Top 30 Most Listened to Songs - DELAY

I know you all want to see the list. Hell, I want to see it, too. It's a tradition.

Unfortunately, my computer's motherboard died on Sunday, and despite my best efforts, I've not been able to revive it. Since the results are all kept on said computer, the big 'Top 30' post is delayed until I can bring it back to life.

Since the movies were all queued up anyway, we'll go on to them with no delay.

Let's Make This Place Look Not Awful

For the first time since I moved from Xanga to Blogspot six and a half years ago, I switched up the color and template. I still prefer the dark background/light text scheme, but I've made it so that the template is a little wider, and all of the sidebar stuff is on one side, instead of two. This means that there will be less scrolling, and I think it just looks better (unless you have a tiny monitor, in which case it'll be a little wonky).

Let's Get This Party Started

So, it's been a while since I did anything with this space. I don't really do any sorts of reviews anymore (maybe in 2013), the last couple of seasons of Spookymilk Survivor haven't been of the writing variety (I might do writeups on some of the current All Star challenges, we'll see), and the awesome lists that I was doing have concluded.

The most obvious answer is to start up another kickass list, of course!

Starting  on January 2nd, I'll be counting down my 100 favorite scenes/moments in movies. If this sounds like a good idea, it's because it most certainly is. Once a weekday, every weekday, I'll share another scene or moment or piece from a movie that I find just a little bit better than the one from the preceding day. It'll be great.

How will this be better than the video game list, you wonder?

* This whole thing is already written and scheduled. That doesn't mean that it'll be proofread any better than the video game list, but there won't be week long chunks where I basically tell my readers to go screw themselves.

* One list, not two. Remember how there were two lists before? Well, this time there's only one. How is this better, you might ask? A little thing called consistency.

* Better handling of things the fact that I'm going to be watching awesome things while the list is ongoing. When I made the video game list, I purposefully left some spots open. My line of thinking was that as I played awesome new video games, they'd certainly merit spots on the list, and so I should leave space open for them. That was stupid and if I hadn't played and loved the ever-living shit out of Chrono Trigger, it would've been disastrous. I won't be doing that this time. Instead, this list is solidified, and if I watch Troy and think that that one scene with Eric Bana deserves mention, I'll mention it in its own post around where I think that scene would've shown up (think of it as a sort of 10 vs. 10a type of thing).

So here's how this thing is going to work.

1. Tomorrow I'm going to post the list framework. For now, it'll just look like a big set of numbers (1 to 100). As I reveal more of the list, it'll fill up, and each entry on the list will have a link back to it for ease of use (that's another way this list will be better. I should've put that up above).

2. Starting Monday - and continuing once a day til Friday - I'm going to reveal some scenes that are interesting or noteworthy, but didn't make the list for one reason or another.

3. Starting December 24th, I'm going to do my annual music roundup.

4. Starting December 2nd, the list proper begins. It doesn't end for MONTHS.

Are you excited? Let me tell you, you're not nearly excited enough.

Top 50: Meta - Just How Hard Are These Games?

Since it was asked (about 15 seconds ago, by the looks of things). Here's my scale for 1-10 video game difficulty. Keep in mind, I never meant for this to be a cut and dried scale. Also, I'm generally talking about the main game, not those insane sidequests. Kingdom Hearts rates about a 5, beating Sephiroth in the arena would rank much higher.

1 -  Nonexistant challenge. The game practically beats itself. Generally games this easy simply aren't enjoyable, as there's no challenge whatsoever.
examples: The first few levels of Tetris (you know... the really slow ones that you always skip because you're sitting there the entire time wishing the damn game would hurry up, already). Most games made for children under the age of 5.

2 - Pitifully easy. The game technically doesn't just lie down and ask you to beat it, but it still doesn't go very far beyond "interactive movie".
examples: Most 'casual' games (Plants vs. Zombies springs to mind),

3 - Pretty damned easy. You will be able to play straight through, only replaying the occasional challenge.
examples: Tony Hawk games, Most FPS' on lower difficulties, Super Mario Brothers II (with the obvious exception of Triclyde).

4 - Chill. Most games eventually find there way to somewhere between here and 6 with enough practice (even Megaman gets to be easy once you've got in completely memorized..........or so I hear).
examples: Most JRPGs spring to mind. I'm not talking about those crazy side missions where you have to kill a 900,000,000 HP monster in forty-five seconds using only a toothpick. I'm talking about the standard quests, normal grinding... that sort of thing.

