This is Brett speaking

Finals week is always a good time to blog because it's a good way to procrastinate while still feeling mildly productive.

Speaking of procrastinating: this is what I've spent much of the past 24 hours doing. It was well worth it. (After you click on the link, if you click on "Play," then "Continue," then "Start," it should show you my contraption in action.) If you follow that link, which I highly recommend, you might recognize the title of my "contraption" as a Simpsons reference. (But you probably won't, which is why I'm mentioning it here.) The original title to the game puzzle was "Unpossible," but that doesn't show up on the video of my contraption working.

I hadn't planned on blogging again before the weekend, but I was considerably remiss in my first post as far as the old MySpace blog is concerned. In other words, I left out all the sports news of the day.

It's nice to see that the ACC is still wrecking shop (or "owning shop," as I heard someone say recently) in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, thanks in part to UNC's destruction of Michigan State last night. Two notes on this:

1. The ACC is undefeated in this challenge (10-0), and
   
2. The Big Ten is, in fact, composed of 11 schools, not ten.
   

There was some discussion in my house last night about when UNC will actually play in a close game. My roommate Austin's primary purpose in watching sports is to see overtime, so blowouts really undermine his whole goal there. Anyhow, the consensus was that it would probably be the first Duke game, which is February 11.

My loyal followers probably know that I like to get some NHL (or Scott Spiezio) news in blogs whenever possible. The big news coming out of the world of hockey recently was that Sean Avery made inappropriate public comment number 138 of his career. The best part of this story is that multiple Sportscenter anchors warn the audience that they may find the comment offensive. I've seen both Linda Cohn and Scott Van Pelt give this warning. So, I'll give it here, before linking to the story: you may find Sean Avery's comments in this story offensive.

Also, Rajon Rondo earned a triple-double last night on my fantasy bench. So that's a bit bittersweet.

I have another post up on the Star-News blog about The Guild, which is a hilarious online show about MMORPGers, a.k.a. people who play World of Warcraft, a.k.a. Nathan.

Question of the Day:

What is the coolest "contraption" you've ever seen?

My take: The Anheuser-Busch brewery in St. Louis. I usually try to ask questions that I have a good answer to. This is obviously not one of those.