Blah, blah, blah

This past weekend ended up being a weekend where Cindy and I stayed around the house and straightened up the downstairs and really didn't leave the house, with the exception of when I walked the dog, went to the grocery, and went to church. Cindy didn't leave the house at all. When I got to the end of the weekend, I wished I had got some physical exercise outside. It was a pretty day with highs in the 60's and sunny. Now it is much cooler and is supposed to get wet by the end of the week.

Next weekend is the poetry seminar for which Cindy bought me a ticket to attend. The seminar will be at the Margaret Mitchell house in Atlanta. I am excited about the prospect. I wonder a little bit about where and how the seminar is conducted.

This is seminar week for me. I have a legal seminar on Thursday. Then I have the poetry seminar on Saturday. I ought to set up another seminar for something else and just make it a total learning experience.

Bill Day is trying to set up a time to go fishing on Friday. That would probably turn out to be a fly fishing seminar. That would be three seminars in a row. Of course, it is supposed to be very cold by the end of the week and even some frozen precip. I don't know how that would work out for fishing. I don't think he is contemplating going ice fishing.

There was good football this past weekend. A couple of the teams which I was pulling for to pull off upsets against the favored teams won, i.e. San Diego against Indianapolis and New York against Dallas. Its not that I really support either of those teams. I just like pulling for the underdog most of the time.

I was thinking about that yesterday afternoon. The teams that I like and support have narrowed over the past years. I used to pretty much like all of the teams in the SEC and several of the teams in the midwest. Over the years, however, I have narrowed my support to mainly the teams for schools for which I have a connection.

I don't even really like to watch football when I don't have a team involved which I care about. Yesterday, I watched the two games I referenced above and both games were good tight ballgames in which the underdog ultimately won. I used to like the Colts and the Cowboys, but my support for them has dwindled over the years.

I used to be a big Cowboys fan back in high school and college. I can pinpoint when my ardor for them began to dissipate. At the end of the 70's and beginning of the 80's the Falcons brought Leeman Bennett in as coach. He immediately had an effect on the team. All of a sudden the team was playing at or near the top of the NFL. In 1980 [Good brother Frank reminded me that the Falcons were beaten by the Cowboys in 1980, not 1982. Frank reads my blog to correct my memory. Thanks, little brother], the Falcons had the best record in football. The team drew a byeweek because of their superior record. In the second round, the team was to play Dallas in Atlanta.

At the beginning of the game, the Falcons went out to a lead on the Cowboys. Unfortunately, the second half was not kind to the Falcons. By the end of the game, Dallas had won by a couple of points, scored in the final minutes. Dallas ended up losing to the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC championship game the following week, a team which the Falcons matched up with very well and had beaten every time they played in the past. I am convinced that the Falcons would have played in the Super Bowl that year and won. The whole history of the franchise could have changed.

Meanwhile, the Cowboys found success in the 90's but the team wasn't as fun to watch as back in the 70's. I just never really regained my love of America's team.

Meanwhile, the Falcons have played like the tide, vacillating highs and lows, from year to year. Most of the time, it was poor. They had their moments. I still think they should have won the Super Bowl in 1998. I think they left their game on the streets of Miami. Still, that victory over Minnesota was superb. Morten Andersen is still the best. I was so glad when the Falcons brought him back this past year and the year before. All the young kickers they had were pretty miserable. Meanwhile, Morten Andersen had lost some yards on his leg, but could still put them out there consistently on the short and medium range kicks. It was kind of like having your own private George Blanda.

When I was a teenager, the Oakland Raiders had George Blanda as their kicker. George had played for Bear Bryant at Kentucky, graduating around 1948. He had played for the Bears for a long time, then played in the old AFL for Houston and Oakland. In 1970, he had won three football games in a row as a kicker and as a backup quarterback. I remember my dad saying that it was nice to have a player in the league who was about your age. As George Blanda was dad's contemporary NFL player, I guess Morten Andersen is mine.

The Great Dane, that's a good hero to support in your middling years.