Whatever

Another Super Bowl has come and gone and now all we are left with is finishing out the last couple of months of winter and looking forward to fishing season. We aren’t big fans of basketball and the local college ice hockey team, although entertaining, is not having a great season. Fortunately, the winter has been unusually warm for this part of the country so hopefully we can endure until spring.

In actuality, the Super Bowl was one of the more entertaining, exciting, and close of any in recent memory. We just have a hard time getting really excited about big market, big payroll, big hype teams like the Yankees and the Giants winning all the time. Last year’s Green Bay victory was much more satisfying and closer to our home here in northern Minnesota.

We were kind of hoping that Brady would even the score with Eli after the Giants ruined the Patriots perfect season back in 2008 but the Pats were not quite able to pull it off after another great fourth quarter come from behind performance by Eli Manning and the Giants. You have to hand it to Eli, he has now outdone his older future hall of fame brother and most certainly assured himself a spot there also as a two time Super Bowl winner. Most people would not have put him in the same category as his brother, Peyton, early in his career but he is looking really good now and Peyton’s career is certainly in its twilight if not over. Eli’s best might be yet to come. Congratulations to the Giants and hope the Vikings make a comeback next year.

There are only two games left in the current pro football season. The Pro Bowl is coming up this weekend and many of our favorite star players will be there. The only Minnesota Viking who made the Pro Bowl this year was Jared Allen and he won’t be doing much because they don’t let the quarterbacks get rushed like usual for fear they might get hurt. The Pro Bowl is usually pretty boring except for the interviews with all the star players. Sometimes if it is close, it gets a little competitive but usually not.

The Super Bowl, on the other hand, should be really exciting. It will be a rematch of a few years back between the Patriots and the Giants. In that game, the Giants ruined the Patriots chance for a perfect season so it is likely to be a good grudge match. We will be rooting for the Patriots to win this one but it sure would have been nice to see Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers repeat again this year.

I don’t know what happened to the Packers in their first playoff game against the Giants. Aaron Rodgers was off in his passing game and, to add insult to injury, his receivers dropped eight passes in that game. I don’t think they dropped many more than that in the whole regular season. It was really a strange day for the Packers.

We didn’t get invited to any Super Bowl parties this year so I guess we will be spending a quiet Super Bowl Sunday at home unless we get an invitation at the last minute. Actually I have never gotten invited to a Super Bowl party since I have been here. I guess none of the Filipina women that live around here and host most of the parties are not big football fans. Maybe, we should host a Super Bowl party next year. I am sure a lot of the husbands are big football fans, and who knows, maybe the Vikings will make it next year? Naaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh…..

My favorite quarterback in the NFL used to be Tom Brady. Sorry Tom, you have been replaced. My new favorite is Bronco’s quarterback Tim Tebow. Not only is he hot, but I really like his style of play and the fact that he has not been shy about his strong Christian faith. He has been roundly criticized for the shortcomings in his passing game but with his great running and good decision making, he has been able to take a rather mediocre Denver Broncos team all the way to the playoffs.

All of the so called “experts” said he would never be able to make it as a top tier NFL quarterback. Early in the season, when the Broncos had lost all but one game, the fans were chanting to give Tebow a chance. I think the Broncos coaches only put him in because of the demands of the fans and much to their surprise, he managed to win six of the next seven games, many in a very exciting and last minute comeback style of play that made many of his fans start believing in miracles.

After the Broncos went into a three game losing slump towards the end of the season, the experts weren’t giving them a chance against the highly rated Pittsburgh Steelers in the first round of the payoffs. The Steelers seemed to be daring Tebow to pass the ball all through the game and when he did, he threw multiple pin point passes for big gains that put the Broncos up by a score of 20-6 at half time. When the Steelers came back in the second half to tie the game, sending it into overtime, most still thought that the Steelers were going to win.

After winning the overtime coin toss, the Broncos set up on the 20 yard line after the kick off touch back. Again, while the Steelers were expecting a run, Tebow threw a quick pin point pass across the center of the field which went for 80 yards and a touchdown on the first play from scrimmage. Another miracle finish for Tebow? I will let you be the judge.

In his college days, Tim Tebow wore the numbers 3:16 on his under eye patches, representing his favorite scripture verse, John 3:16. My hubby has also noted that a significant related verse is 1 John 3:16 (and 17). There was also a commentator on TV that mentioned another 3:16 verse that might be of interest. The verse I am referring to is Revelation 3:16. And, if that weren’t spooky enough for you, you might find it interesting to check out how many yards Tebow passed for in that playoff game against the Steelers. Yeah, you guessed it, 316.

