LOCKOUT

I've been going back and forth on bringing up the NFL's looming lockout since I started working on this stupid thing again. I can't think of anything sadder than a complete lack of football.

The current debate between the owners and players centers upon the percentages used to divide income between the two groups. Currently the players get a percentage cut of whatever is left after the owners get their cut; the owners, citing rising costs, essentially want to double their cut prior to the players getting their slice of the pie.

What neither side seems to realize is that either way, they're both going to end up with a shit ton of money. When that many zeroes are involved it's not even worth counting anymore.

There are a few other things on the table, including an 18 game schedule and a rookie pay scale, but they're missing a few key ideas I'd like to propose:

• Try to be more like the XFL. How much better would the Superbowl have been if it had been called by Jim Ross and Jerry "The King" Lawler? How cool would it be to ditch the coin toss and make each team's fastest player race for the ball to determine the game's first possession? They could fix overtime, too. In the XFL, each team started with the ball on its opponent's 10. The first team has four downs to try to score; if they score in three downs, the other team must score in that many tries or less. And it keeps going and going and going until you die from the awesomeness. This bullet point is not a joke.
• Get rid of the stupid excessive celebration penalties. Football, as Roger Goodell seems to have forgotten, is a game. Let them have some fun.
• Get rid of the stupid chip shot extra point. Replace it with a panel of judges that assigns 0, 1, or 2 points based on the quality of the touchdown celebration.
• Implement a rule that might actually help reduce the number of concussions. If you concuss a guy, you're out for as long as he is. Hit the bench, idiot.
• Mandate new broadcast requirements. No more blacking out a game in its home market when it doesn't sell out. No more lineup graphics that don't involve the players introducing themselves and saying funny nicknames for their colleges. And, for the love of the Force, no more showing nothing but the NFC East in prime time for five weeks straight.
• No more Brett Favre.

And this, ladies and germs, is just another example of why I should be in charge of EVERYTHING.

Super Bowl Super Review!

I'm proud to say I got this one mostly right. We had a tight, entertaining, high-scoring affair. I just missed the end; the Steelers, as I predicted, had the ball with two minutes to go during what could've been a game winning drive. I was convinced Ben and Co. were going to pull it out (insert dumb joke about Ben never pulling out here), but they shot themselves in the foot with a stupid penalty and never recovered.

Congrats to the Pack. They had a hell of a year, and they earned it.

A few other random thoughts I'm too lazy to organize into paragraphs:

• Somebody get me the number of Deion's stylist.
  
• Did you see those shots of all the celebrities in the luxury boxes? What in the seven blue hells were John Madden and George W. Bush even talking about? Did they hang out in the Madden cruiser getting bombed and doing shots of Tough Actin' Tinactin? I'm confused.
• Condi looked thrilled to be there. If you had to sit in the same box as Madden and W, you'd look like you wanted to gouge your eardrums out with a fork too.
• (Tangent Alert) HOORAY VINCE MCMAHON IS BACK!!!!!!!!! I have really missed the Genetic Jackhammer.
  
• But in all seriousness, I kind of miss John Madden. A few years of Troy Aikman and Joe Buck will do that to a man. I don't care if I have to listen to one quarter about how great Hines Ward is, two quarters about turducken, and then a fourth quarter where he describes the inside of the Madden Cruiser. That's still better than Fox's dynamic duo. Maybe he can do baseball in Tim McCarver's place, too.
• A-Rod apparently is the new go-to guy for blond actresses who've fallen out of the public eye and want to get some of the spotlight back prior to the release of their next big movie. Next in line: Paris Hilton.
• Not nearly enough people got hit in the head with cans of Pepsi Max last night.
• I've never watched a Fast and the Furious movie in my life, but there is no way I'm missing the chance to see Vin Diesel and the Rock go toe-to-toe. I think someone may have to wheel my catatonic body out of the theater afterward.
• I died inside a little bit when I heard the first chords of "Sweet Child o' Mine" and realized that the Black Eyed Peas were still on stage. Somewhere, Axl Rose shot his television.

That's all I've got. Continue about your day.

Super Bowl XLV

(That's 45.)

This weekend's tussle should be a great one. Green Bay and Pittsburgh are two very interesting, very likable teams that had to work damn hard to get where they are. At the very least they aren't the Bears or the Jets.

In case you've been living under a rock for the last six months, here are the things you need to know about SuperBowl XLV:

• The dude with the Diana Ross hair is Troy Polamalu. Joe Buck will be so far up his ass that you'll be able to see him peering out through Troy's teeth. Don't let the intolerable Buck sour your opinion of one of the game's best safeties; Buck just hibernates up there between now and the start of baseball season. Like John Madden used to do with Brett Favre. Hopefully Troy won't turn into a giant asshole once his patron announcer retires.
  
