Thanks to David for first making me aware that I made a minor boo-boo on one of the picks last week, caring so little about the OAK at BUF game that I forgot the trivial matter of picking a winner. Well, let me just say I honestly would have picked Buffalo - so Chris, keeper of the tallys, go ahead and "mark it a 0".

HOU at KC: The Chiefs "really need a win here", but you can say that about any given team in any given game at least 95% of the time. Still, Arrowhead puts this one in KC's favor. KC.

PHI at DET: Chris seems to think he's on to something. This week he goes to the well one to many times. You gotta admire his moxie, though. PHI.

BAL at CIN: If you haven't already jumped off the Bengals bandwagon, do it soon. A three point win over the Dolphins is almost worse than a loss. BAL.

AZ at ATL: Poor Arizona. It's unfortunate that the worst team in the league always ends up playing a team that's better than them. ATL.

JAX at TEN: I'll contine riding the real cinderella this week (and yes, this is a direct shot at Chris and his love affair with Detroit). Upset Special. JAX.

NO at STL: The current Rams remind me a lot of the late 90's 49ers - an aging team that has clearly regressed to mediocrity, in eveyone's eyes but their own. But the Saints are whiny losers. STL.

CLE at NYG: New York must be feelin' fine right about now, even though Washington wasn't the prize they thought it was. Is Kurt Warner back? No, but he's playing Cleveland. Side note: the Browns' official motto is "More Impotent Than Ever". Levitra should give them a call. NYG.

CHI at MIN: We're not going to use the "C" word in this post. Let's just say the Vikings need to build up some early season wins to make sure they have the chance to blow everything down the stretch. MIN.

PIT at MIA: Perhaps their real reason Ricky left is that he had some inside information from the National Weather Service on what Florida was in for. PIT.

SD at DEN: Despite all logic and the lingering permanent-ink stain of Ryan Leaf, I'm starting to believe that San Diego is actually decent enough to belong to the NFL this year. But you're not going to beat an Angry Broncos team in Denver. DEN.

SF at SEA: We should all be aware now that this year's sexy preseason super bowl pick is, like pretty much all other sexy preseason super bowl picks, a dud. But it doesn't take much to beat the Niners nowadays. SEA.

GB at IND: Despite the fact that I'm really and truly disgusted with the Pack at this point, I will not stop my streak of assuming they will win every game they play. GB.

TB at OAK: Yes, these teams did play in the super bowl less than two years ago. I didn't care about it then, so I'm sure as heck not going to care about it now.
"Game I Don't Care About of the Week", and this time I'm actually going to pick the Raiders to win. OAK.

DAL at WAS: Really, what exactly does Washington have going for it? The defense is all style and no substance, Clinton Portis is a fragile head case, there's a quarterback conrovery brewing, and their owner has replaced revered individuals like Jerry Jones and Art Modell as the most unlikable in the league. But Dallas has Vinny! Run Vinny, the Grim Reaper has a 4.38 40! DAL.

Time for NFL picks, but before we get to the meat, I must make a request to Chris to get his sidebar scoring in order and include Monday night's game in the tally. I know Chris is underhanded enough to have been hoping this would have just slipped under the radar when we move to the next week, and I understand how he must be under tremendous pressure to bend the rules after two years of poor showings, but I will give him the benefit of the doubt this time.

SF at NO: It's amazing how "this year" is always the year when the Saints will stop their underachievers and put it all together. Look up "Loser" in the Dictionary and there's a picture of the Saints. Interestingly, the second definintion just says "Tom Arnold". SF.

WAS at NYG: I'm at a loss of what to do with Skins games now that the Fun n' Gun is gone. I can make "Joe Gibbs is old" jokes but it's just not the same. That doesn't mean I'm going say anything actually about football in this caption, though. WAS

DEN at JAX: Bold Prediction: Jacksonville will be this year's Carolina in the AFC. They may not win nearly as many games as the Panthers but they'll be in every one right up to the final whistle. Upset Special! JAX.

PIT at BAL: I'm sure some people are interested in this game. But seriously, yuck. BAL.

