Its 6:01 in Southern California, and if you've never lived on the West Coast, one of the oddest things is having sports start at earlier times. The sun is still out, people are still at work, and I haven't shaved in three days. ABC is now on my TV, and it looks to me like Pittsburg is playing San Diego. Great. The only way I could want to watch this game less is if Pittsburg were somehow playing itself.

Here we go -- my reintroduction to MNF. They're playing some sort of army-horse-drama-marching music. There's the stadium; looks like we're in San Diego. Cool, a helicopter. Flags! Four helicopters! Everyone is very excited. When did regular season NFL games turn into the Super Bowl? We move down to the field -- there's a bunch of military men -- one of them is screaming "Are you ready?!?!?" The crowd responds. I'm creeped out --what the hell is going on?

Now the teams are running out of the tunnels. I feel like this is all building toward a huge explosion or some kind. Now we hear voices, and we're up in the booth. I'm let down.

Al Michaels is still hosting MNF, and at some point in the past 11 years, John Madden hopped in the booth with him. MY GOD, look at this man's head. If this is how bloated you get at age 143, count me out.

The best thing about John Madden, besides the fact that he's probably going to have a heart attack sometime during these next three hours, is that 8 out of 10 pictures have him standing exactly like this:

He's all like, "Hey, what do I know? I'm just here watching the game with you, pal. Can I call you pal? I sure feel like we're pals! Buddy." It makes me feel comfortable. By osmosis, you are now comfortable and completely at ease with me. Email me your credit card numbers.

Michaels says a bunch of stuff I don't get. I don't know who LaDandelion Thomsicle or Ben Ruffleburgers are, but they must be important. Then Al says that everyone is "stoked" in a grab for that elusive 18-34 year-old male. It's 2005, Al -- the only people who are "stoked" are now in the 35-50 demo. Here we go -- it'll be interesting to see how they've changed the opener -- there's no way it's still that bearded hillbilly with the "Are you ready for some football" song, right?

Oh. There he is. It's a little supercharged from what I remember, but -- whoa! This all moves real fast -- lots of input -- um okay - cowboys girls robots get ready hit it steelers al john keys babies fireworks producer credits lightning more robots dancing flux capacitors screaming MONDAY NIGHT WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

This is professional football in the future, folks. Thank god I went for the downers instead of the uppers tonight. Either way, I'm paranoid and am going to watch this from under the kitchen table. My sister says our kitchen has AIDS. We need to clean.

I'm exhausted, and we're only now getting to the kickoff, which San Diego does. Flag on the play. Referee Jeff Tripplet is on the call. 11 years later and I still can't understand what they say. Have microphones been left behind in the technological revolution?

Steelers are offensing. Apparently Ruffleburgers is pretty good -- so good he just threw it out of bounds. Football has changed -- we used to always say that was bad. Whoa! Marty Schottenheimer coaches the Chargers! That means lots of the dreaded Marty-Ball. Poor kid.

We're meeting the offense -- they do a graphic/video thing where each player comes up and talks. I've chosen Marvel Smith (#77) as my favorite. His parents went with the big "we're gonna name this kid to either be a pro athlete or get beat up every day" gamble. It paid off. We're inspired -- the next random girl I knock up, I'm naming the kid Awesome Stud Quarterback.

Bill Cowher is still coaching the Steelers. He's been there since like 1852, and he's had his angry face on for all but four minutes. Blah blah blah no scoring yet. Here's another Kingdom of Heaven DVD commercial. I love how they advertise this like we don't remember that nobody went to see it in theaters because it sucked. I don't want to get Orlando Bloom mad at me or anything, but I don't get Orlando Bloom. He's small, kind of girly, and sports that rodentesque facial structure.

Regardless, Drew Brees just fell down all on his own. JESUS, it's not even halfway through the first quarter -- who signed me up for this crap? My word count is going to be 47 million.

End of the first 0-0.

Here's a little info on guard Mike Goff from chargers.com. He likes eating and trucking. Who would have guessed?

Posted by on October 11, 2005 12:48 AM