A Letter to the NFL Replacement Refs

by Brian Heissenbuttel

To the fine gentlemen acting as the NFL’s replacement refs:

           

            First off, I want to congratulate you. Not everyone gets a magical note that allows them to abandon their current, meaningless life of hard labor at Party City or Dick’s Sporting Goods. You are a lucky, elite group of men who live their lives in their parents’ attic and play five hours of Madden every day. (If you haven’t beaten the Saints while playing as the Browns yet, you don’t deserve to make that claim)

            Second, why do you want all the mainstream teams to miraculously fail at the start of the season? The last time I remember the Seahawks having a winning record was…um…before my generation. Yeah. I do believe the Packers are good enough to squish the Seahawks. But you stubborn, biased, or just plain stupid referees decided to make things interesting. I’ve never seen a worse array of penalty calls. Defensive holding, pass interference (or lack of such), offside, and roughing the passer. This is football. People get boo-boos all the time and they don’t need to be defended with a 15-yard bandage.

            I don’t know how the normal refs feel about this. Those who are mostly concerned about their salaries were probably watching Week 3 with smug expressions based on all the dreadful calls. (If you didn’t hear, they were screaming bullshit after each bad call in Baltimore) The other bunch is sickened by the way these abominations of men are destroying the fiber of the NFL. Roger Goodell, you may not be losing money by the bucketful yet, but I guarantee by the end of the regular season you will have to trade in your 90” plasma TV for a 70”. Times are tough. At least you came to your senses soon.

            Finally, as a note to all NFL personnel, why did you choose this group of misfits for this extremely important role? This isn’t Bad News Bears. You need well-qualified people at each position for an industry as big as this. If you didn’t see death threats from disgruntled fans as a possibility, then you really need to focus your binoculars.

            I thank the people who finally decided that this had gone far enough. The fans will enjoy the rest of the season. I think we can all agree that if the kicker did not have two feet and an elbow in bounds, then the fumble was NOT wide left.

A Guy Thing: A girl's response to Borderlands 2

photo by Kristina Hagman

By Kristina Hagman

Borderlands 2 just came out! Borderlands 2? I’ve never heard of Borderlands 1! This is the kind of thing I hear about every time my guy friends and I spend time together. Videogames this, videogames that. And maybe a bit about the latest football game.
“Hey, you should come over and play Call of Duty with us sometime,” they invite. Guns? Killing people, however imaginary? No thanks.
As girls, this is not something we enjoy. Most girls would much rather spend their weekends laughing with girlfriends and shopping, not cramped up in a dark basement with simulated guns firing and blood spurting everywhere.
If girls can navigate the streets of Mario Kart with acceptable fluidity, we congratulate ourselves on the feat, and think nothing of the fact that a harder level will knock us out in the first seconds. After this achievement, we will continue onto something worth our time, like our hair.
Boys do not think this way. They have to be the best of the best of the best when it comes to the games they are playing. If they are not on the highest level of Borderlands, which happens to be 69, they are doing something wrong. If they do not have the best weapon that can kill the most people, they are doing something wrong. If they cannot race their car at least three seconds faster than the rest of the group, they are doing something wrong.
Where does this sense of competition come from? It is a well-known fact that men are naturally competitive. The nature of life causes them to show off, in hopes that they will snag a worthy female. But never have you heard, “I’m really into this guy, he has such a profound skill when it comes to gaming!” Never.
And what are the positive aspects of videogames? Hand-eye coordination? How to defend your house in the event of a zombie apocalypse? Unless mutant aliens invade our planet, or some other anomaly happens, these strategies will never help.
Girls don’t see the point of videogames. Recently, my brother decided to go over to his friend’s house, just to play a new one. That is a strange way of hanging out with someone. Laughing and talking and getting to know each other is a much more preferable method.
I’m not say that girls are superior. I’m just saying that you’re not going to find a group of girls yelling at a TV, shooting virtual enemies and killing as many people as possible. We realize that this activity is pointless, and would find a better way to spend time.
Naturally, many guys will argue that they enjoy playing videogames because it’s a way to get their competitiveness out. You could do that playing football, or soccer, or even chess if you’re that kind of person. And, to be honest, men playing sports are about one-hundred times more attractive than someone who sits in front of a screen battling away. What do you have to lose?
So even though the release of a new videogame might be synonymous to the release of a much-anticipated movie, keep the hype to yourselves. Borderlands 2 might be exciting to you, but you might as well be speaking gibberish to me. Is that about the state lines? Maybe it’s about Cuba! The level with the sky falling was really hard, I need to be a 69 to do it well!
I guess it’s just a guy thing.