This year, I went back and forth on who I wanted to win. I finally made my surprising choice (it was a surprise to me, anyway) and wonder how close I’ll be with my prediction. I’m sure the readers of EveryJoe will let me know what they think one way or another.

We’re having a collection of appetizers for the game, which is something we used to do for every game but this year changed to the “soup of the week” theme. I didn’t feel like making soup, so here we are with apps.

What are you doing for the game?

Internet Dating Is Not Like Ordering a Pizza

I told the DJs that to answer that question (which I don’t mind at all, btw) is “another show entirely.” Hey – if they want to have me back on just to talk about Favre, I’m all for it. As it was, my spot taped in two segments (taping meant Cherie didn’t have to get up at the crack of dawn….) and I’ll try and provide a link once it’s up.

I may get some crap from the guys at EveryJoe for my stance on this. Some say that there is no crying in sports, and I say there is crying that no one likes to talk about. So hey – I’m a girl, in touch with my emotions, and I cry – I’ll talk about it.

In case you missed some of my posts this week, I talked about why a win in the Super Bowl is the only thing that really counts, how Rex Ryan’s comments about Charles Woodson as Defensive Player of the Year really bugged me, the rundown from my predictions last week, and the sad death of Chicago Bear defensive end Gaines Adams.

I’m off to church and then a day watching hours and hours of football. Could there be anything better than those two things? (In that order!)

Dave Begel had a great column today on OnMilwaukee.com about the Packer game, and more specifically, the play of Aaron Rodgers. I enjoy his take if only for the fact that it has more truth in it that most fans are willing to admit. The media has had a real love-in with Rodgers, almost to the point of making him out to be the second coming. I made a case on EveryJoe a few weeks ago that the stats are very misleading this year for both the Packers as a team and for Rodgers. I even predicted (shock!) that the Packers would come out jittery and end up losing. I got ripped apart for this assessment. Someone emailed me and told me I should never be allowed to predict another game ever, while another fan left a comment that told me I knew nothing about football, and that “Sorry the stats show Packers winning and not Arizona.”

Too bad, folks. I was right. The Packers might have been ranked as the second defense but they gave up 51 points. The sad part is, the loss isn’t on the defense alone. The whole team didn’t play up to the level needed to win. Stats don’t tell the story on everything, especially when it comes to the Packers. Interestingly enough, I made this same argument when Jay Cutler joined the Bears. I said the stats showed him as the player you want in your fantasy league, but on a real team he’s a wildcard and a gun slinger. (I got ripped for that too…. but my, how quiet people are now about it.)

Back to the Pack, however, it isn’t that I wanted them to lose. I was very nervous watching the game on Sunday because while I was cheering on my team, I had a feeling that they would fall short of winning. When Rodgers threw that pass that could have won the game, I didn’t even hold my breathe to see if Jennings would catch it. I already saw that Rodgers was keyed up and would overthrow it. He could have won the game right there but didn’t.

Does that mean that Rodgers is a bad quarterback? Nope. He’s a good one, but not the great, second coming, type quarterback that many in the media (and fandom) seem to believe. Time will tell with him. One thing is sure, having the experience of this game will help him down the road. It all adds to maturity and experience, and I have to believe Rodgers will take every lesson he can from playing in this game against one of the greatest (and my favorite) quarterbacks of all time. Speaking of which, can you believe Kurt Warner threw more touchdowns than he did missed passes? I can!

To sum it up, Packer fans, don’t be sad about this year. We’ve got a lot to look forward to and next year the team will be better able to handle the tougher schedule that they will now receive. In the meantime, I’m still having a hard time taking down the Packer tree. Sniff! Think it’d be okay if I left it up until after the Super Bowl at least?

I found this recipe for “shrimp and corn chowder with fennel” in the February issue of Real Simple. Do you get this magazine? It’s my all-time favorite. I love the tips on organizing and the recipes I’ve pulled out have been awesome. They also have some recipe books I’m thinking of getting one of these days, too. One is for Easy, Delicious Meals and the other is for Meals Made Easy. I’ve found quite a few really great recipes over the years from Real Simple. One is that beer cheese soup deal that I made the week we played the Vikings. (The game stunk, but the soup was delicious.) Hopefully we’ll have a great game and some good soup tomorrow!