5 - Perfectly average. The game neither falls at your feet begging for mercy nor beats you mercilessly over the head until you melt the cartridge down and mold it into an obelisk of torment.
examples: lots and lots and lots, but Knights of the Old Republic comes to mind right now for some reason. That game always seemed like a pretty good balance between "ah, i'm kicking ass" and "ah, I died".

6 -Slightly Harder. You'll die. Sometimes you'll die a lot, but there will never be that point where you simply get stuck.
examples: Diablo II, Bioshock, Vectorman, Scott Pilgirm: The Game

7 - Challenging. There will be segments of this game that you will get stuck on for a while. Never so challenging that it becomes a drudge. Probably my favorite difficulty level.
examples: Devil May Cry, Most SNES-style platformers (Donkey Kong Country, etc), Frequency

8 - Old school NES-style punishing. Throwbacks to back in the day when a game made you earn the crappy little "you win" ending cutscene.
examples: Most Contra games, Splosion Man, VVVVVV, Gauntlet (single player)

9 - Brutal Difficulty. There are points where I'm unsure I can beat the game, but with enough time and effort, it eventually becomes doable.
examples: most FPS' on their highest difficulty (I don't like playing FPS' on their highest difficulty), most of the earlier Megaman games

10 - Unfair difficulty. I'm reasonably convinced that I can't beat these games without cheating.
examples: NES Ninja Gaiden Games, Ikaruga, Battletoads (btw, fuck Battletoads), I Wanna Be the Guy

It's Happening (Again)

Life has been crazy, and The Lists have fallen behind - and that's awful.

Starting Monday, that ends. I'm not going to make up for lost time, so the presumed end date is going to change to... I dunno, sometime in February, I think? However, we're going back to an entry from each list on both Monday and Friday.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled nailbiting while we wait for SPooky and DK to judge this week's challenge,

Real Life Can Be So Annoying Sometimes

Between work, golfing (poorly), salsa making (pretty damn well, thank you), and a host of other nonsense, I've been left with precious few minutes to formulate thoughts on video games.

To hell with that noise.

Tonight, you get the next entry in the video game list (number 33 - Big Rigs Over the Road Racing!, and starting tomorrow, it goes down on the 'once a week' schedule. BANK ON IT (actually don't, because I'm notoriously flaky when it comes to these, but I'm serious, I really do hope to keep up with this now).

How Incredibly Meta of Me

I’ve added “share” buttons to the bottom of my posts. You can do… various different things now. Most interestingly, with the +1 button (which feeds directly into the swanky newish Google+), you can share with the world just how much you loved Entry #12 on my video game list (which would be, of course, Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing).
Since I’m loathe to give you an all-text entry, here’s an XKCD joke.

Not Dead

Just vacationing. I wrote some stuff about the Twins that I may or may not share, but that’s not the point here. I’m here to talk about pointless list making.

The long-hinted-at upcoming ‘list of 50’ is going to be a two-parter. Both parts will be posted simultaneously.

First Part: My fifty favorite video games.

Second Part: My fifty favorite moments in video games.

I’m writing everything up now. I’m figuring on posting one entry from each list every Monday and Friday. The “Top 50 Moments” list will be full of spoilers, so I’ll be sure to make it so that any spoilers can’t be accidentally discovered (I hate accidental spoilers as much, if not more than any of you, so no worries there).

I’ll be making another post pretty quick here that will serve as a running table on both lists.

So yeah, the first post will be up either on this next Monday or next Monday, depending on how much scribbling I’ve done to that point. Assuming I don’t dawdle or engage in any of the slacking off that I tend to do, these lists will be completed in mid-November. Everyone will almost certainly be long past caring by then, but seeing as how I’ve written quite a bit of this already, I will be posting it anyway. Suck it, list-haters.

Great. Now What?

Now that my free writing time isn't being funneled into creative writing (at least for the time being), I can get back to actual blogging.

So, I think I'm going to kick off another one of those lists like the one I did back in '09 (favorite moments in music). I'm currently doing some writing for it, so that it won't be all off the cuff like the last one was.

Now that I think about it, that one could really use an update. Ah, well.

Also, more writing about music - 'cuz that's what I do when I'm not kicking ass in other ventures.

