Payoff of paying attention to Florida State

So this crazy football game happened. If you missed it, basically Miami and Florida State went back and forth and Miami came back in the final moments and took the lead. Da U won 38-34.

I hate both teams. Despise them. Like really, the only way for me to win this game as a fan was if both teams lost. But hey, watching FSU isn’t the worst thing in the world with the guy they have under center. Christian Ponder is totally cute, right? It’s not just me? Help me decide.

Hike! Hellooooo Chris Ponder!

Hump Day Hottie/Don’t Judge Me: AJ Burnett

Good morning.

*hides from all Mets fans, some Jays fans, plenty of Yankees fans*

(Incidentally, you don’t need a white horse to steer you back onto course.)

For each one of you that sees the “Read the rest of this entry” link here and doesn’t click on it, a child is taught that Saves are useful statistics and that Derek Jeter is worthy of this year’s All-Star Game start. (So that’s a maybe. But do you really want to risk it?)

I feel so dirty. But I like it.

So I’ve been watching a lot of NBA basketball lately. The Playoffs are actually exciting this year and well there really aren’t any other regularly televised sports that I want to watch. So as I was watching the first game of the Orlando-Detroit second round series and I found myself thinking bad, bad thoughts. Thoughts that I knew I shouldn’t be thinking. Thoughts for which I knew my friends would ridicule me. Thoughts that may very well damn my eternal soul. But there they were, floating around in my brain nonetheless. What should I do about them? Should I divulge these awful thoughts, these vile feelings? Should I let the world in on my dirty little secret? Will I be able to forgive myself for openly admitting to such blasphemous tendencies? I’ll let you be the judge…

Saturday Morning Hate Sex: The Hit Parade

And this’ll about do it for the 2007 season. (Was it good for you?) One day of conference championships and rivalry games, then that’s all, she wrote.

(Programming note: Five Ladies’ teams have wrapped their seasons. If you care to follow along with us, we’ll be glued to Tennessee vs. LSU on CBS at 4:00 Eastern, and Pitt vs. West Fuckin’ Virginia at 7:45 on ESPN.)

I know better than to try and wrap my head around the past three months. (I mean, my boys are about to play for the SEC Championship. The hell?) But there’ll be long months of analysis and head-scratching in the offseason, and we’ve still got games to play. So kick back, pour a drink, and enjoy a little afternoon delight with the finest of the season’s hate sex recipients…gentlemen we’d love to hit, in one fashion or another.

Saturday Morning Hate Sex

I have a confession to make, for those of you who’ve stuck with this feature all this time. It’s been a source of much discussion, caused a couple of you gentlemen to inexplicably criticize my housekeeping, and it’s time to know the truth: That is not my bedroom, over there to your left. I Googled “unmade bed” the day I started this series and the rest is history. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. (That said, I do love the sheets, and I’d kill a man for those shelves.)

Home stretch, girls. And what a ride. If there’s one comfort we can take into bowl season, it’s that the number of upsets and disasters is such that no one’s humiliation remains front page news for long.

(If there’s a second comfort, it’s that we get pretty faces and forearms of boys marginally too young for us to ogle before soldiering on the following week.)

Lean with me, rock with me, jump with me:

Saturday Morning Hate Sex

Not a bad week for us here at Ladies, all told. To review:

Rutgers rolling over Army in primetime. Iowa holding on for bowl eligibility. Tennessee putting serious hurt on Arkansas at home. Texas rolling through a shootout with Texas Tech.

Those two losses, though? Ouchtown, population: us, and we never saw it coming.

No one could’ve predicted Clemson would field a viable football team this year…least of all Wake Forest, playing like I-AA imitations of their former ACC Champion selves. Sorry, Cousin J-Money–at least you had the big WFV win for solace.

Same for SA and Michigan…unlike Clemson they’ve been sleepwalking all season, but who knew Wisconsin would pick Week 11 to start playing football? (But who’ll remember this if they beat Ohio State?)

Let’s send our two lovely Ladies on their way to bigger and better things this week with some eminently beddable boys from the opposite sideline:

Saturday Morning Hate Sex

The season is waning!  This year has simply flown by in a haze of ludicrous upsets and marquee comebacks.  And it finally feels like fall, even in southern California.  Perfect day to curl up with a good book, a glass of wine, and reflect on the changes of the past year chain one of your most attractive nemeses to the bed and commence to forgetting your worries.  Bit of a nail-biting weekend for us last week…of the seven Ladies’ teams playing, we had two three-point margins of victory (Texas and Pitt), a four-point win (Michigan), and a one-point loss (Wake). We were 5-2 on the week, and that’s something to celebrate, particularly in 2007, the Year of the What The Hell. It’s Saturday morning, though….time to go from nail bites to neck bites.

