I have to wake up in three hours but I can't go to sleep because the only thing I've been doing the past hour (since I cut my game-watching event with the back half of the Fourth Quarter to go) is shit something close to something solid, but not.  My gut and colon are going to keep me up, I just know it.

And then I'll be groggy as shit getting up, and I'll be late getting to work.  Oh, and I have the task of picking up VIPs from their hotel.  I'll fart a really nasty fart while I'm driving, I'll tell you what.

Tomorrow is going to suck.

So Begins My Most Taxing Day In A Long Time

So here's my schedule for the weekend:

• Go to work, but since it's Saturday, I go to work an hour later.  Also, for this Saturday, I get to be in a department all by myself, so that'll be nice.
• One other bonus: I leave early.  But that's because I need to get home early to take my parents to the airport.
• I have a bunch of hours to kill before my alumni club game-watching party.  Might go to Hooters and use the November coupon.
• Hope to Buddha I'm able to take a good-sized nap after I get home and before I go to the game-watching thingy downtown.  Because that starts at 10, will probably last until 1:30 ... and then I have to wake up around 5:30 because ...
• ... I have to report very early, 6:30 for the Vikings Game.  Don't know why; I don't do that much anyway, and besides, anything that needs to be done that early the morning can be done by one of the other eight people who are there, and who all will be told to report at 6:30.  But hey, it's good money.  Just hope the people there aren't dicks.
• Will relax at My Favorite Stripclub (Non-Cover Division) after work.  Hopefully I'll be able to stay awake.  Also, the possibility that I will get into a fight with someone there and get thrown out is always a negligible chance just greater than 0, so there's that.

So I should be in the clear by Sunday evening.  It's just getting from now until then, and specifically getting from Saturday night until Sunday evening, that will tax my body, my mind, and my patience in a way I don't think have been tested in a long time, if not ever.  Wish me luck.

Was This The Smart Thing To Do The Day Before They Leave?

We got the safe deposit thing done just now.  Woke up before my planned 10 o'clock because My Fucking Father was doing shit in the kitchen -- stomping his feet up the stairs, pounding what sounded like a thistle, and using the fucking blender.

We were about to leave.  But Mother decided she needed to run back inside to grab some identification.  So of course I'm fucking left alone in the car with My Fucking Father, and of course he started in on, "When you can, clean up your room," and, "When you can, go buy a book.  It's no good just sleeping in your bed all night."

I finally ginned up the courage to do something I don't think I've done yet.  After that first thing he said, I broke out my phone to start looking through my Twitter.  And after the second thing he said, I literally got out of the car to stand outside while looking at my phone.  I can't fucking stand it anymore.  He has pulled that bullshit on me for years.  It's beyond annoying -- it's hurtful.  And I couldn't take it anymore.  I understand that this could poison what might go on between us until they leave.  But 1) it's just a day, 2) they can arrange other transportation to the airport if they want, and 3) I finally feel as though I am not just standing in front of him, taking his yelling and screaming.  I'm not taking it anymore, no matter how innocent he'll say he was being.

I thank Rocketman for my spine.

Let's Try This Again

I really, really wanted to get my parents to go the bank after work one afternoon, but having Friday totally free totally makes that senseless.  So we're going to try and do it tomorrow, presuming there is no holiday that I know of that I have yet to reason would result in the closing of banks for a second day this week.

I was an open book toward Mother.  When I came home, she asked me what time I wanted to go.  I didn't have a time, so I asked her what's best for her.  Unfortunately she batted the ball back on my side of the court, so I just picked the same time we went out on Monday.  I would have preferred to just go whenever I woke up.  But now I have to wake up at a time in the morning.  This also presents the possibility that, like on Monday, my parents would want us to have an early lunch, which would ruin my plans of getting lunch on my own.  And beyond that there are a lot of things I want to do (get my shoes shined, get the car washed, exercise) that may be at the mercy of my parents as and after we go to the bank.

And I was the one who insisted on doing this.  Be careful what you wish for.

