SemiConscious Dot Org

Kids, let’s take a journey, way back through the misty veils of time, to the year 2003. It was a strange and unusual era: our President was a stupid, morally bankrupt thug; the Democrats were a bunch of spineless appeasers who rubber-stamped his every evil whim; we were involved in ugly, brutal wars on the other side of the planet for absolutely no reason whatsoever; and the White Stripes and Radiohead released the year’s best albums.

Ok, so maybe things really weren’t very different back then.

In 2003, the world of football was dominated by the New England Patriots, a hard-nosed bunch that won a series of close, ugly, low-scoring games punctuated by ball control offense and molar-rattling defense. Here at last, one might assume they’ve detected a historical difference: for this year’s edition of the same team is powered by a record-setting scoring machine which throws the ball constantly. Some in the national sporting press have even gone so far as to hang the dreaded “finesse team” label on them because of that.

Well, they can all shut the hell up now, because what happened in yesterday’s AFC championship game against the San Diego Chargers was nothing less than a reversion to Pats Of The Stone Age. Faced with a big, physical team that was supposedly going to push them all over the field, they grounded the aerial assault, lined up in a three tight end formation, and ran the ball right down their fucking throats.

During that final, spirit-crushing nine minute drive to run out the clock, I kept hoping that the camera would pan over to Philip Rivers on the sideline. I wanted to see if he was preoccupied with jawing at the fans while his team had its heart ripped out and its season ended. Alas, it was not to be, as the camera never alighted on his face again, and we’ll sadly never know. Bye bye, douchebag.

As if the Patriots kicking the obnoxious Chargers to the curb wasn’t satisfying enough, the New York Giants beat the Green Bay Packers for the NFC title, a fantastic event which simultaneously

a) Removes the only NFC team that made me even slightly nervous
b) Ensures that I won’t have to listen to the national media fellate Brett Favre for two straight weeks
c) Means that another Boston team will win a title at the expense of another New York team
d) Fulfills my wish for the Patriots to beat a Manning in the postseason this year.

Everything’s coming up Milhouse!