Melissa Runs

As is the case with every Sunday, this owns my life from the second NFL Sunday Countdown begins and the minute the final 4pm game ends:

If you’re a football fanatic, this is a non-negotiable channel to add to your current cable package. You can check their website to see if it’s available in your area. Even if you hate football but joined your significant other’s or office fantasy football league, this might just make you see the sport in a different light. No commercials, and you see every single red zone play in the NFL on Sundays. Get the channel. You won’t be sorry. Unless you absolutely can’t stand football, then I’m pretty sure you won’t get anything out of RedZone.

Naturally, I dressed the part of a New England Patriots fan in red, white, and blue. And while pulling my jersey on I realized I had something else to add:

My Team USA Sparkly Soul headband! How convenient the colors of our flag are the same as the Pats uniforms.

Oh, say hello to that Blue Moon beer in my hand:

I declared last weekend it wasn’t my favorite because it was too spice-y, but it’s growing on me. And the remnants of a 6-pack are in our fridge and we don’t waste beer in our house. That’s alcohol abuse. I’ll drink it and take one for the team.

Mmm… beer.

Where was I? Oh, FOOTBALL.

I was partial to the early games since they were all SO close and fairly exciting. Although it was pretty sweet to watch RG3 tear it up again, even though the Skins ended up losing by 3 to the Rams.

Am I speaking Greek to some of you? Sorry.

Unfortunately, the Patriots couldn’t eek out a win against the goddamn Cardinals, losing their first home opener since 2001. Ouch. After several holding calls on Gronk and a Woodhead TD called back, they had a chance to win by one by making a simple field goal. NBD for Mr. Super-Reliable Gostkowski.

Except today it WAS a big deal.

[tweet https://twitter.com/Patriots/status/247429975966363648 align='center']

Quite a few expletives were heard in our household, and then silence. I grabbed us another round of beers to mourn the embarrassing loss to a team with such a weak defensive line. Sad day.

Once the 4pm games kicked off, I decided I was in the mood for sangria.

Fill glass 3/4 of the way with sangria, then add a splash of brandy & top off with sparkling water.

Once my drink was made, I got to work on dinner. I adapted two recipes from How Sweet It Is:

Smoky Sweet Potato Burgers with Roasted Garlic Cream & Avocado

Quick Caprese Quinoa with Homemade Basil Oil

I tweaked them both a little (ie. omitting flour & panko from the burgers, and omitting basil oil & adding fresh basil + balsamic reduction to the quinoa) but both turned out amazing:

I came across her blog for the first time last week and already have a ton of recipes bookmarked to make. Jessica has SO many veg options!

And now I’m doing laundry. EXCITING! It pretty much downpoured the entire day so not once did I feel guilty holed up in the house for umpteen hours today. Football & beer. You guys, life was hard today.

How was your Sunday? More productive than mine?

Do you watch football or wish it didn’t exist?