Loading Up Enough Food For The Zombie Apocalypse, I Reckon

Yeah, I need to discuss with my parents the food in the fridge.  They have done a good job of cleaning out all the food that had been in there up to about a week ago.  But there's still a lot, and there is a lot that I cannot eat.

For example, Mother had started making yogurt.  It's good -- she says one of the main things she did is not use corn syrup -- but, as she is wont to do, she made a ton of it.  There were 17 glass cups of plain vanilla yogurt in there yesterday.  When I counted them up last night, I was about to bring it up to my folks.  But I just checked in there now and it's down to a dozen.  Guess Father horked a ton of them down today.  But that still is way too much for me to eat.  Well, unless I can, like, eat them every other day.  Will they keep for a month?  I don't know.  But I can't believe that Mother thinks I can eat the same damn thing every day for two weeks.

Also, there is a lot of food I simply can't recognize.  I noticed a plastic tub of ... something, for instance.  They don't expect me to eat that, do they?

Need to bring this up with them before they go.

The Weekly Minnesota Sports Survey

Positive Numbers: Gopher football (Re-Entry!).  Man, I never thought I would ever see this:



I am still trying to contextualize the importance of this victory, 31-26 Saturday afternoon over then-fifth-ranked and undefeated Penn St., in the annals of recent Twin Cities sports history. Because I'm not sure if there has been one quite like it.

I'll try and narrow it down, because of course there have been many notable victories over very good teams in the past.  But this is different than, say, the Minneapolis Miracle, or (to deploy a maybe not-so-good example) the Gopher basketball team defeating #1 Indiana back in 2013.  I'd be lying to myself if the heft of this win doesn't stem from the fact that the Minnesota football program has vacillated between mediocre and irrelevant for the past half-century.  Hardcore fans have not been waiting but hoping that this squad would rise from the dead, and casual fans note that other schools have had whopping success and wish that would happen in Dinktyown.  That final realization of, "Holy shit!  They actually did it!" forged a bond between those types of fans, and that was the force that pulled all of them on to the TCF Bank Stadium field.

But there's more to it than that, and you have to give credit to the team on the field and, yes, Head Coach P. J. Fleck.  Despite fears from local fans who've seen their teams break their hearts in mind-boggling ways, the Nittany Lions defense was pushed around by the Golden Gopher Offense from the get-go.  Meanwhile, on the other side of the ball, the Defense ... well, actually Antoine Winfield, Jr. had two Interceptions that short-circuited Penn St.'s early attack and pushed the Lions on their heels.  Now, PSU is a good team, and by the end of the Fourth Quarter the U. was holding on for dear life.  But that's when Jordan Howden sealed this program-defining victory:

pic.twitter.com/m0FUkSCHrJ

— Videos by: FTB (@FTBVids1) November 9, 2019

And I think that play encapsulates what's so special about this win.  Upsets happen all the time, even in these parts.  But a common way to infer an upset win is to believe that the winner is deficient on talent, at least on paper.  The University of Minnesota played nobody up until Saturday, but I will go out on a limb and say that this team has a bunch of talent.  They are a damn good team.  And on Saturday, they went into the Game with a decent chance to win ... and by God, they did.  They met the challenge against a foe that was great, but proved they were equally formidable.

This win is not a fluke.  They didn't need a rookie taking the wrong angle on a flying tackle.  They didn't need the home crowd to influence the refs on the court into giving them foul after foul.  Fleck and the team practiced, had a game plan, executed that game plan, made their own luck, and earned a stunning victory that propels them to 9-0 for the first time since 1904 and into the Top 10 (at #7, to be specific) for the first time since 1962.  And while this could be viewed through maroon-and-gold-colored glasses, this team looks as though they are just getting started.  They keep this up and the Rose Bowl, The Promised Land for Tim Brewster, could be the worst-case scenario.  And, my goodness, this program could be set up for success at a level not seen in three generations.

