anticipation – Uncle Crappy

March 19, 2021March 19, 2021

FKOAUCNFFC (BTYBPP*) tip off.

Sister Jean says it’s go time. And we never argue with Sister Jean.

Because you never argue with a Chicago nun.

But we don’t need to be afraid of Sister Jean — or of rogue yardsticks: There is championship basketball on our screens and the Fourteenth Kind Of Annual Uncle Crappy NCAA Final Four Challenge (Brought To You By Piper’s Pub*) is underway.

As I do every year, this is the post where our picks are revealed and we all begin the painful public shame and humiliation of sports prognostication — and for one lucky contestant, never-ending glory and $50 for drinks and food at the legendary Piper’s Pub. So — who ya got?

As is tradition, we begin with Yours Truly:

Gonzaga and Michigan on one side of the bracket and Houston and … wait for it … Ohio State on the other. Title game is the Zags and my Buckeyes. And the champion? Gonzaga is this season’s Team Of Destiny — but the Buckeyes are winning the title. And they’ll win by a score of 74-68.

Next we have the contestant I’m rooting for: Mrs. Crappy:

Gonzaga vs. Alabama, Purdue vs. Illinois. Illinois beats the Zags for the championship, 82-79.

And now, the rest of yinz guys, pretty much in no particular order:

Strang, who isn’t rolling with her hometown Bonnies:

Final Four: Houston, Texas, Iowa, Ohio State. Championship Game: Houston vs. Texas Winner: Houston (80-77)

Morgantown Socialist Joe:

Final Four: Gonzaga, BYU, Arkansas, West Virginia National Championship: Gonzaga, West Virginia Winner: Gonzaga Tiebreaker: 136

Ex-Pat Pittsburgh Girl, Esq.:

My FKOAUCNFFC (BTYBPP*) picks as selected by pulling my sweet sixteen selections out of a hat: Final Four: Baylor v. WVU, Kansas v. Texas Semi-finals: Kansas v. WVU National Champion: WVU

Aunt Annoyed Angel, who’s been doing this for as long as I have:

Ok, here goes. Final 4: Gonzaga/Alabama, Ohio State/Tennessee. Final 2: Alabama v Ohio State. Winner: Alabama. 73-68I’m well aware that one side of my bracket is very family & personal preference influenced… I just couldn’t get past it no matter how I tried.

And this is a first in the long and storied history of AUCNFFC: Entries from an entire family: AAA’s sister Lianne and the kids who bestowed upon AAA that first A: C and G Haviland.

Lianne:

Ok- here is my info- Final four- Oregon, Baylor, Alabama, Illinois Champ game: Illinois vs Baylor Champion: Illinois (75-68)

Miss C:

final four: Gonzaga, Baylor, Colorado, Houston. Champ game- Gonzaga vs Baylor. Champion- Gonzaga (83-79).

Mister G:

final four- Gonzaga, Baylor, LSU, TN. Champ game: TN vs Gonzaga. Champion- Gonazaga (87-82)

My question for AAA and Lianne: Do the kids have to take you guys out for dinner if one of them wins?

Next up: Cleveland Kelsey, who is as much of a homer as your Uncle Crappy:

FKOAUCNFFC (BTYBPP*)! Final Four: Ohio State, M!ch!g@n, Iowa, West Virginia. OSU/scUM in the championship. OSU wins 72-71

Red Buppy:

Gonzaga over Michigan. West Virginia over Villanova. Gonzaga 71, West Virginia 63. (If this looks like I haven’t paid any attention to college basketball this season, it’s because I haven’t.)

Kewyson, who apparently discovered brevity somewhere between 2019 and 2021:

With Covid rules in play, one never knows – but I stuck with the tried and true (and no Duke Blue) –
M*ch*gan / Iowa – with the Team up North prevailing
Illinois / Baylor – with Illinois coming through with the win
Final victor goes to Illinois – 87 – 83

Styx 4 Curl Girl, another contestant who’s been doing this for a very long time:

Final four: Gonzaga vs. Alabama, Ohio St. vs. Houston
Championship: Alabama vs. Ohio St.
Champion: Alabama
Tie Breaker: 78-72

Good luck everyone!

