Off Track: It's Fantasy Football Time!

Every now and then I get the urge to post something that isn’t running related whatsoever and I always usually just trash it because this is a running blog. However, I’ve decided that it’s my blog and if I want to write about something that’s not running related then that’s exactly what I’m going to do. I’ll be using the new Off Track tag for these kind of posts. Get it? Off Track can mean not pertaining to the usual subject matter or it can mean not on the track, as in track and field. It’s a really funny pun! You might even say that it’s punny. (Punny! Ha! Another one, I am just on fi-yah with the jokes today!) These Off Track posts won’t happen very often, but today I’m going to talk about fantasy football.

I love fantasy football. Does that make me a geek? Perhaps, but no more than having a blog does so I’m OK with it. At the very least, I don’t cry myself to sleep about it anymore. Anyway, I decided to give you all a chance to get beaten by me in Fantasy Football and have started a league that you’re all invited to be a part of. Candis is also in the league which means there are 10 open spots left. Details below:

Who can join? Anyone. Lurkers, regular readers, first time visitors, non-runners, fantasy football virgins, seriously anyone, I don’t care.
How much does it cost? It’s free, hosted by CBS Sports.
How do I sign up? Click this sign up link and then enter the password. If that doesn’t work search for the Half-Fast Fantasy Football private league on CBS Sports.
What’s the password? bloody nippl (I was going for ‘bloody nipples’ but it cut off the ‘es’ just to be difficult.)
When is the draft? The live online draft will be held Thursday, August 28th at 9:15PM Eastern Time.

I have no idea how quickly this league will fill up or if it will even fill up at all, if it doesn’t fill up then I’ll try to open it up to the general public so that we have enough teams and then resume crying myself to sleep at night. There are no prizes for first place except the pride that will swell up in your loins which may or may not make you a faster runner (the safe money's on not).

I’m so excited for football season to start and for my productivity at the office to take a nose dive. Let me give you a little peek at what consumes my days during football season, or more specifically, fantasy football season.

- Monday is for checking the scores from the weekend’s games and figuring out what needs to happen in the Monday Night Football game. I need 4 TDs from Colts’ tight end Dallas Clark, but I need someone other than Peyton Manning to throw them to him. This can happen right?
- Tuesday is for checking out which free agents are available and submitting waiver claims for them. Kicker Rob Bironas kicked 8 field goals in one game? I must have him, he’s going to do that every week, no?
- Wednesday is for discovering which players I received from the waiver wire and checking out which players other teams dropped.
- Thursday is when I begin checking my player’s match-ups to see who’s playing a tough defense and who’s playing the Lions. Thursday is also the day that teams release their official injury lists. Tom Brady is listed as ‘probable’ oh no! Is that Belichick being disingenuous or am I really stuck starting Kyle Orton this week?
- Friday is when I set my lineup for the coming weekend’s games. Friday is also a good day for reading the fantasy analysis websites and articles and second guessing myself into losses.

As you can see, it is a time consuming endeavor, especially when you add in all of the running and blogging that I’ll be doing as well. My boss is going to have to ease up on the workload over the next 5 months if we’re going to make this whole employer/employee relationship work.