Viewed through those narrowing filters, maybe the Timberwolves' MV3 run in 2004, in particular their seven-Game Western Conference Semifinal win over Sacramento, is the closest and most recent analogue of this type of win, the one where we finally could reasonably shake off our inferiority complex and think, "Dammit, our team is good, and I genuinely think we'll beat you."  Now, again, I don't think many of us predicted a win over Penn St.  But, again, this isn't a "Sun has to shine on a dog's ass at some point" type of anomaly.  This proves that this team is the real fucking deal.  And so us fearful sports fans now believe the Gophers have a more-than-decent shot to march into Iowa next Saturday and win.  That is how important Saturday's Game was.

#0: Vikings (Last Week: -4).  This may have been the best weekend in Minnesota football history.  No, the Vikes' win over Dallas in Dallas for Sunday Night Football doesn't register to what the U. did the day before.  But I was more down on the Vikings than I was on the Gophers.  I really didn't think they would have a chance to beat the Cowboys.  And I wrote them off once I heard that Defensive Tackle Linval Joseph was out for the Game.  That meant that Ezekiel Elliott would run right around, over and through the Vikes.

But by Buddha, they didn't allow that to happen!  Elliott was stuffed for only 47 Yards rushing.  That forced Cowboys Quarterback Dak Prescott to throw the ball and ... well, to be honest, he had incredible success doing that.  But somehow, late in the Game where they had the ball deep in Minnesota territory and were driving for the go-ahead Touchdown, Dallas dialed up back-to-back running plays to Elliott that resulted in a no-gain and a three-Yard loss.  Faced with Fourth Down, a pass in the flat from Prescott to Elliott was broken up by a diving Eric Kendricks, and the Vikings got the ball back.  (They weren't able to run out the clock, but Dallas was forced to heave a Hail Mary for the final play of the Game, and it was intercepted by Jayron Kearse in the end zone for the lone Turnover of the night.)  Cowboys Twitter wanted the head of Head Coach Jason Garrett for those running plays.

Meanwhile, Minnesota kept right on humming on Offense.  The O-Line was opening up massive holes frequently for Dalvin Cook (who had 186 total Yards from scrimmage) to bust through, and that set up play-action where Kirk Cousins remained very effective.  Kyle Rudolph scored the squad's first two TDs (the first was a Beckham-esque triumph; it's still possible Cousins was trying to throw the ball away), and in an important call, Head Coach Mike Zimmer told the team to go for it on 4th & Goal from the 2 with two Seconds left in the Third Quarter ... and Cook was able to run around the right side of the line and get into the end zone for the Game-winning score.

If they would have lost I would have said this was par for the course for this franchise.  In retrospect, I can say that they needed this win.  They are now 7-3 and only a single Game behind Green Bay in the NFC North with ailing Denver coming to town Sunday.  And I can believe, somewhat, that this is a damn good team, too.

#-1: Gopher volleyball (Last Week: -1).  Swept both Maryland and Ohio St. on the road, won eight in a row, get to the Final Four and I'll give more of a shit.  They're home for four starting with league leaders Wisconsin Thursday night and Michigan Saturday night.

#-2: Gopher men's hockey (Last Week: -2).  An encouraging sign: The #PrideOnIce took five of a possible six Points in Michigan over the weekend.  Technically they tied the Wolverines on Friday, but they play anyway because they reward another/winner (?) Point to the team that finally wins the Game.  And the U. broke a 2-all draw in Double Overtime courtesy of, you guessed it, Sammy Walker.  No similar dramatics needed Saturday afternoon as the Gophers won, 3-1.  Not sure if they've turned things around; will need to add to the small sample size with a home two-fer versus Penn St.  (I have a ticket to the Friday tilt, which I bought at the State Fair.)

#-3: Gopher women's basketball (Last Week: -5).  I have to admit that this team's place in the survey pecking order is a matter of timing.  They should have had their season-opening loss over Missouri St. included in this week's survey.  But I didn't get last week's WMNSS out until the evening, by which point they had already lost to the Bears.  So the only match taken into consideration for this screening week is their 32-Point curb-stomping of Vermont at Williams Sunday afternoon.

