemate had picked out. It made for a pleasant day.
Today he went and filled out the adoption papers, paid the fee. The new dog should be moving in sometime between Wednesday and Friday. Coolness.

I still have a cold. It's the reason I'm not supposed to catch colds. The cough is irritating but not debilitating.

The coolness is that I got a second hand iPod Touch. I like it a lot. Cost me $75, so far works fine. I
Click image: "Neat and Tidy" by Major League Baseball got a raise at work so this was my treat . . . actually I just wanted one. I like being connected on the WIFI but its pretty obvious that having an iPhone and 3GS connections would be incredible and incredibly expensive. I'll stick with this and just hope for miraculous hot spots. Since I have WIFI at work it means I can answer emails and stuff at will instead of hoping the owners fix the rickety lap top we have at our disposal.

The WIMAX from ClearWire is pretty paradoxical. It went out, the modem wouldn't connect. I called and was told that it was because I would have to move to their Clear service which is 5 meg down and 50K up. (50 k up is painfully slow, 5 meg down is okay). I had to wait 3 days to get the new modem. When I got it they hooked up fine but there was a weird charge on my card. I called again and got an apology and a credit, 3 days later, for the $25. Curious.
I was reservedly happy with the Clear service, even though I thought this was a lot of grief for a service that wasn't a month old yet. Until I got an email telling me I was using the service too much and they were going to cut me off or charge me more . . . So I'm not allowed to use the bandwidth they give me? YOW!
This isn't going to work out for sure. Hammering my debit card with two incorrect charges for some unknown reason, cutting me off for 3 days, then say that I'm using the service more than anticipated is kind of nutso. They claim the service agreement covers excessive use but that seems crazed to me. I'm paying for a service that I can't use? Great googa mooga. What a great idea for a business, selling you stuff you're not allowed to use.
WIMAX is a totally cool idea but Clear or ClearWire are jerks and not a trustworthy company from my experience.
Back to looking for a dry loop dsl provider.

I still don't have a TV but thanks to friends I got to see an mkv fie of the USC-Cal game. Very interesting. I'm impressed and dumbfounded by turns. The greatest disappointment for me was the O-Line. I expected them to be monsters and they've looked merely competent. Too much talent to
Click images for desktop size: "Art and Beauty" by Robert Crumb not overwhelm.
Matt Barkley doesn't look as good as the hype. I know his shoulder must still be sore but he lacks the confidence at weird times. Maybe with Ronald Johnson coming back for Notre Dame the deep threat will let him open up his game.
I'm incredibly unimpressed with Jeremy Bates as a play caller. Way too much NFL fear play calling. College ball is about being loaded on faith and hope and looking to a player to step up and perform a miracle. It's not about making the "safe" call and prevent defenses.
Still this is a very good exciting team I feel proud of.

I went and saw the worst football game of my life on Friday night. Very poor. It made me sad as the kids were pretty typical and totally willing to lay it all out there.
I got to talk to the HC and they're interested in having me as an assistant. He said all the right things but when I watched the game I realized I could never work for him.
The team is 0-8 for a reason, and it's not the talent of the kids. The HC had implemented a no huddle offense. You could see hesitation at the line as the kids attempted to remember over complicated assignments. The no huddle is a very cool thing if you've got the personnel. It was obvious that this isn't the case. It was just an ego thing playing to the HC's fantasy and ignoring the talents and weaknesses of the kids.

Click images for desktop size: "Frank Sinatra" You have to lead kids and the only way to do it successfully is to be their servant.

And to prove my deep understanding of the game of football; last week I was an impressive 9-5 in my NFL picks. I can bask in that for a moment. 9-5.
I forget what my friend got. I think I was 11-3 or something trivial. I have discovered how she cheats. She reads my picks and the ones I get wrong she chooses the other teams! How low and nearly contemptible. I don't think her score is official so even if she unofficially has 45 correct picks for the season my 42 exactly correct picks are assuredly official and hence count for far more. As usual my picks are in bold.

