Latest Super Bowl survivor pool results (better late than never)

Last fall, I ran the third annual National Football League survivor pool among my characters, their friends, and real life people.  However, I have not released the results - until now.

Luke Muellerleile, a former "student-athlete" at Carleton University in Minnesota, won this year's contest, as the Minnesota Vikings outlasted all other teams through six weeks of competition.  Muellerleile won the pool on Oct. 16, when the Vikings were 5-0.  Now, the slumping team is 6-5 and out of playoff contention, but there's still time left to salvage their season.  Nonetheless, Muellerleile still wins the grand prize of a VIP trip for four to Super Bowl LI and associated pre-game events, courtesy of NFL On Location.

He outlasted first-timers such as talk show host Patrick MacLeamy and NASCAR wife Sherri Pollex, as well as veterans like Billie Barefoot, Brooke Liptrap and Josh LoMonico.

Here are the complete results:
Arizona - Billie Barefoot (3) Eliminated 9/11 (23-21, NE)
Atlanta - Rhett Jeffers (2) Eliminated 9/11 (31-24, TB)
Baltimore - Brooke Liptrap (3) --> Seattle --> BAL Eliminated 10/9 (16-10, WSH)
Buffalo - Jim Brinson (1) Eliminated 9/11 (13-7, BAL)
Carolina - Steve Post (1) Eliminated 9/8 (21-20, DEN)
Chicago - Patrick MacLeamy (1) Eliminated 9/11 (23-14, HOU)
Cincinnati - Brittany Raylene (3) Eliminated 9/18 (24-16, PIT)
Cleveland - Dustin Fox (2) Eliminated 9/11 (29-10, PHI)
Dallas - Billy Bob Ribble (3) Eliminated 9/12 (20-19, NYG)
Denver - Sherri Pollex (1) --> Carolina Eliminated 10/2 (38-21, ATL)
Detroit - Harvey Barefoot (2) Eliminated 9/25 (21-14, GB)
Green Bay - Katie Von Hinz (2) Eliminated 9/18 (17-14, MIN)
Houston - Bamm Bamm Plumpkin (2) Eliminated 9/22 (27-0, NE)
Indianapolis - Rita McBuddy (2) Eliminated 9/11 (39-35, DET)
Jacksonville - Barbie Blank (3) Eliminated 9/11 (27-23, GB)
Kansas City - Brendon Bump (1) Eliminated 9/18 (19-12, HOU)
Los Angeles - Blinky Blink (1) Eliminated 9/12 (28-0, SF)
Miami - Brittany Ramos (3) Eliminated 9/11 (12-10, SEA)
Minnesota - Luke Muellerleile (2) --> Washington --> MIN (season winner)
New England - Marc McBrien/Anthony Buttinelli (1) --> San Diego Eliminated 10/2 (35-34, NO)
New Orleans - Ricky Hooter (1) Eliminated 9/11 (35-34, OAK)
NY Giants - Ron Barnes (2) Eliminated 9/25 (29-27, WSH)
NY Jets - Jake Stubblebine (1) Eliminated 9/11 (23-22, CIN)
Oakland - Bobbington Brandt (2) Eliminated 9/18 (35-27, ATL)
Philadelphia - Bud Strickland (2) --> Arizona Eliminated 10/2 (17-13, LA)
Pittsburgh - Josh LoMonico (3) Eliminated 9/25 (34-3, PHI)
San Diego - Alecia A. Moore (1) Eliminated 9/11 (33-27, KC)
San Francisco - Ralph Ortiz (1) Eliminated 9/18 (46-29, CAR)
Seattle - Brian Warner (3) Eliminated 9/18 (9-3, LA)
Tampa Bay - Alonzo "Popeye" Barefoot (1) Eliminated 9/18 (40-7, AZ)
Tennessee - Lyndsey Rowley (1) Eliminated 9/11 (25-16, MIN)
Washington - Lyman Bowling, Jr. (1) Eliminated 9/12 (38-16, PIT)

Names in red are those of actual people.  Numbers in parentheses are the total number of contests for each contestant.

Busy week on Photoshop

I have played around with Adobe Photoshop a lot over the last week.  Here are three of the items I have completed.

First, I retrieved a photo of a North Carolina-based rock band called The Aviators, who performed at a recent festival in Harnett County.  Since they aren't well-known figures elsewhere, I simply placed the photo in a new file and re-identified them as members of betaBOOZEbrain.  I created them as a group with boy-band looks that record harder-edge rock music, so imagine if the Backstreet Boys had a playlist similar to Pearl Jam or KISS.  I imagined them as a four-piece band, but expanded it to a quintet by adding another guitarist, to match the setup of the actual band.  The name was borrowed from the 1989 game show Now You See It, which as I mentioned before is a favorite TV show of mine, and one I wish was more available in reruns.

Up next is a picture of British actress and singer Keisha Buchanan, who I have re-labeled with the coolest stage name I have ever imagined, and you'll see it below in the caption.  I have seen listings of people named Kimberley Wimberley in What's in a Name? Confessions of a Name-Dropper, a book by Paul Dickson, and of Kymberly Wimberly, a former valedictorian at a Mississippi high school, so I just re-spelled those.  "Shawnelle" actually came from a male basketball player who played in major college and the NBA, Shawnelle Scott.  As for "ButtaFly," it has two meanings: "butta" is African-American slang for someone who has a laidback demeanor, and "fly" refers to a sharp dresser, so envision the two concepts put together.  Also, a butterfly transforms from a cocoon, so it means Kimberly has grown personally and professionally.  My "ButtaFly" character is a spoken-word artist.

Finally, I have used head-and-body substitution to imagine Brittany Raylene (Buddy Wayne's wife) together with her mother Rebecca, grandmother Mildred, great-grandmother Ruth, and great-great-grandma Bertha.  Now, five living generations in one family is very rare, and that's almost certainly what such a picture would not really look like.  But, in the new Earth world I have created, anything is possible!  (The bodies are those of "characters" in the TLC reality TV series My Five Wives.)