So the Raiders won, and they're playing their old coach who bailed to go to Tampa Bay, after Steve Mariucci, the ex 49er coach, waffled on whether to take the job. It's the kind of drama even Hollywood could invent. Real life is sometimes way more interesting than fiction.

And Al Davis, who people call "the godfather", I just found out was the first NFL owner to break the colour barrier and hire african american players. Which reminds me that tomorrow is Martin Luther King Day, and I don't have the holiday off. Bad huh?

My pastor read a sermon at church today that Dr. Martin Luther King delivered in 1956, and it was very good. Dr. King had pretended he found a long lost letter from Paul to American Christians. The man definitely had a way with words as was evidenced by this early sermon. The themes Dr. King brought up in 1956 are so timeless too, as the country faces whether affirmative action and other programs to promote racial diversity have any merit at the college level.

My Dr. Martin Luther King connection. During my college time, Dr. King's daughter enrolled at my school, but left after a semester to go to Howard University in Atlanta. I never saw her, but everyone said she was very nice.

Although I'm a 49er fan, I'm jumping on the bandwagon to cheer on the Raiders because they're a Bay Area team. It's one of the perks of living in an area with two football teams. There's a good chance if one of them loses, the other team may win. GO RAIDERS!

The geriactric Raiders team is definitely redefining for professional football the age limit and longevity of players who stay injury free and take care of themselves. I read Bill Callahan even had the players train differently, so they don't get too tired because of their age. His strategy has paid off, as the Raiders look strong and don't fade in the fourth quarter as many teams expect them to do.

I love the fact that Bill Callahan has never held a head coaching job before, and now finds himself as a rookie coach in his first superbowl. I wonder if he allowed himself to have this dream. And what a dream. There are head coaches who have never taken teams to the superbowl, and Callahan goes in his first year.

My prediction: the Oakland Raiders will win Superbowl 37 by a touchdown, and it will be a close, well fought game.

And now we can look forward to why we really watch the Superbowl; the commercials.

I caught part of the North/South Senior Football Bowl yesterday in between errands. During the half time, I watched the senior football players take their shirts off and get weighed and measured before a room full of pro football scouts and coaches. The announcers said that sometimes players don't give their correct weight and height, so this process checks them.

It was very weird watching the whole process. I was first reminded of an animal auction, and then a slave auction that I've seen depicted in movies. But if these guys make it to NFL, they will get paid bucket loads of money. Some guy from the Detroit Lions said, "Some of these players are taller than I thought they were, and thicker too." Wow. The coaches and scouts really pay attention to a player's physical attributes. I had no idea.

Uh oh. Poor Philadelpia Eagles. If the Raiders win, it will be the Chuckie Bowl.

Why I drink alkaline water. Aside from all the health benefits, it does make filtered water taste very good. Honestly.

Bad diet, either a present one or one in the past, can cause acid wastes to be stored in the body. A meat and potato diet, for example, can cause the body to become more acidic. When acid wastes enter our bloodstream, the blood, in order to maintain that narrow pH range, will store them somewhere else. Acid salts stored in the body, over the decades, will overburden the system. A way has to be found to rid the body of wastes. Some examples of solidified acidic wastes are cholesterol, fatty acid, uric acid kidney stone, urates, sulfates, and phosphates.

The body uses the blood system to dispose of wastes; these are removed in liquid form, and are often deposited in the lungs and kidneys. If there are too many wastes to handle, they are deposited at various organ systems, like the heart, the pancreas, the liver, the colon, and other locations. Sometimes these wastes are deposited on the walls of arteries, and over the years can spread throughout the body.

The breakdown of this disposal process, especially of acid wastes, is what we call the aging process. In order to slow down and reverse this process, one must begin removing acid waste from the body.

The best way we have found to do this is to drink alkaline water. This water, having a pH of between 9 and 11, will first neutralize harmful stored acid wastes, and if you consume it every day, will gently remove them from your body. Yet, since the water is ionized, it will not leach out valuable alkaline minerals like calcium, magnesium, potassium, or sodium.

Japanese doctors have treated their patients for over four decades with alkaline water. They believe that the immune system loses its power to throw off disease when the body becomes too acidic. They advocate drinking alkaline water, eating alkaline foods.