Last night was the College Football National Title Game! What Fun!

College football season has come to an end. This is where I pretend to be sad, say something about the dark months ahead.

I’m not really sad this season has ended, because we were bad, and because each bowl game we weren’t in, including the national title game, reminded me we were bad. I have already fully impressed this basketball team. They’re not going to win a ton of games, but they are fun to watch. And we’re about a month away from the Will Bolt era of Nebraska baseball beginning. I wonder how long it will take before I see someone tweet that he should fire his pitching coach.

Joe Burrow Throws Magical Balls

They had to be magic. The connections made between Burrows and his receivers in last night’s game was incredible to watch. The same was true at times for Trevor Lawrence, but Burrows had a historic season (set the record for most TD passes in a season).

It was a good thing that was the last game of the season. If we’d seen that kind of performance mid-year, it would have ruined football for all of us. We would have been looking at our own quarterbacks and receivers, wondering why they couldn’t make those throws and those catches and hated them for it.

Human beings are like that.

My First Fail Of The New Year (Already!)

Every new year is a time for re-evaluation. I typically don’t do this until after the national title game has been played because the new year hasn’t started until college football season has ended. I started early this year, maybe because it’s a new decade, maybe because extending the title game to January 13th is a bit much. Take your pick.

I set some goals. You are supposed to write them down so they become more real. I did so. On a computer, because I don’t hand write anything anymore and haven’t for a while. My handwriting looks like I’m a meth addict and I spend so much time on keyboards each day that writing with a pen/pencil only increases the carpal tunnel-like pain I get at times.

I’ve already failed miserably at one of my goals.

Here’s what I wrote:

Wean myself off Depakote, even if it’s just as an experiment. I am trying I am tired of feeling groggy and dull. I want to verify this medicine is responsible.

Depakote (DivalProex) is a brain seizure medicine I take daily. It’s typically prescribed for epilepsy, although in my case it is supposed to limit the severity of my headaches. It is prescribed to people who have problems with migraines. It’s also been described to me as a “mood stabilizer”. It is sometimes prescribed for bipolar disorders.

It makes me feel groggy and dull. There are many times during the day where I feel as if I’m walking around trying to keep from falling asleep, even though the people around me tell me that I seem perfectly fine. I have had this problem during a couple of my podcast interviews, yet feedback I’ve gotten from people is that I’m doing a pretty good job. Perhaps they’re just being kind.

Last weekend I decided I was done with the Dekapote.

It wasn’t some kind of ‘rage quit’ done. I didn’t flush the stuff down the toilet. I just stopped taking it. Tuesday night I started to feel an increase in headache pain. Wednesday at mid-morning my daily headache increased to pain level 9. I was at a point where I had to lie in bed in a dark room, avoiding any light source, which included my computer and phone screens. Looking at my phone gave me the feeling of being stabbed in the eyeballs with big, hot needles. Or shot with lasers right in the eyeballs. Whichever sounds worse. I had the chills. And the shakes. I sweat so much I was soaked. I also had a sore throat.

At first I thought it was influenza, ‘cause that’s what’s “going around” right now. You know who else has these symptoms? Drug addicts going through withdrawal. I don’t know that from experience, it’s just what I’ve seen in the movies. I thought, “Maybe... It’s not the flu. Maybe it’s withdrawal.” I staggered to the bathroom, took a DivalProex and went back to bed. Stayed there all day, all night. Next morning I was functional enough to move around, even go outside.

I kept doing the regular dosage, and (mostly) everything went away within a couple days. I’ve read the literature I was given on Depakote. It includes warnings that epileptics who stop taking the medication that:

quitting abruptly can cause seizures that will not stop (status epilepticus)

That sounds horrible. It sounds like a terrible way to die. “I don’t have epilepsy”, I’ve told myself. I will be fine.

I apparently missed this part:

Stopping a seizure medication like Depakote suddenly can cause serious withdrawal symptoms or other problems.

Or perhaps I ignored it.

