I’m going to throw out some thoughts since I’m up at 7 a.m. on a Saturday morning.

  • I have the best alarm clock in the world. My cat, F’ing, has gotten me up at exactly 5:22 a.m. each of the last five mornings. Sonofa…
  • Here are my projections on the new divisions for the Big Ten. Assuming they actually do split Ohio State and Michigan, I think it will look like this: Coca-Cola Division–Michigan, Nebraska, Iowa, Northwestern, Michigan State, Illinois. Pepsi Division–Ohio State, Penn State, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Purdue, Indiana. That’s the best way to break them down and still have some inter-division rivalries and some cross-over appeal. Oh, and the division names? I mentioned that about 7-8 weeks ago that they should sell off the naming rights. If they’re going to sell off the name for the league championship game, and everything else, they might as well sell off the names for the divisions. Think of the marketing opportunities and the amount of money they could make from that. Yikes. Coke vs. Pepsi. Home Depot vs. Lowe’s. Apple vs. IBM. Ohh, that’d stir it up, although in that league, who’d actually the be old stodgers and who’d be the new hipsters?
  • Nostalgia hit like a brick yesterday as sugar mama took me to dinner at Three Dollar Cafe. It wasn’t the one I had been to before, as apparently most of them have closed. That’s what happens when you haven’t been to a place in 14 years. The last time I was at one was 1996 when I was here for a month for the Olympics. I volunteered and worked at the World Congress Center, and those credentials and all my stuff from that whole experience are some of my most prized memorabilia. When I wasn’t working, I was pretty much hooked up to a tap at Three Dollar. There were three of us and by the second week, the waitresses all knew us by name. Ahhh good times.
  • Another bit of “Hey, remember when…” hit Friday as well. In a bad way. I’m so out of shape. I can’t believe I ran a half-marathon less than four months ago. My lard ass has gotten lardier. Sugar mama told me we lived on a mountain, literally, but I didn’t listen well. So I went for a run yesterday and either she was waaaayyy right or I’m worse than I thought. I couldn’t make it all the way up the hill on the road outside our complex. I did two miles in about 20 minutes, probably because the last half was downhill and I was going so fast I almost fell twice. I need to get on a plan quick.
  • I couldn’t fall back to sleep this morning because of more than just F’ing. I’m a bit anxious. Today’s our fantasy football draft–in case you haven’t heard, I AM THE CHAMPION–and that’s always exciting. I have to study here in a little bit since I really haven’t looked at the projections much yet. But it’s more than that. I’m a bit anxious because I have to actually start writing for real. This blog is great and all, but now I’m going to be spending more time worrying about writing for money. It’s not much, but I’m writing some opponent preview stuff for Huskers Illustrated Magazine and its website, and then the other day I just picked up a gig writing a volleyball blog for NCAA.com. So I actually do have stuff to do as those seasons are getting into full swing, but since this has only been taking about 30 minutes a day, I’ll be able to post on here as well. Your luck, right?
  • I wish they had a Scott Pilgrim vs. the World and Toy Story 3 double-feature somewhere. Nothing funny there, just two movies I kind of want to see right now.