The International House of Bacon

Good times. I have a ton of stuff piled up - I wish I could say I was busy this weekend, but I won’t lie - I spent most of it playing Blue Dragon. If you’re reading on the LJ side, I’m getting intermittent comment notifications, so if I haven’t replied to your comments from earlier, it’s because I only saw them about 20 minutes ago.

* The closest thing to zombies of late. Personally, I’d consider myself blessed in a few ways.

* The rumored number two porn collection in the world doesn’t actually exist. One less reason to visit Cambridge University, I suppose.

* Reason covers the Hugo Chavez disaster. To me, the Chavez situation continues to be one of the great disasters of the world currently - not nearly as bad as the situations in Africa and the Middle East, but a horrible situation that should really get more honest coverage.

* Attention, Democratic voters who subscribe to the “the world hates us because Bush’s diplomacy sucks” meme: claiming that a world leader lacks a soul isn’t going to repair that. And I don’t especially care if she’s right (because I’m inclined to believe she is) - that’s not how you deal with it.

* A fun link for video game fans, especially those with any fond memories of the Ultima series: The Many Deaths of Lord British.

* Larry Kudlow reminds us that if a recession really is coming, it ain’t there yet. Expect the media to continue to push the issue regardless, however - they haven’t been honest about the economy in years, so why start now?

* A great story about the guy who moved into a homeless shelter with $25, and came out a year later with an apartment and $5000 in cash.

* Cato demonstrates the reality surrounding part of Hillary Clinton’s health care plan. Oops!

* England floats a smoking permit. The mind reels.

* I hate the Dolphins because I’m a Patriots fan, but I’ve always liked Zach Thomas. He’s set to meet with the Pats this week, and the thought of it excites me to see him in a New England uniform.

* Sometime last year, you’ll remember a video circulating from 1994 about Dick Cheney’s position about war in Iraq. Namely, that he was against it for reasons many believe actually occurred during the last few years. Of course, it’ll be interesting to see people spin the video of Bill “I was always against the Administration’s war” Clinton making the case Bush should have made. Video here. If we did it right the first time, or if Clinton actually acted as he should have in 1998, it’d be very interesting to see where we’d be today, 10 years later.

* A great spring training prank by the Phillies.

Dunno if I’ll get another post out today, but who knows.

1) Lack of aggression. Everyone’s all pissy about Belichick deciding to go for it on 4th and 13 as opposed to a 50 yard field goal - I liked that move. I didn’t like Belichick not throwing a red flag on the fumble that Woods clearly fell on and then the Giant defensive lineman stole after the play was called dead. I didn’t like Belichick punting from 4th and 3 inside the Giants’ 50 yard line. I didn’t like the fact that the Pats didn’t make a single memorable vertical attempt the entire first half.

2) Game planning. It was apparent in the first half that whatever the plan was, it wasn’t working. The Pats scored one touchdown in part due to a pass interference call, and that was essentially it. In the second half, though, it appeared to me that the adjustment was to…not adjust. Brady was getting wrecked, but I didn’t see extra tight ends in there. I didn’t see an extra blocking back, Faulk was still going out for passes. They finally got rolling in the 4th quarter with the slant patterns, but why did it take so long? The Patriots came back in the first game against the Giants in part because the blocking was much improved in the second half. What happened last night?

3) Bad luck. After all, the Pats got very lucky against the Ravens this season, had some significant breaks in the last 8 games leading up to the Super Bowl anyway, but, with the exceptions of the 12 men review and the pass interference on Watson, the luck didn’t go New England’s way. The fumble recovery by Woods, the blatant offensive pass interference on the sideline throw, that absolutely incredible catch by Tyree against Harrison in that final drive - sometimes, the football gods just say “enough,” and that’s that.

At the end of the day, the Patriots simply got outplayed, though. Outplayed, outcoached, outclassed. I haven’t seen that since the 2002 season, and that’s what makes this loss somewhat heartbreaking. Kudos to the defense for stepping up as well as they did, but that’s about it. The rest was a dismal failure I haven’t seen from this football club in years.

Ah well - 10 days until pitchers and catchers.

If anyone’s even reading at this time of day.

* Personal opinion: Patriots 38, Giants 20. I don’t see this being close.

* From The Locker Room, an article at Tech Central Station about the successes of free market reforms around the world. A pretty interesting list.

* Cato at Liberty on Ted Kennedy actually getting it regarding the role of the judiciary v. the role of the legislative branch. I suppose you can teach an old dog new tricks.

* John Tierney at the New York Times signed he and his wife up to eHarmony to see if they could get a match, and then wrote about the results. A pretty interesting insight into the whole eHarmony thing.

* FactCheck.org debunks the long-standing myth that the unemployment stats don’t count folks who aren’t recieving benefits. A piece worth reading even if you already knew that.

* I’m very glad John Edwards is gone, but The Munchkin Wrangler posted a beautiful takedown of Edwards’s campaign yesterday that’s worth linking to.

* Julia Sweeney does a one-woman show about her atheism, and lists 10 things she’s learned.

Have a good weekend.