You’ve probably read articles or known someone with bipolar disorder who stopped taking their medication, became erratic and damaged their lives or the lives of those around them. You think, “Why would they be so stupid?”.

I can empathize with them. Taking meds like this isn’t like taking a heart medication, something for your blood pressure. It’s the brain we’re dealing with. First, there’s plenty of people who hate being dependent on medicine. I am one of them. Second, after you’re on this stuff for a while you wonder what it’d like if you weren’t. You’d have more energy, of course. You’d feel more creative. You wouldn’t be so groggy. So you quit.

When I told my wife that I’d failed my first goal of 2020 already, she said, “It wasn’t like you tried to ‘wean yourself off it, you just quit’”. She might have a point. She might be being kind.

Why am I telling you all this?

To let you know that as we start this new year, this new decade that you are not alone in your stupidity. If you’ve already failed this year, congratulations, as least you’ve tried. Now we can go on to try and fail at other things.

We’re all faking it through life in one way or another. You are not alone when you do these things.

It also might - might - be preparation for something else I am considering that could be even dumber.

Nebraska Introduces “Fair Pay to Play”

Senator introduces bill allowing college players in Nebraska to profit from name, image | Nebraska Legislature | journalstar.com

”Our preference continues to be for a national solution to this issue, versus a state-by-state approach,” an NU spokeswoman said.

Until that happens, Perlman said, Nebraska may be at the mercy of other states. If competing universities are allowing their student-athletes to profit from their name and image, then NU would likely need to follow suit to remain competitive.

This is going to happen in one way or another whether anyone likes it or not. I’ll do more on this later.

When Ernie Chambers did this way back in 1981 we all thought he was a loonie. Turns out, he was just way ahead of his time. Always kind of liked Ernie Chambers.

ESPN Top College Football Players

ESPN released their top 11 college football players of all time last night during halftime of the national title game. What a bonanza for them.

Below is the list, and our former kicker Drew Brown’s comment, along with my reply.

Call me absolutely shocked for having Jim Brown at #1. He’s done a lot of great things, but he’s done some pretty nasty ones as well.

They might as well have called this a list of the greatest running backs of all time.

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Newsy Things

National champions by year, 1869-2019: The definitive total - Banner Society
Or the closest thing to it, based on historical consensus. We’ll also do a final count at the end.

College football’s 70 most underrated teams ever, based on the AP Poll - Banner Society
The most underrated team from every preseason AP Poll ever.

PERFECTION! LSU Beats Clemson 42-25 - And The Valley Shook
NEW ORLEANS — They did it.

LSU’s magical season ended at the top of the peak of college football as the Tigers claimed their fourth national championship Monday night with a 42-25 win over Clemson. LSU is the SEC’s first 15-0 team in the College Football Playoff Era.

Early Big Ten Football Predictions for 2020
A complete breakdown of way-too-early Big Ten predictions for the 2020 season.

Ohio State men’s basketball vs. Nebraska: Game preview, prediction - Land-Grant Holy Land
The Buckeyes look to get back on track against the Huskers.

Minnesota Football: Gophers ranked No. 10 in final AP Top 25 - The Daily Gopher
The Gophers' Outback Bowl victory made an impression

Illinois is ranked for the first time since December 2014 - The Champaign Room
All it took was a win over Rutgers. Who knew?

Kenny Bell Talking About The Blindside Block Rule

Then There’s This

Microsoft bids farewell to Windows 7 and the millions of PCs that still run it - The Verge
Microsoft is ending support for Windows 7 today, but millions of machines are still running the OS. Security patches won’t be available unless businesses pay extra for support. Windows 7 marks the end of a traditional Windows era.

Google says new AI models allow for ‘nearly instantaneous’ weather forecasts - The Verge
Predicting the weather is notoriously difficult, but many experts hope new machine learning techniques could help better sort the sunshine from the sleet. In a new research paper, Google describes how it uses AI to create speedy rainfall forecasts in the US. The work has not yet been integrated into any commercial systems, but looks promising, especially in a world increasingly effected by climate change and unpredictable weather patterns.