Random Food Thoughts, Some NFL Week 1 Thoughts, And Why I Hate Fantasy Football
Stupid, stupid me! This blog was supposed to be posted Monday night.
That’s what happens when you click “Save” instead of “Publish.” WTH is “Save” bolded, and not “Publish”?????
(:P)
Quick-hitters:
- On Sunday night, I went to Ralphs and bought some “premium” (< 20% fat) ground beef, with the intention of making some hamburgers. I usually just buy the cheapest ground beef I can find, so I was intrigued in finding out what was so “premium” about this stuff.
After grilling one up for dinner on Monday night, I figured out what is so great about premium meat. Talk about melt-in-your-mouth goodness! That was about the best burger I’ve ever cooked for myself: a ~1/3 lb. patty, slightly seasoned with kosher salt and Mrs. Dash, grilled to medium-well, topped with American cheese and fresh lettuce. It was a shame that I was too lazy to slice up some onions.
I’ve got about three more pounds of this stuff sitting in my freezer (yeah, I know…); methinks I’ll have another one later tonight.
(EDIT: Of course, that didn’t happen…read below.)
- No thanks to Hank, I decided to order myself some Papa John’s pizza last night.
(Note that this entry was added AFTER I realized that I hadn’t yet published this blog entry. Again, stupid me.)
I went with an XL Italian Meats Trio pizza, and a pepperoni thin-crust pizza. Good stuff! I also had some carrot and celery sticks with ranch dressing to compensate for the fact that my pizzas had no veggies on it. No, the tomato sauce does not count as “veggies.”
(I know, that sounds like an awful lot of pizza. Well, I can always freeze what I don’t eat. I now have about 1.5 whole pizzas sitting in my freezer.)
- Damn these Baked Lay’s are ridiculously addictive. At the rate I’m going, I’ll mow through both bags of chips I bought by the end of this week.
(Non-sports fans, you could go ahead and stop reading here.)
- So here are my thoughts of Week 1 of the NFL season:
1) Who, really, was surprised that Randy Moss had such a big game for the Patriots? Isn’t it amazing how extremely gifted players look really impressive when they try? I suppose I should go ahead and anoint the 2007 Patriots as this year’s Super Bowl champs, right? (And yeah, I just threw up in my mouth a little.)
Speaking of the Patriots, how about the Patriots getting caught videotaping Jets’ defensive coaches, trying to find signals sent out by these coaches in order to get an edge? Can we go Barry Bonds on the Patriots and start doubting the legitimacy of their three championship rings now? Who knows how much of an edge Belicheck and his players got from making these videotapes? For all we know, the Patriots might not have won a thing without cheating to this extent!
(Personally, I believe that the Patriots would still have been good enough to win a ring or two without the help of videotaping their opposition. However, isn’t it a tad suspicious that QB Tom Brady wasn’t at all in danger of being sacked during the Pats-Jets game on Sunday? Yeah, I know the Pats’ O-Line is very good and highly underrated, but can even the most die-hard of Pats’ fans say, with 100% certainty, that the Pats got no competitive advantage in the Pats-Jets game from questionable activities?)
A four-game suspension to Coach Belichick, and the forfeiture of two draft picks (a second- and fourth- rounder will do) should be a sufficient punishment for the Patriots.
2) Hey, Baltimore, how about running the ball a few times when you have first and goal inside Cincy’s five-yard line?
3) Hey, Tony Romo, didn’t you used to be Tony Romo?
Speaking of Cowboys-Giants, how great is it that the Giants, fresh off a tumultous 2006 season (and the off-season afterwards), are already screwed one week into the 2007 campaign? Brandon Jacobs is hurt, Eli Manning is hurt, and so is Osi Umenyiora.
I’ll say it’s 50-50 that coach Tom Coughlin makes it to November.
4) The Bears look bad, really bad (and not bad as in good). Neither Bears’ RB can run the ball, Rex Grossman is still Rex Grossman, and the Bears’ D lost two starters on defense for the season.
I’ll say it’s 20-80 that the Bears’ win the NFC this year.
5) The Colts look pretty good, no?
I’ll have more thoughts later in the week.
- So I am qutting fantasy football. I am participating in four leagues this year, and I have done something that I have never done in my fantasy sports career: I have never started 0-1 in EVERY league I’ve participated in!
(The closest I’ve ever come was when I played in three NBA fantasy leagues, and started the season by losing in two leagues, and tying in the third league).
Freaking Peyton Manning. Freaking LT. Freaking Tony Romo. Freaking Plaxico Burress. Freaking Bears’ D!!!!!!!
Oh well, there’s always next week, right?
By the way, here are my teams for the other two leagues that I have not yet listed (* - waiver wire pickups):
Team 3:
- QB: McNabb, Big Ben
- RB: LT, Benson (!!!!!!), Barber III, T. Bell, Turner, C. Brown*
- WR: Harrison, Boldin, R. Curry*, D. Jackson
- TE: Cooley
- K: Graham
- DEF: Baltimore
Team 4:
- QB: V. Young, M. Hasselbeck
- RB: R. Johnson, B. Westbrook, D. Foster, M. Turner
- WR: L. Fitzgerald, R. Wayne, R. Curry, V. Jackson, K. Curtis
- TE: V. Davis, D. Clark
- K: J. Wilkins
- DEF: Chicago
The fact that is most appalling to me is the fact that I didn’t break 75 points in any of my four leagues (74, 72, 72, 69).
I guess I should not have drafted a defense early in every league I participated in 
Happy blogging!
I picked up some premium ground beef (~9% fat or something like that) a few weeks ago. It was yummy, but I wasn’t able to finish it like most of my perishable foods. Ended up throwing a 1/3 of it away since it started to smell funny.
Then I noticed every time I opened the lid of my trashcan, my entire kitchen would smell funny.
So I took the trash to the garage, and the next day, the whole garage and car smelled funny.
That’s what I get for throwing away meet the day after the garbage pickup.
This is why I always have Lysol lying around. It doesn’t eliminate all of the odors, but spray enough of it and it’ll make the odors more manageable. If you don’t have Lysol, a quick (albeit messy) way to manage the odors is to sprinkle some baking soda in and around your trashcan.
Did you throw the meat away in a plastic bag? Usually, I store my meat in Ziploc bags; if the meat goes bad (as if that ever happens here :P), I just seal the bag, throw it in a plastic grocery bag, close that as well as I can, and toss it.
This is why I always make sure to throw the garbage away on a day where I’m cooking meat and have to trash any part of it (including bones and/or strips of fat that I trim off). With two people, we could sometimes go 4-5 days without filling up the garbage can, so there are times where I will be throwing away a half-filled bag of trash.
BTW, 9% fat ground beef, eh? *rubs fingers*
Woo, I influenced someone to get pizza!
Those burgers sound good. Post pics! I like ‘em with Worcestershire sauce and minced onions.