OK, I guess what I thought was funny -- Eli being wrong about what head cheese was made of in the made-up internal dialog in which he also says how smart I am -- wasn't so funny.

But listen, folks. I'm a professional journalist. I know how to Google "what is head cheese" before talking about head cheese.

DavidWilliam, thank you for coming to my defense. Soccer fans and bicycle racing fans seem unable to enjoy their sport and take a little needling it. It seems to insult them to the core for anyone to criticize their favorite sport, and how DARE anyone say they don't like it, or find it boring.

Funny, I've called baseball and football and basketball and hockey boring at various times, and nobody has ever reacted that way. People disagree, of course, but nobody has ever questioned my intelligence or accused me of having some kind of inferior attention span for, say, writing about how boring hockey has been for the last 10 years or so.

Also, I love how soccer fans drag out the "soccer is the most popular game in the world = soccer is the best game in the world" argument. I doubt any of the people making that argument would make the same argument about a musician, movie or television show.

As a baseball fan, I've heard my whole life from non-baseball fans (including the soccer fans who have written in to this thread) about how boring baseball is. And you know what? It IS boring. If you happen to find it boring. I happen to find it fascinating. This doesn't not make me any better than a person who finds it boring. I married a person who finds it boring, and I just couldn't be any more fond of her.

I happen to find soccer boring. It's not because I'm stupid. And it's not because I don't understand it. I just find it boring. I make jokes about it because these jokes amuse me, and the reaction of soccer fans to them amuses me even more.

I would argue that yes, if the Colts get to 14-0, then lose a meaningless game or two with their subs playing, then win the Super Bowl, it's a comparable achievement to Miami 1972. Maybe better, given the general parity in the league and the famous easyness of Miami's '72 schedule.

Dungy has said he'll rest his starters once home field is secured. I would guess, as Peter King did in yesterday's column, that they'll treat those games like exhibition games 2 and 3, playing the starters for several series to keep them sharp, but getting them out before halftime. With a regular season roster, you can't get 'em all out, but I mean the stars.

Seattle can clinch a playoff spot next week, but there's a good chance they'll still be fighting for home-field advantage in Week 16. And home-field advantage is no small thing for the Seahawks, who have to go a long way to get to anyone else's home field -- and everyone else has to come a long way to get to theirs. Seattle teams in any sport get a snootfull of travel by the end of the year.

If you ask me, this schedule was meant to serve up another Colts AFC Championship season by the league, while ensuring that they'll play in that godforsaken dome-thing all the way through the playoffs.

Well, I guess I won't ask you then. The Colts' schedule, like everyone else's, was determined by a formula. They play the teams in their own division twice each, all of the teams in one of the other divisions in their own conference and all of the teams in one of the divisions in the other conference. This year the Colts, like all AFC South teams, play all the teams in the AFC North and NFC West. It rotates, so the AFC South plays the AFC North again three years from now, and six and nine, and plays the NFC West four and eight and 12 years from now. I don't think there's a way to rig this to favor any one team.

The other two games on the schedule are the same-place teams from the two divisions in the conference that they don't play. So that'd be New England and San Diego, the champs of the East and West, since the Colts won the South last year.

Also, someone wondered whether the Dolphins rested their starters late in '72. I don't think they did.

Actually, I just got around to watching the Grey Cup yesterday (Wed).

Everything you say is true, except I thought the Black Eyed Peas were a little weak. Do they perform live much? I thought they did, but they looked amateurish. I realize Fergie's not really there for her voice, but she does have a nice voice. Somebody should teach her how to sing, or at least how to breathe. Breathing's important. Shouldn't be gasping for breath between every line of singing as though you've just run a marathon, at least not when the dancing to that point hadn't been rigorous.

But at least they weren't the Rolling Stones, who will be dragged out and wound up for the offend-nobody Super Bowl halftime.

I think I'm going to write a little bit in Thursday's column about the Grey Cup game.

Excuse me, but I feel slighted about not being properly credited for chiding you about the lack of comment on the Grey Cup - my Monday letter even got a star, damn it...

Sorry. I linked to it. And who do you think gave you that damn star?