Unlike their male counterparts, the female b-ballers don't have an impressive non-con.  Their toughest, or at least most notable, opponent in this part of their sked is against Arizona St., they play them at The Barn Sunday.  They also host Wisconsin-Milwaukee Thursday at high noon.

#-4: Wild (Last Week: -6).  This past screening week calcified a pattern that can viewed as either quirky or troubling: This squad gets out to shitty starts.  They started down 2-0 at Anaheim, down 4-0 in San Jose, and 2-0 in Phoenix.  And yet the Wild were able to come back in all three contests.  And they came back to beat the Ducks and the Coyotes!  (And, well, made it a hell of a game vs. the Sharks before finally falling, 6-5.)  One can look at this and see the makings of a sorry group of players who wake up to late to make things interesting and will see their recent good fortune regress to the mean.  One can also look at this and believe that this group has some necessary grit in them.  In which side does that debate fall?  We'll have to wait and see.

They finish up their western swing tonight/Tuesday night in Los Angeles.  They then come home to host The Bastard Winnipeg Jets and The Bastard Hartford Whalers.

#-5: Timberwolves (Last Week: -3).  Got blown out in Memphis.  Survived The Smoldering Carcass That Was The Golden State Warriors in Overtime at Target.  Got nipped on a buzzer-beater by Denver superstar Nikola Jokic, also in OT.  Finally, outlasted the Pistons in Detroit.  Maybe we're seeing a pattern with this club as well: Not as bad as we thought they would be, but still too young to believe they have a sure spot in the postseason.  The early buzz surrounds Andrew Wiggins, who has been the team's leading scorer in eight of the last nine Games including a 40-Point masterpiece to take out The Bastard Philadelphia Warriors Friday.  Maybe he has overcome his insouciance and decided he wants to earn a paycheck in the NBA.  On the downside, Ryan Saunders's edict that the Timberwolves will join The Analytics Age and rain threes has not come to fruition; the main reason they lost to the Nuggets Sunday afternoon is that they shot 6-of-45.  Ick!

Another busy screening week, but three of their four Games are at home: San Antonio tomorrow/Wednesday night followed by a back-to-back of Washington and Houston.  They then strike out on the road Monday to begin a home-and-home with The Bastard New Orleans Jazz.

#-6: Gopher men's basketball (Re-Entry!).  I feel really bad about sticking these young men down at the bottom of the WMNSS, especially in their first screening week of their new season.  I vacillated between them and the Timberwolves.  Ultimately, the Wolves' wins were more impressive than the U.'s season-opening victory over visiting Cleveland St. by 35 Tuesday.  What hurts is the nine-Point loss to Oklahoma Saturday in, of all, places, Sioux Falls, S.D.

What to make of this team?  They've lost seven players from last year's experienced club that made it to the real second round of the NCAA Tournament.  And while that makes it Richard Pitino's most successful year at Minnesota, the players they lose include cornerstones Amir Coffey and Jordan Murphy.  The new additions should re-fortify their frontcourt, but prognosticators say that there is just too much turnover to expect a return to The Big Dance.  (As of right now, Joe Lunardi has the Gophers out of the bracket.)

The team plays Butler tonight/Tuesday night as part of the B1G/Big East Gavitt Tip-Off series.  They then visit Utah Friday.  Whoa, this is a very beefy non-conference schedule, I'll give them that!

Where I Hate That I Can't Put 2 + 2 Together

Today is Veteran's Day.

About a year ago, my parents insisted on taking me to the banks because they wanted my name on their safe deposit boxes, in case they needed me to access them.  But -- have I talked about this already? -- when I gave the banker my driver's license, she noticed that my last name did not align with my parents'.  Well, it did, but it wasn't in the right order.  Somehow, my last name was put before my middle name.  Actually I had noticed it before.  Years, in fact.  I didn't think it would be an issue.  Well, until my parents wanted my name on their deposit boxes.

Today is Veteran's Day.

