Enoch

Link. :D But, seriously... I got nuttin'.

He could be a good fit, if they use more roll- and sprint-outs in their passing game. The other concerns for the Bears going forward is that their offensive line is getting old, and their schedule will probably get harder. (It can't possibly be as easy as it was last year, can it?)

Garcia is only a legitimate option for teams running a 'West-coast' style offense like the Eagles do. He'd be pretty useless in the deep-ball centered passing game that Chicago uses.

Except for the play where Danieal Manning decided that it wasn't necessary to be within 10 yards of Reggie Wayne while he was running a deep post route. Would it be wrong to make an MVP vote for Rex Grossman, IND? Once Indy realized that Evil Rex had come to play, they went very conservative, happily taking FGs and squibbing the kickoffs beause they knew that the Chicago offense was no threat.

I concur. Also important: the officiating was quite good. Nobody wants to go through the round of (quite legitimate) griping about the refs that followed last year's big game.

Gold coins are weightless. Every once in a while, a group of bronze-age spearment will triumph, Ewok-like, over a squadron of modern attack helicopters. If all the lights go out, for even an instant, a grue attack is imminent. You must gather your party before venturing forth.

You know, if they really want to get that fence built quickly and cheaply, they should hire some illegal Mexican immigrants. Those dudes are hard workers. "

Uh...because they were expecting to be able to save that money? There's nothing saying they didn't feel they were losing a lot of money before the conservatives were in power. Not only that, but I doubt that banks, investment companies, financial planners, etc., will convert a person's assets into an income-giving trust for free. Many people probably spent a fair amount of money to reorganize their finances to take advantage of the changes in tax laws. Revoking those changes means that this money was mostly wasted.

But awareness with whom? I don't know how many of the show/movie's target viewers (generally high school and college-aged males) are watching World News Tonight or reading the NYT. I'd bet that 98% of the people reading these stories are going to read those entertainingly awkward descriptions of the show that you excerpted and wonder what kind of idiot finds that entertaining. Plus, the ad firm and Turner will likely be sued to pay for the costs of Boston's overreaction.

I'm probably going to get (or, if I'm feeling brave, build) a new PC in a couple of months. So I guess I'll get it then. Hopefully that'll be long enough for most of the driver support issues to be resolved. From what I've read, I honestly expect to have more difficulties adapting to the new Office UI than I will with Vista.

I played for about an hour after patching last night, and had a problem that I'd never seen before. Khelgar just disappeared. He was in my party leaving the Flagon, I walked over to the merchant quarter, into the Temple of Tyr and out again, and then I noticed that he's just not there-- no avatar or portrait, just as if I hadn't invited him along. (I don't know if it happened when I entered the Temple or exited.) I went back to the Flagon and didn't see him in the common room, but I was able to re-join him into my party when I left. I went to bed at that point, but I'm going to test it out tonight to see if it's a repeating error.

There is no microtext in that post. All of the words in his post should be underlined, as should "really" in Nartwak's post and the "Sneaky!" post by Krookie. They're not showing up underlined for me, either, but I am getting the pop-up tooltip when hovering my cursor over the proper words. I didn't know what to look for until I used the 'reply' function to peek at Rosbjerg's ML.

The little black "O" indicating a dev post is gone. I have mixed feelings about this. It was a nice way to know which threads were "important," but it also obliterated the little folded-down corner which helps track the threads that I have commented on (i.e., which threads are "really important" ).

This:

BearvsColt.com Most of them are pretty stupid, but I found the third one funny. Say what you will about the matchup, but this certainly wouldn't have worked with the Patriots or Saints in the game.

John Coltrane w/ Eric Dolphy - Impressions. (Also features Elvin Jones on drums and McCoy Tyner on Piano. I'm not sure who the bass player is-- if it's the same personnel as when Trane & Dolphy recorded this on the "Live at the Villiage Vanguard" album, it's Jimmy Garrison.)

