Its been a while. Thanks to the creation and emergence of the WCD in the Madden world, my blogging has gone down in a serious way. Any free "computer time" is usually spent writing up the games - at least when I'm not playing Counter Strike, that is. The games are a blast to watch - I'm writing them in so much detail now that a single game with 8 minute quarters can take up to 3 hours and change to get through. And that's just watching and recording the game. After that there is about four to seven hours of writing up the game and arranging the pics on the site. The write ups are tedious, but the end product is fun to see. I just hope my web site doesn't run out of room.

When last I wrote on this blog, it was about the Seattle Seahawk playoff game. Since then, the NFL playoffs have continued. Most years I'm totally pumped on the NFL post-season, but this year I'm finding that its dragging on. I long for the Eagle to lose - just as Gwen longs for the Steelers to win. Given those sentiments, its easy to see why today was a bad football day for she and I who spent most of the day watching the games in my apartment. Now, I have to listen to two weeks of Eagles this and Eagles that. It will be enough to drive me crazy. I've said it once and I'll say it again - I hate that fucken team. (And I'm trying not to swear as much in this blog - mostly because I heard that Adam's mom reads it! But the Eagles can still bring that out in me. And of course, I hate them even more for it.)

Luckily, I'm fairly confident that the Patriots can take down the filthy birds and all can be right in the universe. I don't think I can handle the idea of the Eagles as the World Champs. In fact, typing that just now has sickened me. *SHUDDER*

Yes, this hasn't been my favorite NFL season, and not just because the Giants weren't all that good. Sundays just seemed to drag a little this year. And though I still love it, I suppose I loved football just a little bit less this time around. A trend perhaps? That remains to be seen. I do look forward to getting my Sundays back. There's too much to do while I'm still in the country.

I say that last sentence like I know for sure where I'm going next year. But I still don't. It looks favorable that Germany will still be the plan. But, I'm still not 100% sure, and won't be until at least a month. More as it develops, of course.

A week ago I finished my last official "WARD" month as a resident. Its sort of a milestone, I guess. The last guy I admitted was some guy who fell while he was sawing wood and landed on his hip. There was no fracture, so orthopedics wouldn't touch him, but he had to come in to the hospital because he couldn't walk secondary to severe leg and back pain. So I gave him some IV morphine around 2 am and then went up and went to bed. And that was it. There was some work before that but otherwise it was a quiet night. I had that Sunday (last Sunday) and Monday off, and I spent it mostly lazing around. (And watching football, of course).

We were supposed to go snowboarding last Monday, but some crazy "warm front" rolled through Washington and absolutely killed the snow conditions, turning fresh snow into rain and actually depleting the already meager bases. Its been a terrible season for Washington skiing, and I'm not happy about it. It's nearly the end of January, and I haven't even been up yet. Sad, really. Things will change, however, as in 2 weeks we'll be heading up to Canada for a week in Whistler. Its managed to stay somewhat better that far north, but still it remains a subpar season for the legendary Canadian powerhouse.

I'm doing rheumatology now, which is a great elective month. Its all clinic, with no weekends and no call. The staff docs are really chill. Most of the patients are old people with bad arthritis. I'm doing a lot of steroid joint injections. Not the Barry Bonds type steroids, but rather the anti-inflammatory type. Its kind of odd and cool to stick a needle into someone's joint space. You expect to run into bone most times (say when you're injecting under the knee cap), but there are lots of little synovial fluid spaces that line the joints and the needle just slides right in. Neat.

This weekend a bunch of us (Gwen, Pete, George, Cristin, Dave and myself) headed out on Friday night. I haven't been drunk for at least 5 weeks now (sort of a long streak given my infamous 'city livin'), and I was ready and willing to have a few drinks that night. We started off at a Teppan style Japanese restaurant. The waiter was dressed like some sort of Spiderman chef - with this crazy red and blue uniform. He did the usual schtick, which includes throwing knives in the air, spinning eggs, making onion oil towers, setting things aflame, and the like. It was all very routine. He was also some sort of NFL nut, however, and when he overheard us talking about the playoffs, he simply activated and launched into all sorts of dissertations on why the Patriots were the best team, why the Seahawks faltered down the stretch, why the Falcons were too streaky to win it all, and all sorts of other theories. It was fairly impressive, actually. His english was somewhat broken, yet he was hailing the details of a zone blitz. It was cracking George and I up - that's for sure.

After dinner we rolled out to Belltown and hit some hipster bar called "The Viceroy". It was one of those annoying overly crowded, overly loud bars where there are a lot of guys who come straight from they gym and stand around the place with their heads on swivels and one eyebrow permanently arched. The only reason we ended up there is because we were meeting some other people from work. It was good people watching, at the least. After that we hit a few more bars and then headed home. A bunch of people crashed in my little pad that night.

