If there is anything my mother isn't known for, it's being graceful on her feet. My mother trips and bumbles over the smallest things, sometimes over nothing at all.
With our upcoming cross-country adventure looming, the Beloved and I decided to celebrate our own Christmas a little early this weekend. On Saturday, we stayed in our jammies, opened our stockings and exchanged gifts. Penny got her first stocking and was excited to find a couple of new toys and a few treats.
We said no tv or computer and we stayed in, lit the fireplace, listened to Christmas music and read. The weather cooperated for such a day by providing a much too rare all-day rain. Pretty much a perfect day.
The Christmas feast this year was a Bobby Flay recipe that we’d decided on – a veritable mouthful: Pan Seared Duck with Red Chile Pear Sauce, Bourbon-Brown Sugar-Asian Pear Relish and Potato-Blue Cheese Cakes. We had it with an excellent Novy Family Syrah.
This week is busy with a lot of prep and packing. I did stop by AAA today while I was out and scored this important travel aide:
We hit the road in THREE DAYS!
A team that wins a lot of games, that is relevant year-in-and-year-out, that consistently makes the playoffs and contends for, but never wins a championship – rightfully said to underachieve on the biggest stages.
or
A team that has been generally irrelevant except for one season in which enough things came together for them to squeak into the playoffs and pull off (an over-achieving) Championship, only to return to irrelevance?
Next up is Mrs Dolittle's column. As you can probably guess from her pseudonym, Mrs Dolittle talks to the animals. Not for her, however, the time-honoured tradition of talking to an animal by vocalising speech sounds, waiting for it to meow, bark or squeak, and then cooing "oh, he thinks he's people!" No, Mrs Dolittle communicates with animals psychically. She meditates quietly and tunes into what animals are thinking. She goes into a trance to tap into your pet’s thought processes. She brain-rapes them, essentially. Let's not sugarcoat this.
This month, Mrs Dolittle is forcibly inserting her mind into a hen.
Or rather, several hens, starting with Henry who tells Mrs D about how wonderful it is to submit to her partner, the cockerel Bertie (who , Mrs D notes with with stunning insight, 'is rather cocky'). 'The hens accepted that their cockerel was the boss,' she says admiringly.
She moves on to a broody hen, Francine, sitting on a clutch of eggs, who has a 'feeling of relaxed purpose’. Mrs Dolittle asks her if she’s bored and gets the reply ‘Not boring at all. Youngster to hatch, very important.’ So charmed is Mrs D by this ‘wonderful experience’, she tells us she will communicate with her whenever she is stressed.
Through Mrs Dolittle, C:IF is promoting its sly anti-feminist agenda that women should submit to their men and will never be happier than when fulfilling their maternal duties. C:IF wants us barefoot and pregnant and chained to the wall of the barn.
Ignoring this misogyny, I pressed on. There is a lack of chickens in south London so I chose to commune with an animal more commonly found here: a squirrel. Specifically, Ceiling Squirrel, who lives in our loft and likes to scrabble around noisily in the evenings.
Earlier this evening, I sat back on the sofa, closed my eyes, and waited. Sure enough, within minutes there was a tell-tale pattering and thumping overhead. 'Hello?' I thought very hard. 'HELLO?' Nothing. I wondered if Ceiling Squirrel had heard me and was translating my thoughts into Squirrelese and forming a response. This could be slow. This could be like using chat rooms on a dial-up connection in 1995. From up above, nothing but the sound of tiny paws scuttling around. Thump. Bang. Clamber, scramble, tumble, CRASH.
'I wish you would be quiet, Ceiling Squirrel!' I thought loudly.
And suddenly, Ceiling Squirrel came though. 'No, you don't,' he psychically replied, 'because that would mean I was dead. Then you'd have to deal with my stinking rotten corpse. FUCK YOU. I’m going to fuck shit up in here until the end of your tenancy.'
I ended the connection. No-one needs a squirrel cursing directly into their brain. Some people may see this exchange as me projecting my thoughts about our loft-dwelling pest. I assure you, it is not. Ceiling Squirrel spoke to me. There is no real evidence for this, but it is a fact.
CONCLUSIONS
I need to tell the landlord about the You Know
What in the You Know Where. (Shh. He can hear you.)
Following up yesterday’s look at the NFC, I wanted to take a look at the AFC, where I think the picture is much more wide open. With Atlanta being taken out by-and-large by injuries, the NFC is really about 7 teams trying to fill 6 spots – the AFC, by contrast has 10 legit teams and even a couple at 5-7 that aren’t mathematically eliminated just yet.
