Bitching my way to the weekend (horribly off-target picks inlcuded).

(In patronizing douchebag voice) Hey there guys, how’s everybody doing today?

Yep, we’re one week closer to the end of football for the better part of 7 months and to the never ending snoozefest affectionately known ‘round these parts as “baseball season”. Sure, I get excited to go catch a free Spring Training game or two in March as well, but who among us isn’t so bored to tears by meaningless fucking baseball games by mid-May that they’re drinking themselves to sleep by 8:30 every night? Really? There’s no way I’m the only one, right?

Anyway, I’m going to get to Sunday’s Conference title games in a minute, but first I have to cover a couple lingering issues from the past week.

First, all these new responsibilities at work are really starting to bum me out. I mean, how am I supposed to keep up with all of my research (read: reading of blogs) when every time I turn around there’s more work for me to do? Is this what the rest of you poor slobs have been dealing with for years now? If so, I’m amazed none of you have committed suicide or at least raped a stray cat out of pure, unadulterated frustration. You’re all much stronger than I am. Just ask the Tabby that’s been hanging around that dumpster behind the liquor store.

Umm, yeah, sorry about Tuesday.

Secondly, there’s no denying that Florida is an extremely backwards and fucked up state. If I ever doubted this, TJ has more than illuminated this fact to me throughout the last 6-8 months. However, with that being said, I can’t, for the life of me, understand why somebody wouldn’t want to live in the coastal areas of Central/South Florida. Seriously, its fucking sunny and 70 degrees here today and that’s the coldest its been in two weeks. While I’m as scared and mortified by the inbreds and walking dead in this state as the rest of America, they’re not that hard to avoid. We put all the living dead in self contained communities and make all the inbreds live on the wrong side of major highways (the interior, if you will). If you try hard enough, you can avoid these people almost entirely. You can also go to go the beach, have barbecues and drink outside in the middle of the winter. (Note: You can also fish too, but fishing is for the kind of people who find Carlos Mencia funny. These people can blow me where the pampers is.) Maybe its just me but no matter how hard I try I just can’t figure out why people choose to live in places where you have to do things like rake leaves, scrape windshields and drive in the snow. It literally boggles my mind.

Alright, now that I’ve bored every last one of you to tears, we might as well get to this weekend’s games.

Saints @ Bears: Chicago fans ought to be awfully glad that this game isn’t being played in New Orleans. No, not because of the enormous home field advantage that the Saints have playing in the Superdome or because the wintery weather in Chicago should slow down the positively Pac-10 offense of the Saints. While those are both solid reasons, here’s a better one:

The last time that Rex Grossman played a game in New Orleans (as well as fellow Bears Alex Brown, Ian Scott & Todd Johnson) he ended up getting drunk, getting in a fight with the Miami Hurricanes on Bourbon St. and, eventually, getting his ass handed to him by those same Hurricanes in the Sugar Bowl. If the Sex Cannon couldn’t concentrate with New Year’s Eve looming in his scope, how the hell could he be expected to get adequately prepared for a mere football game when there are hundreds, nay, thousands of young women of questionable morals just dying to get blasted by the Cannon in the Crescent City? Since the game in is Chicago though, the Bears have a shot at this one. Admittedly, its not a good shot since, you know, God and destiny have each chosen the Saints as their mistress but its still a shot. As much as we’re all tired of hearing about the myriad storylines involving the Saints, we won’t get a reprieve this week or next week (Who likes the Super Bowl bye week anyway?) for that matter. The Bears defense is just too banged up to contain the Saints offense. SAINTS

Consider Rex distracted...

Patriots @ Colts: One unexpected result of being out of the office for much of this week has been the lack of Manning-Brady coverage that I’ve had to endure. Basically, this means that I’ve only gotten about 36 total hours of articles, news reports and overall general chatter about this matchup. The way the media talks about these two and their impact on Sunday’s game you’d think that this was the championship game of a Flag Football tournament or something.

My hatred of Peyton Manning has been well documented in this space, as has my boredom with the Patriots as a whole. So, this basically lays out as the ultimate no win game for me. However, when pressed to pick a winner here, I’ll rely on my collegiate alliances to guide me. The Colts’ biggest star is Peyton Manning. Peyton Manning, as we all know, is a gay waterhead who went to Tennessee and wears tight jean shorts (like any self respecting/loathing homo). The Patriots, on the other hand, have two starting wide receivers who went to the University of Florida, both of who are responsible for some of the funnier moments of my collegiate life. (The Jabar Gaffney incident has been covered here before. As for Caldwell, well, he named his daughter Rechela even though his given name is actually Donald. Could I even make something like that up? Yes. Did I? No.) On top of that, the Patriots have a total of 5 Gators on their roster and Bill Belichick and Urban Meyer are BFF these days. I think you know where I’m going with this one. Manning finds a way to be less than impressive in yet another big game and…the Colts lose. PATRIOTS

In case you haven't been paying attention lately, I'm currently 2-6 in my playoff picks. So, yeah, you might want to disregard everything you just read.

One last thing: It came to my attention today that former porn star and stalwart of my early 20s Chasey Lain hails from Cocoa Beach, a mere 10 minute drive from my house. Evidently, she lived and "worked" in Cocoa Beach (home to approximately 35 Gentleman's clubs) before moving to LA to pursue stardom. How this slipped under my radar all these years is beyond me and frankly, I'm sorely disappointed in myself right now. Looks like its time to get back to work on that flux capacitor, and fast.)