I know, there's been a serious lack of blogging this week. The second week of January is probably my busiest work week of the year, so there were plenty of late nights and I spent about six hours in the office today. The worst should be over, though, and work will still be busy but closer to normal.

A few thoughts:

- I'm warming up for the Pats-Jaguars matchup tonight with the Green Bay-Seattle game. It was quite a game on the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field (don't you hear the NFL Films guy's voice in your head when you read that?) Seattle jumped out to a quick 14-0 lead in the first quarter. This appeared to only piss off Brett Favre and the Packers, as the just walked off the snowy turf with a 42-20 win.

- I never got around to a Florida trip report, so I'll sum it up quickly. We had a great time with the family. J. and R. get along so well with their cousins. It's really too bad that we live so far apart and they can't see each other more often. My parents watched all four kids while A. and I and by brother and sister-in-law went to a very nice Italian restaurant in Winter Park for dinner one night. As far as we could figure, it was the first time the four of us went out to dinner with no kids since J. came home nearly 10 years ago.

- We also had an amazing day at Epcot. We were there from the rope drop at 8 AM until Illuminations was over at 9:45. Getting there at opening meant that we got to ride the big headliners (Test Track, Mission: Space and Soarin') first thing in the morning before the crowds got heavy, so we never waited in a line over 30 minutes.

- We got to see the new improvements to both the inside and outside of one of my favorite Disney rides, Spaceship Earth. The hideous Mickey hand that was erected for the Y2K celebration was finally removed and the geodesic sphere looked great in all it's solitary glory. The appointment of Pixar's John Lasseter as head of Disney Imagineering is already paying dividends. On the inside, the ride has been refurbished with revised audio-animatronics and a new Judi Dench narration. It keeps the spirit of the old ride but with some nice upgrades. The biggest change is at the end of the ride. On the way down from the top of the sphere your "time machine" turns backwards as always, but now an interactive game pops up on a touch screen in the vehicle. You answer a few questions and then the screen shows you a cartoon on what your life might be like in the future based on your answers. We know there are multiple scenarios, since A. and R. had different questions in their car than J. and I had. All in all, it was very cool.

- The Sox re-signed Doug Mirabelli to a $550,000 one-year contract. He took a cut from $750K last year (although he has a chance to make $1 million with incentives). I think Mirabelli has pretty much figured out that his only baseball career option is to continue on as Tim Wakefield's personal caddy. He really can't hit any more; his OPS has declined from a respectable .893 in 2004 to .721, .595 and ..638 the last three years. Wake is comfortable with him behind the dish, though, and I guess Theo figures it's worth putting up with his bat to keep Wake happy.

OK, time to see if the Pats can go to 17-0. My prediction: 38- 24 Pats.