What does Chachi say? Chachi Says:

Gonzaga v Texas
Houston v Baylor

Final
Gonzaga v Baylor

Gonzaga 86-79

No Cardinals and no Panthers? No problem for Calipanthergrl:

I have watched like 20 minutes of MCBB this entire season. But I’m in! Here are my entirely laughable picks: USC/Michigan & Syracuse/Purdue. Michigan/Purdue. Michigan (84-73)

My #CnCShow partner Carla knows college football. Does she know college hoops as well?

Gonzaga / Alabama Baylor / Illinois Gonzaga / Illinois Illinois wins 82-78

And, for the record, I have Ohio in the Sweet 16.

Hey, me too!

Next up is Dudders, the baddest woman in all of Pittsburgh:

I would like to join that basketball event you host each year! I like to randomly pick teams and not do any research. Final Four: Purdue, WVU, Gonzaga, Alabama. Final Two: Gonzaga and Purdue. Gonzaga❤️

She added in a subsequent message that her tiebreaker is 91-88.

My former colleague North Coast Matt:

Final Four:
Gonzaga, Alabama, Houston, Illinois
Championship
Gonzaga vs. Houston
Champion
Gonzaga
total combined score: 157

Your defending AUCNFFC champ, the Sports Chump:

Against my better judgment, I’m going chalk. Give me all number one seeds in the Final Four.

Illinois, Gonzaga, Baylor and Michigan with Gonzaga beating Baylor in the final game 82-67.

But what do I know?

Pgh Rugby Ref has taken over Kewyson’s claim to the most-verbose contestant each year:

The day the brackets came out I completed one quickly, without any research or thought (other than no number 1s in the Final Four). After I looked at my selections, I figured there was no chance of winning (hell, I might even Blutarsky). All week I had the intention of putting in some effort for a real bracket (I’m sure you know about intentions and what road it paves). It’s a little more than an hour before deadline, and no extra work has gone into selections, so you get my original choices:
Virginia over Colorado
West Virginia over Arkansas
Virginia
Final score total 124

A blast from the past: M Fulk:

Hey, why not?

Final Four: Kansas vs. Alabama, Purdue vs. West Virginia
Championship: Alabama vs. Purdue
Champion: Alabama
Tie Breaker: 80-85

Spoon, on behalf of his basketball-playing boys:

Kids picked this one. I’ll think about getting them Piper’s if we win.

Final Four: Gonzaga vs. Alabama, Ohio St. vs. Clemson
Championship: Alabama vs. Ohio St.
Champion: Ohio St.
Tie Breaker: 77-75

Susan, who did, in fact, get in just under the wire:

Hopefully getting in under the wire: Iowa, Michigan, Ohio St, Ilinois. Michigan/Ohio St. Michigan. 151. Please do not reject based on my winner.

Dish, who is an actual person and not a restaurant on the South Side:

Gonzaga over Alabama, Illinois over Arkansas. Gonzaga over Illinois, 83-77. I did at least 90 seconds of research for this!

My Penn State friends are partial to hockey and football, but TraiLion paid more attention to the Lions’ hoops season this year than she would probably admit. Her picks:

Ohio State over Illinois, Iowa over Michigan, Iowa over Ohio State (sorry). 112 points.

The lion’s spouse JCK158:

Gonzaga over FSU, Baylor over Illinois, Gonzaga over Baylor, 158.

It’s excellent when you guys provide me with your own nicknames. Right, Scooter (38 seconds from being defending champions)?

Gonzaga, Alabama, Baylor and Illinois
Gonzaga and Baylor
Baylor
150
F the Mutant Twins

As to Scooter’s final comment: If you know, you know.

And finally, we have Juan, oh he of little basketball knowledge. He is entered each and every year against his will (or, at least, without his awareness); I couldn’t find picks from Phil’s Mom, so we’re going with the virtual version of the Penny-Flipping Method — ESPN’s random bracket generator. And while it’s not going to win him a damn thing, I’m going to be pulling for these picks anyway:

To be clear, this is my Bobcats vs. Texas Southern on one side and Purdue vs. Liberty on the other. And in what would be a championship matchup for the ages, Purdue will beat OU in the title game. And no, I’m not picking a tiebreaker. C’mon now.