I'm Not Being Fair...

...I've barely blogged enough this year to push last year's year end music lists off the front page. I know this. We can't do anything about the past, let's move on.

This summer was taken up mostly with Spookymilk Survivor (I finished in third place out of 21, so woot for me!), and absurd pile of work, and various different outdoor endeavors. I know it's not an excuse, I watched a lot of Twins games, I suppose I could have been mentioning those (then again, most of my Twins discussion took place over at the WGoM). I'm not doing a very good job of justifying the continued existence of Nibbishment, but bear with me.

Putting all of that behind us, we're going to move forward. Starting December 26th, I'm putting forth my week-long "year end music list extravaganza", just like I've been doing for years now. I've put a helpful schedule beneath, so that you can pretend to care about this. I'll be doing full write-ups on everything, as always. So if nothing else, it's a good excuse to come and laugh at the fact that I'm not a very good music critic.

Dec 29 - Top 20 Moments in Music: 2010
Dec 30 - Top 20 Songs of the Year
Dec 31 - Top 20 Albums of the Year
Jan 1 - Top 30 Most Listened to Songs of 2010

Okay, so it's less "week long extravaganza", more "desperate bid for attention", but I hope you'll read it anyway. Especially Jester, if only so that he can mock me mercilessly when Lady Gaga inevitably shows up in my "Best Song About Vengeful Sex" category.

Challenge Accepted

The Jester is (correctly) skeptical about the unzombification of this blog, saying that he'll believe that I'm back when I'm still regularly posting in one month's time.

I'll do you one better, I'll post something at least marginally substantive every day for the entire rest of August. At least once a day, I'll make a post concerning... well... I'm not sure exactly what I'll talk about every day for a month, but I'll make it work.

Also, there will be no more meta-style posts about blogging. The "Blogs About Blogging" tag is jumping up the leaderboard at an alarming rate.

Blogging About Blogging

A couple of things...

• I'm going to change the template of this site, which I've hated since the very beginning (at least it's not as bad as my old Xanga, eh, Jester?) There will be a tasteful banner at the top, and the sidebars will be arranged a little better so as to make Nibbishment seem a little less like a wall of text.

• I'm thinking about adding a little bit of comment protection. I have two reasons for this.
  
  1. I'm getting a fair bit of spam, especially since I made that post about the Vista defender issue. That post is by far (and I mean by FAR) my most viewed and commented upon article, and I'm genuinely happy that I was able to help a few people out, but good heavens has it been a magnet for spambots.
  
  2. I like knowing who says what. When someone hilariously says that he finds it likely that I live in my parents' basement, I want to know who that is, so that I can congratulate him on his deductive powers*. Even if it's just an alias, I'd like to have something to know things by. Until I do so, please utilize the "name" field when you leave comments. You liked the Highway Hunter soundtrack? Sweet. I did, too, but if I commented on your site, I'd totally leave a sign saying "Nibbish was here".
  

* Although, to be fair, I actually live twenty floors below sea level - in a bunker.

• Remember that whole "50 Favorite Song Parts" thing I did last year? I was thinking of giving myself some sort of similarly unreasonable blogging task right away. You know, to punish myself for re-entering the blogging fray. I'll think on what that Top 50 list might be. This time, you won't have to wait three weeks for 10-1.
  

• Also, as a throwback, behold the mighty dikdik.
  
  

CD Review: Neon Bible

This post has the potential to be surprising for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, it's been almost a half a year since my last post. I'm sure most of the people who read this blog probably thought I had been kidnapped, and that no one bothered to pay the ransom.

No, the truth is, I just haven't thought of much that would be interesting for others to read. Most of the people I discuss things with are either on my IM, or chilling over at SBG's place. Also, just about any spare creative thought has been going into Spookymilk's Creative Writing Survivor.

The second reason this might be a little surprising is that I'm kicking it off with a review of a CD that's already over three years old. The title isn't a typo, it's time to take a look back at Neon Bible. I loved it back in the day (it was my number one album for 2007), but it's been getting a pretty savage beating by everyone in the wake of the new Arcade Fire album, The Suburbs.

Neon Bible seemed pretty well respected by the populous when it first came out. It got an 87 on Metacritic, which landed it around number seven for the year, and hit a lot of the critics' year end lists (twenty five 'major' top ten lists, by Metacritic's count), and general consensus seemed to be that it was a pretty damn fine package.

