I Don't See You Lasting

Glad to see Trump putting a stop to this "bringing one person into the boardroom" nonsense. It's usually people that do little things to piss him off right before the boardroom that wind up with the axe (this was very much reminiscent of the Bradford firing for me). Chris may have still been able to get Markus fired if he brought Mark into the boardroom, so I'm not sure of the whole decision to bring just one person in. I also agree with the assessment that Markus will be gone shortly. He's sort of cut from the same cloth as Sam and Raj as the designated "zany character".

I'm cleared for the game against UBC on Saturday, so let's see if I'm actually successful at killing myself this time ;)

Rucked Over

My face got a bit messed up in the Rugby intersquad game. It's starting to heal now, but for the first couple of days it looked like I'd gotten into a fight.

I'm not sure how this edition of The Amazing Race is going to go. For one, watching families fight isn't nearly as entertaining as watching couples fight. As well, it looks like (for the first couple episodes at least) they're just driving around the States. That's not nearly as fun as watching contestants interact with locals in other countries. Regardless, I think it will be hard to top last season. Rob and Amber were arguably more entertaining on The Amazing Race than they were on Survivor (I said arguably), and there were a number of other memorable characters as well (notably Gretchen and Meredith).

I had a long-ish post detailing my activities this past weekend, but it for some reason it didn't publish, and I don't really feel like re-typing it. Suffice to say that I went to a football game with a complete football neophyte, and missed out on debating in the final at Grant Davy's because I didn't guess the right debater.

In regards to Jeremy Roenick's remarks on Sportscentre this evening regarding Canadians giving him a hard time because of his birth certificate, perhaps Canadians are envious of the fact that he has so many more Stanley Cup rings than the majority of them. Oh, wait... (I agree it was much funnier when Patrick Roy said something similar, but that's because he could back it up, and, he's Patrick Roy).

Football:

Toronto and Ottawa
Well, it looks like we're once again getting a western crossover. Ottawa is in freefall, and I don't see it stopping now. Toronto will have Bashir Levingston back, and I'm looking for them to rebound from their loss last week.

Edmonton and Hamilton
There's a bit of a danger of a letdown from last week. However, even if the Esks haven't turned the corner, I think they can still beat Hamilton. There's word that Ed Hervey should be back in the lineup, and that should be enough to push the Esks over the top.

Montreal and Calgary
This should be an interesting one. While Montreal has shown that they can beat up on the Winnipeg's of the world, they haven't been able to dominate good teams in the same way. Calgary has been able to keep pace with Edmonton and Saskatchewan in the race for second thus far. While there will likely be a fair bit made about Jeremaine Copeland facing his old team (again), I think it's getting rather close to midnight for the Stampeders. Montreal should pull this one out.

B.C. and Saskatchewan
It sure was nice seeing B.C. lose last week. Well, guess what, it's going to happen again. I'm looking for the Rider D to get similar pressure on Dickenson to what the Eskimos got. Additionally, it was special teams that killed the Lions last week, I anticipate it being worse with Corey Holmes. Saskatchewan almost beat B.C. last time, but for a few mistakes. This time they'll actually do it.

PAC-Man

Council meeting tonight was actually halfway decent. I think that the Senate Task Force stuff was productive, and I think there were a number of good ideas brought up on both sides in the Physical Activity Complex debate. That being said, I still think that Council tends to get a bit hung up on procedural questions (the whole PoI argument was really unnecessary, particularly since it's unenforceable. The solution needs to be Councillors showing discipline, not people having to resort to points of order "becuase that wasn't a question"). At any rate, it should be interesting to see how it all plays out in a couple of weeks.

I'm looking forward to the debuts of the new Apprentice series. I'm probably not going to keep watching the Martha Stewart one past the first episode, but I've always enjoyed the Trump one (even when it's been rather mediocre).

On the sporting front, none of the games last week went my way. Hopefully this week will be better.

Ottawa and Calgary
I really need to be objective about this one. While there should be no doubt which team I'm pulling for, I can't in good conscience pick the Renegades in this one. Sorry. Calgary it is.

Toronto and Saskatchewan
This should be a pretty good game. Saskatchewan's defence has firmed things up, and their offence isn't making as many mistakes any more. That being said, I think Toronto is still the better team at this point, and that will be shown on Friday.

B.C. and Edmonton
Pity the rest of the country won't be able to witness B.C.'s first loss on television. That's right, in spite of their recent struggles, I'm going with Edmonton. B.C. may be undefeated, but apart from Ottawa they haven't really been blowing teams away. While an undefeated record is still impressive, this isn't a team that has looked unbeatable, and I'm confident that the Esks are going to illustrate that.

Winnipeg and Montreal
Montreal is a really tough team to figure out this year. They almost took B.C. to overtime last week, but they've been beaten by teams like Winnipeg and Ottawa this year. Things are looking rather bleak in Winnipeg as well. I'm going out on a limb and picking Montreal in this one.

But Where's The Water?

Well, Survivor is back on, so that means that in addition to football predictions, I'll also be talking about reality television again.

It always takes a couple of weeks to sort of figure who everyone is, but this season looks like it'll be ok. I do think that this emphasis on "let's see if we can come up with a challenge that will kill them" doesn't necessarily add all that much. If I were just watching for the challenges, I'd watch Fear Factor instead. That being said, it does have the added bonus of disadvantaging teams that keep around their lazier types, who always used to worm their way much further in the game than they had any business being (not that this sort of thing doesn't still happen, but maybe it might be a bit different this year). Anywys, Jim looked like he may have been an interesting character, but that's often the case with the first one off. I'm also looking to see how the experiment with previous players plays out.

