This summer was unlike any other summer before. Last year I joined a keeper fantasy football league and it was the first summer for members in the league to decide what players to keep. So in early July the negotiations with other managers began. I do admit this was the soonest I have ever began to discuss and research for fantasy football. Needless to say my wife was not as excited about this change. It seemed like every other day I was on the phone, negotiating and trying to make the “perfect” deal. My wife would just shrug her shoulders every time my phone rang because she knew it wasn’t going to be a short call.

Then the magic happened. While at my cousins wedding my wife and I were invited to join a couples league for only a small fee of $10 a piece. I looked at my wife and asked would you like to try? At first she was not excited I would be joining another fantasy football league, but reluctantly she said “sure.” This is where the fun starts.

It was an online snake draft and after a brief explanation my wife was all set. She was actually showing some excitement during the draft. Lucky for my wife during the draft she was able to get her beau, Tom Brady. But to her credit she did an excellent job drafting. I explained to her the line up, scoring and she has been so into it ever since. It has been a marriage saver.

I downloaded the app for her iPhone, taught her how to check scoring, edit the lineup and pick up players and she is now in love with fantasy football. In week 1 my wife was on her phone checking scores more than I was. While at work I was constantly getting text messages about how her team and players were doing. She was also constantly giving me score updates. My wife does research and is adjusting her line up all the time. All her hard work is paying off because going into week 4 she is in first place in the league with a record of 3-0 and has scored the most points in the league. She is now a believer and lover of fantasy football.

I don’t know why I didn’t think of this idea sooner but Sundays are now just as fun for her as they are for me. Watching football all day is her love now too! Thank you fantasy football for saving my marriage.

Got this video off You Tube for then entertaining yet some what controversial video game Grand Theft Auto V. Are you going to go and pick up your copy? The game just went on sale this week. Hope you enjoy.

My wife and I started watching Dexter on a friends recommendation and we were quickly hooked. We started watching when we were a couple seasons behind and with Netflix we quickly caught up. We enjoyed Dexter so much we spent a little bit of extra cash to get Showtime each time Dexter was coming on.

However, I’m writing to share my dislike about how the series ended. Don’t be alarmed I’m not going to give any spoiler alerts, but I had a lot of disappointment with the final season. It’s really disappointing to have 7 good seasons and then just a bust of a final season. I was never hooked to the final season and the supporting characters were not engaging and I never liked them. The only character I enjoyed was Hannah McKay. From my perspective it appeared the writers of the show just couldn’t figure out a way to end the show, so they just came up with a “pretty good.”

Now if you haven’t seen the final season don’t fret, it’s certainly worth watching but the ending was pretty poor. Overall the final season of Dexter was just ok and pretty disappointing as a pretty big fan of the series.

I’d love to hear what other big Dexter fans think about the series finale.

This can be short and sweet and to the point. The Minnesota Vikings drafted Cordarrelle Patterson in the first round and he has only been on the field for 11 offensive plays. The Minnesota Vikings actually traded up to take Patterson and he still has been nonexistent in the Vikings offensive game plan.

However, this week I have read some articles stating head coach Leslie Frazier wants to include Patterson more in the offense. Why did it take 2 weeks, 2 loses for these types of comments to occur. We have seen in recent history, the Vikings top draft picks have been put on the field right away. The most recent success was Harrison Smith. The safety from Notre Dame was plugged in on defense right away because of the need for a quality safety in the line up. Well, the Vikings certainly have a need for quality wide receivers in their line up, put in Patterson.

Maybe just maybe Patterson isn’t ready and is looking terrible in practice. I haven’t read this anywhere but if someone doesn’t play, it typically means they don’t practice well.

Please coach Frazier put in Patterson! If he isn’t ready please then let us know that too, because when the team trades up in the draft for someone, the public kind of expects him to play. And play not just on kick returns. If Frazier does what he says I am very excited to see what Patterson can do. It can’t be much worse.

Me & my Grandma. I miss you Grandma.

Today is the anniversary of my Grandmas death. She was an amazing woman and she was the perfect example of putting others first and loving everyone in her family. A couple good stories about my grandma.

Whenever I went to a formal dance in high school we always had to make a stop at grandmas so she could get a picture with us. She loved to see us all dressed up.

She also always had gum and mints in her purse. After I would say hello, I would always follow up with, “Hey grandma got any gum?” I don’t ever remember a time when she said no.

Grandma also taught me how to play the dice game. She was very patient and boy was she a good player.

There are so many fond memories I have about my time with my grandma and I miss her every day.

I can’t believe the NFL season is just one day away. It seems like just yesterday the Vikings sent Joe Webb to the field for injured Christian Ponder in the playoff game after winning 6 straight games.

I am very excited for this Vikings season and I do like what the Vikings General Manager Rick Spielman has done this off season to improve the roster through the draft and free agency. The biggest signing I think was Greg Jennings because I have said all along, Christian Ponder does not have anyone to throw the ball to. Jennings is not that old, an excellent receiver, and has a chip on his shoulder after the Packers sent him to the curb. He will be an excellent number one option for Ponder.

