Go Away

A mixture of all the great Weezer albums, no song exemplifies "Blue Album"-esque songs as much as "Go Away" from Weezer's latest effort "Everything Will Be Alright in the End." I'm really excited about this album. It definitely has it's bright spots, and, along with "Hurley" is up there in the best efforts from Weezer in the past decade. "Pinkerton" and the "Blue Album" still stand atop as Weezer's best, but this and "Hurley" certainly challenge the "Green Album," "Maladroit" and "Make Believe for third, fourth and fifth.

I've been to a few soccer, football and volleyball matches, as well as a cross country meet recently. I'm definitely getting around to a little of everything. There will be a big night of football tomorrow as the area teams look to make it three straight wins, and close out their regular seasons. Football playoffs begin next Tuesday already, and tennis and soccer are already over.

Fantasy football took another turn for the worse this week as I lost in both leagues. However, I didn't do bad in either league. They were pretty much bad beats. Philip Rivers continued to be a beast for me, but there have been a lot of impressive quarterbacks, though Rivers has to be second only to Andrew Luck in consistently great performances. My running back situation is thin at the moment, and I'm pretty banged up at wideout, but the return of Brandon Marshall was nice to see this week. Also, Greg Olsen has continued his great play, so that's promising. The good news is that I remain in first place in my main league, and only dropped down to second place in my other league via tiebreaker.

In the T.O's Picks segment, I technically went 7-2 last week, since I picked a St. John's game that's actually scheduled for this weekend, because I didn't look at the date. Since that was my fault, I'm giving myself another loss to finish at 7-3 for last week. Still not bad. I got all six prep games right, but did not pick the Gophers, and foolhardily picked the Vikings. That puts me at 31-9 since I started picking.
For this week my picks are as follows:
Becker over Little Falls: There is almost zero chance of a Flyers upset here on a short week against a very good Bulldogs squad. It will likely be a blowout.
Cathedral over Milaca: Milaca has not been able to do much too well this season, and they are going to finish with another loss at a tough Crusaders squad to finish 1-7. 
Pierz over Belgrade-Brooten-Elrosa: This also shouldn't be close as the Pioneers should easily finish 8-0 on the regular season.
USA over United North Central: Yet another blowout victory upcoming for the Patriots as they too finish undefeated.
Royalton over Parkers Prairie: The Royals should get a win here, though the game may be close as it is on the road.
Maple Lake over Holdingford: The Huskers are handed their second loss this week by a really good Maple Lake team.
Gustavus over St. John's (for real this time)
SCSU over MSU-Moorhead: Should be no problem for the Huskies this week, and they have a decent shot of running the table as they play all the west schools.
Gophers over Purdue: Purdue is not terrible this season at 3-4, and they've played with Michigan St. and Notre Dame, but the game is at TCF, and the Gophers are 4-0 there this year.
Vikings over the Bills: The Vikings defense should finally shine against Kyle Orton, and the offense only needs to get one score against a vaunted Buffalo defense that is top five in DVOA this season. Vikes win 17-13.

I have many pictures to share from the past week, so enjoy:

The girls race takes off at the Royalton Invite, Oct. 7.

Olivia Gall, left, and Brandi Kloss watch as an errant Holdingford shot hits the net, Oct. 7.

Gall blocks a Corrie Ethen shot.

Kloss tips the ball over to the Huskers' side of the net.

Kloss with a cross court shot.

Senior Zach Carlson finishes to a second place tune of 17:07 at the Royals' home meet.

The boys' race gets off to a start. The Royals' varsity boys finished in second through fifth place.

Royalton's top female finisher Chloe Novak heads to the finish.

Senior Josh DeCann (right) hustles over to celebrate after Thomas Miller (No. 1) scores the game-winning touchdown, Oct. 3 against Foley.

Noah Boser gallops for a touchdown in the snow, Oct. 3 against Eden Valley-Watkins.

Bulldogs' senior Stephanie Koetter attempts to tip a shot over Upsala's Kiley Smieja.

Christy Masog heads in the backstroke in the 200 individual medley, Oct. 2 in Little Falls.

Little Falls senior Federico Zonca rips a kick past St. John's Prep defender Kevin Stark-Haws.

Zonca chases after a pass that is about to be snatched up by SJP goalie Joey Stock.

Austin Visker attempts to keep the ball in bounds, Oct. 2 against the Johnnies.

Sam Beam blocks out Wynston Tacheny in front of the Johnnies' goal.

Beam and Tacheny fight for a ball.

Zonca in route to a breakaway goal.

Beam advances the ball past an SJP defender and toward the goal.