The game: Patriots at Dolphins
The beer: Devil’s Purse Shelby Rose Red Ale
The result: Loss, 22–12
The commentary: And lo, how Rush nerds rue the Dolphins’ two-point conversion!

As a quick postscript to last week’s coverage of The Star Wars Holiday Special (which unexpectedly ballooned to over three thousand goddamn words), Chuck from Stuff You Should Know summed it up as “killing time at the Wookiee household.” That’s it! For two hours!

More podcast talk: Callers to Patriots Unfiltered do their best to ruin what is undoubtedly the most entertaining and balanced coverage of your New England Patriots. Give me Eldred and no one else—no Nick “Baby” Love, no Todd from Toronto, no Chris with additional letters. Fellas, you are not why we listen. Someone did call in with a good observation on Tuesday though, following another uninspiring (and, unfortunately, season-ending) loss on Sunday: “The brand of football they’re putting out there, it’s just not entertaining.”

Indeed. Third-and-four conversions were once achievable even with these “weapons,” when we had a generational quarterback who didn’t make every defender sell out to successfully cover the keeper. And so, best-all-around-guy Cam Newton runs for two or draws a sack or chucks it at a receiver’s feet and you realize you weren’t yet fully deflated—har! har!—and let out a little more air, but not the last of it because fourth-and-two or fourth-and-eleven or worse is on deck and perfectly impossible. Nick Folk is the team’s MVP and it’s not close—King Bill couldn’t even pick a better kicker in Justin Rohrwasser with a three-round head start! And I’m to trust him to rebuild this team in his late sixties/early seventies? Ty Law, Lawyer Milloy, Willie McGinest, Tedi Bruschi, Ted Johnson (that defense!), Troy Brown, Kevin Faulk and Adam Vinatieri were inherited from Bill Parcells. Belichick drafted Richard Seymour, Asante Samuel, Logan Mankins, Deion Branch, Chandler Jones and Jamie Collins and shoved them out of town too early. (Not to mention the passed-over-several-times Tom Brady, who remains a superior option until at least 2022. The smallest violin.) And those are just the hits! I mean, check out the high-round busts.

It’s pathetic how many championships the team could have won if Belichick had any talent-evaluation skills whatsoever. Just look at his track record in the second round. Look at it! Optimistically, it’s going to take two or three years to turn this around. I just wish our peerless head coach and our detrimental general manager were different people.

I met Ivan for a couple of parking-lot beers the other night and it felt criminal and freezing. Breweries pioneered how public spaces can work during a pandemic but mass gatherings under gas-heated party tents are no way get this shit under control. Creatively parked cars, though, provide enough social distance, personalized soundtracks, economical four-packs and casual conversation to pretend this is normal suburban behavior for old friends in their mid forties. Is it June yet? Or is it COVID-20?

We’re a week away from Thee Ohsees’ Protean Threat taking the 2020 Biffy® or Creamy® or whatever I’m calling these now. Gross! The band was its own competition (aside from Fuzz III), releasing the jammy Metamorphosed and Weirdo Hairdo “EPs” in October and December, respectively; the Protean Threat remix Panther Rotate that isn’t quite my thing (excepting “Don’t Blow Your Experiment”) but is appreciated for its effort, clever title and batshit sleeve; and two zero-crossover live-stream events/albums in Levitation Sessions and At Big Sur, also from October and December. What is your favorite band up to?

Up next: I guess it’s our turn to miss the playoffs? Weird. Merry Christmas!