I finished all my christmas shopping today. I'm finishing all of my christmas wrapping right after I finish with these results. WIth that in mind, I'll forego my usual brilliant tangential ramblings. I won't even talk about how by the New Year I will be the fattest I've ever been. Hell, as a sign of how dedicated I am to doing this thing quickly, I won't even make fun of groug. And he's a ripe target. You all know he is, too.

But none of that is to say that I won't ramble brilliantly or tangentially, or both even. That's not to say that I'm not 180 pounds and climbing, with no looking back in the foreseeable future. Hell, that's not even to say that groug's fat melon head isn't shaped like a butt. It's just to say that I don't have time for all that crap today.

Sorry. Maybe next week.

49ers @ St. Louis:

1. illini49er (6)
2. Mike Hawk (12)
3. wjackalope (14)

Green Bay @ Chicago:

1. sfgfan (0) - All that complaining finally paid off!
2. Josh from Hollywood, Fooch (2) - Should have complained more.
3. wjackalope, StrictlyFootball (6) - Complained too much.

Carolina @ New York Giants:

1. howtheyscored (10)
2. StrictlyFootball (12)
3. 49erLou, Fooch, Number22Drew (14)

Pittsburgh @ Tennessee:

1. StrictlyFootball (8)
2. howtheyscored (22)
3. Dub4lif3 (34)

Arizona @ New England:

1. ro128487, albertoleecho (26)
2. J2daZ, Ninerfromacrossthepond (32)
3. Florida Danny (34)

Atlanta @ Minnesota:

1. ro128487 (0) - OH, WHAT A BONANZA! (Call it a farewell, Stark)
2. marcello (2)
3. wjackalope, albertoleecho, Fooch (6)

Which makes our week 16 leaderboard look like this:

1. Ninerfromacrossthepond – 57
2. wjackalope – 54
3. albertoleecho – 49
3. StrictlyFootball – 49
5. Niner Fan Lost in WI – 48
6. jtoj – 44
7. marcello – 43
8. 49erLou – 41
8. Number22Drew – 41
8. proudcanadian99 – 41
11. howtheyscored – 40
11. Josh from Hollywood – 40
13. bayboy – 39
13. sfgfan – 39
15. Fooch – 37
16. ro128487 – 35
17. groug – 34
17. illini49er – 34
17. JerseyNinerFan – 34
17. Mike Hawk – 34
21. Ninjames – 24
22. good as gold – 22
23. J2daZ – 21
24. Florida Danny – 20
25. SuperFly – 19
25. Vote4Gore – 19
27. sancho8297 – 18
28. sam23 – 16
29. CB30 – 15
29. UnleashTheGore – 15
31. Rishi – 13
32. 408 – 12
32. Dub4lif3 – 12
32. Netsky – 12
35. youngbuckeroo – 11
36. mojorisin’ – 9
36. montasmob69 – 9
36. shlecko – 9
39. PHUT! – 6
40. etb2 – 5
40. gatling – 5
42. Ali4President – 4
42. camwoody – 4
42. zonedogs – 4
45. BallHead – 3
45. bondslegend – 3
45. Niners_Are_The_NFL – 3
45. The Golden One – 3
45. zenbits – 3
50. Ceradecke – 2
50. KingofDucks1987 – 2
50. ProfessorBigelow – 2
53. DiegoAsFan – 1
53. jfainsf49 – 1

Now THAT'S a week! Let's get started!

ro128487 and sfgfan are the clear winners of the week. Both guys managed perfect scores, and both performances put them from being in positions of waning or no hope into being very clearly in the playoff hunt. ro128487's 35 current points are especially impressive since he's only played a partial season.

I think that in light of sfgfan's onslought, it's worth congratulating me. Me, and Josh from Hollywood, that is. Both of us did just enough this week to hold sfgfan off. Both of us moved within one point of the playoff seeding tiebreaker. Both of us are pretty awesome. And I mean half of that from the bottom of my heart.

albertoleecho and wjackalope both also deserve mentions. albertoleecho regained (granted, shared) possession of third place after what seemed like weeks of slumming it. wjackalope had a quiet but nonetheless solid week, a brief reminder of what made him so dominant for so long, and a prelude to what should be a very interesting race to first place.

And I'd be loathe to not mention StrictlyFootball. Or, I mean, I'd be loathed. By him. But he had a very nice week and really deserves to be recognized. To think that after weeks of talking about wjackalope, albertoleecho, Niner Fan Lost in WI, and Ninerfromacrossthepond, it would be a fifth party who was was in third place and surging? Kudos.

Losers include groug. Man, I just can't help myself. I'd better never meet him in real life, though. Not if I like my ribs. And I do! I really, really do.

Hey, Fooch! You also scored! Actually, you're in pretty good shape up there. Is the final leg of the "lull them into a false sense of security and then strike before it's too late" strategy coming into play next week? Inquiring minds may or may not want to know. They're being uncharacteristically coy about the whole thing.

From a little after two oclock until almost sundown of the long still hot weary dead September afternoon they sat in what Mrs. Coldfield still called the office because her father had called it that--a dim hot airless room with the blinds all closed and fastened for forty-three summers because when she was a girl someone had believed that light and moving air carried heat and that dark was always cooler, and which (as the sun shone fuller and fuller on that side of the house) became latticed with yellow slashes full of dust motes which Quentin thought of as being flecks of the deal olf dried paint itself blown inward from the scaling blinds as wind might have blown them.

For Christ's sake, I forgot how long Faulkner's sentences were. And that's one of his short ones....