I got pissy with my folks at the time.  Having a license plate with my name looking like that didn't hurt me none, but they forced me to go to the DMV, with my birth certificate, to get the state to change it.  And they -- seriously, I thought about I blogged about this already -- actually made the same mistake again before they fixed it.  I got my new license with my names in the right order earlier this year, but it felt as though I had to wait a long time to get my new license and then my new, correct license.

Today is Veteran's Day.

With my parents wintering, and with me remembering their insistence that I get my driver's license fixed, I was going to make sure that the crap I had to go through was worth it.  So I insisted that we go to the banks to finally get the name on their boxes fixed.  (There are actually two deposit boxes we went to, and I'm sure that my name is "wrong" on both of them.)  I have Mondays off.

Today is Veteran's Day.

I actually was called into work today, but I still had the morning off.  So I thought this morning was the perfect time to go to the bank to get my name changed (even though, and I'm sorry for throwing in impertinent information, they told me we were going to a third bank to add my name to a safe deposit box they have there ... so what about the other two boxes?).

Today is Veteran's Day.

My alarm woke me up.  In a half-hour we were going.  To the bank, like I wanted to.

Today is Veteran's Day.

We get to the bank.

Today is Veteran's Day.

It was totally empty.

Today is Veteran's Day.

We were all, "What the fuck?!  Why are they closed?!"

Why?  BECAUSE TODAY IS VETERAN'S DAY!  I KNEW IT WAS VETERAN'S DAY SEVERAL DAYS BEFORE TODAY!  I KNEW TODAY IS VETERAN'S DAY, AND I KNEW THAT I WANTED TO GO TO THE BANK TODAY, BUT I DIDN'T FIGURE THAT I CAN'T GO TO THE BANK TODAY BECAUSE TODAY IS VETERAN'S DAY!  I KNEW OF ONE FACT, I KNEW OF A SECOND FACT, BUT IT DIDN'T OCCUR TO ME TO PUT THOSE TWO FACTS TOGETHER TO UNDERSTAND THAT I COULDN'T DO WHAT I WANTED TO DO!  BECAUSE I'M NOT AS SMART AS I SHOULD BE, OR COULD BE, OR WANT TO BE, OR NEED TO BE.

Goddamn I hate myself right now.

Guess I'm Getting Cancelled; So What ... Right?

Uh, I'll admit it -- I've been in a horny streak on Facebook lately.  So when it comes to the Stories on there, which I still don't quite get, if it's a sexy one from a model, I decided, just last night, to start using this "emoji" thing and reply with an eggplant.  Just want to let them know how I feel.

It's sort of a risk, I get it.  But many of the Facebook friends I have display pictures that are meant to titillate, and arouse.  They should understand that their male friends might react in a perverted way.  Or, they should be ... aware.  You know?  What, they're doing it for the art?  (wanking motion)

Well, I have, as of right now, given the eggplant emoji to six posts.  While I was at Brit's this (Sunday) afternoon to watch the MLS Cup, I saw that one of them blocked me.  She went out of her way to tell me by replying with a hashtag.  I have no fucking clue why.  She is a model.  On top of that, she posts photos of her sexy self all the time.  She was showin' her ass on the picture I replied to with the eggplant emoji, for crissake.  And she's offended?

I was going to just brush it off and say, "Whatever."  But there is one big wrinkle: She lives here.  I think this is a big town, but knowing my bad luck, I will run into her somewhere, and we're going to recognize each other, and shit will get awkward.  Beyond that, I am, suddenly, worried about my reputation.  I realized that, if she wants to, she can talk about me and what I did.  I don't have much of a public profile, but whatever social circles I'm in now, well, she could expose this, and maybe the people I interact with won't like it at all.  And then what?

And now I'm thinking about what I would want to do in the future.  Maybe I want to be more active politically.  Maybe it's time to re-start my sportscasting career.  If I do either, and then this comes out, well, that would end my hopes of succeeding in them, wouldn't it?  I've been thinking about this "cancel culture."  And while I truly think a lot of people (well, men) need to atone for their sins, I do wonder if it can go to far, and whether this wheel can turn on me -- poor, little, innocent old me, all over an emoji.