In case you’ve been out of the loop, I’ve been making a soup or stew recipe every week for the Packer game. This week it was the mulligatawny soup, and it was so good! Inexpensive to make and delicious besides. Also, it made TONS of leftovers. The soup was a hit, the game was a win, but the injuries of Al Harris and Aaron Kampman have left me very sad.

They’re both out for the season. This week we’ve got the Lions (on Thanksgiving – YES!) and to be honest, I’m not sure how this one will go. Thanksgiving games tend to be somewhat unpredictable anyways, and then with our two key injuries and the Lions performance from last week… I think it could go either way. I’m going to edge toward the Packers only because Matt Stafford could possibly miss the game with his shoulder injury.

Speaking of which, have you seen the very funny video about Stafford now? Someone is spoofing his newly found he-man status after toughing it out with that shoulder only to go back in and throw the game winning hail mary touchdown. Check it out:

Oh… silly sports fans! (And yes, I count myself in that mix.)

Which reminds me, I went to see Packer legend Forrest Gregg at one of our local bookstores last week. What a story this has turned out to be! I wrote about it on my EveryJoe column, but let me tell you that this visit is truly one of my favorites in terms of Packer memories. And not for the reason you’d think.) Gregg spoke about his new book, and we all politely listened, asked questions, and laughed. You know how it is with a bookstore appearance – you want to be polite and accommodating. Gregg, now in his 70s, talked about the Lombardi years, days of old, Brett Favre, and the kinds of things players used to do that now get called for a penalty.

Before and after his appearance, he was gracious about posing with the guys in the audience. As he came to the table to sign copies, I asked if I could have a picture with him as well. He looked me in the eye and said, “Let me tell you a sad story.” Since he had been standing for an hour, I thought he was going to tell me that he needed to sit down, that he was an old football player and his knees were bad, or that he has to draw the line on pictures somewhere. Anything would have been better than what he said.

Instead he told me about Bart Starr getting sued by some woman who had a picture of them together. The only thing I remember about Starr was that an 80-some year old woman tried to extort money from him a couple years ago and had written threatening letters to him. She pleaded guilty and we haven’t heard a word about it, but at the time the woman was claiming that she had a relationship with Starr.

I’m not sure if this is what he was talking about or not. But Gregg said ever since this happened to Starr, he doesn’t pose with women. We all laughed and he sat down. Our laughs were the kind that happen when someone says something stupid and you don’t know what to say in return. The bookstore lady looked a bit taken back, and even said, “Well what if she poses with you and her husband?” Of course by this time Gregg was seated. Discussion over.

He then asked me who he should sign the book to, and I was going to be a smarty pants and say, “Well you better sign it to my husband or else I’d probably try and sue you” but I didn’t. Why bother at this point? He’s an old football player that obviously thinks he’s charming enough to pull off a sexist comment and not have anyone think better of it.

On our way home, of course, my husband and I laughed our heads off. What a dippy thing to say! I still think perhaps Gregg really did have to sit down and was just tired of taking pictures. But whatever. This story is a way better Packer memento than actually having the picture. We’re taking the picture we did snap of Gregg alone while he was giving his speech, and are making it into an ornament for our Packer tree. I’m going to write “I don’t pose with girls” underneath Gregg’s photo.

The life of a Packer fan. You never know what’s going to happen next.

But remember, the word for today is not Forrest or Packers or even chauvinist but mulligatawny!

Not only did we lose, but we lost SOLIDLY. We lost to a quarterback who started for the first time EVER today. We lost to a team that averaged 13 points a game, but today managed to get 38. As NFL Fanhouse said:

Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers threw three interceptions and completed less than half of his passes. The combination of his penchant for holding the ball too long and Green Bay’s lackluster offensive line just proved to be too much…

Too much indeed. This was a game we were supposed to have WON, people! You know those teams that remained winless for a year or more? You’re supposed to beat those.

I don’t know what else to say, except that it was nice to hear the old “Battle of the Bays” line that I remember so well from my youth, and the Bucs have an exciting young quarterback that I’ll keep my eye on. He showed an incredible level of maturity for someone 21 who was starting for the first time ever.

The game ended with an interception, which seemed fitting given how the rest of the game was. The commentators have taken to putting a timer next to Rodgers to show how he hangs on to the ball too long, and it is nice to see Ahman Green again, even though he now wears a different number (and thus my Ahman Green action figure is no longer accurate!)

