Well, it won't be 0° -

neither air temp nor wind chill - in Arizona for the Superbowl. You had to remind yourself, while watching the Divisional Championship games, that the weather was bad, or you'd have wondered why the teams weren't playing very well.

The Packers are out, as the Minnesotans have been making a point of reminding me. [Is it time for me to renounce my Cheeseheadship, since I've been living mostly in Minnesota since I turned 18? ...No. I became a Packer fan between the Starr/Lombardi era and the Majkowski era, so I think I've earned my seat at that table. The fact that I can spell Majkowski without looking it up...well, that's the shibboleth.]

And I'm not done being a Packer fan. That was a great, great season! And I'm not ready yet for the Favre era to be over yet. This is a very young team, overall, and I want to see what they do next year.

As for this last game, without a doubt the Giants played better. The Packers needed a Desmond Howard to win that game. Driver stepped up to the plate, but in '97, they had two great receivers and Desmond Howard. If Green Bay doesn't have a street named after that guy, they need to get one.

Back to the weather, when the announcers said that the Giants have been practicing outdoors while the Packers were practicing indoors, that gave me a bad feeling. As it was, the difference was one interception. And it looked to me like both QBs were suffering from cold hands in OT. Favre took the greater risk, and paid the greater price.

Look, as well as things were clicking (comparatively) for the Giants' offense, it's a wonder the Pack held them to three field goal attempts, there in the fourth quarter. For those who don't know, only one of them succeeded - the longest one. Any one of them would have won it for the Giants, and the final one did. Score: 20-23 Giants.

Terribly disappointing to me, and, no doubt, my swiss brethren across the border...and it don't look to me like the NFC is going to take the Lombardi trophy this year...

Ah, I'm just going to take the elder Manning brother's advice and be bummed out.