And there you go, boys and girls. I have to say that I’m disappointed that I didn’t get any TikTok entries; that might be a thing we’ll work on for 2022. As is always the case, if I missed your entry, it’s nothing personal — I’m just an idiot. Let me know and I’ll add you to the list. Let’s all enjoy the hell out of the hoopage. And good luck to everyone. Especially me Mrs. Crappy.

September 15, 2020

comfort. italian style.

It’s been a decade or more since we’ve had a functioning oven in our house. As it turns out, finding a replacement 24-inch gas wall oven is significantly more difficult — and more expensive — than one might expect.

Much of the time, I don’t miss it. And by “much of the time,” I mean I don’t miss it in the summer, when I would be hesitant to turn it on anyway. The rest of the year, though, can be tough. I would totally bake cookies in December if I could. Having an oven could have improved my first crack at smoking a brisket earlier this year. And as the weather starts to cool off, my brain immediately starts craving things I can’t make — casseroles, baked ziti, stuffed shells … and lasagna.

Necessity is the mother of excessive kitchen toys, and at some point a few years back, my craving for lasagna drove me to the internet in search of a solution. And the internet told me that our crock pot could help.

I’ve tinkered with the original recipe to the point that it’s no longer derivative — it’s pretty much my own. And since you guys asked:

What you’ll need:

Olive oil

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 large onion, diced

2 jars of spaghetti sauce

1 small can of tomato paste

1 pound of ground beef

1 pound of ground sweet Italian sausage

1 box of lasagna noodles

15 oz tub of ricotta

About 3 cups of shredded mozzarella

About 2 cups of shredded parm

Spices: Italian seasoning, dried basil, dried oregano, parsley flakes, thyme, red pepper flakes, salt, black pepper, and a bay leaf

Sugar to taste

What you’ll do:

Dump the cheeses in a mixing bowl and stir until all three are combined evenly. Set aside.
Brown the meats in a skillet, breaking up the large pieces as you go. Drain the fat and set aside.
Sweat the garlic and onions in enough olive oil to coat the bottom of a sauce pan. Add the jars of sauce and the seasonings. You’ll add about a tablespoon of each of the spices except salt and black pepper — add just a little of those. Drop in a bay leaf and let it simmer for a half hour. When time’s up, remove the bay leaf, add a little sugar to suit your personal taste and once you’ve got it down, add the meat. I’ll simmer this for a bit too, although with hours to come in the slow cooker, it’s probably not necessary.
Haul out your crock pot and get ready to layer. You’ll go in this order: meat, noodles and cheese, and you’ll have enough stuff to repeat that for three layers. Note that the noodles are just straight out of the box; break them up to fit a full layer each time. The crock pot will take care of cooking them.
Cook on low for four or five hours.

When you’re done, cut out a wedge of lasagna and drop it on your plate. If you’re lucky, you’ll have one whole side of that wedge kind of brown and crisp like those ridiculous brownie pans that are arranged so every piece is an end piece. Make a salad, open a bottle of red wine and go to town.

No oven necessary.

July 17, 2017July 18, 2017

old bike. old guy.

When I finished up with my Army-sponsored field trip of Bavaria and was getting ready to return to Athens, I got myself a present: a new mountain bike for riding between my apartment at West State and Shaffer and OU’s campus.

I’ve never done much actual mountain biking, but my 26-year-old purple Giant Butte (known at my local bike shop at the Giant Purple Butt) continues to be reliable. It’s mostly for recreation these days, but I appreciate the fact that the creaky old guy and his creaky old bike still have many miles left.

Both of us creaky oldsters are riding on Sunday, but not strictly for pleasure. We’re participating in the 16-mile portion of the Tour De Cure Pittsburgh, a ride to raise money for the American Diabetes Association. The ride takes place outside of Butler, on the hilly roads between the Big Butler Fairgrounds and Lake Arthur Country Club.

