Ryan's Jungle Fun

The Comforting Ache of the Summer Holiday

2009-06-22T09:36:00.002-05:00

I am sure I have no lost my entire readership after ignoring my blog for a couple months. That presumes that I actually had a readership, though, which probably flatters myself. Anyhow, here is what is up with me:

It's the second full week of summer for me after school (finally) finished a couple weeks ago. Naturally, (because my one talent in life is writing essays, apparently) I pulled some great grades last quarter, so I am happy about that. Now, I'm just sitting at home trying to balance relaxing, reading for my BA thesis, and doing housework. It's not an exciting life but it's pretty stress free.

The lack of stress is important. What I find amazing about last year is that I did much better academically than I did in either of my first two years and I did so while displaying almost every classic symptom of clinical depression. I felt worthless and hopeless and wanted to sleep all day and occasionally fantasized about ending it all and yet I still managed to pull straight A's. The came at a cost, though. School is a highly stressful environment for me. I struggle to make all the personal relationships work.

Home is a more pleasant environment for me. I get enough social interaction to keep me from going crazy from my parents but I don't have to deal with a lot of people all the time. I am shy and I have a fair bit of social anxiety. At home, I don't have to worry about being "on". The effort of being personable takes a lot out of me. I don't make that effort at home, so it is less stressful.

It is nice to be home because I am happier here but I find that happiness bothersome in that it is strictly localized to home. I am not happy when I am at school. I feel like I'm not really depressed if I can be perfectly happy at home but I can no longer cope with the school environment. I was about a week or two from a mental breakdown when school ended. If there had been another three weeks left in the quarter, I fear something terrible may have happened. I definitely feel like I need help so that I can deal with school when September rolls around. I just fear that doctors will say that I am fine and that I am not depressed but that I will once again struggle during the school year like I have the past three years. I would rather be clinically depressed and on medication than a supposedly normal person who just hates his life 9 months of the year.

Beyond the drama of my mental capability or incapability not much is happening in my life. I've started a workout plan, hoping to add some weight to my pitifully thin frame. It's going reasonably well so far although I generally don't appreciate the constant soreness. We'll see how it works out. I find that the hardest part of the whole equation is just eating enough to provide my body with the calories necessary to gain way.

Other than that, my life is a whole lot of nothing right now. To further quote Maximo Park's "The Kids Are Sick Again," which is quoted in this post's title. I'm just spending "pointless days pining, afternoons whining".

Chelsea Musings

2009-05-04T22:35:00.003-05:00

Once again, I am dreadfully failing to come even close to being productive. Time to write on the old blog again. Tonight's topic, sports musings.

CHELSEA MUSINGS

Wednesday is the second leg of Chelsea's Champions League Semifinal with Barcelona. Chelsea played the first leg at the Camp Nou in Barcelona determined to do just one thing: prevent Barca from scoring. They successfully accomplished that goal. Guus Hiddink, ever the tactical master, pulled a new trick out of his sleeve. Instead of picking two out of the trio of Michael Essien, Michael Ballack, and John Obi Mikel to man the midfield, he chose all three. The versatile Essien shifted to right wing and acted as almost a second right back, playing just slightly in front of Branislav Ivanovic. Meanwhile, on the left, Florent Malouda displayed a fabulous work ethic in tracking back to aid Jose Bosingwa who superglued himself to Lionel Messi for the whole of the match. That left Didier Drogba all alone up top and with very little support. He almost managed to nick a first half goal anyway, which is a testament to how well he is playing currently.

The night was all about defense, though. Barcelona had the odd dangerous moment. Bojan Kristic probably should have done better with a brilliant service from Dani Alves that provided him with a clear header opportunity. Nonetheless, the Catalan goal scoring machine was rendered mostly impotant. Chelsea tackled vigorously and often and Petr Cech produced one of his very best displays of the season to keep the leaders of La Liga out.

Predictably, the football purists howled. Pep Guardiola berated the Blues for refusing to play actual football. What did they honestly expect? There is an established tactic for handling Barcelona over two legs. You park the bus at the Camp Nou and pray that you don't concede before taking it home to win the decisive match. Playing free-flowing attacking football against Barcelona is a suicide mission. No club side in the world can go tit for tat with Barca in that way and have any prior of survival.

Now, Hiddink faces yet another tough task. How does he beat Barcelona at Stamford Bridge. The crowd will certainly be plenty excited for what will be by far the biggest match of the season for the Blues to date, but that can only go so far. Chelsea needs to win. That means that Chelsea has to attack. The time for sitting back is over. How do you attack without exposing yourself to deadly Barcelona counterattacks? That's the big question.

Hiddink experimented with one possible solution by finally debuting a 4-4-2 with Drogba and Anelka up top together and Lampard on the right wing. The experimented proved conclusively that the notion that the two strikers cannot play together is utter rubbish. They linked extraordinarly well. Drogba set Anelka up for the first goal. Anelka played Drogba in for the third. In between, they both played a role in setting up Florent Malouda.

However, the plan has its flaws. Fulham had far too many chances of far too great a quality during the Chelsea's 3-1 win. Erik Nevland scored Fulham's lone goal as the lucky benificiary off some soft defending and even softer goalkeeping. Without the usual midfield trio, Chelsea couldn't impose their physicality like they normally do. In addition, Lampard appeared lost on the right wing.

I would expect Chelsea to come out in their normal 4-2-3-1 formation. The left back will almost assuredly be assigned to man-mark Messi once again. Other than that, it's hard to imagine what Guus can do to outfox Pep Guardiola. This time around, Chelsea may just have to play it's game the best way it knows how.

While they do have to face the fearsome Barca offense, Chelsea does have some advantages of its own. Victor Valdes is not considered one of the world's top keepers. In front of him, Barcelona has an unsettled centre half situation. Carlos Puyol is suspended and Rafa Marquez is out with a season ending injury. Gerard Pique will thus be teamed either with usual left back Eric Abidal or infrequently-played Uruguayan Martin Caceres. Moreover, even when they are at full strength, Barcelona's defense can be beaten. Zeus knows that Dani Alves can only loosely be termed a defender as he does precious little defending. Certainly, height is not Barcelona's strong suit and they can be beaten aerially.

Real Madrid got clobbered 2-6 by Barcelona at the weekend but in the process exposed Barca's defensive frailities. Sergio Ramos figured in both goals. First, he served a perfect ball to a completely unmarked Gonzalo Higuain, who deftly headed into the net. Then, he found himself totally unmarked and scored off an Arjen Robben free kick. One imagines that Chelsea will be providing plenty of service to the noggin of one Didier Drogba. Even the sometimes uninterested Michael Ballack may be intrigued enough to steal a goal for himself. Heck, even Branislav Ivanovic, the two-goal hero at Anfield, is probably licking his chops.

If Chelsea don't get lured into a passing competition with Barcelona and instead use their superior physicality and aerial prowess, they have every chance to prevail at the Bridge with that most English of tactics, Route One football.

The Kids Are Sick Again

2009-05-03T16:31:00.004-05:00

I haven't accomplished ANYTHING yet this weekend, so I figure that there's no sense in starting to be productive now. It's time to once again start writing in the old blog. I'll write about various other things soon hopefully, but now it's time for a song.

Maximo Park are one of the best bands in the world, in my humble opinion. You'd have a hard time arguing that, though, especially in America. Most people in the United States would have no clue who Maximo Park are. Then again, most people in the US that I talk to don't even know who the Smiths are. So fuck them, right? What could they possibly know?

Maximo Park are a 5 piece band from Newcastle, England that formed in 2003. Technically, they formed in 2000 but it wasn't until 2003 that frontman Paul Smith joined the band. Maximo without Paul Smith are like the Stones without Mick Jagger. The concept just doesn't work. Their first album, A Certain Trigger, arrived in 2005. They followed it with Our Earthly Pleasures in 2007. Following the one album every two years schedule faithfully, their third album Quicken the Heart is due out in just one week.