Mr. Spielman I also thought had an excellent draft with three first round draft picks that helped the Vikings needs right away. Like most NFL drafts, players fall, and for the Vikings to be able to select Shariff Floyd was awesome. He will be a force on the defensive line right away and a good replacement for Kevin Williams when his career ends. It was also very smart to select a corner back next and get the talented Xavier Rhodes. The Vikings have a lot of talented receivers in the North to try and cover and his addition was greatly needed. Last, moving back into the first round to get Cordarrelle Patterson, WR from Tennessee, was another interesting move. The Vikings need wide receivers and his impact on special teams will also be very helpful.

However, unless you have been living under a rock this preseason the talk on all the major markets has been about Christian Ponder. Can he lead this team at the quarterback position? Can he be more than a game manager? I don’t pretend to be a great NFL coaching quarterback mind, but in my opinion, he needs to complete more passes and rack up more completion yards. The Vikings success will fall on his shoulders and this being his third year he must be better. We need to see some improvement and if we don’t it will be very interesting to see how the Vikings coaches and management will handle his playing time. Will Matt Cassel see any playing time this year? I hope not, but you never know. Fans here in Minnesota are very quick to call for the back up quarterback. Ponder is the key to this team and I hope the guy can succeed.

How good will the Vikings be this year? Well I heard a very interesting question on KFAN in Minneapolis FM 100.3, and I’m paraphrasing but it went something like this, with the roster changes made by the Vikings is this team better or worse than the team last year? I hope and pray each year for the Vikings to be better and make it to the Superbowl. However, I don’t think a Superbowl appearance is in the Vikings future this season. I predict a 9-7 record and failed playoff appearance. Sorry fans.

As I get older and my pants are getting tighter, I am in the beginning stages of evaluating my eating habits. I am also starting to evaluate my junk food intake. When I am chasing 3 little ones around it certainly is hard for me to find time to exercise but I am feeling convicted to monitor more closely my snacking.

It is very easy to get something on the go, through the drive through and have the cooler that tastes so good. This is where I am finding I consume most of my calories and cause me to go over my daily allowance most days. It is time to buckle down and get rid of excessive amounts of junk food and the snack right before bed. It is so hard after a long afternoon of working to just go home and go to sleep. I’m hungry. But anytime you want to accomplish something it will take some work. I gotta put forth some work.

So here is my plan.

Step 1: Never skip breakfast.

Step 2: Find healthy snacks with good portion control.

Step 3: Plan my meals ahead of time so I am not forced to go fast food at meal time.

Step 4: No snacking 1 hour before bed.

I really want to slim down and lose about 15 pounds. Here goes…wish me luck!

Recently I had the chance to go and play a round of golf at Black Bear Casinos Golf Course. I really love their 2 for 1 deal on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesdays because the round only cost me $30.

It’s a super nice course that is also pretty hard with some small greens and narrow fairways. I am certainly not a very solide golfer but despite how hard the course is, the good outweigh the bad. Some more good of the course are the nice fairway grass, nice white sand in the bunkers, and the greens were in great shape. I think the coolest part of the round is having a cart with GPS and accurate yardage markers. Being able to sit in your cart and see the green is only 107 yards away is pretty cool.

If you check the website you can find some nice deals to play at the Bear and their season pass is pretty reasonable as well. I would definitely recommend to give it a try.

What can I say? This summer is almost over and I feel like I hardly did anything fun. I did however as previously posted, complete a lot of home improvement projects to get the house ready to sell (which is now on the market) and got the chance to catch up with 2 of my closest friends that I had not seen in a super long time. I did play some golf this summer. I will be attending the Minnesota State Fair. I will hopefully attend the Minnesota Reniance Festival I am hoping for a tropical vacation this winter. Why go somewhere tropical in the summer?

I certainly have not blogged very much this summer and I am disappointed in my lack of blogging. I love blogging and love my readers.

I have not done much exercising this summer and I’m a little disappointed about that as well. It was a sad day this summer when I donated some of my pants that no longer fit. I have a feeling when Emma goes back to school, Cooper to day care and Nora has a sitter I will invest in a membership to Snap Fitness. For some reason I love the treadmill a little bit more because when I road run I just can’t figure out how to keep the same pace.

As summer winds down it also means one thing…FOOTBALL SEASON. I got a deal through Directv this year to have the NFL Sunday ticket and I am very excited to have the chance to watch any NFL game I want. Sundays are going to be the best this fall.

I hope you all had a good summer and I have included a couple pics.

Me and Beau,
Friends since age 6

Me and Dave
By the way he fainted at my wedding

We are ready for the fire works!

Sorry about the lack of posts but house projects have consumed all my free time this summer. Updates will be coming soon and thanks for checking back to see for new posts. Life has been good to the Bashaw’s.