Yeah, I'm scared that she can damage me and my dreams.  So, in retrospect, maybe it wasn't wise for me to do this emoji to someone who lives in the same city as I.  I was just thinking that these models would be cool with it.  Like I said, they'd have to know what they're doing, right?  Well, let's see if I have to reap the whirlwind.  Meanwhile, I need to monitor the other five (three of whom are models [one nude], seven (five of whom are models [one nude, one a porn star], the other two being bodybuilders) to see how they will react.

But shit, if I see another ass, you goddamn right I'll give her the eggplant.

I gotta be me.  I gotta be me.

Nightmares, Of Which I Can Remember Only One

So, I drank coffee at Glam Doll, and I guess I needed to pee while I was sleeping, because in my nightmare I had to piss.  And I was in a crowded public area and I couldn't find a bathroom.  I went from ... I guess urinal to urinal and/or spot on which to pee to spot on which to pee (I don't really understand this part), but I finally decided, like a dog, to piss on, IIRC, on the shovel of a huge payloader.  (Please don't ask me how.)  It was blocked from view by something, like a human-length bollard, and so I had the privacy to pee standing up.  Makes sense, right?  (No, it doesn't.)

But I had to pee so bad that ... uh, it's a nightmare so things are fuzzy, but either my piss stream was so powerful that it either bounced off the loader shovel and arced many feet away, or (again, work with me here) I peed in an arc many feet away.  Regardless of the path, I was sending my urine across this busy room, OK?  And it bounced on, like, the floor or a table, and it splashed all over the people around that area of this busy room.  And in the part of this nightmare that makes the most sense, those people were both surprised and very, very angry.

And then I woke up.  And then I had to pee real bad.

Wish I remembered the other two nightmares I had.  They probably made more sense.

Father Looks Like Sluggo

So one night I went to knock on the master bedroom to let my parents know I was going to work out.  I open the door, let them know, and they say yes.

But then I stop.  From the door, Mother is on the left side of the king-sized bed and Father the right.  Usually when I say I'm heading out for the night, Father is under the covers watching TV.  And he was on this night.  But as I made my quick glance towards Mother and then Father, I lingered on Father for just a second, and then something latched onto my eyes so I couldn't look away.

And then I looked -- like actually looked -- at Father. There was something wrong with him, or at least off.  And then I realized: He had nearly all his hair cut off.  Like, I could see his scalp, his skin.  On top of his head.  He looks like Sluggo.

So apparently while I was taking my post-dinner nap (I've been doing it more since the weather started to turn colder), they went out to get his hair cut -- and he got all of it cut.  It was a buzzcut, something similar to what I get.  But I rarely, if ever, get it shorn to the stubs Father got it to.

This is an understatement: I have never seen him in such a hairstyle.  All my life his hair has been at a length.  Maybe it gets short to the point where I notice that he had it cut, and sometimes it got a little shaggy, but I have seen Father with a certain ... uh, amount of hair on his head.  It was one of things I took for granted -- and good, because I didn't have to ever spend any amount of brainpower processing the thought of seeing Father differently.

But now I do.  Well, it does help that he has been wearing his hat more nowadays -- probably due to the colder weather, but maybe he's wearing it because what he did is shocking the hell out of me.  I just wonder why.  Maybe he was sort of thinking the way I think when my hair gets too long.  It gets in the way, and I have to stay awake longer and longer the more hair I have, and I get to a point where I say, "Screw it, I'm getting it all shaved off."  Don't know why he decided to do for the first time in my lifetime in his seventies, though.  Maybe I should just let him be; it's just hair, after all, and maybe he just decided he wanted to something different.

Or, maybe he's sick.  I used the old car the other night (not this night when I saw Father's nearly bald head) and I saw a few facemasks slid in the middle console.  If something's really wrong with him, Father would tell me.  Right?