This year, though, it seems the only constant thing people have to say about The Suburbs is that it's a 'welcome step back toward the Funeral days'. Many of the places that I've been reading mention how dour Neon Bible was and how the new album thankfully eases up a little bit. So, what happened in the last three years

I think a lot of the dour reputation Neon Bible gets comes from the album opener "Black Mirror". Honestly, I feel it to be the weakest song on the album, and if there's a song that gets skipped, it's generally that one. It sets up the pessimistic attitude, but it almost does it's job a little too well. "Keep the Car Running" just feels like such a perfect album opener, with its soaring hook and driving beat. The light - almost haunting - title track moves perfectly into the massive sounding "Intervention". The songs are all dark and ominous, without much light filtering in, but they're almost all fantastic. In fact, from front to back, I'm not sure I know of another album where I consistently play every song (excluding "Black Mirror").

A couple of listens in, I can tell you that The Suburbs is a great CD, and will be high on my year end list (yes, that means that the lights are coming back on around here - more on that later), but Neon Bible remains one of my favorite albums of all time. I can listen to it today, having heard it countless times already, and still get the same feeling during "Intervention" that I did back in the day. I still whoop and shout to "No Cars Go", and "My Body is a Cage" makes my blood run cold. Detractors should take another listen - in my opinion, Neon Bible is every bit the album Funeral is, maybe even better.

Now. Come to Minnesota, damn it. I missed the last tour because I was busy getting married, and I'd like to check another favorite band off the list.

What's Goin' On

In lieu of posting here, I've been doing the following:

* Landscaping (for the most part done, the place is starting to look nice!)

• * Golfing (been shaving strokes off at a rapid pace... the difference between my best and worst rounds of the year is a whopping 16 strokes!)
• * Work
• * Watching the Twins continue to be an incredibly frustrating team to root for (really? no middle relief to be had out there for cheap?). Of course, since the AL Central is just an AWFUL division, we're only 2.5 games out.
• * Listening to all kinds of different new music (Dinosaur Jr.'s "Farm" is very good, and I've finally purchased "Silver" by Starflyer 59, which is extremely solid, as well).

 

All that and more. Sorry about the gap; but really, if you've read this blog for any length of time, you really should've seen it coming.

To summarize, I'm back... again.

So There I Was...

...not updating... ever.

That'll change starting now.

Year-End Extravaganza!

At this site, we believe in lists. We also believe in inactivity. It seems I've gotten the inactivity part down pretty well, so what better way to jump back into the blogging fray than to post lists for 11 straight days?

Therefore, here's how the next couple weeks are going to pan out (I'll be going back to this page and editing in links as they become fleshed out).

Tues, December 23rd: Revisionism: 2002 Year End List
Wed, December 24th: Revisionism: 2003 Year End List
Thurs, December 25th: Revisionism: 2004 Year End List
Fri, December 26th: Revisionism: 2005 Year End List
Sat, December 27th: Revisionism: 2006 Year End List
Sun, December 28th: Revisionism: 2007 Year End List
Mon, December 29th: Top 20 Favorite Moments in Music - 2008
Tues, December 30th: Top 20 Favorite Songs - 2008
Wed, December 31st: Top 20 Favorite Albums - 2008
Thurs, January 1st: Top 30 Most Listened to Tracks - 2008
Fri, January 2nd: Looking Forward to 2009

Also, in the coming weeks, I'll be doing a bit of design work to the site, because as of now, it's sort of unappealing in every way a site can be. This will be a small step towards making some additions and expansions around here.

This 'N That: Keyboards, Staying Positive, and More

• My keyboard is currently giving me fits. Occasionally, I'll type a letter, and it simply won't show up. I'm trying to triple-check the spelling on all of this, but I'm sure things will occasionally slip through, and if they do, I can't say I'm altogether concerned about it.

• In Pete news, I was out at Linds' family's cabin for the weekend of the 4th. I got in all the requisite lakeside activities in, such as fishing, cleaning fish, smelling like fish, and getting sunburned. I believe cards were played as well. Fun was had by all.

• While I was at the cabin, I got to hear the Twins play some very exciting baseball, as the Twins swept Cleveland. I really don't want to get ahead of myself, and there's way too much baseball left to be saying this, but I'd like to think that this series (in addition to the series Cleveland played against the White Sox) really crushed their chances of making the playoffs. Meanwhile, the Twins have been playing above their heads for about a month straight now, and as a realistic Twins fan, I realize that shoes will probably be dropping on our heads at some point, but this has been a LOT of fun to watch.

