The Sandlot

So yesterday morning I leave my house around 730am to make my weekly hour commute up to the office. The intersection is kinda messed and hard to explain so here's a diagram (the red dots are stop signs). I'm headed west on 104 and I turn left on 93 and head south. Theres no stop sign going that direction but there are stop signs from the other 3 sides.

Theres a guy in a white pick up driving East on 104. He exits off 104 onto the short one way road which vehicles need to go down if they intend on turning south on 93 or continuing on to stone road.

So I make my left and as I'm mid way through the intersection I see said pick up on my right starting to go through the stop sign. As luck would have it he T-bones me on my rear passenger side wheel area.

I pull over and he pulls in behind me and here's where it starts to get interesting. First, the other driver is a guy seemingly my age. We go through the whole "you OK?" routine. Guy then proceeds to tell me that the collision is my fault because I stopped on 104 before turning for traffic or some BS. I just kinda stare at him then go, "uh, no I didn't, and you're the one who has a stop sign, not me." He tries to argue more then suddenly changes his tune as we go check out the damage.

Right above my wheel well is all dented and scratched and his front bumper has no real damage to it other than his license plate being knocked off. Hes like, well we can settle this right here and avoid wasting two hours of our time cause I'm running late for work. Tries telling me that the damage to my car will just buff out then whips out a wad of money and offers me a couple hundred bucks. I'm having none of this and just call the cops so they can come file a report since hes at fault. Afterwards I notice my steering/alignment is also fucked up.

Now I've spent the last 2 days dicking around with insurance companies and only today do I find out that they did determine he was at fault and that Monday I can get my car in the shop for repairs. I just got this car at the end of May. Fuck man.

Tis the season, for pleasin... me.

The NFL regular season opens up tonight as the Colts take on the Saints in what should be a high scoring affair. If there's one thing that can dull the pain brought on by the end of summer it is the beginning of the NFL season. The 2007 season is shaping up to be one hell of a year. A tumultuous off season has created havoc with traditional and conventional wisdom. Teams once thought the be playoff teams or at the least contenders have been left for dead. Teams who were awful last season find themselves on the cusp of post-season births. All this and not a single game has been played.

In addition to the NFL starting tonight, so do the millions of fantasy football leagues around the globe. Not only do I have to pay attention to and cheer for the hometown team, the Bills, but I must also keep track of the 30+ guys on my multiple fantasy teams as I vie for bragging rights and hundreds of dollars. And that's the beauty of the NFL. Combine top quality pros and coaches duking it out for 16+ weeks and the industry of fantasy football and you have months of nail biting jubilation or alternately, humiliation. Try and top that college football!

In my ESPN fantasy league, we have 10 managers, each vying for the top prize of $300 or 2nd or 3rd ($150 and $50 respectively). That's $500 up for grabs for those bad at math. Months of scouting and preparation came to a head a few Mondays ago when we held our annual draft.

This is my 4th season running the ESPN league, but I've been participating in fantasy leagues since high school. I've yet to win anything. This year that's all going to change I think. Upon looking over everyone else's rosters I noticed a trend. Good to great starting rosters, little to no depth. Most teams are 2 injuries away from scrambling to find some 3r string buddies to start for x number of weeks. Then there's my team, Darrell's Subs. Each of the past 3 years I've had good drafts get ripped apart by having no less than 5 of my starters go down with injuries. With that in mind this year, I drafted like a champ I think. My starting line up is good, its probably like 3rd or 4th best, but unlike everyone else, I have many capable backups who are starters on their NFL teams. at this point I can take a couple injury hits and not see a noticeable drop in point production. The fantasy season is a long one and I drafted for the long haul.

I didn't waste the #3 overall pick on Payton Manning instead of getting a stub RB like teddy did. I didn't waste my 2nd and 3rd round picks on an injury prone QB and an unproven 2nd year QB (McNabb and Cutler courtesy of Drew). I didn't draft an injury riddled running back corp or make a #9/#10 RB a #5 pick (santos drafting Rudi J and #5 overall then getting T-hun and T Jones later on). My only questionable move was taking Addai over LJ at the #6 spot. A move that the more I think about it was the right call (though maybe I should have nabbed Alexander instead). Only time will tell.

In any event, the weeks to come will be filled with joy and heartache and I look forward to it all. Hello Fall.