The musical landscape is fairly littered with jangly self-important UK indie bands. I enjoy The Enemy for example but there is something about their stiflingly self-conscious desire to speak for the masses of the Credit Crunch era in the way that Oasis and the Manic Street Preachers did the same for disillusioned 90s lads did that is off-putting. Also off-putting is the manufactured arrogance of bands like the Artic Monkeys. Maximo Park is refreshing because they are entirely different to the other bands on the scene. They are no less pretentious. In fact, they are probably more pretentious than most. However, their is a certain honesty in Paul Smith's pretensions that make it all acceptable. One gets the feeling he just does, to reference a song title, read "Russian Literature" all day and that he is the kind of fellow who can and does quote Byron at will.

It makes him the modern rock scene's nearest equivalent to Morrissey. With apologies to Liam Fray of the Courteeners, a self-styled "Morrissey with some strings" who opens for the man himself, Smith is the one who most nearly approximates the Mancunian crooner in terms of unique gesticulations and remarkably verbose lyrical sensibilities.

The Smiths, then, are an obvious influence but sonically there are traces of the Manics, Editors, and probably several other bands that I'm not thinking of right now. The important thing about Maximo is not that they sound different (they do, but not markedly so) from other bands but that they are different. While they work in a common sonic territory with other bands they stand out from the pack thanks to their unique lyrics and Smith's remarkably manic energy. The whole band seems to pulse with the energy that Smith puts into his performance.

A Certain Trigger was the debut, a guns-blazing, teen-angst ridden introduction of the band to the world. Our Earthly Pleasures saw Maximo refine the formula trying for clarity, depth of emotion, and sometimes sweetness where the previous album had supplied jangly guitars, superficiality, and self-righteous and self-conscious nervousness. Quicken the Heart promises to be the dreaded change of direction album. Smith said, "The whole affair is going to be quite stripped down compared to the last album because we don't like to repeat ourselves." That can only mean one of two things. Either it will be a brilliant redefinition of an underappreciated band or it will be their suicide.

The first single is "The Kids are Sick Again". As one can see from the title, Maximo is veering into dangerously political territory here. Besides the ocassional success like the Manics and "If You Tolerate This..." songs about sick youth are almost always bad news for rock bands. Thankfully, Smith saves us all from rants about government and the economy and instead sings vaguely about "pointless days pining" and his loss of self-respect before indulging in the hackneyed yet still somewhat powerful refrain of "The kids are sick again/nothing to look forward to/they jumped the cliff again/future sinks beneath the blue".

It doesn't pack the sheer energy of "Our Velocity" and in that sense it may be ill-suited to be a first single. However, it's a better than that lyrically vacant song from the last album and hearlds a yet tighter and yet cleaner style from Maximo. If the rest of the album can stay away from pseudo-political ditties and stick to the relationship heartbreak that has been the most fertile source of Maximo's songs, it could just be their best effort yet.

Here's the tracklist for Quicken The Heart:

Wraithlike
The Penultimate Clinch
The Kids are Sick Again
A Cloud of Mystery"
Calm
In Another World (You Would’ve Found Yourself By Now)
Let’s Get Clinical
Roller Disco Dreams
Tanned
Questing, Not Coasting
Overland, West of Suez
I Haven’t Seen Her in Ages
Lost Property

Here's the video for "The Kids are Sick Again":

"Don't Give Up"

2009-04-13T12:44:00.003-05:00

One more reason that I am somewhat rubbish at life. Instead of writing my own blogs, I know simply regurgitate others' words. *Sighs*

I was listening to a new song on Marina and the Diamonds' Myspace when I decided to read her blogs. Minus the stuff about celebrity, this encapsulates a lot of what I've been feeling. Here's what she wrote:

Back from New York.

Feel happy but also sad and like world hates me. Feel like i may rule the world but also fear in reality i am big failure who is rubbish friend/ deluded/ crap at love etc.

Feel greedy and horrible for spending all money in new york.

Feel mean for being mean person in life.

Feel like i do not want to grow up to be twat face celeb. Have been thinking deeply about the notion of fame and celebrity and what it actually means, what i would personally gain from it and how one can get to a point where one doesn't want attention/ recognition for unhealthy reasons eg "Oh Hey i have a gaping, gangrenous hole for a heart and and i want everyone to love me for no reason whatsoever". Cause most Famouses seem pretty fucked up and weird and not very loved in reality because they love themselves too much to form real, stable relationships. The ones that are normal and kind and add something to pop culture are the ones worth the space.

I have always really admired people like Madonna for doing what they want, for being disciplined when the rest of the world cant be bothered and for staying focused on their goals until they achieve them. But it freaks me out when I realise most of these people are now really fucked up or sad and I just wonder what it's all really about..

Dont want to be like the unhealthy celebs. All those people who gossip and care about material shit, their $11k bags, whats in fashion, who is having sex with who etc. I am as prone as anyone to the media/ celebrity but its so diseased and wrong and damaging and not what any of us should be wasting our time on. Where are all the old fashioned people in the world. Why do i never meet them. Feel like i dont want to go to any parties and that everyone in the world is crazy amazing fun party animal except for me and that i am just a boring girl and ''all i wanna do is take ugly dogs for a walks".*

*To get me through this difficult time in life, i am playing Hassle's 'Love me to pieces' for 5 hrs now.

PS. I am not in any way considering myself a 'celeb 'in this post.

PPS. Everything in this post is aimed at myself.

Well, you've got that last bit wrong, Marina. It's aimed at me, too. Everything from feeling deluded and rubbish at love to feeling hopelessly old-fashioned and stodgy for not partying to resorting to listening to Erik Hassle on repeat to get through things resonates strongly with me.

The other songs that get me through things lately? Those of Morrissey and of Marina herself, especially "Obssessions".

Words from a Hotel Parking Lot

2009-04-12T01:48:00.003-05:00

I did not write this. I found it in the parking lot of a Best Western in Countryside, IL. That weekend was one of the worst weekends of my life. This is one of the worst nights in my life. Tonight, I think I've just had a panic attack. In order to try and calm myself down, I'm transcribing these words and uploading them to the world. I have preserved the orginal handwritten capitalization and punctuation and attempted to transcribe what appears as exactly as possible. I hope that whoever wrote this is well right now.

Every Day Its getting HaRDer to Decifer, the Real Between the Facts and Fixing of these liars I am just another coward lying on the Floor, Can you Hear Me Crying Now OR AM I A Whore looking For the Attention that I Seek IS there anybody listening .Believing in Anything seems So Fake, WISh I could just Clear my head and Make My ESCape. Cant take too Much more before I've gone insane. Watching all of the Repeated Memories Archived in my Brain . IS this Really life or Just a Dream?

VV Brown -- Bringer of Hope

2009-03-04T16:34:00.002-06:00

I must say I was happy when I checked Twitter today and saw this tweet from VV Brown:

"i just love nerdy intellectual men who are awkward and witty. They are so super sexy...; ) especially those who dont realise there hotnesss!"

Given that I self-identify as a nerdy intellectual man and that I am awkward and at least aspire to wittiness, this gives me hope. Oh, and VV, if you're reading, I'll be your American Boy. Even if that is an Estelle lyric. You know you want some American nerd lovin'.

If you're wondering who, exactly, VV Brown is, wonder no longer. You may have read or heard (perhaps right here) that 2009 in music is set to be the year of females playing synth-pop. There is a whole laundry list of acts that fit this description. Let's see:

Lady Gaga (R&B-ish)
Little Boots (pure pop)
La Roux (New wave)
Mini Viva (Xenomania girl duo)
Pixie Lott (Not terribly synthy, Gabriella Cilmi-esque)
Alex Roots (Avril Lavigne-ish)
Marina and the Diamonds (actually just one person, a bit like Kate Bush with a synth)

That's just off the top of my head. VV Brown is very much part of that group. She has described her sound as both "indie doo-wop" and "50s synth madness". That about covers it.

