brainsplotch

Hiya folks, hope all my loyal reader(s) had a good week. I'm happy to report that I have recovered from MSU's loss to Iowa last Saturday. Disappointing loss for the Spartans, but certainly one of the best college football games I've seen in quite some time. The hard hitting and defensive intensity reminded me of Big Ten gridirion action from the seventies and eighties. In fact, I'd even say that in many respects, the MSU/Iowa game reminded me of the 1966 MSU/Notre Dame 10-10 tie. This is not to say that Iowa and MSU's teams are as talented as those '66 Spartan and Irish teams, but the dominance of the defenses was quite similar. (By the way, I'm definitely not old enough to remember that '66 game, but I do have most of the game on VHS tape and have watched it several times). Anyway, Iowa deserved to win and I wish the Hawkeyes well the rest of the season. Okay, enough football for now. It seems like everything in our house is falling apart lately...

Two seconds, one play. That's what the Michigan State/Iowa came down to. One play and two seconds determined whether Spartan football fans everywhere would spend the rest of the night in elation, or mope in dejection. Unfortunately for the Spartan nation, Iowa made good use of that two remaining seconds and scored a touchdown from the MSU two yard line and won the game. I try to tell myself that it's just a game, but this one is a hard pill to swallow. After Iowa took a 9-6 lead, Michigan State got the ball back with just under three minutes left on the clock. The Spartans made two spectacular plays (a brilliant hook-and-ladder and an unbelievable touchdown pass from Kirk Cousins to Blair White) that would have made most people believe that the football gods were smiling down upon Spartan Stadium. However, I've watched too many MSU football games to be sold on the happy ending. I can't sleep. I shouldn't let a football game bother me like this. Didn't I ...

What you've all been dying for, my weekly Spartan football report. I've been a little lazy this season. Last year, I'd write these little dispatches right after the game, this year I'm waiting until the middle of the week if I get them out at all. I'm sure all those football fanatics out there are simply starved for my brilliant insights, since there are so few football web sites and blogs out there. Anyway, the MSU Spartans knocked off Northwestern on Saturday in what was a somewhat dull affair. At least the Wildcats didn't spoil this particular Homecoming. In other Big Ten action, Michigan crushed Delaware State in the biggest mismatch I've seen all year (I watched some of the Big Ten Network's replay), Purdue upset Ohio State and dominated the Buckeyes in the process. Congratulations to the Boilermakers on a job well done. Every once in awhile the Buckeyes need to be humbled. Illinois was trounced by Indiana (!), further sealing Ron Zook's doom. T...

At noon today, the Michigan State Spartans take on the Northwestern Wildcats at Spartan Stadium. I will be in my usual location, a few miles east of East Lansing, camped out in my basement with the game on the television. It seems like the Spartans have righted the ship, to borrow that hackneyed cliche. After their three-game losing streak against Central Michigan, Notre Dame, and Wisconsin, I was about to give up on the season and begin X-ing out the days on my calendar until basketball's Midnight Madness. So what does the football team do? They beat Michigan in a heart attack-enducing game in which the Spartans played their best 56 minutes of football all year only to see Tate Forcier almost single-handedly bring the Wolverines back from the dead. Luckily, State made the plays in overtime to win, and prevented me from tailspinning into a deep depression, with visions of the Hobbit-like Forcier in my head. Last week, State went down to Champaign-Urbana and beat an Illinois team ev...

The Feelies' excellent 1986 album, The Good Earth , was reissued by Bar/None Records back on September 8. It was a long time coming for this stellar recording, which had been out-of-print for far too long. A few weeks ago, while subbing at Schuler Books and Music, I finally decided to order it, and after it arrived, picked it up from the store on Friday. Although the Feelies' 1980 debut album, Crazy Rhythms , is more highly acclaimed by critics, I've always preferred The Good Earth. It has a warmth and a...well, earthy quality that the first much more jittery and spiky album lacks. (This is not to say that I dislike Crazy Rhythms. Not at all. It's just a completely different listening experience compared to The Good Earth ). I first became acquainted with The Good Earth in the fall of '86, when I was a freshman at Michigan State. A friend of mine, Peter Overton (who later changed his last name to Kadyk and became an acclaimed avant garde artist and dancer in San ...

Some random thoughts: I saw that the mother of Dylan Klebold (one of the Columbine killers) wrote an essay for Oprah Winfrey's O magazine. I haven't read complete piece, just bits of it. Susan Klebold was unaware of the torment her son was experiencing until after the tragedy at Columbine High School. As a parent, I can't help but try and imagine myself in her shoes--and then I tell myself, "Time to STOP imagining this!" The anguish this woman has experienced is unfathomable. Please don't think that I sympathize with Susan Klebold more than the other parents of the Columbine tragedy, i.e. the parents of the children who were the innocent victims, but she suffered as much as any other parent, and perhaps in a more harrowing way considering her son contributed to the tragedy. She has probably spent considerable time in the last ten years wondering in vain whether she could have seen the warning signs. What a burden to carry, Boy, have I been Mr. Depressing la...

Shortly after the euphoria of the Michigan football win, we learned that a friend of the family died tragically, and quite unexpectedly, at the age of 34. She had just given birth to a son the previous week, and died of a massive stroke exactly one week later. The details are so tragic and sad that the more I think of it, the more depressing it becomes. She left behind a husband of thirteen years and three children (an 11 year-old, a 10 year-old, and the newborn baby who will never know his mother). I think I've already given out too many details. I struggle with how much information I should put in this blog (and if you've noticed, I don't generally use personal names in here). How personal do I want to make it? Do I really want to put deeply personal information out there into cyberspace? Then again, if I'm going to blog, and make it a little more than recaps of football games and other trivia, then it makes sense to let whoever is actually reading to know whe...

First of all, this game never ever should have gone to overtime. Yet, given that Michigan State was participating in the game, it should not be surprising at all. With about 4 or so minutes left in the game (it's a bit of a blur to me now) State had a 20-6 lead. I had a sneaking suspicion the lead wasn't big enough. I was praying that the Spartans could AT LEAST add one more touchdown to make it a 27-6 lead. Instead State went into predictable mode (what happened to the screen passes to our receivers, which Michigan was incapable of defending all day?) and gave Tate Forcier and the Wolverines an opportunity to tighten it up. And tighten it up was an understatement. Michigan tied the game at 20 with only two seconds left in regulation. I've extremely happy with the turn of events in overtime, but must admit that I was so frustrated at how regulation ended that I couldn't even bring myself to watch the overtime. Instead I went outside and walked up the street in the cold...

Today's the Michigan State/Michigan football game, and once again I face the dilemma: do I I REALLY want to put myself through the pain and torture of watching it unfold on television? I think Michigan State has a chance in this game, provided their defense isn't as awful as it was against...uh, Central Michigan, Notre Dame, and especially Wisconsin. Plus, even if State is able to keep this a close game, I don't like their chances of winning since they've shown no ability to win close games this year (CMU, and Notre Dame). To make matters worse, it looks like the Tigers are headed to a big collapse in the American League Central, so we Spartan/Tiger fans could be in for a disappointing weekend. Sorry for the "glass is half-empty" attitude, but it's ingrained in me at this point. I'm just too used to disappointment. Guess I'll have to enjoy Nick Hornby's new book, Juliet, Naked , which is really great so far.