Wouldn’t you know it. Last time I blogged about football my hubby and I had gotten so frustrated with the Vikings that we decided to become Packers fans instead. Now that we started rooting for the Packers this week, wouldn’t you know it, they lost their first game. I feel like a curse on whoever I root for. My teams always seem to lose. My hubby keeps telling me not to get so depressed because it is only a game but I can’t help myself. Maybe I should quit rooting for all my favorite teams so they can keep winning, or in the case of the Vikings, start winning.

The Packers game was scheduled to be shown on our TV this week because the Vikings hadn’t sold out the stadium so they almost got blacked out. The remaining tickets ended up selling at the last minute so the Vikings game was shown instead of the Packers. It was no big surprise when the Vikings got hammered by the Saints, but it was a big surprise to hear that the Packers had lost. I guess their offensive line has gotten really banged up lately so the Kansas City defense was all over the Packers quarterback, Aaron Rodgers, all game long. The Packers almost came back to win it in the last few minutes but fell just five points short of preserving their perfect season record.

Maybe it is better for their Super Bowl chances now since they will be able to rest and protect many of their starting players once they clinch home field advantage throughout the playoffs. If they were still trying to preserve their perfect season record they would be very tempted to play Rodgers and other people who should be resting up for the beginning of the run toward the Super Bowl. They will need to be healthy and on top of their game because New Orleans and San Francisco are both playing really well right now.

I remember just a few years ago when the Vikings made it all the way to NFC Championship game. That was a game that they probably should have won against the New Orleans Saints. That has been the story that has been repeated for the Vikings over and over again in their entire history. So many would have, should have, could have games. Yesterday’s game against the Detroit Lions was another of those should have type games.

This time the Vikings had nothing to gain but a little bit of pride in what has turned out to be their worst season so far. It is not that they don’t have a lot of talent, they do. They have come really close to winning most of their games this year but always seem to be able to come up with a new and creative way to lose each time.

I thought that once they got rid of head coach Childress last year that maybe they would find their way back to their previous winning ways but I was wrong. If anything the coaching this year seems to be even worse than under Childress. The dumb things that they have done to lose so many games seems to have been shared equally by both the players and the coaching staff.

The new rookie quarterback, Christian Ponder, who was touted as being such a smart player has turned out to be anything but. His performance yesterday could only be described as dismal. When the backup, Joe Webb, came in to the game, he was almost able to pull off the win single handedly by himself. Had the obvious and inexplicable lack of a face mask call been made on the last play of the game, the outcome quite likely would have been different. Just another of the Vikings long history of could have, would have, should have. If I were able to ask the coaches one question it would be why they had such an extremely talented player as Webb sitting on the bench most of the season. I had been begging to see him as a wide receiver all year, but now think that maybe he should be the number one quarterback. Whichever position he plays, it should be on the field and not the bench. Number one example of coaching stupidity: not playing your best and most talented players.

Oh well, at least we can look forward to a high pick in the draft next year. Fortunately for us, my hubby has lived, not only in Minnesota, but the Chicago and Green Bay areas as well. Consequently, we have currently adopted the Green Bay Packers as our current home team. That really helps us get away from the normal seasonal depression that seems to come on this time of the year as the days get shorter. From here on out, we will be blogging as bonified Green Bay fans. GO PACK!!!

Before I came here to the US, I had no idea of what the weather was like here in northern Minnesota. The day I arrived here in late March of 2006 was about 45 degrees Fahrenheit in Minneapolis and I thought I was going to freeze into a block of ice. Even though my new husband had provided me with warm winter clothing, I could not stop shivering until I got to the warmth of our hotel room. Fortunately, the weather began to quickly warm up after that and soon I was experiencing a beautiful Minnesota spring and summer. It was a good thing that I did not arrived in December like we were first hoping because I might have changed my mind and gone back to the Philippines before spring arrived.

Now here it is December again already and I am not looking forward to another long cold Minnesota winter. Fortunately, we are planning a trip to the Philippines in the upcoming months so hopefully I won’t have to endure the cold weather for too many more months. We are also now starting to think about buying a place in the Philippines and spending the winter months there while coming back here for the great spring and summer weather. That would be the best of both worlds in my opinion.

I love to be able to get out in the sun on those warm Minnesota days and spend sometime boating and fishing on the area lakes. I also like traveling a lot and have thought about buying an RV so that we could travel to visit my sister in Colorado and our friends in New York whenever we would like. The perfect rig for our Minnesota summers would be an RV towing our boat with a motorcycle on the back bumper of the RV. I have been checking out the RVs at the b n rv website and they have the perfect rig at rock bottom prices.

I have never seen my hubby get this mad watching football on television when we were watching the Vikings play the Falcons today. We both expected that the Vikings would have a winning season this year after firing Childress as the head coach but we were wrong. This year is probably the worst season that the Vikings have ever played, very disappointing. My hubby was threatening to never watch the Vikings again. He said that he has now gone back to being a Packers fan because they play smart and he once lived in Wisconsin near Green Bay. I guess you would call my hubby and I fair weather fans.