Oh, I'm not advocating changing anything, and I certainly don't know enough about hockey to apply any of my observations there (although I work 2 blocks away from an NHL venue, so I really should drop in for a game or two at some point). I'd gladly have the players endure more knee sprains and torn labrums if it means a lower risk of spinal injuries. My point was simply that the use of protective gear in American Football tends to make the sport more physical, not less.

You have to take into consideration the athletes, if american football was played without pads a couple of people would die every game. I think that the death of a president's son is what brought about wearing helmets. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> What people don't consider when they talk about "all that padding" is that the padding is covered by a hard plastic shell. Undoubtedly, this greatly diminishes catastrophic injuries, but it also gives players a weapon with which to hit others and makes a player feel safer so that he can go full-speed into contact rather than pull-up to protect himself. The end result is probably more joint injuries, concussions, stress fractures, etc., than there would be without the pads. And, to keep us on topic, office softball leagues are fun. (Although out-of-season at the moment.)

Passing over the Super Bowl for a moment, I'm beginning to think that the Pro Bowl might actually be worth watching this year. Why? Little Bill! Belichick, as the losing coach in the AFC Championship, gets to coach the AFC squad. Lots of potential drama there: The AFC Pro Bowl is roughly 1/3rd San Diego Chargers, who were not particularly happy with Belichick's behavior in and after their last playoff game. Also, (and perhaps most importantly) what is he going to wear? Do they make a Hawaiian hoodie?

I've gained a bit too much weight over the last year, so I've been trying to work it off a bit by playing some basketball with co-workers after work. I lack the patience & motivation for non-competitive exercise, so this is a good option for me. They rent a gym from an elementary school once a week (it's 3/4ths length, but the hoops are regulation). Middle-aged bureaucrats are about right for my level of skill and athleticism. I do need to go buy some more supportive sneakers, though. Sprained ankles are no fun.

Not only that, the "Tackle" in question was nomally a defensive lineman, who had been originally drafted by the Pats. The Colts used one of Belichick's signature plays (TD pass in a playoff game to an eliglbe defensive player-- usually Mike Vrable, in Belichick's case) against him, with one of his former players! Huge style points.

Wow. Pats-Colts was an amazing game. (Saints-Bears, not so much.) Really, what else can be said about a game that included touchdowns scored by Logan Mankins, Dan Klecko, and Jeff Saturday?? Oh, and congratulations to Trent Dilfer-- he's no longer the crappiest QB to be a Super Bowl starter.

One thing that worries me about using the Oblivion engine is getting the look of the Wasteland right. If I can walk out of the Vault and see nothing between me and the horizon but a few bleached gecko bones, I'll get chills. But if they give into the temptation to create scenic vistas where I can see the whole gameworld, I'll be sorely disappointed. The Wasteland needs that Mad-Maxish look of total emptiness. (The real thing to avoid in using Oblivion's engine is their horrendous learn-by-doing skill & advancement system. It's counter-intuitive, not fun, and encourages all kinds of meta-gaming behavior. Oh, and the total lack of memorable characters, but that's not really an engine issue.) If they can get the mood and tone that is Fallout right, I'll be reasonably happy. Morrowind was stronger in this area than Oblivion, but that's probably mostly because they went for a more traditional fantasy setting.

There is a canon of statutory interpretation that statutes must be construed as to avoid "absurd" results. I think that it would be pretty clearly appropriate to apply it in this case. (As well as the canon that criminal laws should be construed to the benefit of the accused.) As for marriage as an institution of the state, as of 1997, there were 1,049 U.S. federal laws in which marital status was a factor. (Click the first search result here.) You can argue whether this is good or not, but you can't deny that there are social consequences of marriage.

You know, I really don't care if NFL players smoke a little ganga in the offseason. But how dumb do you have to be to try to bring your weed through airport security disguised in a water bottle?! How does Vick not know that you can't bring any water bottles through security any more?