I don't think I'm ready for the NFL.

The No Favre League, that is.

Brett Favre retired Tuesday. Life as we know it has come to and end.

No more underhanded passes. No more throwing snowballs at Donald Driver. No more tossing floating ducks into triple coverage — and still finding a way to complete a few of them. No more winding up and firing the football as if he's trying to impale the receiver.

And no more fun.

Favre was as unique as the pronunciation of his name.

Now, he's gone.

Who am I supposed to idolize at the quarterback position now? EliManning?

Who am I supposed to imitate while playing touch football at the park? Rex Grossman? Well, I kind of do that already. My playground quarterback rating is 36.2.

I'm certainly not going to adopt AaronRodgers as my fave.

I guess there's always Ben Roethlisberger. I know he'sgoing to be around for at least eight more years, unless he uses some of that signing bonus to buy another motorcycle.

Favre didn't just let me down with this decision.

Who is John Madden supposed to get giddy over now?

We're going to miss his long-winded diatribes about Favre.

"Bam, boom, whap. Brett Favre. You gotta love Brett Favre. Brett Favre (something unintelligible, guttural grunt, deep belly laugh). That's Brett Favre."

But now the big guy can no longer say that. He's going to have to talk affectionately about someone like, say, Tony Romo.

"Bam, boom, whap. TonyRomo. You gotta love Tony Romo. The thing about Tony Romo is (slurred words) Jessica Simpson (another guttural laugh). Tony Romo is a heckuva football player."

It's just not the same.

For 17 years, there were two things you could count on: Brett Favre and the Pirates losing.

Now one of those things is gone.

But I'm just being selfish. What more can the dude do? He's played 253 straight games, has all the passing records known to man and capped his career with one of his best seasons.

I just want him back.

The only thing that consoles me in these dark days is the fact that he might pull a Michael Jordan.

He can still play and it looked like last season that he still loves to play. Maybe come August he will change his mind and show up at camp inWisconsin for one more go around.

You can never say never. Junior Seau unretired about 50 million times, so at least we can hope that Favre will unretire at least once.

I doubt it, though. Favre was never one to rethink a decision on the football field — he just let it rip.

I suspect he will do the same off of it.

So, get used to Favre riding his tractor in Mississippi on Sundays this fall. We're going to have to fill the void with someone.

Cleo Lemon, anyone?

Mike Kilroy is a staff writer for the Butler Eagle.