Panthers vs. Saints was actually the better game. . .:

Today was a thrilling college football playoff final, where two teams who had proven they were great played each other all the way to overtime, and Alabama somehow found a way to win after falling behind 13-0 at the half.

But there were too many missed penalty calls, too much brawling and too many silly mistakes to call this a perfect game.  And on top of these complaints, Ohio State and Central Florida must be sitting around thinking they could've beaten either of these guys.  We'll never know now, because the college football playoffs are too damn small.

The NFL playoffs, meanwhile, start with 12 teams.  Some of them are pretty ugly to watch, so maybe 12/32 is too many, but in any event at least we're sure that no worthy team was left out.  And one thing we do know, the Panthers and the Saints were both legit this year.  They played a fantastic, highly skilled, well executed back and forth struggle with each other, and the Saints barely came out on top in the end.  There wasn't any immature nonsense in this game, just pure beautiful football.  I wouldn't be surprised if the Saints went all the way this year, Drew Brees just doesn't miss.

Saints vs. Vikings is going to be another classic, coming up in just a few more days.

I wasn't sure if Basilisk was going to be good enough, since this new season is based off a book that wasn't written by the author of the book that begat the first season.  It turned out to be just fine, though.  I'm now confident it will be a worthy addition to the greatness of Basilisk as a whole, if nothing else, it's better than Macross 7.  It looks and feels and acts a lot like the original.

I should be finished with 200 Years Together soon.  The book makes me furious and reaffirms my wish to be forever rid of Jews in my new all-white utopia.  Solzenitsyn's tone is paternal and forgiving, but the facts he lists out are damning in and of themselves.  There's no way you can walk away from this book thinking it's a blessing to have a Jewish minority in your country.  They're about the worst cohabitants imaginable.