You guys know already that I have type 2 diabetes; that’s not really why I’m A) riding or B) asking you for a donation. I’m riding because this year is different. None of us has any idea what health insurance policy will look like by the end of this year, but there’s an excellent chance that me and my fellow diabetics could be facing the restoration of coverage limits, of premiums that jump because of our preexisting condition … or maybe being denied coverage altogether. And the potential scope of the problem — 30 million people in the United States have been diagnosed with diabetes and another 86 million have been identified as pre-diabetic — is horrifying.

What’s the solution? A better option than waiting on the 2018 midterm elections is to find better treatment options right now. To better educate people about the disease, its causes and how the risk can be mitigated right now. To find a cure … right now.

I don’t want to leave these problems in the hands of people to whom they are abstract policy bullet points. So I’m asking you to donate — right now. Click here to get to my donor page; you’ll need just a couple minutes and a couple bucks to help solve this problem for ourselves.

And me and my creaky, old Giant Purple Butt will be honored to ride on Sunday on your behalf. Thanks.

June 26, 2017June 27, 2017

take the ride.

You guys will recall that I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes two summers ago.

You may also recall that I wasn’t especially happy about it.

Since then, it’s been kind of a struggle. I did really well early on, but recently I’ve been a bit lazy, especially about running … even though it was a big reason why my A1C dropped a bunch from my initial test to my second one.

Recently, though, I’ve discovered a new motivation for getting back to the things I was doing well in the first year after my diagnosis. And that motivation is coming from Congress.

Yes. Really. Let me explain.

I am fortunate. I have pretty good health insurance. The deductibles are higher than I would like, but overall, the coverage has been excellent, particularly for someone with a chronic condition like mine. Prescription coverage in particular has been helpful. I pick up a mess of pills, insulin, needles and other fun stuff every month; if not for my insurance, I would have quickly gone broke trying to keep up.

This isn’t the case for everyone. My coverage is a luxury, and those who have a more bare bones insurance policy might struggle to keep up. And depending on what happens in Washington this summer, that problem might become even bigger. If health insurance “reform” is adopted in its current form, 22 million people who are currently covered would lose their insurance. And if any of those folks are paying for the same Lantus, the same Metformin, the same Farxiga and the same testing supplies I’m paying for, they’re going to be in trouble.

Potentially, it gets worse. The House version of the bill would end requirements that those with preexisting conditions must be covered without penalty. That means an insurance company could, for example, double or triple my premiums because I have diabetes; it also means they could just flat out drop me.

And that’s just me. The American Diabetes Association estimates that there are nearly 30 million people — adults and kids — in this country who have diabetes. Another 86 million have been identified as pre-diabetic. If a good share of those people see their premiums skyrocket — or if they lose their coverage altogether — we’ll have a full-blown crisis on our hands.

Obviously, there is a political discussion to be had here, but I’m more concerned with what I can do now, outside of whatever happens with the various health-care bills in Washington. And what I can do now is raise a little money. I can contribute to efforts that will educate people about what diabetes is and how it can be prevented. I can help ensure that treatment methods are effective and efficient.

And I can help fund research that eventually will find a cure.

On July 23, I’m going on a bike ride with Tour de Cure Pittsburgh, on a course just a bit north of Butler. I’m taking the short ride, the 15-miler, mostly because I used to live there and I know exactly how hilly that part of Butler County is:

cure ride — Check out the elevation graph. Ouch.

Not a super long ride. But trust me, I’ll earn whatever money you decide to throw my way.

See how I snuck that pitch in there? Heh.

I need your help. I have to raise $200 to be able to participate in the ride. I think I can do that without much trouble, but I’d really like to double that total. And do it before July 23, which is not quite a month away. And if you have a few dollars to spare — and a minute or so as well — you can help me reach that goal by visiting here.

Remember — this isn’t for me. I’m doing OK. This is to make sure that the millions of people who have diabetes have the access to treatments they need. It’s to help others understand what they can do to avoid getting it in the first place. And, at some point soon, it will be to develop a way to fix it once and for all.

Again, please click here to donate. And thank you. <3