Here's her debut buzz-building limited release "Crying Blood"

And here's her newest single, "LEAVE!"

One to watch, indeed.

Chelsea at the Crossroads, Part Two

2009-02-20T22:29:00.002-06:00

Chelsea at the Crossroads, Part Two: Scolari's Fatal Flaw

The January transfer window presented Chelsea an opportunity to improve their squad and address the weakness plaguing it, but that was never on the cards. Prior to the window’s opening Peter Kenyon warned that Chelsea was unlikely to make any significant buys because players of the quality Chelsea seeks are either unavailable or cup-tied in January. Fans’ hopes that this was merely a smokescreen were not fulfilled. Indeed, Chelsea proved a selling club in the window. Substitute left back Wayne Bridge was moved to Manchester City for a reported 12 million pounds and long-serving second choice goalkeeper Carlo Cudicini was allowed to join Tottenham on a free transfer. Chelsea’s only incoming players were Turkish teenage prospect Gokhan Tore, Inter Milan flop Ricardo Quaresma, and 21 year-old defender Michael Mancienne, who returned from a loan spell with Championship front-runners Wolves. Quaresma would immediately get his chance to make an impression as Scolari, who managed him with the Portuguese national team, installed him in the starting XI against Hull City. Hull City, like Chelsea, ran out to a blazing start but of late the wheels have come off somewhat for the Tigers. Conceding goals, with alarming regularity, Hull seemed the ideal opponent against whom to revive the Blues’ flagging attack. However, Chelsea once again played lethargically and unimaginatively.

Quaresma, like Chelsea’s other wingers, proved uninterested in challenging defenders by driving to the byline and thus failed to add a needed dimension to the offense. Chelsea dominated possession but largely failed to create legitimate scoring chances. With the Blues desperately needing all 3 points to keep pace with Aston Villa and maintain distance over Arsenal, they instead limped to 0-0 home draw that arguably flattered them, for it was Hull who had perhaps produced the best chances. It was a game the caught Scolari out and marked him as stubborn and unimaginative. While Scolari had complained that his squad was too bureaucratic, he ultimately proved equally bankrupt of invention.

When Chelsea, at Roman Abramovich’s order, sacked Scolari, the move was largely greeted by surprise. The papers openly questioned the wisdom of sacking a manager after only 7 months on the job. Had not Scolari been hailed as a great success in the glow of his September returns, they asked? Frequently, it was pointed out that Scolari had not been given the resources in both money and talent that perhaps he had bargained for. On this reasoning, the sacking seemed the rash decision of impatient ownership who were reacting to a mere month’s worth of poor results. In fact, the poor results stretched back deep into the fall. Viewed in the lens of hindsight, it is apparent that Chelesa’s struggles were long evident and that Scolari’s termination was the logical and necessary conclusion to his uneven tenure.

The home match against Stoke City on January 17 provides perhaps the best example of the errors of Scolari’s ways. Stoke, like Hull City, is only freshly promoted to the Premier League. While Stoke has had considerable success inside the friendly confines of their home ground, the Brittania Stadium, they have struggled mightily on the road. Furthermore, they are heavily reliant on Rory DeLap’s long throws for consistent scoring opportunities. Having already beat the Potters 2-0 at the Brittania, Chelsea seemed sure to make light work of them at Stamford Bridge. That was not the case.

From the very beginning, Stoke gave the Blues fits. An early Rory DeLap throw was headed straight into the air by Alex who was fortunate that no Stoke player could get on the end of it. Petr Cech then failed to reach the ensuing corner kick providing another scare. Ultimately, Chelsea settled in and began to dominate the contest but a packed Stoke defense prevented the Londoners from claiming the lead they perhaps deserved. Scolari chose not to change tactics at halftime and it was the visiting Potters who netted first after the break. A Stoke counter-attack caught the Chelsea defense napping and DeLap coolly slotted by a helpless Petr Cech. With just minutes left, all seemed lost when suddenly Juliano Belletti headed in from point-blank range in the 88th minute to give Chelsea a lifeline. Then, in the dying seconds Frank Lampard, wearing the captain’s armband with John Terry a late injury scratch, lashed a 20 yard screamer into the top left corner of Thomas Sorenson’s goal to claim an unlikely win. Lampard, almost giddy with excitement, ran over and mobbed the embattled Scolari in a very public show of solidarity.

Lost in the thrill of victory was the truth of what won the day for Chelsea. While veterans Belletti and Lampard netted the crucial goals, it was the youthful vigor of two of Chelsea’s substitutes that put them in the position to do so. Little-used 19 year old Argentinean striker Franco di Santo headed across goal to set up an easy flick home for Belletti on the first goal. On the second goal, it was another 19 year old, Slovakian winger Miroslav Stoch, who made the key play in just his second first-team appearance. Stoch’s beautifully weighted cross led to the maelstrom from which Frank Lampard’s stunning winner ultimately emerged. Scolari, however, seemed not to recognize the contributions that the two young attackers made to the victory and neither of them saw an increase in pitch time subsequently.

Put in a nearly identical situation against Hull, Scolari left di Santo and Stoch on the bench and instead used his substitutes on the typically defense-minded Belletti, the chronically disinterested Drogba, and lackluster Deco. The Stoke victory should have been a turning point for Scolari’s Chelsea. It should have been the day on which Scolari discovered that his young prospects were ready to play a major role in Chelsea’s campaign. Instead, Scolari learned nothing and stuck to using the same players in the same system. How can Scolari honestly criticize his squad when he refused to use his youngest, hungriest players?

Ray Wilkins’ management of the team at Watford last Saturday further made a mockery of Scolari’s claims. Scolari steadfastly refused to pair strikers Nicolas Anelka and Didier Drogba. Wilkins, on the other hand, did just that against the Hornets. Drogba responded with perhaps his best effort of this season. In the early going, Drogba linked up with Anelka beautifully only to see the Frenchman unluckily hit the outside of the post with his shot. Still, Watford scored the first goal with Tamas Priskin’s delicate chip over the offside trap. It was an unfortunate for development for the Blues, who utterly dominated the game and surely deserved to be comfortably ahead long before Priskin’s 69th minute effort. Wilkins, unlike Scolari, responded with a deft tactical change. Holding midfielder John Obi Mikel was replaced with Stoch as Chelsea shifted to a 4-4-2 with Anelka and Drogba up top. The change paid immediate dividends. Anelka bagged goals in the 75th and 77th minutes to give the Blues the lead that they would not relinquish. At once, Wilkins shattered two of Scolari’s adamant beliefs. Not only could Anelka and Drogba play together but they could also do so in a 4-4-2, which Scolari refused to play.

Ultimately, it was not merely a bad run of form that doomed Luis Felipe Scolari’s tenure at Stamford Bridge. It was his inflexibility and refusal to try new tactics and play young players that proved his undoing. These characteristics made it abundantly clear that Chelsea would not come out of its winter slumber under Scolari’s watch. With crucial fixtures against Watford in the FA Cup, Aston Villa in the Premier League, and Juventus in the Champions’ League on the horizon, Roman Abramovich realized that if he was to save his season it was now or never. For a club struggling to slowly attain self-sufficiency, missing the financial windfall of the Champions’ League is a nightmare scenario. That is the scenario that was staring Abramovich in the face as he viewed a fixture list with Aston Villa and Arsenal away still to come and an unresponsive, unimaginative manager. Given the circumstances, Abramovich had no choice but to sack Scolari in an attempt to save his team’s season.