Welcome to the weekend, dear readers.  Let’s get it on….after the jump:

Saturday Morning Hate Sex

Last week saw the rarest of Saturdays for college football in 2007: A day where half the top ten wasn’t unceremoniously disassembled by less-than-deserving squads. The weekend was not without nail-biting, however, as two Ladies’ teams played games into overtime (Tennessee and Iowa), two won by merely a field goal against teams they should’ve put away handily (Tennessee and Texas), and two suffered devastating losses (Pitt because they were So!Close!; Rutgers because it was never close, At All).

We spent so much of the summer in giddy anticipation of the season, only to be knocked on our collective asses week in and week out by the madcappery of upset after upset after upset…and now, with the closing of the year on the horizon, you know you’d do it all over again. And by “do it”, I mean “bed gentlemen of the opposing team to banish the sting of defeat”. Let’s hit it.

Saturday Morning Hate Sex

THAT’ll teach me to play nice. The Scarlet Knights, Panthers, Longhorns, Demon Deacons, and Wolverines all benefited from a little TLC…but serial heartbreakers the Hawkeyes and Volunteers are bound and determined to drive Andie and me to drink. (To more drink. Yes, that’s saying a lot.) If there’s one upside, it’s this: It’s 2007, and so far this season, both Iowa and Tennessee have avoided being the jaw-dropping SportsCenter-leadoff Crushing Defeat Of The Century Of The Week. There’s enough ridiculosity to ensure we’re not the story. Does that lessen the pain of my trip to Tuscaloosa last week? It does not, but I comfort myself with the knowledge that it could be so much worse…and with the pretty boys all in a row, after the jump.

Saturday Morning Hate Sex: Kiss and Make Up

Last week, on SMS: I look forward to the day when no Saturday Morning Hate Sex post will be necessary. When every Lady’s team finds themselves on the shiny happy end of the scoreboard…

Last week, on the field: Tennessee, Texas, Wake Forest, Michigan, Rutgers, and Iowa, victors all. [Pause while I stare in wonderment at my own hands and wish very, very hard for a pony.] So this morning, let’s leave the handcuffs in the bottom drawer. No frustrations to grind out, just the sweet memory of triumph and the fervent hope for another win.

No, I’d like to use this morning for makeup sex. My boys came through for me last week in a big way, and one in particular is finally reminding me why I loved him in the first place.

Saturday Morning Hate Sex

I look forward to the day when no Saturday Morning Hate Sex post will be necessary. When every Lady’s team finds themselves on the shiny happy end of the scoreboard, and no one’s star quarterback weeps. On ESPN. In primetime. In HD. (Attention, Mister Tebow: I, too, hit the waterworks when the battle goes ill for my boys. I am, however, A Girl, and not a Division I blue-chipper. Take it like a man:  Bottle up your emotions until you snap years down the road in a series of unrelated incidents.)

*ahem*

Where was I? Right. In an orderly, usual season, we might have seen that day already. A day when the Ladies can kick back with a cocktail, bask in the glow of victory, and never once have to hiss, “Catch the GODDAMN BALL” at their television screens. But this is no kind of normal season, and it’s not even halfway over, and already we’re all carrying scars.

But no matter who prevails, we’re still coming out on top. Let’s get our healing on, after the jump.

Saturday Morning Hate Sex

Oh. Oh, last week sucked. (Hush your filthy mind; that’s after the jump.) Fifty percent of the Ladies saw their beloved college teams fall. Of course, we were in good company…everyone who’s anyone was on the losing end of the scoreboard. The top 25 is full of pretenders and upstarts. Chaos reigns, and I’m not just talking about my twisted sheets. I’ve been battling the nervous giggles of survivor’s guilt since Saturday night–my Vols had their usual bye date bumped up two weeks this year and I’m ridiculously grateful.

But it’s a new day. A new week. And if the college football gods are off their bender, a return to some semblance of order and right. Let’s take this morning to wipe the slate clean, and get down and dirty with our vanquishers. Join us, won’t you?

Saturday Morning Hate Sex

Can it be we’re a month into the season already? That’s a lot of ticks on the scoreboard. A lot of swigs from smuggled flasks. A lot of stolen kisses in the quad, and a lot of notches on our bedposts from our Saturday morning purge romps.

Most of the Ladies’ teams had good outings, but Andrea’s Iowa Hawkeyes fell in a tooth-and-nail slugfest to Wisconsin…and two weeks later, it’s time to move past Florida and the throttling they handed down to my Tennessee Vols. Get comfy, boys, I’ll want to be on top for this.