• The Hold Steady's new CD 'Stay Positive' comes out July 14th. Just as a quick spoiler, it's quite good, so I'd encourage anyone who liked their previous stuff to check it out. I would also obviously encourage anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about to check out 'Boys and Girls in America', their 2006 release. It's just really good, no frills attached, straight-up rock. Besides, Craig Finn is a Twins fan, and really... Twins fans who rock should be given the benefit of the doubt, even if they really never need for it.

• Sigur Rós' new CD, annoyingly titled 'Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust' (roughly translated, it means 'With a Buzz in Our Ears We Play Endlessly') has been out for a bit now. I haven't really had a chance to listen to it enough to come up with a final judgement on it, but for now, I'll say that I really enjoy the first half of the CD, when they're all experimenting with their signature sound (they have some real interesting songs that sound like Animal Collective and Funeral-era Arcade Fire), and only kind of enjoy the second half of the CD. The second half feels like the same stuff we've heard from them for a good many years now, only not quite as memorable. The stuff on the first half is just so interesting and engaging, it sort of makes the second half a letdown. Ah well... I'll keep listening.

• You'll remember that I voiced my displeasure at Universal Records' censorship of Be Your Own Pet's 'Get Awkward' CD. Importing the UK release is still the only option if you want the full package put together as the band intended, with the 3 songs in their original slots (and that has a way of being... expensive). Luckily enough, however, if you desire the 3 culled song in physical format and still desire to have money left over to fuel your car, the band has released the songs on an EP. Get Damaged contains the 3 songs in question, and nothing else; it's also inexpensive enough to actually almost merit picking up.
  
  Universal Records still sucks, though...

This 'n That: It's Business Time

Haven't had a good chance to do much with the space the last couple weeks. I have, however, had a chance to catch some new music, so here's what I've been after the last few weeks...

Flight of the Conchords (s/t)
Ah, the Flight of the Conchords. I was lucky enough to get my 3 month HBO trial during the run of the eponymous show, and became an instant fan. All the songs from their full length self-titled CD will be familiar to fans of the show, who should be pleased to see such classics as 'Business Time' and 'Prettiest Girl (in the room)', while people unfamiliar to the group might be a bit confused as to what the fuss is about. 'Leggy Blonde' is still awful, and a couple other songs seem a bit detached without the show to act as a reference point (even though most, if not all of these songs existed in some way before the show even aired). Still, the Conchords are awesome, and this set shows that fact quite nicely.
(7/10)

Crystal Castles (s/t)
Whoa, this is fun music. Crystal Castles use an Atari 5200 chip inside of their keyboard to produce what could best be described as videogame dance pop. The songs alternate between ridiculously catchy sugary songs that sound like old school nintendo soundtracks and hyperactive shouty electronic spazz outs. Greatly enjoyed.
(8/10)

Gnarls Barkley (The Odd Couple)
Big kudos to Gnarls for moving on from 2006's biggest hit. 'The Odd Couple' could have been nothing but 15 stabs at re-bottling lightning, and to their credit, they haven't gone in that direction. Instead, they've filled their followup with manic, flow-of-consciousness r&b similar to the stuff on St. Elsewhere, only more consistently good. The mountains have been smoother out a little, but the valleys have been filled in quite a bit, too.
(8/10)

Panic at the Disco (Pretty. Odd.)
I was a moderate fan of Panic's first CD (back when they were known by the asinine name of "Panic! at the Disco"), but thought they were nothing special. If they had churned out another 'Fever You Can't Sweat Out', I probably wouldn't have given it a second look, but hearing that they had abandoned pop-punk entirely in favor of Beatles-ish pop-rock songs, I had to check it out. Well, at least the album lives up to it's name. It's really strange hearing a band who sounds like they only just heard about the Beatles try to emulate what they've discovered. There's no way on earth Panic should be trying to copy the Beatles, but they don't know that, and it makes the music more interesting than it should be. As an added bonus, they still know how to write a decent hook, so in the end, even though there's no way that this CD should work, it somehow does. Barely, but it does.
(6/10)

