Labor Day Weekend 2014 +Addendum

Football

The heat and humidity were awful at the game yesterday. I don't know how the kids play in conditions like that.

I stayed hydrated but in the fourth quarter I was starting to feel a little sick - like I could throw up. I didn't say anything about it to anyone - but in retrospect - should have left early.

Had a hard time walking back to the truck after the game. And when I finally got home, I still felt un-well for a couple of hours.

At least half the crowd at the game was gone by the fourth quarter too - due to the heat and the score.

State did pull out the last minute (1:37) victory with a great march down the field and touchdown. It was the only time we led in the game.

Don't know what to think about the team yet. Hard to tell with this game. The first half we looked like NC State of last year. The second half we looked pretty good.

Weekend

Have 2 days left of the 3 day weekend. Absolutely nothing planned.

Addendum

Right after the above post, I went out for breakfast and stopped at Target to pick up a cheese grater.

I've been meaning to get a handle / rotary cheese grater for, gosh, years? I just never think about it when I'm out running errands. So, made a special point to do that this morning.

The one I got has a cap for the open end so you can leave the block of cheese in the tool - cap it - and just put the whole thing in the fridge. It also comes apart very easily for cleaning.

Here's the one I got:

http://www.target.com/p/oxo-softworks-rotary-grater/-/A-13567830#prodSlot=medium_1_6&term=cheese+grater

Wonder how long the link will last?

Football Addendum Note

I feel much better about yesterday's game and the rest of the season after watching Coach Doeren's post game press conference. He answers questions directly and doesn't cop out with coach-speak or bull-poop.

http://www.gopack.com/collegesportslive/?media=462421

There were a lot of comments about conditioning and how that helped our team finish the game while the other team was having problems.

Not said was something about conditioning that I've been thinking and carping about throughout the Tom O'Brien era.

Every year with T'OB we were plagued by seemingly endless injuries. The same thing last year (Doeren's first year and carryover from T'OB's conditioning program). I always felt that we had so many injuries each year that it had to be linked to our strength and conditioning coaches and methods.

This year - Coach D's first full year - with his new strength and condition coaches and regimen, we've had only 1 serious practice injury resulting in a player being out (for probably 3 or 4 games). And - no injuries in our opening game - and all the guys did well. Especially in horrible temperature and humidity conditions.

Clearly T'OB could never figure it out. He was not the coach and leader I had hoped he would be. And frankly, he was mired in his own out of date philosophy and did not possess the intelligence, temperament and ability to adapt and learn.

2014 Football +Addendum

The 2014 College Football season has begun.

Watching Texas A&M at South Carolina - didn't even know I had the SEC network. Wonder if I'm paying extra for that?

Thankfully Johnny Manzel is in the NFL so I can pull for A&M over South Carolina. I do not like the University of SC. They are an ignorant state's version of ECU. You ever visited South Carolina? If you look up Trailer Trash in the dictionary - the entry reads "see South Carolina".

NC State Football

It's going to be another long football season for Pack fans. Not as bad as last year - but nothing to write home about either.

We expect to win our first 4 warm up games - although no team we play should be taken for granted. After we start 4 - 0 it will likely be a struggle to win 2 ACC games to become bowl eligible.

Something like 70% of our players are freshmen and sophomores. I expect us to be 'in' all our games - but experience (or lack of) will have an effect.

Rebuilding takes time. Those freshmen and sophomores will become juniors and seniors making up 70% of the team in 2 years. So the future is indeed bright.

And who knows, we may surprise ourselves and exceed expectations this year.

Either way - I enjoy watching college football and going to the games.

And - college basketball (which I like best of all) is right around the corner.

Picking up Chip and Weeble Saturday morning for the noon-thirty game. I'm going to fix up some country ham biscuits first thing Saturday and have OJ and Champagne for mimosas. That ought to make a nice little pre-game tailgate.

Addendum

Enjoyed watching SC get totally drubbed by A&M.

Switched over to the Wake Forest at UL-Monroe game (UL-Monroe quarterback is an NC State transfer). A contest of "who is the worst team in this game?"

Wake Forest could easily go 0 - 12 this year.

And we lost to WF last year!? Jeebus . . . .

Sunday, August 17, 2014

Work

I've been working at NC A&T for the last two weeks - commuting each day. That makes for very long and tiring days. I'm glad to be done there (mostly).

Last Thursday, happened upon a deer that was lying next to one of the academic buildings (Marteena Hall). It looked healthy but wasn't moving - except to turn its head to watch us. We called Campus Security and Guilford County Animal Control arrived shortly after our call.

When GCAC tried to net the deer - it got up and took off. You could then see its right rear leg was completely broken at the hip. They chased it down and took it away to be euthanized.

I hate to see animals suffer. Fortunately the whole episode took all of 20 to 30 minutes. Security and GCAC arrived quickly after our call and knew exactly what they were doing.

We were guessing the deer had been hit by a car. It would have suffered a slow starvation death if we had not seen it.

NCSU Football

Tickets have arrived.

The Wolfpack Club is building a new indoor practice facility which is taking up a huge portion of the parking at the stadium. The WPC has been sending out emails warning folks that there would be a major reshuffling of parking assignments. Well, turns out, they have renumbered the spaces and tightened them up (at least they look closer together). However, we seem to be in pretty much the exact same space as last year. The folks that sit behind us were parked 2 rows from us. They've been moved all the way out of the stadium and to a remote lot (the Trinity Lot). Per the WPC they were going to reassign everyone according to their club ranking - so I guess we've been pretty much where we were supposed to be.

Still rebuilding, we're going to have a pretty sad season. I'm expecting 6 and 6 - which sounds bleak - but will be a big step up from last year's 3 and 9.

It takes time. Looking for improvement. Especially on defense.

Home

Not much else to report. Weekend was pretty routine. Mowed the grass for the first time in 3 weeks - it's been raining the last 3 weekends and this is the first dry one. The grass had gotten way out of control.

My neighbor brought over a ton of grape tomatoes from his garden (and some cucumber and hot peppers). I sauteed the tomatoes with some onion and mushroom for a light sauce for pasta. Plus a little garlic, basal and oregano and dropped in a couple of the peppers - whole, not chopped. It was yummy. I love fresh food.