It's that time of year.

The weather is starting to turn ugly, as it's been cold and grey for the past week. I don't think its made t to the forties this week, and several overnight lows have been down close to 20 degrees F. In preparation for the winter, the "Beard that made Marty do evil things" has made an early return. For those of you that have not been able to see the progression, as I usually come home for Christmas with a full beard, here's a timeline...

Day 5


Day 10


Day 15


Day 20


Three weeks to a pretty full beard isn't too shabby. Now, only three more weeks until end of the busiest semester I've had in a long time. Then it's time to bring on the ice! It's almost time to get the ice-fishing gear ready.

When is a win not good?

...when it shows you how incompetent your favorite team is. Am I glad the Browns won last night? You bet, a win is better than another loss. Did the Browns deserve to win last night? Not really. Here's just my take on the game and I am only going to focus on the Browns last field goal drive...

It's first down and ten from the Bills 38/39 and there's two minutes left. Now this is a 56 yd field goal (in Buffalo in sub-freezing temps so the ball doesn't carry as well) and stretching Phil Dawson to say the least. Keep in mind that we have all 3 time-outs. If you are willing to take a chance to win the game with an improbable 56 yarder (which they did) wouldn't you want to give the Bills as little time as possible?

One single run, anytime from 1-3rd downs would have taken the clock down to less than one minute when Buffalo gets the ball back, and maybe gotten a couple yards to make it a little easier kick. I don't see any logic in three consecutive passes, and I understand if one of them was caught, this argument is a mute point. Two runs and the clock is under a minute and the Bills have no time-outs left. Instead three incompletes and we used 21 seconds and had to hope for a great kick (and some luck).

It's official, by posting this, I have now passed into the ranks of those fans who think they know more about football than the coaches, but I won't even attempt to say that. Hopefully you all won't lump me in with those internet morons. However, I think this game is that proverbial straw for me that I can no longer wait and see if Romeo Crennel will progress into a decent head coach. Since he is neither coordinator, he must manage the game. That is the worst thing he actually does. This is just one example where the Browns could have made it a lot less exciting and given themselves a much better chance (better than relying on a missed 47 yarder) to win the game outright. Leaving on a good note, he did preserve time in case the kick was good, but they never should have been in that situation.

Whew... I must move on to bigger and better things. Go Browns!

oh yeah, Braylon Edwards... meet hands.

Hands... meet ball.

Hands... catch ball.




Braylon catch the ball!!!

The Busy Month

It seems that every October just gets busier and busier. With classes entering into exam time and labs having a mountain of grading during the second month of the semester. Over the past week I've finished up grading over 250 pages of poorly written lab reports from my students. I did take some time for myself.

Two Wheel Tango sponsored the cyclocross race at Veteran's Park in Ann Arbor last Saturday. A lot of my co-workers were racing, so I went out and gave it a shot. It wasn't too bad for not riding my bike for the past two months, and I didn't finish last! The best part of the race was that Leslie (part owner) lives next to the park, and she had a barbeque for all the racers and Jolly Pumpkin donated a pony keg of their Bam Noire beer. Yum... Jolly Pumpkin ales are quite unique, with open fermentation, they always get a little wild yeast and some sour notes to their beer. It's a little hard to find, but some of the better places carry it.