Atmosphere (When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That Shit Gold)
As an aside, I would like to state that this is the best album title of the year. They can give out the award now, and save everyone the trouble of trying to think up clever plays on words and puns. Nothing can top this. Musically, it's a mixed bag. I really enjoy Atmosphere when they're playing the over-the-top, big bragging music. This CD doesn't really have any of that. Lyrically, it's a revelation, after hearing Slug rap about 'Slug and the things that Slug hates' for his entire career, we get a concept album of sorts about how much life sucks and how family needs to stick together through it. All the familiar themes (girls, strippers, inner city lifestyles) get turned on their head and twisted around to a more personal setting. Some of the songs are almost completely resigned, and all of them carry around a certain gloom, but the much more subdued production and almost 'tender' vocal treatment give them a weight you don't expect from rap music. Like I said before, I enjoy this act more when they're in 'The Arrival' mode, but this album almost necessary by the time 'In Her Music Box' ends. Different, but good.
(7/10)

 

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Chalk This Up Under 'Cockflickery'

Looking at the now famous video of Buzz Bissinger's hissy-fit, there are points to be made for the fact that blogs don't necessarily encourage good writing (and I'm a shining example of that), and there are plenty of world class cockflickers out there (and the fact that I have a 'cockflickery' tag lumps me uncomfortably close to the people that think the word 'douchebag' is hilarious). But honestly, to berate somebody for the comments on his blogs? That goes beyond cockflickery to absolute worthless babble.

On a side note, one thing that actually strikes me (other than a certain inward sigh over how impervious to logic some people are) is how uncomfortable it must have felt for Braylon Edwards to be sitting there watching the whole thing. That had to have been awkward.

Simultaneously the Most Blasphemous and Awesome Thing You Will See Today

Teh baptizum of Jesuz!
¹³ Den Jesus caem from Gallalee, to has baptizm from John ¹⁴ But John was all "Ur doin it rong, j00 needz to baptize me"
¹⁵ And Jesus answered sayin "STFU and baptize me n00b" and John did.
¹⁶ Wen he was baptized he gtfo of teh water and, ZOMG, teh ceilinz opened up and teh Spirit of Ceiling Cat caem down liek a duv and landeded on him ¹⁷ And, ZOMFGWTF, a voice from heven sayed "Hai guise, dis my son, and I tink he teh leet"

Courtesy of the lolcat bible, an effort to translate the entire bible into "lolcat", a terrifying internet language used to caption cat pictures.

In other news, due to a combination of having very little free time, and having nothing all that relavatory to say, I haven't been updating with any real frequency. This will (hopefully) change in the new year.

Have a wonderful Christmas, and an equally wonderful new year!

Bliss, Madness

Changes

I've been married 3 weeks, I've been at my new job for 5 days... Things are hectic right now. Leaving Unicel was as difficult as I figured it would be; probably a little more difficult, actually. I worked with good people, and it's always hard to leave something like that behind and jump off into the unknown for such base requirements as pay, work shift, and job security.

Married life, on the other hand, has been about par for the course thus far, the only obvious difference being Linds doesn't call her parents' house 'home'. We had been going out for 5 years, and been pretty serious for at least 4, so there haven't been a large number of surprises. The only big difference is that overpriced piece of metal on my left hand... I swear i took that thing off no fewer than 30 times a day the first week.

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Let's See How This Looks

The normal sized bolded text just isn't enough to make each paragraph heading stand out. I guess I need to experiment a little.

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A Silver Lining

Vikings fans have known for a couple weeks now that Adrian Peterson is the real deal (I suspect that Oklahoma fans have known for longer than that). Sunday confirmed those truths to the rest of the world. No Viking has ever rushed for that many yards (and no Bears' defense has been gouged for so many). The best part? Rather than looking like a fleeting phenominal game, it looked like AD was simply doing what he does; running hard for positive yardage and breaking a tackle or two. Rather than looking like an aberation, it seems to imply that he could break huge gains at will.

Even so, Sunday almost turned into another sickening example of Coach Childress' ineptitude at getting, then keeping a lead. The 4th Quarter turned mean in a hurry, and some questionable clock management forced Ryan Longwell to kick a career-long field goal to win. Tarvaris looked alright, it's very encouraging that he threw no interceptions, and he made very few mistakes throughout the game.

Don't get me wrong, this still feels like a 6-10 team at best, but there's just enough silver lining here to where the clouds don't seem quite so bad.