We had bean and sausage soup from a very old Campbell’s soup recipe book I have. Every once in a while I like to make a recipe that is straight out of the 1950s. For some reason, this makes me extremely happy. (And on a day when my Packers lose like they did today, a little bit of happiness is definitely appreciated!)

Why are you so easy on Favre? [Expletive removed] him! He has a huge ego and should have never gone to the Vikings!

My, what big eyes you have, Favre Hater. What exactly did you think I should write about him? He’s on another team. We didn’t want him anymore, and since it’s a free country, he had the choice to do that. The fact that a grown adult is seething with this “Favre has a big ego” hatred is laughable to me. Do you have a life? Seriously.

You may think Favre has a big ego, but guess what? He really is that good. More than that, if you were one of the classless buffoons who booed him, I’ve got some new thoughts for you.

Here’s what I say to all these folks who have their undies in a knot because our former quarterback, the one we didn’t want anymore, actually went somewhere else: focus on your team. Give Favre his due. He’s a mature quarterback and played extremely well. Yay for him. But again, focus on your own team. There are many things wrong with the Packers right now. Focus on those issues. Favre (I hate to inform you) really isn’t our big problem right now. There are a ton of others. Let’s work on those.

As far as the scuttlebutt over his leaving, I’ve heard rumors from the beginning that we don’t know the whole picture. Rumors like Thompson wanted Favre out and even went so far as to yell and scream in the locker room in front of the team that he wanted him to retire. He wanted his newly drafted boy Rodgers in, and he didn’t want the fan backlash of having to cut or trade Favre. One of the announcers even alluded to this during the game. Part of making Favre “the enemy” is done by media to help get the fans riled up for their team. I’m confident that in time the truth will come out little by little. But in the meantime? Seriously – let it go. It’s done now. It’s like breaking up with a boyfriend. Wish him the best, mean it, and move on. You’ll be so much happier if you did.

As a side note, thanks so much to the folks at Female Shopper.com for listing my EveryJoe sports column one of the top female blogs on the Internet.

It was a lovely day except for the Packer loss today. I actually had some hope that we might pull it out, but that was foolish fan logic and nothing more. Still, it’s nice to know that Brett Favre not only comes back to Lambeau and kicks our butts but also ties yet another NFL record (that of the most games throwing four or more touchdowns. He tied Dan Marino today.)

Not surprisingly there were a smattering of both boos and cheers for Favre. Also not surprising was the overconfidence of the Packers. Didn’t I just mention this last week? Johnny Jolly costs us deeply with his first quarter illegal headbutt, and Rodgers was on the ground more than he was upright.

Favre was emotional in the end, and no kidding. Personally, I don’t have it in me to hate him. I don’t have it in me to spend too much time thinking about him. He’s a great player, on a great team, and is fun to watch. But what I’d really hoped today was that we would just shut up and play and beat ‘em. Sigh…

Even when we hold Adrian Peterson to low yardage the Vikings still have some major weapons. Speaking of Peterson, did I tell you what my favorite commercial is these days? You’ll understand why in about five seconds. Behold:

Yeah. Nice.

Anywho, I looked over the rest of our schedule. The Vikings have the toughest second half schedule (in my opinion) in our league. We have a very easy schedule and I’m hoping that means we can at least have more wins than losses. That’s what it’s come to people!

Our hamburger soup turned out fabulous and we’ve even got leftovers for the week! Bonus. It’s on to Tampa Bay next week. They are currently 0-7. I’m thinking we should be able to win that one, what do you think?

So let’s rewind: Packers have a bye week, then play the Lions, then the Browns. Lions and Browns are SO BAD it’s ridiculous. What’s worse, at least with the Lions, we didn’t have complete control over the game. (Sigh….) so, a win is a win, and we can’t be picky. So I won’t dwell on the games. (Mark that down on your calendar!)

To keep up with the whole “soup and stew” theme for the games, we made homemade ham and potato soup for the Lions, and Guinness stew for the Browns game. The ham and potato soup is a recipe I tweaked and
just basically make up each time I do it, but for the Guinness stew I started with this recipe from Martha Stewart and then added and subtracted from there. It’s really a wonderful recipe.

This week for the Vikings? I’m making my famous hamburger soup.

Go Pack!