Beer and football V: I chewed my fuckin’ arm off and made an escape

Week one
The game: Patriots at Dolphins
The beer: Notch Mule Corn Lager
The result: Loss, 33–20; Texans win, 17–6
The commentary: Pictured is the exact moment in time when the scales tipped in Miami's favor. (Well, about two hours after the fact—I was watching on a delay. Again. But still.) I did not pause when Mike Wallace caught the (essentially) game-tying touchdown with Revis all over him. I did not say "OK, G., let me rewind and pause it right… here! Since you're not napping why don't you put on your tutu and stare at the screen so I can take a picture. And do something ballet-ish."

Regular-season losses don't affect me like they used to. A game ends and then G. and I go back to tucking in all her stuffed animal friends with silk scarves and/or giggling while bonking them over their heads with her inflated butterfly. Even during the game, as it got uglier and uglier, depression wasn't an option. It took a minute to remind her that she actually enjoys football when she exclaimed "I don't like football, I like soccerball!" Then we settled in on the couch and I reminded her again of who her favorite players are. "They keep falling! Why are they falling?" Excellent question.

What I've come to dread the most following a loss is the backlash by media, "fans" and more media. The shouting ranges from "Belichick the coach is better than Belichick the GM!" (rational and accurate) to "Mankins wouldn't have let us get out-physicaled!" (maybe, but it's happened with him before; also, "out-physicaled" is accepted compound nonsense) to "James Develin should get the ball more!" (classic New England racism) to "Trade Brady and put in Garoppolo now!" (ludicrous from all angles, regardless of Brady's standing as an elite quarterback). It would be and has been an insufferable week to root for a team with such a rich history of losing. Oh wait!

Houston Texans: I am alive. It was hard to resist checking that score on my phone but I didn't want to risk seeing the home team's outcome. The goddamn crawl… individual statistics and fantasy breakdowns? Who gives a shit? (Though seeing RG3's thirteen completions for fifty-nine yards in the second quarter was encouraging and amusing. Four and a half yards per completion? Even Ryan Fitzpatrick had to feel bad for him.)

I also had my eye on Bills–Bears. Nine of nineteen people were knocked out of the pool and five of them have the godforsaken Bears to thank. Where were you assholes last year? Only one guy took New England—I hoped that, if nothing else, Jordan Devey brought more down with him. Rats. Another person picked the fucking Super Bowl-winning Seahawks against a Packers team that, on paper, had a chance to win. Congratulations, you no longer have the best team in the league to fall back on. After this week, I'll be unable to fall back on a team that made it to the last three AFC Championships—I trust that Belichick & Co. will make enough adjustments to keep from losing two in a row to start the season.

The Mule is the real deal. Likely the lightest colored beer I've had in years but as flavorful a lager as you'd expect from Notch. It was a pleasant surprise to find it in bomber form at Pamplemousse in Salem in a moment of needless panic following lunch—turns out I'd already been chilling a "week one" beer for a month or so. By six o'clock Sunday it will find a home in the plumbing under my house.

Up next: Smooth Jimmy Apollo ensures me the Patriots are his Lock of the Week against the Vikings. When you're right fifty-two percent of the time, you're wrong forty-eight percent of the time. Cheers!