Chelsea at the Crossroads, Part One

2009-02-16T23:24:00.006-06:00

Chelsea at the Crossroads, Part One: The Rise and Fall of Scolari

It has not been, it must be said, a banner year for Chelsea Football Club. The campaign began brightly enough. After dumping dour and unpopular manager Avram Grant, who brought the Blues to the very brink of Champions’ League glory, Luis Felipe Scolari was introduced to lead Chelsea into the future. “Big Phil” brought an impressive CV to Stamford Bridge, having reached the very pinnacle of footballing success as manger of 2002 World Cup Champions Brazil. His mission was ambitious: to bring trophies to South London and to play attractive football doin it. The early returns were encouraging. Chelsea shot out of the gate quickly, dominating all comers and racking up a gaudy goal differential. Scolari’s brand of football looked set to revolutionize or at least revitalize the often dull Premier League.

However, things were not what they seemed. As the English fall brought a chill over the land, Chelsea’s play cooled, too. First, Xabi Alonso’s deflected shot carried Liverpool to a 1-0 victory and broke Chelsea’s 4 ½ year Stamford Bridge unbeaten run. It heralded the demise of invincible Chelsea. Scolaris’ tactics had been found out. When opponents realized that fullbacks Ashley Cole and Jose Bosingwa provided all the width to the Chelsea attack, the Blues’ Offense was rendered stagnant, narrow, and predictable. Suddenly, Chelsea’s squad seemed to lack the dynamic players necessary to break down packed defenses.

It was an issue that first arose in the summer transfer period where Chelsea was, at least in comparison to previous years, not a major player. Scolari did not make the lavish expenditures typical of Jose Mourinho’s tenure. Instead, Scolari and Chairman Peter Kenyon set about downsizing the squad by offloading what were deemed unnecessary players such as Steve Sidwell, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Claude Makelele, and Hernan Crespo. Scolari’s only major purchase was a relatively modest 7 million pound outlay on aging Portuguese playmaker Deco who together with Jose Bosingwa, who signed before Scolari began with the club, comprised the whole of Chelsea’s significant summer additions. While the club’s decision not to bring more expensive, proven talent to the squad may at time have seemed a financially prudent declaration of faith in the team’s younger members, it came to seem a grave mistake as Chelsea began to appear a team that had grown old together and was sorely missing Arjen Robben and Damien Duff, who provided width and invention to Chelsea’s league-winning squads and who were never properly replaced.

As Deco and Bosingwa, who initially got off to dazzling starts in South London, became increasingly less effective, the acquisition that Chelsea failed to make, that of Brazil and Real Madrid starlet Robinho, was thrown into harsh relief. Robinho is the exact sort of young, dynamic, creative player that the Blues squad cries out for. The transfer had at one point been all but a done deal. Chelsea, indeed, had already begun to print up the shirts. However, at the last, Manchester City, newly backed by wealthy Abu Dhabi sheik Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, swooped in and made an offer that Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich declined to match. It was a clear indication of a new role for Chelsea. No longer were they the fantastically wealthy new boys chasing championships at any cost. Chelsea had become more sober, responsible, and determined to live nearer their considerable means. Yet they remain haunted by their past. Previous foolish expenditures, a tendency to acquire players who had already passed their primes, and the failure to build an effective and productive youth system has left Chelsea with a squad that, compared to the other “Big Four” clubs, looks old and thin.

Scolari plunged forward continuing to play his favored 4-5-1 system, claiming that his squad left him little choice. Even when Ivorian striker Didier Drogba returned to full fitness, he refused to pair he and his French counterpart, Nicolas Anelka, maintaining that the lack of defensively able wingers and a left-sided alternative to oft-injured winger Florent Malouda prohibited such arrangements. While Scolari doggedly persevered with his system, losses and costly draws began to pile up. Burnley saw the Blues out of the Carling Cup. Arsenal humbled Chelsea in league play at the Bridge. Cluj, Bordeaux, and Roma stymied them, allowing no wins on Chelsea’s Champions League travels. While management publicly maintained Scolari’s job was safe at least until season’s end, fan dissatisfaction began to grow and many started to question whether the Brazilian had the skills for club management in the Premier League.

So....My Weekend Sucked...

2009-02-16T21:30:00.005-06:00

Since I'm not getting anything productive done like homework or applying for interships, I figured I might as well write some.

Now, if you'll recall (or refer to) my last entry, I was set to ask out this cute girl in my English class. Well, I did it Wednesday. The results? Not great.

I went into class with a greater eye on her body language and tried to figure out whether she might be interested in me. In doing so, I realized that she was betraying no signs of interest. She wasn't looking at me a lot or flipping her hair or doing any of those things typically associated with flirty behavior. On the other hand, she certainly wasn't closing herself off and once again things were very friendly between us. We chatted a bit before class and even whispered back and forth a bit during class. Having realized that she probably wasn't actively interested in me, I nonetheless decided to still ask her out. Maybe she hadn't been thinking of it herself but there was still the chance, I thought, that she might be willing to go on a date simply based on our friendship.

After class, walking out of Cobb, I asked her whether or not she might like to grab lunch on Friday or Saturday. At first, she didn't quite understand and explained that she was very busy this weekend but then I asked her again what she thought of the idea itself. "You mean like a date?" she said. I confirmed that's what I meant. She clearly was blind-sided and wasn't feeling it. To her credit, she was very nice about it and handled it remarkably well. First, she hesitatingly said, "I'm not sure if I want to date..." and then when I remarked that it was on the table and that there was no pressure she said "I'll think about it...".

Though the note she left off on gave me a slight amount of hope, I know that in reality there isn't much of a chance of things coming good for me. The tone with which she spoke indicated pretty clearly that she wasn't interested and was trying to make the best of an awkward situation. I never wanted to be the dorky guy who misinterprets girls' friendship and forces them to politely reject him, but it seems that is who I've become. Really, I'm left with no good options. If I try to remain patient and hope that a relationship naturally comes to me, I get disappointed when that fails to happen. If I try to be proactive and aggressive and ask girls I like out, I just get disappointed and depressed when they reject me. I don't know what it is about me, but I donn't seem to attract the interest of girls at all. I know that I'm too shy and that I'm not always personable, but I don't think I'm so overwhelmingly misanthropic that the occasional girl might not take an interest in me. I think the only girl that has ever been remotely interested in me is Laura and given the way I was unceremoniously and unexpectedly dumped by her it's hard to say how much she ever really fancied me.

I get a lot of advice from people who tell me to not worry about it and to enjoy my youth without being proccupied with girls, but honestly I'd like to know what it feels like to be in love and loved in return before I'm too old. Sure, I'm only 21 but most guys have at least had their first kiss by 21. Me? No. Moreover, I've been borderline depressed off-and-on at least since the beginning of college maybe even since the beginning of high school. The time I felt happiest? The three weeks that Laura and I were somewhat of an item. My self-confidence was better, I was happier, and I had a reason to get up in the morning. Now, life seems somewhat meaningless and empty. I don't have many friends in Tufts yet and many days I go all day without talking to anyone. It's a pretty damn lonely way to live.

I'm actually starting to get pretty worried about myself. I think about death far too frequently. I never seriously consider doing anything rash and I've never self-harmed, but I think about it enough to scare myself. What terrifies me is that eventually I'm going to graduate and I'll be even more alone than I am now. I guess I'm just a weak person. I need people around me to support me and prop me up. Now, there are at least still friends on campus and RAs and RHs that are pretty much obligated to talk to me if I need help. But when I'm out on my own it's going to be even lonelier and there will be even less support. There are thousands of smart girls on campus. If I can't strike up a half-decent relationship under these circumstances, what chances am I going to stand in the "real world?"