STL at ATL: I'm pretty sure that the last good team the Rams had to play were the Patriots in the Super Bowl. Side note: Marshall Faulk and Mike Vick have always struck me as guys who would never turn down a visit to Ricky Williams house, if you catch my drift. They just have that ... feel ... about them - a feel that doesn't have to involve dreadlocks. STL.

HOU at DET: Chris picked the Lions in a small upset here, forgetting all the advice I've been freely dispensing over the past few years. Some people never learn. HOU.

CHI at GB: No explanation needed. It's going to be a long season, Lovie. GB

IND at TEN: Everything seems to say that Indy will win this game, but I keep having visions of one of those insanely active Titans defenders streaking down the sidelines with one of Peyton's passes. TEN.

CAR at KC: How many people were laughing this past season when Kansas City convinced itself its defensive problems were scheme-related? I know I was. Yes, I'm sure there's a scheme out there that will cover up the fact that you don't have anyone who can play cornerback. KC.

SEA at TB: I used to always pick against the Bucs because they were overrated & media darlings. Today, we see a passing of the torch. TB

CLE at DAL: After being forced to watch the Human Brain Fart, Tim Couch, this preseason, I realize just how bad Cleveland had it. CLE.

BUF at OAK: Not excited at all.. in fact, this is the perfect time to bring out my beloved "Game I Don't Care About of the Week" for the very first time this year.

NE at AZ: Denny Green will improve Arizona, but I'm talking about 5-11 improvement, not 11-5 improvement. NE

NYJ at SD: The Jets have a nice little team on their hands, at least until Curtis Martin's deal with the devil expires. NYJ.

MIA at CIN: All the Cincy bandwagon jumpers need to realize that we're talking about the Bengals, here. Still, the Dolphins will cure what ails ya. CIN

MIN at PHI: Did I ever mention that I hate Minnesota? Last year, it took about 3-4 early wins for Fans and Players alike in the twin cities to assume they were guaranteed a super bowl trophy. I think this year it took about one. They Eagles will do OK until they lose Brian Westbrook, and believe me, it will happen. PHI.

For those of you who aren't "in the know", I've been having trouble posting recently. Specifically, I can FTP insightful commentary to the negative273 server as much as I want, but things seems to be very hit-or-miss in terms of the URL actually resovling to anything. However, David assures me that when this happens is a localized problem, and would not prevent my vast audience of say, Albanian, readers from accessing this site on a regular basis.

So, I will resume posting as normal, and assume everything's visible to outside world. If things aren't showing up for you, let me know, or, better yet, let David know.

Football picks will be coming up in a day or two, but for now, just a few notes.

First, Lisa got a spam message the other day about "getting rid of your debt the Christian way". I assume it's a short time until we see "refinance your home the christian way" "you've just won a new digital camera the christian way", or ... well, you know where I'm going with this.

Second, everyone (and old people in particular) needs to pay heed to Lucas's First Residential Axiom:

HUMAN BEINGS SHOULD NOT LIVE IN FLORIDA.

Hot wet swamps that routinely get hit by hurricanes should not be on the list of places where one would want to set up shop. And speaking of bad residential ideas, I was a little annoyed with the talk that New Orleans was going to be history if Ivan hit it head on due to the fact that much of it is below sea level, inspiring me to write Axiom #2:

HUMAN BEINGS SHOULD NOT LIVE BELOW SEA LEVEL UNLESS THEY LIVE IN SOME SORT OF FUTURISTIC UNDERSEA BUBBLE WITH MANY ROBOTIC OR SEMI-ROBOTIC DOLPHIN PETS.

And finally, a belated note on the Olympics. Worst commericals, surprise surprise, go to McDonald's, with their Chicken Strips (I refuse to refer to them by their given name) "we're being fresh and funny" advertising campaign. Psychotic people love chicken strips! Hooray! When burger king did it with the office guys, it was borderline terrible. The McDonalds ads just make me uncomfortable. On the other side of things, we have the equally stupid but somehow infinitely more funny Emerald Nuts commercials. The only reason I know what "Emerald Nuts" are is because of those ads, so I guess they did their job.

Plus, we have a new season of football commericals coming up... this should be fun.