I sit here wondering on another terrific September day...will the Browns ever have a CBS game in HD? Hey, at least we are on in Alaska this week.

I was back at Velocity last night. No peaches in the salad available this time. Had to go with the one that had pears and gorgonzola amongst other items. And sliders, of course.

Speaking of food, the Free Times alerts us to a bunch of new restaurants that have recently opened or are opening forthwith.

Meal of Links

One of my favorite shows returns on Sunday. Yes, it's "Dexter"! This show about a serial killer hooked me right from the start, and I'm up for the ride again this season.

"I've been hypnotized!" That is a really...cool...effect. OK, I'm back. I think.

Who knew? Canadians like pot. Check that. Canadians really like pot. In BC, it's a $7 billion industry. And this quote: "They're making a lot of money on those oil rigs, and everywhere Canadians are making decent money they are doing a lot of drugs." They must have missed this:



Exercise Yard

There were some choices for boxing this evening. Well, there was really only one choice for me. I had to watch Andre Berto-David Estrada and Kelly Pavlik-Jermain Taylor on Home Box, letting "Bad" Chad Dawson toil in obscurity over on Showtime. BTW, HBO has some terrific bouts the next two months, including Pacquiao-Barrera, Calzaghe-Kessler, Cotto-Mosley and Mayweather-Hatton. On paper, that is a list to look forward to.

The Berto-Estrada bout was actually pretty good. I've followed Berto's career since the day Mike and I saw him live 5 years ago at a USA-Irish match. Clearly, he was the best fighter there that evening and he's had a nice pro career, thus far. Estrada proved to be just the right kind of opponent, one who would throw some shots, not go down easily, and take him the distance. Estrada won only one round, the first, but traded 84 power punches with Berto in the third, and 94 in the eighth. Berto was relentless throughout, while emptying the kitchen sink all over Estrada. Estrada will be seeing jabs in his sleep for weeks, but there were lefts, rights, uppercuts, maybe even a bolo punch or two. Berto finally stopped the game Estrada in the eleventh, who will probably sleep until Tuesday.

Next, the middleweight championship fight between Youngstown's Kelly "The Ghost" Pavlik and Little Rock's Jermain "Bad Intentions" Taylor. Somebody's "O" has got to go! (I love when Buffer says that.) Lamps, Merchant and Lennox did a really good job calling this fight. Lennox even brought out his favorite word, "disdain", when they failed to touch gloves at first, during fight instructions. And Merchant mentioned it must be a good fight, "because I have five drops of blood on my shirt".

This one was almost over in Round 2. Pavlik got hit with some tremendous shots and went down. I was amazed he lasted the round because after the knockdown, his legs were still rubbery. As Pavlik said after the fight about the knockdown, "Shit, this is gonna be a long night." But he recovered and had a nice third round to get back in the fight. The middle rounds, for the most part, were less chaotic. Taylor seemed to fight in spurts and I liked the fact that Pavlik was connecting with the jab. He actually threw it most of the fight, however, Taylor was doing a fairly good job of counterpunching early. Later on, it seemed Pavlik was connecting more often without an answer from Taylor. Afterward, Taylor thought he had tired himself out in the early rounds when he was beating on Pavlik. I don't know, that excuse rang hollow with me, because Taylor did have some moments after the second round. I thought him far fom inept.

But going into the seventh round, all of the judges had Taylor ahead, as we found out later. I think the range was 3 to 5 points, as Pavlik was paying a high price for the 10-8 second round. It was a close fight, but as usual, the champ was getting favored on all cards. But then came the seventh round. Pavlik was working the jab, and eventually backed Taylor into the ropes. Then he hit him with a hard right. Taylor was hurt and moved into the corner, and you could see Pavlik sensing the kill. He hit him with several shots including a big uppercut and the referee didn't even count as Taylor appeared out on his feet and then sunk to the canvas during that final onslaught of punches.




















I actually leapt out of my chair on this one. I was very excited to see Pavlik win the title. He has a style that connects with the fans. He had lots of support from the live audience this evening, and maybe he can now fight a little closer to home. I'd love to see a title fight around here.

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44 Across: Actor on TV's "The Virginian" (7 letters) Answer: McClure Today's puzzle was OK. But what was that salute to Japan yesterday with: "Kirin Carpenter", "If You Knew Sushi" and "Kimono Dragons"?