This is what I spent my Valentine's Day weekend thinking about. I was hoping that this girl would say yes and it might be the best Valentine's Day that I've ever had. Instead, she said no and it was the worst. Just as I know why Laura dumped me, I know why she said no. In fact, I went in fully realizing that there was a large chance she would say no. Still, the rejection brought all the old feelings of inferiority that I had carefully supressed after Laura rushing right back. It hit me harder than I expected it would and than it had any right to. This girl did nothing wrong, of course. If anyone did wrong, it was me in asking her out when she wasn't betraying any signs of interest, but that knowledge hasn't stopped my pride from being gravely wounded. It hasn't stopped me from being useless ever since and in a total emotional funk.

I had that class again today, but she was sick and wasn't there. It appears I'll have to wait until Wednesday or maybe Friday to see her again. I hope by then she'll have thought about it and I can settle this somewhat in my mind. There is a (maybe) 1% chance that she'll have thought about it and deemed it a good idea, but I know that in all probability it will come down with the 99% and she'll confirm that it's not going to happen. I just hope that things aren't awkward and it won't ruin whatever small friendship we had cultivated prior to me asking her out. I can't bear to lose another girl full stop like I did Laura. I just hope that things come around for me eventually and I can finally achieve some sort of contentment because I don't know how long I can go on like this feeling hopeless, lonely, and lost.

Time for the Next Phase

2009-02-08T21:15:00.004-06:00

After the mess that was and is what happened between me and Laura, I've got that nervous feeling back in my stomach. It seems to me that I must initiate the next phase soon.

I've been sitting next to this really cute girl in my English class and I've developed a pretty healthy crush on her. She's really smart and insightful but not in a pretentious and typically U of C way and she's really fun to chat with. Normally, I don't socialize too much with people in my classes but she was super friendly and started chatting with me like we were old friends. Friday we walked from Cobb to Bartlett together after class continuing a conversation that we were having at the end. It felt really good to talk with a girl in that way again. It's just not quite the same talking to female friends as it is talking to a girl you fancy.

It's a dangerous situation because she seems like a super friendly girl and I don't want to mistake her friendliness for interest in me. In fact, I'm reasonably sure she has none. But at the same time, from the looks of her facebook she doesn't have a boyfriend either. I figure it can't hurt to ask her out. I just have to work up the courage to do it and figure what the best way is. If she rejects me out of hand, at least I tried. It might make class awkward if she's not interested, but that's a chance I have to take, I think.

Hopefully, this isn't just a set up for more heartbreak, but I'm really optimistic for the first time in a while. The odds may not be good but at least it gives me some hope and hope is an important thing, indeed. I really hunger for female contact and companionship and when I see such a cool girl 3 times a week, it's hard not to be excited about the prospects.

We shall see. It's time for the next phase to begin.

Song of the Day -- S Club 7 "Bring It All Back"

2009-02-06T11:09:00.002-06:00

I haven't wrote anything on here in ages. That's mainly because I've scarcely had a chance to breathe lately. Between school, the sim league, trying to fix my computer, and trying to maintain some semblance of a social life it's been a full plate. I've got tons of decent writing ideas kicking around but it's hard to find time to sit down and write just for my own pleasure.

That said, I have a bit of time now before class so I thought I'd throw up a Song of the Day. Today's choice is "Bring It All Back" by S Club 7. S Club 7 was a seven person pop group consisting of Tina Barrett, Paul Cattermole, Jon Lee, Bradley McIntosh, Jo O'Meara, Hannah Spearitt, and Rachel Steven. It was created by Simon Fuller who also managed the Spice Girls and created "Pop Idol" and it's subsequent worldwide spin-offs, including "American Idol". Completely a formula pop group, S Club was Fuller's next idea after leaving the Spice Girls.

S Club 7 was propelled to success by their BBC children's sitcom portraying their ongoing adventures around the world. The theme song to the original series, set in Miami, was "Bring It All Back". Upon it's release, it shot to #1 in the UK singles chart.

I hadn't really heard much S Club until I was surfing youtube the other day and I hit upon this song. Wow! It's so saccharine that you almost want to fall over holding your stomach, but beyond the schmaltzy sweetness it's an amazing bubblegum pop song that is infectious. Plus, it helps out the kiddies by telling them to follow their dreams. S Club 7: Doing a service to the world by preventing kids from becoming emo. Of course, all the kids who listened to S Club in that era probably now hate pop and will only listen to Fleet Foxes and Vampire Weekend or whatever the vogue band is now, but at least they aren't hanging out at Hot Topic or slitting their wrists! Thanks S Club!

Have a look and listen:

Small Dilemma

2009-01-24T18:08:00.003-06:00

After buying a new Chicago card (because the old one won't read anymore) and purchasing a ticket for the Ting Tings concert, I'm wondering whether or not $50 is too much for a Morrissey ticket.

On one hand, he's a honest to goodness music legend. On the other, is he really 2.5 x better than the Ting Tings? His prices are that much higher. I figure I'll probably splurge on them eventually because of how much his music means to me but it seems steep. That said, the memories will probably be worth it.

EDIT: Dilemma solved. I went ahead and ordered the ticket. It turned out to be closer to $60 thanks to some BS "convenience" charges. I just figured "How many opportunities am I really going to have to see Morrissey?" Plus, I've heard that he's brilliant live.

This Post Is A Reminder

2009-01-18T00:55:00.000-06:00

...that I need to check when Ting Ting tickets go on sale. They're playing the Metro in Chicago on April 5. I need to see them. This post is a reminder so that I don't forget about the show!

Introducing...Defend Moscow

2009-01-17T16:20:00.004-06:00

I didn't mean for this to turn into a music-only blog. I have a mind to write about the first few weeks back at UChicago as well as a bit about Chelsea and possibly the Buffalo Bills Simulation Football League. However, for now it's another brief music post.

A few days ago, I was reading Popjustice's Twitter and they were doing another thrilling installment of the "in the post" feature. Basically, since Popjustice is a popular and influential music blog, they get sent all kinds of stuff for free by artists who are hoping for some publicity. "In the post" is a series of tweets (aka Twitter posts) that simply details what they received in that day's mail. In that installment of "in the post" they received a CD from Defend Moscow and mentioned that they were quite good, so I took a peak at their Myspace.

First, please note the amazing logo. Secondly, the music itself is really good. The single is "Manifesto," which is about Leon Trotsky, if I remember correctly. It's a nice solid uptempo number. In fact, everything that Defend Moscow do is uptempo, and they tend to all share the common theme of wistfully recalling what might have been. It's happy music about being sad, not to put too fine a point on it. Sample "Manifesto" lyric:

Everything was right
Now everything is wrong
And I will never hope for more.

Next up is "Die Tonight," which doesn't sound as if it will be very jubilant lyrically. And it isn't. Sample "Die Tonight" lyric:

We know we're going to die tonight
And the darkness overrides the light
Well we know were going to die
Say goodbye
Don't even try
Because no one's getting out alive

Then we have "You Just Walked Away." It's a song about loving and needing someone and then seeing them walk away as if it meant nothing. Given recent circumstances, I find this a poignant bit of pop. Chorus of "You Just Walked Away":

And you just walked away
And left me on my own again
You just walked away
And left me here with this pain

The last song on their Myspace is "Sign of Life". Not surprisingly, it's a song about looking for meaning for life. First verse of "Sign of Life":

All I needed was a little emotion
All I needed was a sign of live
All I wanted was an indication
That it's not real

So there you have it. Defend Moscow makes mid/uptempo electropop that sounds very polished and cool and deals with themes of heartbreak and regret. They're like the Ting Tings chilled out, intellectual sibling. Here's the band's bio in case you want to know more (this is stolen from their facebook, so of course it's all fluff):

Managed by the mastermind behind The Wombats, Defend Moscow are destined for great things.

Comprised of musicians from London, Bergen and Paris, the quintet are armed with a manifesto to spread their brand of indie-electro across the globe.

