CBS Sunday Morning Power Rankings

Unexpectedly, improbably the Cincinnati Bengals are going to Super Bowl LVI. I was five years old the last time that happened. I was seven the last time any Cincinnati sports team played for a championship of any kind. I need some time to process this. This happened. I have two weeks to unpack this. Until then, I'll tie it into Sunday Morning by bringing up that Tracy Smith is from the Cincinnati 'burbs and currently based in LA. The Super Bowl is in LA. I don't know when she would moved away or if she's a Bengals fan, but Bengals fans/ Sunday Morning recap bloggers are clamoring for Tracy Smith-Joe Burrow interview to hype the game. I know that media rights pretty much prohibit because NBC is carrying the game this year, but crazier things have happened this year - see the above picture. Heroes & Villains Please forgive an obsessive tennis fan a few words about the Australian Open. Halfway through the Świątek/Kanepi quaterfinal, I texted the following to a friend...

It's Saturday night and I'm buzzing a little bit. The team of my youth, the hometown Cincinnati Bengals are going to play in the AFC Championship game. I won't spill many words about the game. It was a defensive struggle that the Bengals won on a walk-off field goal. I thought I had excised the NFL and Cincinnati Bengals from being a meaningful part of my life. But then... well, Joe Burrow is a special human being. I never played football as a kid. Well, I sort of did. Just not with other people. What sort of football can you play by yourself? You can kick and punt. I spent cool Saturday afternoons with a kicking tee and football, using our backyard swingset as makeshift uprights for kicking field goals. I taught myself how to punt a spiral. I remember the first time I punted a spiral while also making solid contact with ball and it rocketed off my foot in a way it never had before. It gave me a warm and fuzzy feeling. As such, my favorite Bengals as a kid were the kicker a...

In the interest of my own sanity, I really do need to get to a point where I can write up, edit, and post one of these recaps in less than 3 hours. This week my intro can be brief. If you read last week, you'll know I came down with a sinus infection on New Year's Day, so most of my week was trying to get over that. I'm finally to a point where I'm no longer coughing up or sneezing out phlegm, so that's a plus. (Too much information? My Mom always says TMI - parents attempting to use modern and even not so modern slang conversationally is like nails on a chalkboard to me. Of course if it were up to me, I'd box the ears of anyone that said the word "cheugy.") I decided I'd try to keep my weekly weedend ritual of running a 10K despite sitting on the couch (for the most part) all week. It may not have hurt while I was running, but I should have listened to the angel on my shoulder telling me to take it easy. When you've taken some time off, it...

I'm starting to clear out the backlog here at the Sunday Morning power rankings. Before delving into episodes past, let's talk briefly about movie previews. There was a time in my life when Roger Ebert was my hero. I fancied myself a film buff and wanted to learn all about them and hopefully go on to either work on them or write about them. As with most things, it was a phase - I got a PhD in physics instead. (A humblebrag? Well, lets just say to this day I regret not dropping out of grad school...) Anyway, back in the day who didn't love movie trailers? YouTube probably killed that excitement because now I'm plan on showing up to a movie 10 minutes after it's listed start time and then still complain when it hasn't started within another 10 minutes after that. In the before times, you never wanted to miss any preview trailers. For one, you got legitimately excited because you hadn't previously heard that such and such movie was coming out and it looked so c...

So, if you read the intro to the already posted recap for November 7th, you might ask, "How are you doing, unknown internet blogger?" The answer is pretty good actually. The whys and wherefores as to my mood earlier in the week needn't be aired publicly. Why am I doing better now?  (The author shrugs and with an upward intonation clumsily guesses, "Personal growth?") Part of it improving mood might just come down to a certain Mr. John Dickerson. Since his Polly Adler segment aired, I've just been randomly bursting out laughing and muttering the words, "Sozzled on jag juice," to no one in particular. If I end up being committed to a mental institution, at least you'll know the cause. Sunday Morning and laughter - it's good for the soul. I do have one regret though. I let an obvious opportunity to reference the Simpsons slip by as Dickerson filled in the Marianas Trench using nothing but slang from the 1920s. I was not on the trolley. Conan...