Cincinnati at Baltimore - The Game of the Week1 Carson Palmer is playing like the elite QB he is while the Bengal defense is playing way over their heads. They are looking like a play off team. This week they meet the team I still think has a chance to get to the SuperBowl. The Ravens are playing meticulous football. Their game against the Patriots showed they are in the oxygen thin stratosphere, a brilliant team playing at the level of their talent, executing with precision and playing with heart. The Bengals are playing with intensity and beauty as well, but theirs has the feel of street football, which is exciting and pretty in
Click images for desktop size: "The Outsiders" by Marvel Comics its own way. I'd love to see the Bengals win this one but the Ravens don't look like a team ready to lose two in a row.

Cleveland at Buffalo - This is an up year rating wise for the NFL. The good games are great but pretty few. This season offers up more stinkers every week than you can imagine. Like this cruddy game of the week contender. Buffalo has talent and Terrell Owens making waves. Cleveland has . . . Derek Anderson, who I still like and then . . .

Washington at Carolina - This stinker has the winless Panthers coming off a bye week. Did they use the time trying to pull the team together or did they grouse about their contracts? The Redskins are a mess but less of a mess than the Panthers. This one could end up 6-3 or 49-47. Either way it will stink.

Pittsburgh at Detroit - I watched Ben Roethlisberger on RAW this week. I was surprised at how much I liked him. He took it to the Chargers last week and the Lions don't have much to compare to the Chargers or to anyone except the Panthers and Buccaneers. This is almost a sure win.

Dallas at Kansas City - The rest of the world is finally twigging to the fact that Tony Romo is not a very good QB. The Cowboys look good as a power running team though and have enough good backs to keep inserting them, at least for now. The Chiefs . . . I feel sorry for them. They have some players and those players are surrounded by a bunch of practice squad stiffs who seem to have given up on the season already. The Cowboys are ripe for picking off but I've no confidence in the team rising to the occasion.

Oakland at New York Giants - Another slaughter. It doesn't matter whether or not Eli Manning plays. The Giant Defense will score enough points to beat the hapless Raiders.

Tampa Bay at Philadelphia - My Survivor pick of the week. McNabb looks on schedule to come back this week. Doesn't really matter as Kolb has the team looking pretty good. I just hope they keep Vick off the field. The Buccaneers have Cadillac Williams and then a prayer.

Minnesota at St Louis - The 4-0 team vs the 0-4 team . . . so much for parity. The most interesting thing about this game will be seeing if Adrian Petersen runs wild after being contained pretty well last week.

Atlanta at San Francisco - Game of the Week contender. The 49er's are playing beautiful football,
Click images for desktop size: "The Family" by Unknown the team rising above the individual players talent to being a cohesive force. The Falcons are a good team coming off a bye week. It will be an exciting match. I'm going with home field advantage to make my pick but I suspect it will come down to the final two minutes one way or the other.

Houston at Arizona - This is one of those white noise games. It will happen but no one really knows why. The most interesting thing to me is wondering when the Cardinals will let Matt Linehart into the game.

Jacksonville at Seattle - This cruddy game has some small interest in that I think the Seahawks can actually win. I'm a Jack Del Rio fan but his Jaguars, this season, are an incredibly inconsistent bunch. This is a long haul road trip to an unfriendly place. The Seahawks, what little I've seen of them have not looked like a bad football team. Matt Hasslebeck should return this game. They have a chance.

New England at Denver - I have no idea how the Broncos got to 4-0. Its like last season, somehow they get all the flukey breaks in the first half of the season before it all come crashing down. The Patriots don't really believe in flukes or luck. I watched the Raven game and this is a scrappy team. I like that. This could be a good game.

New York Jets at Miami - Mark Sanchez and the Jets ran into a buzz saw called New Orleans last week. They didn't look that bad. They have a chance to look good against a confused and confusing Dolphin squad. Sanchez tweeted right after the game something like "I made a lot of mistakes and cost us the game. I have to study and learn from them and not let them happen again." We'll get to see here. I'm counting on the cocky kid.

Indianapolis at Tennessee - At the start of the season this looked like it be a cool matchup, a changing of the guard as the Titans stepped up over the Colts. Instead it's a flash back to ten years ago with the colts being 4-0 and the Titans being 0-4. The Colts keep improving each week while the Titans keep blowing up and looking worse and worse. I can't see prime time making any changes in any of this.

These brilliant picks are for your amusement only. You might want to print them out and use them to light your fireplaces.