Formed via a chance meeting between childhood friends Jon Beck (vocals) and Dave Fawbert (guitar/synths/programming), and Norwegian siren Sofie Storaas (vocals) in Bergen, Norway a year ago, they bonded over a shared love of classic and contemporary electro, pop and indie, and Russian vodka.

Completed by drummer Adam Pickering and bassist Rick Elmos, they immediately set to work writing tracks recalling the finest moments of New Order, Human League, Pet Shop Boys and contemporaries such as New Young Pony Club and Chromeo.

An extensive touring schedule is planned for the new year, along with their debut single, Manifesto – a dancefloor-destroying statement of intent with lyrics referencing the darkest moments of the cold war to be released in January, Defend Moscow are all set to lead an electro-pop revolution.

Finally, here's a clip of them playing "You Just Walked" away supporting Team Waterpolo at 93 Feet East on Brick Lane in London from October 28, 2008:

Song of the Day -- Fascination by La Roux

2009-01-12T18:32:00.002-06:00

I haven't thrown anything up in about a week, so it seemed due for an update. Today's selection is Fascination by La Roux. La Roux is Londoner Elly Jackson. She looks like Molly Ringwald with A Flock of Seagulls haircut and acts like Lily Allen, if Lily Allen were from Brixton and didn't pretend to be a cockney. She describes herself as someone who is very vulnerable and emotional and channels that emotion into her songs.

As for her songs, they are pure synth pop. In 2009, the 1980s are back with a vengeance and La Roux is at the forefront of a new group of acts that are bringing the sounds of classic new wave pop back to the radio.

La Roux's single is "Quicksand" but thanks to the magic of the internet we have about a half dozen La Roux tracks in at least a rough version. One of them, and in my opinion the best, is "Fascination." Jackson's high, fragile voice is on full display and a strong electronic beat drives the track forward with an exciting but not overwhelming urgency. The lyrics speak of the after-effects of lost love as Jackson affirms that "old fascinations lead to new temptations". Everything works together to create a hauntingly danceable commentary on moving on after love is gone with the star of the show being Jackson's unique voice.

Here's the link:

Get Ready World -- 2009 is the Year of Pop

2009-01-06T18:48:00.003-06:00

I've been reading some of BBC's Sound of 2009 coverage, and this year, I'm happy to report is the year of pop. If you're not familiar with the concept, the Sound of 2009 is basically a huge poll of 100+ music journalists. These are print journalists, website editors, and influential bloggers. These tastemakers get together and come up with a list of the acts that they expect to make it big in 2009. How accurate are they. Here's the 2008 list:

1. Adele
2. Duffy
3. The Ting Tings
4. Glasvegas
5. Foals
6. Vampire Weekend
7. Joe Lean and the Jing Jang Jong
8. Black Kids
9. MGMT
10. Santogold
11. Ida Maria
12. One Night Only
13. Alphabeat
14. Laura Marling
15. Cajun Dance Party
16. The Courteeners
17. Gabriella Cilmi
18. Late of the Pier
19. Black Mountain
20. Little Wayne

Except for notable failure Joe Lean and the Jing Jang Jong, all of the first 14 (!) had at least one notable single. Adele and Duffy became international stars. The Ting Tings played on NBC's New Year's coverage and were splashed all over the place thanks to their iPod ad. Vampire Weekend and MGMT became the "it" bands of the year. All of which is to say, that the people who make this list are more likely than not to become major stars.

So what does this year hold? The main sound is 80s influenced electropop. Yes, I think I may have died and went to musical heaven, as one of my favorite sounds is set to take over the airwaves. This year, guitars are going the way of the dodo. In their place is synth and drum machines providing the high energy backing to pure pop vocalists and songs.

Here's the longlist:

The Big Pink
Empire of The Sun
Kid Cudi
Little Boots
Passion Pit
Dan Black
Florence and the Machine
La Roux
Master Shortie
The Temper Trap
VV Brown
Frankmusik
Lady Gaga
Mumford & Sons
White Lies

Note that Lady Gaga is of course already a major star, but she has yet to release anything in the UK, so she's technically eligible, even though anybody can guess that she'll be huge there soon enough. Here's the link to the BBC's coverage. I'm so excited: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7758169.stm

Music -- a Great Christmas Gift

2009-01-05T23:17:00.004-06:00

We didn't really make much of a big deal about Christmas at my house this year. My brothers and I are all 21+ and the parents support us by paying phone and car insurance bills and the like, so they feel (and I agree) that that's better than buying us something we won't use on Christmas. However, my brother Craig exchanged gifts with both me and Brandon (the third brother) and we in turn pool together to get him one (the BBC's Planet Earth in Blu-Ray).

Craig got me "Billy Joel: The Complete Collection 1973-1997". Basically, it's three volumes of Billy Joel's greatest hits and a fourth volume of some live tracks and a Q&A with Joel. Craig already had it, but I didn't and his CDs are scratched to hell so they aren't of good quality to rip from. It was nice to get my own copy of these discs and to have them ripped to my computer without odd sounds because of scratches.

He also gave me a $25 iTunes gift card. After much deliberation, here is what I purchased:

The Fame by Lady Gaga
Ladyhawke by Ladyhawke
The Orange Album by Stefy
"Beat Control" by Tilly & The Wall

I got the Ladyhawke album because it was Popjustice's #1 album of the year and I follow Popjustice near-religiously.

Lady Gaga has, of course, been making quite a noise in the pop world. Popjustice hasn't really talked much about her, but that's because her stuff is just coming out now in the UK. "Just Dance" sits at 3rd on downloads alone in the latest UK Singles Chart, so I'm sure they'll be talking about her soon enough. It's a little bit more R&B than their (and my, usually) tastes, but I've heard a bunch of the songs and I like them all.

Originally, I was just going to get "Chelsea" from Stefy, but the album was only $6 and the rest of the songs seemed quite good in their own right so I thought, "What the hell?" and picked it up.
Beat Control is just a fun song that I had a great time dancing to at a club in London, so I picked it to round me up to $24.96. Not bad for $25 if I do say so myself.

Popjustice's Top Albums of 2008

2009-01-01T22:55:00.002-06:00

I gave you the singles list. Now, here is the list of Popjustice's top 29 albums of 2008. I only have a few of these, but I want more. I've been meaning to get my hands on several of these selections. I'll post the list with albums I have bolded and albums I want in italics.

Popjustice's Top 29 Albums of 2008

1. Ladyhawke - 'Ladyhawke'

2. Girls Aloud - 'Out Of Control'

3. Delays - 'Everything's The Rush'

4. The Saturdays - 'Chasing Lights'

5. Annie - 'Don't Stop'

6. Sugababes - 'Catfights & Spotlights'

7. Take That - 'The Circus'

8. Cut Copy - 'In Ghost Colours'

9. Lykke Li - 'Youth Novels'

10. The Ting Tings - 'We Started Nothing'

11. Alphabeat - 'This Is Alphabeat'

12. Iglu & Hartly - '& Then Boom!'

13. Kanye West - '808s & Heartbreak'

14. Britney Spears - 'Circus'

15. Cyndi Lauper - 'Bring Ya To The Brink'

16. Goldfrapp - 'Seventh Tree'

17. The Japanese Popstars - 'We Just Are'

18. James Yuill - 'Turning Down Water For Air'

19. Keane - 'Perfect Symmetry'

20. Little Jackie - 'The Stoop'

21. Neon Neon - 'Stainless Style'

22. Pacific! - 'Reveries'

23. Rex The Dog - ‘The Rex The Dog Show’

24. Sam Sparro - 'Sam Sparro'

25. Leon Jean Marie - 'Bent Out Of Shape'

26. Same Difference - 'Pop'

27. Hadouken! - 'Music for an Accelerated Culture'

28. Will Young - 'Let It Go'

29. Alesha Dixon - 'The Alesha Show'

We don't mind saying, readers, that this has not been the most exciting year for albums. :(

Popjustice's Top 104 Singles of 2008

2009-01-01T22:36:00.004-06:00

Since it's now 2009, Popjustice has come out with their annual list of the top singles of the year. I don't necessarily agree with the placement of all the tracks. Specifically, I'm not sure that I believe "I Decided" deserves to be #1 or that "Mercy" should languish at 104, but I have about 1/3 of these tracks and they're all great. Popjustice hasn't led me astray before, so I'm going to try to acquire a good deal more of these. Enjoy (songs I own are in bold, songs I've been meaning to download are in italics).

