Congrats to Verno for winning this year's NFL pool, impressively finishing in the top 0.7%. Vern averaged close to a win per week more than me, as I ended up in the middle of the pack, tied for 14th. In the smaller, but trickier spread pool, LastPlace defied his nickname to finish in first place, landing in the top 0.5% of all ESPN pools, which is pretty impressive. I finished in the middle of that one too, though clearly almost last place if you don't count players who didn't make picks all season. Congrats to the winners and thanks to all for participating, as it was a lot of fun. I'll look for a playoff pool... if anyone has any suggestions for a site to curate our picks for the postseason feel free to make them.

With New Year's Day falling on Thursday it's hard to say how much gaming news there will be this week, so we'll just have to play that by ear.

Links:	Thanks Ant and Acleacius.
Play:	Caravan Beast. Bob The Inventor.
Stories:	2014 Proves a Grim Year in Malaysian Aviation.
Science:	Microbiologists cultivate "microbial dark matter." 5,200 Days in Space. Thanks Digg.
Media:	Happy Holidays! From Patrick Stewart And His Singing Hat. Grandma gets pranked with a chocolate iPhone on Christmas. Thanks HARDOCP. OUTLAST: PART 5 (Teens React: Gaming).