Hijinks in change

Today I went to the vending machines to get a soda because I desperately needed some caffeine. Of course that Pepsi Machine refused to take dollar bills. I put my dollar into the Coffee Machine and pressed the change button only to receive a dollar coin. The Pepsi Machine refused that as well. Then I placed the dollar coin into the Snack Machine and pressed the change button. It gave me four quarters and, by combining those four quarters with one in my pocket, I was finally able to buy my Wild Cherry Pepsi.

Talk about effort.

Chicago

I thought the sky was nice last night, so I tried to take some photos of it. I ended up liking this picture of the city around my apartment much more. I hope you enjoy.

ABC/Disney Jealous of Fox's Dancing Teens

Not even the killer combination of Miley Cyrus and Zac Efron (above) would be enough to keep teens from watching this season of Fox's So You Think You Can Dance.

It's not just that Season 6 of the dance-off seems to have the best collection of dance talent ever assembled in a overly coiffed theater, nope this year Fox took it one step further and smartly created the cutest teen couple to ever grace the stage.

18-year-old Mollee Gray from Upland, CA is paired with 18-year-old Nathan Trasoras from Downey, CA and my guess is that teens across America are tuning in just to see their new favorite couple. And oh, what a cute couple these two make. Host Cat Deeley said it best, "I've got a feeling that teenage hearts are breaking all over America tonight."

The judges keep telling Mollee, whose name just makes he seem even younger, that she has to dance older, but her performances have been fun filled delights. (She even described herself as a goofball.) Now, teamed up with Trasoras, the two are going to do even better. Their disco number in the Top 20 competition was the best Disco I'd ever seen on the show. Nathan flips Mollee all over the stage during the routine.

I can imagine that Disney is trying to figure out how to make these two the stars of their own High School Musical or tween-targeted sitcom. For now though they'll just have to accept watching them take over FOX.

Top Chef: Las Vegas

One of the benefits of moving to Chicago is that I now have Comcast Chicago instead of the cable service in Evanston. With that service comes Bravo! This means that I can watch Top Chef - one of my favorite shows of the season. The food always looks delicious and it's fun to pick your favorites and root for them throughout the season.

Unfortunately, last night's episode "Meet Portman" was a really rough episode for my two personal favorites - Mike Isabella and Jennifer Carroll. Both ended up in the bottom three. Isabella is from North Jersey and is the Executive Chef at Zaytinya's in D.C. - a restaurant I happen to love - but his vegetarian cooking skills weren't up to snuff and he went home for poorly cooked leeks.

My biggest beef with Isabella going home is that my least favorite contestant - Robin Leventhal - is somehow still cooking. Robin hasn't made a single dish I've looked at and thought, "Wow, that's Top Chef quality," but she seems to go to the Bottom 3 and skate through because the judges find something more egregious in another contestant's dish. If she'd go home I think the show's skill level would quickly be elevated - and there would be a lot less fighting.

As for Carroll, she just needs to find the rhythm that made her a favorite during the first few weeks of the competition. I hope she does rebounds in next week's episode. Also, I find myself rooting more and more for Kevin Gillespie. I think it's because the food he makes - while simple - often looks delicious. And then there's the Picasso of the group - Michael Voltaggio. Voltaggio seems to be a better natural cook than his brother Brian, but Michael seems prone to a complete breakdown at some point if one of his "visions" don't completely pan out.

Overall it's been a very solid season. If you haven't started watching yet, catch the final few episodes of Top Chef: Las Vegas and root for Jennifer.

Fantasy Football

I was a huge Denver Broncos fan on Monday night. No, it's not because of the ugly brown uniforms they were wearing - obviously I would've been rooting for the Chargers' classy throwbacks if that were the case - it was because my two Fantasy Football teams were desperately relying on the Broncos D/ST, Kyle Orton (Denver's quarterback) and Knowshon Moreno (a Denver running back) and Matt Prater (Denver's kicker) to pull out the victory.

Team Templon was trailing Major Impact 168-122 and seemed destined to spend another week mired in last place - a typical occasion for me in this particular league. That is until Broncos wide receiver/returner Eddie Royal decided to go off in nuclear fashion. Royal returned not one, but two kicks for touchdowns and, along with five sacks and four forced fumbles, the Broncos D/ST scored 35 points! That was enough to get me back into the game and eventually Prater's field goals helped me pull out the 172-168 victory. (Now I'm in 8th instead of 10th, I guess that's better...)

In my other league - yes, I play in two fantasy football leagues - the Evanston Everything were trailing Weapons of Mass Destruction 143-122. This one I knew I had in the bag before the game even started though. 21 points is nothing to make up when the two opposing quarterbacks on Monday night are both starting for you. (Well, unless it was like this Bills vs. Browns game...) Still, Philip Rivers and Kyle Orton did enough to lead my team to a 170-149 victory. (And 8th place out of 12 teams.)

Of course, when I say I was "watching" the game I mean that I was half watching and half watching the points tick by on my ESPN.com fantasy football scoreboard, especially in the case of Team Templon. In fact, last night's game was an example of just how tenuous the world of fantasy football can be. If Nate Kaeding's 50-yard field goal towards the end of regulation had been good I might not even be writing this post today. That's how close TT came to losing.

Thankfully, it didn't work out that way. I guess being a Broncos fan for a night is a fine price to pay for a couple fantasy football victories.

P.S. My combined fantasy football record this season is 5-7. Oops.

Photo

I went to DePaul and Loyola's "Midnight Madness" events last night. This was my favorite photo from the festivities. There's more over at my ChicagoNow blog.

Home Alone

So both of my apartment-mates (flatmates? roommates?) have taken off for Texas to attend a wedding this weekend leaving me all alone with the apartment. This is my last weekend with nothing to do for over a month, so naturally I have a laundry list of things to do.

Ironically that laundry list includes laundry. Thankfully it also includes fun things like playing Madden with my younger brother, watching a bevy of awesome college football games from the comfort of our newly delivered couch on Saturday and (maybe) watching yet another Buffalo disaster against the New York Jets. (It also includes things like cleaning my bathroom, blech to being old.)

I think I might include sleeping in and baking cookies on the list too. It's going to be a great weekend for me to just relax and enjoy having some time alone. But first, Midnight Madness! (At DePaul and Loyola nonetheless.)

Maybe I'll even write some more blog posts...