Popjustice's Top 104 Singles of 2008

The Top 104 Singles Of 2008

It was a good year for pop...

1. Solange - 'I Decided'

2. The Ting Tings - 'That's Not My Name'

3. Sebastien Tellier - 'Divine'

4. Hercules & Love Affair - 'Blind'

5. Sam Sparro - 'Black and Gold'

6. Jordin Sparks feat Chris Brown - 'No Air'

7. Kylie Minogue - 'The One'

8. The Saturdays - 'Up'

9. Katy Perry - 'Hot & Cold'

10. Girls Aloud - 'Can't Speak French'

11. Heartbreak - 'We're Back'

12. Beyonce - 'If I Were A Boy'

13. Girls Aloud - 'The Promise'

14. John Barrowman - 'What About Us'

15. Sonny J - 'Handsfree (If You Hold My Hand)'

16. Britney Spears - 'Womanizer'

17. Miley Cyrus - 'See You Again'

18. Dizzee Rascal feat Calvin Harris and Chrome - 'Dance Wiv Me'

19. Iglu & Hartly - 'In This City'

20. Little Boots - 'Stuck On Repeat'

21. Alesha Dixon - 'The Boy Does Nothing'

22. Leona Lewis - 'Run'

23. Annie - 'I Know Your Girlfriend Hates Me'

24. Ladyhawke - 'My Delirium'

25. Frankmusik - '3 Little Words' EP

26. MGMT - 'Kids'

27. Pacific! - 'Hot Lips'

28. Rihanna - 'Disturbia'

29. Cahill - 'Trippin' On You'

30. La Roux - 'Quicksand'

31. Camille - 'Money Note'

32. Alphabeat 'Fascination'

33. The Ting Tings - 'Great DJ'

34. Keane - 'The Lovers Are Losing'

35. The Jonas Brothers - 'SOS'

36. MIA - 'Paper Planes'

37. MGMT - 'Time to Pretend'

38. Mystery Jets - 'Two Doors Down'

39. Pink - 'So What'

40. James Yuill - 'No Surprise'

41. VV Brown - 'Crying Blood'

42. Pendulum - 'Propane Nightmares'

43. The Killers - 'Human'

44. Rihanna - 'Take A Bow'

45. The Saturdays - 'If This is Love'

46. The Feeling - 'I Thought It Was Over'

47. Tilly & The Wall - 'Beat Control'

48. Blackout Crew - 'Put a Donk On It'

49. Alphabeat - 'Boyfriend'

50. Gabriella Cilmi 'Sweet About Me'

51. Britney Spears - 'Break the Ice'

52. Kanye West - 'Flashing Lights'

53. Cut Copy - 'Lights & Music'

54. Hot Chip - 'Ready for the Floor'

55. Goldfrapp - 'A&E'

56. Madonna feat Justin Timberlake - '4 Minutes'

57. Estelle feat Kanye West - 'American Boy'

58. James Morrison feat Nelly Furtado - 'Broken Strings'

59. Kid Rock - 'All Summer Long'

60. Kings Of Leon - 'Sex On Fire'

61. Kylie Minogue - 'Wow'

62. Little Boots - 'Meddle'

63. Little Jackie - 'The World Should Revolve Around Me'

64. Robyn - 'Who's That Girl'

65. Lykke Li - 'Breaking It Up'

66. Ladyhawke - 'Back Of The Van'

67. Neon Neon - 'I Told Her On Alderaan'

68. Ne-Yo - 'Closer'

69. Alphabeat - '10,000 Nights'

70. Ladyhawke - 'Paris Is Burning'

71. Leona Lewis 'Forgive Me'

72. Cobra Dukes - 'Airtight'

73. Lykke Li - 'I'm Good I'm Gone'

74. Man Like Me - 'Carny'

75. Ladyhawke - 'Dusk Till Dawn'

76. Alexandra Burke - 'Hallelujah'

77. Fonzerelli - 'Losing You'

78. McFly - 'One for the Radio'

79. Rihanna - 'Don't Stop the Music'

80. September - 'Cry For You'

81. Santogold - 'LES Artistses'

82. Christian Falk feat Robyn - 'Dream On'

83. Cicada - 'Falling Rockets'

84. Sugababes - 'Girls'

85. Rihanna - 'Rehab'

86. Pussycat Dolls - 'When I Grow Up'

87. The Count & Sinden feat Kid Sister - 'Beeper'

88. The Ting Tings - 'Shut Up and Let Me Go'

89. Utah Saints - 'Something Good 08'

90. Roisin Murphy - 'You Know Me Better'

91. McFly - 'Lies'

92. Freemasons 'When You Touch Me'

93. Gabriella Cilmi - 'Save The Lies'

94. Adele - 'Chasing Pavements'

95. Beyonce - 'Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)'

96. Boyzone - 'Better'

97. Bryn Christopher - 'The Quest'

98. Cherish feat Yung Joc - 'Killa'

99. Flo Rida feat T Pain - 'Low'

100. Cliff Richard - 'Thank You For A Lifetime'

101. David Jordan - 'Place In My Heart'

102. Delays - 'Keep It Simple'

103. Eric Prydz - 'Pjanoo'

104. Duffy - 'Mercy'

Our longlist did go on a bit further, but there seemed to be a clear break at the 104 point so we've cut it off there. Thank you very much Duffy for ending things.

Song of the Day -- Warwick Avenue by Duffy

2008-12-21T11:37:00.008-06:00

Note that the London post a couple beneath this one is new, but since I started it a while ago it appears below the Premier League post. In that post, I mention Warwick Avenue and the Duffy song of that name, so it seemed like a good time to spotlight the song itself.

Basically, the lyrical content of the song features Duffy arriving at Warwick Avenue to meet with a soon-to-be-ex-boyfriend who has apparently hurt her. She needs to explain to him why she is leaving him. Musically, it fits in with Duffy's retro 60s throwback type sound. The video, which was naturally filmed on location features about 4 minutes of Duffy singing the song while crying in the back of London Black Cab. It's all very chic and minimalist or something.

Anyhow, the song was a big hit for Duffy. It was her third single off of Rockferry after a limited release of the title track and then her smash #1 hit "Mercy." It peaked at #3 and proved that Duffy was no flash in the pan but a genuine new force in UK pop music. It also reached #1 on the UK airplay chart.

It's just a generally pleasant song and has a real belter of a chorus that's just a ton of fun to sing along with. I was humming it to myself the whole time I was near Warwick Avenue.

For reference, here are the song's lyrics:
When I get to Warwick Avenue
Meet me by the entrance of the tube
We can talk things over little time
But promise me you wont stand by the light

When I get to Warwick Avenue
Please draw the past and be true
Don’t say we’re okay
Just because I’m here
You hurt me bad but I wont shed a tear

I’m leaving you for the last time baby
You think you’re loving,
But you don’t love me
And I’ve been confused
Outta my mind lately
You think you’re loving,
But I want to be free, baby
You’ve hurt me.