The next day, (yesterday), I went back out for some more touch football action with John boy and his boys. I hadn't played in about 5 weeks, and was itching to go. It was a rainy, 50 degree day and I loved every minute I was out there. Touch football is so fun I don't know what to say. Throw in some wet conditions and a few other willing participants and you have some fun time. We played for at least 2 hours straight. It was a great time. Some day I'll have to bring my camera out there.

After that I got back and Gwen and I lounged around and watched some Arrested Development, which she had net flixed. We've been watching and LOVING this show. My boy David Cross is in it. But besides even him, the show is amazing - superbly well written and absolutely hilarious. Jason Bateman is gold (yes, you read that right). I can't rave enough about it. I really think Iwan would love it. Anyway, it rocks.

After that, we watched "Lost in Translation", which I hadn't seen since the theater. Like the first time, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Its hard to describe why I like it so much. For one thing it takes place in Japan, which rocks. The other reasons, to summarize, include Bill Murray, Scarlett Johannson, and the power of subtlety. An excellent film. And I'll never forget the time my dad was telling my mom, George and I about watching it on the plane. "Nothing happened!" he shouted at us with exasperation. "I kept waiting for something to happen....and nothing did!" He was all giggles about it, as if he couldn't even contemplate why they'd make a character driven film. Or least one without a single explosion. Ah, my pops. Hey - he likes what he likes.

And on that note, I think I'll take off. It's been a long day of playoff agony between the Eagle's win and the Steeler's loss. In the end, though, I'd rather have the Pats playing the Eagles because they're more likely to beat 'em. And beating the Eagles is the most important thing.

One more thing about football. I loved...absolutely LOVED, the whole Randy Moss debacle. I was watching that game against Green Bay live and I was SO fired up when Joe Buck went nuts after Moss mock-mooned the crowd. I was so amused at how it sent the middle-aged white media into a bristling tizzy. Hi-larious. I mean, HIGH-LARIOUS. Unbelievable. I can't believe people make so much out of this - a man paid to catch footballs is held under the microscope for doing something juvenile. Dude - it cracks me up. Here are two snippets from the ESPN site that sum it up for me:

First from Bill Simmons, the sports guy:

"Best all-around performance: Randy Moss

First, he gets all the uptight guys on the studio shows in a hilarious lather. Honestly, Boomer Esiason became so angry during his pregame tirade on Moss, it was like watching Hitler give those crazy speeches in the late-30's. (Not to compare Boomer to Hitler, but you know what I mean.) Then, Moss decides to wear Thelma's afro from "Good Times." Then he kills the Packers downfield, drops a few 12-letter swear words on camera while screaming at the Lambeau fans, and caps things off with a second TD and the fake moon, which drove the MAWSM (middle-aged white sports media) bonkers again. And then he took credit for the Minny win by claiming that he caused such a distraction leading up the game, everyone was focusing on him and not the annual Minnesota collapse -- which was actually sorta true.

Funniest meltdown: Joe Buck

Seeing him gunning for an Emmy after Moss' moon had to be one of the funniest TiVo moments of all-time, right up there with the Jackson wardrobe malfunction and everything Stephen Jackson did during the Artest melee. Hey, remember the days when play-by-play guys were only there to provide play-by-play and set up the color guys? Then Bob Costas started doing baseball games ... within ten years, we had Buck unilaterally deciding the groundrules for moral decency during NFL games, starting a chain reaction that actually led to FOX and ESPN refuse to replay the clip that night. Since when did Buck turn into the Dad from Footloose? Isn't he like 35?"

And from David Fleming, another ESPN Columnist:

"Indeed. Tagliabue then denounced both Randy and T.O. as being classless, immature and beneath the dignity of the game ... then the networks cut away for several commercials. The first one was for beer, where a horse passed gas in a woman's face. The next one was for a $29.95 video highlight tape of the game's most gruesome, bone-snapping hits. The third one was an ad campaign for the Cardinals new publicly-funded, gazillion-dollar stadium. And the last one was for the new show, 'Who's Your Daddy?'"

In the context of the article, that last quote rocks. I can't believe how much people make of Moss's shit. I loved how Jimmy Johnson, of Fox, just sat there, sort of half smiling, while Bradshaw and "sensitive" Howie Long went nuts on Moss. He must have been thinking, "Holy shit - do you know what half of my Cowboy players were doing between games?" It just goes to show how the average American still fears an unpredictable black man with an attitude. Unbelievable.

And lastly, my favorite quote, from Gwendolyn regarding Bill Bellichick, as she saw him strutting the sideline in today's game with that weird head warmer hat and the sweatshirt on:

"He looks like a middle aged lesbian."

AHAHAHA! Great stuff.

And...scene.