For football, this should be an interesting week.

Winnipeg and Ottawa
This is a tough one. Winnipeg seems to be going down in flames, though they were quite close last week. Ottawa, on the other hand, is coming off getting blown out and is engaged in all manner of Negotiation List and Trade Rumour silliness. I highly doubt that The Bachelor is the solution to their problems, even if they are able to pry him off of Montreal's neg list. Regardless of all that, I'm going with Ottawa to right the ship, though I seem to have been overly generous with them so far this year.

Calgary and Hamilton
You know, I was sort of dreading reluctantly endorsing the Stamps in this one. However, Henry Burris sort of took care of that for me. While the other guy did well in relief in Edmonton (he scored on his only drive, which is one more touchdown than Hank was able to engineer), he should still be a step down. Calgary has a strong defence, so I'm expecting a bunch of Danny Mac picks, nevertheless, I'm going with a Hamilton win. Maybe Jesse Lumsden will make some nice tackles on special teams.

B.C. and Montreal
The Lions are going to have to lose sooner or later (I know I've been saying this most of the year, but it's true). The Als are clearly not the power that they used to be. All of that being said, I would personally find it amusing if they knocked off the Lions, given all the times when the Lions would end similar Montreal winning streaks. That reason is good enough for me, Montreal it is.

Edmonton and Saskatchewan
This is a game that the Esks almost always lose, and they usually look badly doing it. I would say that it would be good for them to be up for one of their former QBs, but there's basically nobody left from when Crandell was here (and that never seemed to work against Nealon anyways). For the Eskimos, the offence has been the proverbial whipping boy for the past week. I think that it would be foolish in the extreme to pull Ray. Hopefully the running game will continue to improve (and there will be greater committment to it as well). Anyways, I'm going with Edmonton to turn things around.

WOW Leather

Volunteered for some Quad Games at WOW this afternoon. Managed to get Gary and Paul Ratti to compete. After I arrived for my shift, a couple of girls in leather jumpsuits pulled up in a Mustang and started handing out gift certificates for Full Throttle energy drink for 1 cent. Pretty tough to compete with that.

On a completely unrelated note, apparently they're letting everyone on wikipedia these days.

O

Orientation was great. The presentations seemed to go really well, and the President's Address had what seemed like a bigger than usual turnout. I was a little disappointed with the understaffing issues at the Plant afterwards. This was my 6th year volunteering with Orientation, and it's consistently been one of the more rewarding experiences I've had in University. At the Plant afterwards, I bumped into one of my former delegates from my last year as an OL. I guess he's a 4th year now. Time flies.

In terms of football, it's a short turnaround week, which tends to make for unpredictable results. Nevertheless, here are my thoughts for the week ahead.

B.C. and Ottawa
One of these weeks B.C. has to lose. As well, Ottawa played them fairly closely last time out. That being said, Ottawa is coming off a big loss to Montreal. With that in mind, this prediction may seem foolhardy, but I'm going with Ottawa to keep things interesting in the east.

Calgary and Edmonton
It's a good thing I wasn't watching the game last week, or I would have been getting angry. At least they won. I'm confident of a repeat performance this week. While the lack of killer instinct, and a running game, continues to be disconcerting, I'm confident that Edmonton should come out with a win.

Hamilton and Toronto
Well, my one mistake last week. The Ti-Cats have now won two in a row, and most of the focus in the lead up to this game is on Bashir Levingston's helmet. Nevertheless, this is a game that Toronto should win, so that's what I'm going to go with.

Saskatchewan and Winnipeg
It appears that Marcus Crandell is the latest saviour in Riderland. However, I'd be careful of putting too much stock in one game, particularly given that the Riders did the same thing to Winnipeg with the other guy in. At any rate, I'm going with the same result, as Saskatchewan climbs back into contention in the west.

Labour Day

So, another week, more football.

I should note that in making these picks, I haven't seen any of the games for the last two weeks, so apart from the results I have no idea how teams have been doing and what personnel changes, if any, have occurred. That being said, this is Labour Day, and certain patterns seem to emerge which should make this easier.

Anyways...

Ottawa and Montreal
This should be a good game, in what is shaping up to be quite the rivalry this year. Ottawa seems to have come a bit back down to earth lately, but they've still been looking good. Montreal has lost two straight as well, so this may be a chance for the Renegades to put some distance between themselves and the Als. However, Terry Vaughn doesn't lose on Labour Day. Montreal it is (I know this won't actually be played on Labour Day, but it's close enough for me).

Winnipeg and Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan has just been in a free fall as of late, so Winnipeg could come at a better time. The Bombers got whupped pretty bad in Regina in the season opener, however they've really improved since then. This is a game that the Riders traditionally win, so I'm going to go with Saskatchewan to pull things together and emerge with the win.

Toronto and Hamilton
Let's see, the best team in the East, who happen to be the defending Grey Cup Champions, or the team that's won one game. While anything can happen on Labour Day, I think it's pretty clear that barring a major disaster the Argos should take this one.

Edmonton and Calgary
This is what Labour Day is all about. I am a little more concerned about this game than I was at the beginning of the season, as Calgary seems to have been looking better as of late. As well, while they apparently won last week, it's clear that the Esks aren't going to be romping all over the league like it looked like they might before the season started. Nevertheless, Edmonton doesn't lose on Labour Day when I volunteer for Orientation.