AFC East
New England (7-5) – a couple of weeks ago, the Patriots annihilated the Titans 59-0 and seemed to be on cruise control in their division and ready to make a serious playoff run, but after dropping 3 of 4, they suddenly find themselves in a dogfight for their division. I still think they’re the best team in the east having quality wins (QW, win against a team currently 0.500 or better) against ATL, BAL, MIA and NYJ. Fairly easy schedule remains – only JAX is a quality opponent – suggesting that they’ll make it in barring a big collapse, but they certainly don’t have the aura of danger of previous Pats teams.
Miami (6-6) – the big turnaround team from last year got out to a terrible start, going 0-3, and still being stuck at 3-5 a month ago. They’ve gotten some QWs – NYJ (2x) and NE last week. Big game with JAX this week and a finale versus the teetering Steelers will likely tell the tale. Still, I don't think this team can go very far.
NYJ (6-6) – sort of the anti-Dolphins. Rex Reed’s team race out to a 3-0 start, but have been scuffling for wins ever since. Their only QW was an age ago (September) against NE. They have a couple of winnable games (TB and ATL) and then two against IND and CIN, who may not be playing for much. That bodes fairly well, but I think these guys are done.
AFC North
Cincinnati (9-3) Consider that they lost their 1st game on that crazy deflection play against DEN and you can argue that they should be the 2nd best team in the conference. QWs versus GB and season sweeps of division rivals PIT and BAL (and CLE, but those don’t count). Like the Eagles, inexplicably lost at OAK and that may keep them from getting a 1st round bye. Still, they’re the Bengals, so how much can you believe? I’ll believe a lot more (or not) after their next two games MIN and SD.
Baltimore (6-6) Nobody really seems all that Wacko for Flacco anymore as the sophomore QB has had all sorts of issues. Like the Jets, they got out to a hot start (3-0) and then dropped three in a row – granted, it was to NE, CIN, and MIN – but aren’t those the caliber of teams they’re going to have to beat in the playoffs? (Their QWs are against SD, DEN, and PIT) They have a pretty good chance of making if they can sweep against PIT, which is the last decent team on their schedule, but they're not playing like contenders.
Steelers (6-6) Like NE, the mighty have fallen in recent weeks. The Men of Steel seemed to shake off a sluggish start and were cruising a month ago at 6-2 after cranking out QWs vs. SD, MIN and DEN. Now having dropped four in a row (including head-scratchers to KC and OAK), the Champs will be lucky to get a chance to defend with GB, BAL, and MIA to close after a gimme at CLE this week. Is it really all Troy Polamalu and his hair?
AFC South
Colts (12-0) The mirror of the Saints in the NFC, the Colts have won every week this season – sometimes not so pretty, but Peyton Manning has gotten it done (QWs = JAX, MIA, ARI, NE, BAL) while taking time off from his full-time job as a product spokesperson. With a 3-game lead on home field advantage, they’re almost assured of playing at home through the AFC Championship. The whole “resting for the playoffs” hasn’t worked so well for the Colts in the past. It’ll be curious to see what they do differently, if anything, this year.
Jacksonville (7-5) Who invited these guys to the playoff race? Probably the most under-the-radar decent team in the league, the Jags only QW is a win against the NYJ. They’ve beaten a bunch of mediocre teams but will have to earn their playoff spot with games against MIA, IND, and NE coming up. I don't see that happening.
AFC West
Chargers (9-3) This was supposed to be a cakewalk year for the Bolts, but DEN’s 6-0 blitzkrieg at the beginning of the season derailed that parade. After struggling to 2-3, SD has rolled off a league-best 7 straight wins (QWs = MIA, NYG, PHL, DEN). Tough games against DAL and CIN will determine if they are legitimate contenders to take out the Colts, or another good-but-not-quite-good-enough Norv Turner team.
Denver (8-4) After blazing out to six straight wins, the Broncos came back to earth with four straight losses. They got off the schnide with a good win against NYG and have a slew of other QWs (CIN, DAL, NE, SD). Two tough games (IND and PHL) will tell us if they’re more like the early-season winners or mid-season losers but two should-be wins (OAK, KC) suggest that the Broncos will get a WC and maybe even the division if the Chargers falter down the stretch.
All-in-all, I’m not sure that there’s anyone that will be able to contend with the Colts at home in the playoffs. I think the Pats are starting to show their age, and the Bengals – well, they’re the Bengals. The only real possibility is the Chargers if they can improve their defense for the stretch run. For what it’s worth, I think the Ravens will be the last WC team (after DEN).
Christine Stockall is employed to do rubbish smudgy pencil drawings of people who have appeared to her, and
BACK ON THE FLOOR, BINKY.
Conclusion: not all dreams are messages from the other side. In fact, none of them are.
Tomorrow: Following Mrs Doolittle's advice, I try to psychically commune with an animal.
I have updated the decor and the photo. ICould I be about to start blogging again? If only for the family records....