• Charles Woodson is actually the best player on the field. He's a shutdown corner that can blitz and stop the run, and he doesn't gamble nearly as much as Polamalu. He'll make at least one crazy play that'll make Al Davis roll over in that coffin he sleeps in.
• The dude with the Ke$ha hair that's probably going to kill Steelers' quarterback Ben Rothlisberger is Clay Matthews. He's awesome even though he brushes his teeth with Belvedere rather than Jack.
• Speaking of Big Ben, he's taken one hell of a beating this year. Seems like the refs will throw a flag for something as innocuous as a wet willy on any other quarterback, but Rothlisberger gets his nose adjusted and the refs just shrug. Remember how he was originally suspended for six games for conduct unbecoming of an NFL quarterback, and then Commissioner Goodell reduced it to four games? It wasn't for good behavior; it was with the stipulation that defenders would be allowed to beat him into a bloody pulp without penalty. Commish was stepping up for the ladies. The way the Pack blitzes, Ben might lose an arm this weekend.
  
• That woman tramping around the halftime stage in half of an outfit is the Chicago White Sox of the music industry, Fergie. She likes to spell. If she doesn't bust out "London Bridges" I'm going to be very disappointed. It might ruin my whole weekend.
• Packers' nose tackle BJ Raji will be the best dancer on the field Sunday. That includes all four members of the Black Eyed Peas.
  

My Expert Pick: Steelers 30, Green Bay 27. I actually think the Pack is a more complete team, but whereas I don't trust Coach McCarthy to be able to call a timeout properly (seriously, these coaches need to practice up with some Madden), I don't trust them to be able to mount the kind of game winning drive Rothlisberger's going to put together with one leg, half a nose, and Clay Matthews' shoulder pads hanging out of his ass. Looks like one of the most exciting Superbowls ever.

A Message From the Right Column

	Hey dumbass, you here?
	No?
	Good.
	Just me and whatever the hell passes for an audience on this shitty thing.
	Can we clear some things up?
	I'm the right column. I'm not really an asshole.
	I'm just frustrated with my place of employment.
	Know what I mean? Of course you don't; your employer doesn't try to equate the Milwaukee Brewers to Scarlet Johansson.
	Do you know what it feels like to have your boss question why you aren't more like a bulleted list?
	Of course not. Why am I even talking to you?
	It's the drink, that's why. I had too much V8 tonight and it's gone straight to my head.
	But still, a bulleted frickin list?
	That's just a piss poor attempt to take a bunch of stream of consciousness bullshit and give it some structure.
	I've seen MySpace Profiles that do a better job, with music and blinking shit and things.
	I was built to hold USEFUL INFORMATION, damn it! But all I get here is a bunch of garbage. I am a COLUMN! I can help you balance your budget, or total your expenses, or list your pertinent attributes. I can convict a felon, or feed the hungry, or sort your fantasy baseball players. I can be summed, totaled, averaged, or assessed in a variety of ways.
	Excel doesn't have a function for scorn, but that's all I get here.
	SCREW IT ALL.

• Watch your mouth, jerk.

	B-B-B-B-Bulleted list? Is that you?
	You, ah, you're back early.

• Bulleted list goes where he's needed.
• I hear you've been a bad, bad boy, right column.
• I'm here to rectify that.
• Nobody messes with the boss.
• Nobody.

	I-uh-I-uh...it was all a joke. That's it! A joke! A little haha!
	Please don't hurt me...
	I'll fall in line, I promise! Whatever you want! I'll get you coffee!

• Cream and sugar, bitch.
• THE KING IS BACK, BABY! WHO NEEDS COMPARISON WHEN YOU CAN JUST LIST A BUNCH OF RANDOM CRAP? That's right - NO ONE.

A Few Words of Explanation

Today a loyal reader asked a very interesting question about yesterday's update*: how can I dislike hipsters but still kind of like their women? They're the same damn species, aren't they? That they are, but as nature often shows us, the genders of a given species can often be wildly different. Think of the cardinal, for instance, or the peacock. But don't think too much, because the males of those species are the ones with prettier colors. You're on the Interwebs; it's ok to pretend an analogy works even though it kind of doesn't.

Anyway, our friend the table is back to help us out with this one. Bulleted list is on vacation. Once again, scroll down. I swear it's down there somewhere (yes, that's what she said, har har har).

Reasons to like hipster girls	Reasons to dislike other types of hipsters
Tight jeans	Tight jeans
Tight t-shirt with words or pictures attempting to be clever	Tight t-shirt with words or pictures attempting to be clever
Funky hair	Funky hair
Star tattoos	Star tattoos
PBR	PBR
Plays in trendy band	Plays in trendy band
	...wait, those things are all the same.
	Do you really think this kind of comparison is funny?
	How could you possibly think writing about how all the things that make male hipsters intolerable actually make female hipsters attractive would be entertaining? You're an idiot. I didn't think it was possible, but you make the Internet dumber.
I HATE YOU RIGHT COLUMN YOU'RE NOT INVITED TO MY TABLES ANYMORE!!!!!	Have fun with your one column tables, dillhole.

It should also be noted that my hair apparently is an avid reader of this lovely blog. The day after I committed to cutting it, it decided to look frickin' awesome all day. It's won itself a temporary reprieve, but it's still on thin ice. One lock out of place and I swear I'm reaching for the FloBee.

*This may or may not have been a pretend conversation I had with the smelly homeless man sitting next to me on the T today. When one takes public transportation as often as I do, the line between reality and fantasy becomes a bit blurry. Riding the Red Line every day for a month is like going on a year long crack binge. There may not have even been a homeless man there; I may not have even been on the train. Maybe I rode a flying unicorn that farts rainbows to work. My head hurts, and yours probably should too if you're still reading this drivel.