Justice is finally served...with some turkey

I hope everyone had a great Bird Day. Mine was good, although Cleveland is still Cleveland. Proud of my roots, glad I don't live there. A couple of quick highlights:

Wednesday Night
Congratulations to my cousins Neil and Bryan for taking first and second in the "Second Annual Thanksgiving Week Poker Game in Dale's Awesome Basement." Extra kudos for Neil as he finished 2nd last year as well. Of course, last year was a much more dramatic final two as a buddy of mine from high school, Demas, came from behind to win despite being down 999-1 in chip count. That is not a joke. For the second consecutive year I received no help from the Poker Gods. Despite only winning one hand and receiving no better than pocket nines all night, I somehow managed to not finish last (6th, actually.)

Thursday
A strange Thanksgiving Day this year as the "traditional" family wasn't with us until after dinner. We had dinner with my step-mom's, step-mom's family. Strange, I know. Then we played some more poker and Bryan and his fiance took the place down.

Friday
It was good to see some of the rest of the people I never get to hang out with because they live in C-town and I live in Chi-town. An especially good time was had with Vinny and Graham. We went to Cleats in North Royalton for some wings and a couple beers and then we were driving Graham home when I received a phone call from the Little Brown Buddy saying he was downtown on W. 6th. After doubling back a la Clint Eastwood for Vinny's parking lot key, we drove downtown and parked in the back lot at Tequila Ranch. By far the coolest hook-up Vinny has come up with in the 15+ years that I've known him.

Saturday
Spent the day at church with my dad, my uncle and Mr. Szakacs setting up the lighting for the Christmas Madrigal (a play we have put on for years that I was actually in the main cast for during my only appearance in the thing.) Then I drove back to Chicago and spent some time in the 'burbs with my buddy Hacksaw.

Sunday
Hung out with Hacksaw and his girlfriend Claudia (although the picture is actually him with our friend Angie in college.) They were in town from Houston, so we paid a visit to Chicago's own Ed Debevics. Ed's is a 50's type dinner where the wait staff all play roles such as "the prom queen" and "letter sweater guy" and they treat you like crap. The more I think about it, I would be great at that job. I don't think Claudia or Hacksaw's dad were very amused.

But, the best thing that happened on Sunday had to be the unveiling of the new AP and Coaches Polls in college football. The Ohio State Buckeyes were moved up to 6th in both rankings despite having already finished their regular season because the Drunken Irish of Notre Dame played like crap and barely survived at Stanford. Pathetic that it took until week 14 for them to get this right, but at least it's done.

However, I still don't think the Irish should be 7th! Upon further review, Oregon's schedule isn't really any tougher than ND's, but I would still make the case that the SEC isn't getting much love over the past two years. I think Auburn is getting low-balled at #9 and Georgia and Alabama are also underrated at #13 and #14 respectively.

Also, I still have a problem with the order of the teams ranked 3-5. LSU's loss, despite the effects that Katrina may have had on it, is much worse than Penn State and Virginia Tech's losses. Later today the BCS rankings will be revealed and hopefully this will paint a clearer picture. Until then, here is my top 15:

1. USC
2. Texas
3. Penn State
4. Virginia Tech
5. LSU
6. Ohio State
7. Auburn
8. Oregon
9. Miami (FL)
10. Georgia
11. Notre Dame
12. Alabama
13. West Virginia
14. UCLA
15. TCU