That Would Come In Handy... Never

As happens every December, my family has entered catalog season. For those of you unfamiliar with catalog season, it is the period between October and January when the occurrence of checking the mail leads to the almost-daily discovery that your personal information has been sold to yet another retailer you have never done business with before. Wave after wave of catalogs arriving from stores you have never heard of, delivering deals on products you wouldn't buy in a million years, even with someone else's money. I would take myself off of all these mailing lists, but I'm not sure where I would even begin, considering I don't know how we got on them in the first place. Instead, I try to make a positive out of the negative by making a game out of flipping through these catalogs and looking for the stupidest Christmas gift available. I think we finally have it this year. It would be the all-season sled.

Now, for the moment I want you to overlook the fact that every sled can be made into an all-season sled if the rider is feeling brave enough. I also want you to ignore the reality that sledding is one of those activities that always sounds way more fun than it ever ends up being. No, what I want to focus on is the fact that this inventor didn't take the easy route one would expect them to and just put wheels on the bottom of a regular sled. Instead this inventor wants you to take the time to freeze a couple sheets of ice and attach them to the bottom of the sled so that you can sled on grass. (Something tells me the inventor was on grass when they thought of this as well.) This way you just don't get a the thrill of sledding down a perfectly good patch of grass in warm weather - you get to literally freeze your ass off as well. Because nothing is more fun on a hot summer day than a cold, harsh reminder that you'll be shoveling snow before too long.

-So, just one week after the Denver Broncos owner said he would be the coach for the rest of the year, Josh McDaniels was fired yesterday. I'm not surprised that McDaniels didn't work in Denver, but I am surprised that it flamed out this fast. I would have expected at least three seasons before Josh's act of trying to be Bill Belichick without having the resume to back it up would start grating on his players. Also, you can't give a first-time head coach complete control over personnel decisions. It is a recipe for disaster. Now, that being said, I still expect McDaniels to eventually be a good NFL head coach some day. First off, he's very young by NFL coaching standards and secondly he does have a good offensive mind. I think he'll take this firing like a man and stay around the NFL as a coordinator. (However, it will not be back in New England. Sorry, Josh, but we're doing just fine without you and don't think Bill didn't catch that report during SpyGate II that taping opposing team's practice was taught around here. We'll forgive failure, we won't forgive trying to throw your old team under the bus. If you had such a problem with it you wouldn't have brought the video coordinator from the Patriots with you to Denver.) Still, next time around McDaniels will be much more experienced and ready to handle the job. Consider his time with the Broncos to be a very expensive internship.