When I get to Warwick Avenue
We’ll spend an hour but no more than two
Our only chance to speak once more I showed you answers, now here’s the door
When I get to Warwick Avenue I’ll tell you baby that we’re through

Cause I’m leaving you for the last time baby
You think you’re loving,
But you don’t love me
And I’ve been confused
An outta my mind lately
You think you’re loving,
But you don’t love me I want to be free, baby
You’ve hurt me.

All the days spent together I wish for better,
And I didn’t want the train to come
Now it’s departed, I’m broken hearted
Seems like we never started
All those days spent together
When I wished for better
And I didn’t want the train to come. No, no.

You think you’re loving
But you don’t love me I want to be free, baby
You’ve hurt me
You don’t love me I want to be free
Baby you’ve hurt me

Here's a picture of Warwick Avenue tube station:

Here's a picture of some houses on Warwick Avenue:

Finally, here's the video link : Warwick Avenue video

Premier League Quick Hits

2008-12-13T10:48:00.002-06:00

So I haven't exactly diligently updated on the Premier League, but if there is anyone actually coming here for there EPL news, they are in the wrong place. I would suggest bbc.co.uk/sport, personally. However, I do have a few quick thoughts regarding the day's action.

Wigan leads Blackburn 3-0. How quickly will Paul Ince be fired? During the post-game press conference seems likely. I feel bad for the guy being a young manager and all that, but right now he's got Blackburn on the fast track to relegation and they should be much more competitive.
Hull did it again and somehow managed a 2-0 lead against Liverpool only to have Steven Gerrard pull it back for the league leaders with two goals in 10 minutes. I don't think it's possible to be any more clutch than Gerrard is. He's worth about 10 points a season on his own. I will never forget how he conned his way into a penalty to sneak an undeserved point against Atletico Madrid in Champions' League.
A typical Arsenal day. Arsenal beat Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, which is surely impressive. The difference between Arsenal and Chelsea, though, is that Chelsea had 7 first team players injured (including Cech, both Coles, Drogba, and Ballack) and beat Middlesborough 5-0 at the Riverside. Arsenal--more or less healthy except for Theo Walcott and I suppose Tomas Rosicky--blew a 1-0 lead and limped to a 1-1 draw.
Arsenal, at least in theory, has more than enough quality to handle Boro'. For goodness sake, their Carling Cup side of reserves beat a full strength Wigan club 3-0. Still, they can't get it done consistently enough.
Liverpool's draw with Hull City bails out the Gunners, though. They remain just 8 points off the pace. However, Aston Villa's 4-2 win over Bolton will drop Arsenal to fifth and they also may cede points to Manchester United who face Spurs later.
The big winners are guess who? Yep, Chelsea and Manchester United. Last season's top two are poised to each gain two points on Liverpool with wins. Chelsea can go top of the table with a win over West Ham. United can moved to just 4 points behind Liverpool with a game in hand.
Liverpool's draw means that Arsenal will remain within striking distance, but in all honesty they need a drastic change in form and soon. They were lifeless against Porto and only occasionally showed quality against Boro'. If they can't give a more consistent effort, they'll never be able to challenge the big boys.
They're still too shaky in defence. It's not just Almunia or Gallas, even though they certainly have their flaws. Clichy, at least as live texts indicate, had a bit of a shocker with some rash challenges. I think Wenger probably prioritizes fluid attacking play so much that he compromises his defence.
Exhibit A: Kieran Gibbs. Gibbs may make a fine fullback some day, but against Wigan he was constantly getting run up and down the flank. To be fair, he always recovered and never was fully beaten, but it's indicative of what happens when you turn wingers into fullbacks.
Chelsea gets away with Cole and Bosingwa pushing deep into the wings but they have John Terry and Petr Cech forming the backbone of their defence to bail them out. Gallas and Almunia hardly compare.
In fairness to Arsenal, Theo Walcott's and Tomas Rosicky's injuries are significant. Right now, they have no true wingers and Walcott's pace and creativity always gives defenders fits. Right now, it seems that all the midfield playmaking must come from Cesc Fabregas and that's too heavy a burden for the young captain.
I suppose Wenger could get creative and play Adebayor and/or Van Persie in midfield, but that would require quality reserve strikers. Carlos Vela has sublime skill but Wenger clearly doesn't trust him just yet and he has a tendency to be anonymous for stretches. Bentdner, goal against Kiev aside, can't finish a goal for the life of him.
If Arsenal is to be competitve in the Premier League, or even in Champions' League for that matter, Wenger is going to have to spend some cash in the transfer window. A capable winger and solid centre-back should be at the top of the list.
Rumour has it that Wenger is interested in Brede Hangleand, Fulham's rock in central defence. Hangeland seems like an odd fit for such a fluid team as Arsenal, given his awkward playing style, but there is no doubting his effectiveness. I suppose the Cottagers would listen to the right offer, but I can't see how Fulham could sell him. Fulham is not a good scoring team so they depend on their rock-solid defence. Hangeland is the key to that. He defuses an absurd amount of aerial threats and frees up Hughes, Pantsil, and Konchesky to focus on dispossessing opposing attackers.
Speaking of Fulham, they are almost certainly the most tedious team in the league to follow. Today's 0-0 draw with Stoke City makes it three goalless draws in four for Fulham. Certainly, one point at a time is better than none. Ask Paul Ince, Tony Mowbray, or Roy Keane and I'm sure they'll confirm that. Furthermore, all of those goalless draws are on the road, so it's hard to complain too terribly much because at least they're avoiding a relegation battle. Still, it doesn't exactly make thrilling reading on the live texts.
In all honesty, Aston Villa is one of the top four teams in the league right now both in points and in actuality. With Ashley Young in positively scorching form and Gabriel Agbonlahor not much worse, Villa is legitimately a better team than Arsenal and certainly more consistent. That makes Fulham's back to back draws at Anfield and Villa Park that much more impressive.
Still, Fulham is going to need to start getting three points from some of their fixtures sooner or later. Particularly they are crying out for some away wins. Their form at Craven Cottage is absolutely solid, but they just don't win enough points away from home.
It's hard to reconcile the Robbie Keane situation. Keane is saying that he is staying at Anfield. Rafa Benitez insists he will not be sold. But when Liverpool is searching for a late breakthrough against Hull it's not Keane that comes of the bench. El Zhar and Babel instead take the pitch. How damning of an indictment is it that even without Torres available, Benitez apparently rates Keane as no better than his fourth best striking option behind El Zhar, Babel, and Dirk Kuyt playing out of position?
If Keane isn't going to see the field, there doesn't seem to be any reason why Benitez wouldn't sell him back to Tottenham and Harry Redknapp, who covets him, other than pride.
One almost wonders if there isn't something more at play, an injury perhaps? Yes, Keane isn't in form, but his form did not appear to be so horrendous as to warrant his current treatment.
It's nice to read these articles about how not even Manchester United fans like Dimitar Berbatov. Even his own team's supporters realize what a wanker he is.
Wanker of the Year shortlist: Berbatov, Cristiano Ronaldo, Nicolas Bendtner, William Gallas, Albert Riera. Any others?
Everton nicked a late goal to beat Manchester City despite having exactly zero fit strikers for the game and being forced to play midfielder Tim Cahill up front. Surely this is cosmic (karmic?) justice for last week's heartbreaking loss to Aston Villa.
Every time I hear about Tim Cahill, I think of the song "Trippin' On You" by a dance artist named Cahill.
City fans now officially want Mark Hughes' head and I can hardly blame them. City has a lot of talent but they are letting it go to waste and keep suffering poor results. Surely things will improve after the January transfer window, but is Hughes really the man to spend those millions?
It's fascinating to wonder who City will get. Among the rumored names are Gianluigi Buffon, John Terry (don't see that happening), Frank Ribery, Lukas Podolski, and David Villa. Just to name a few. That's five players to the world's best starting XI.
Chelsea meanwhile have signed, are in talks to sign, or will not sign Braga striker Orlando Sa, depending on who you believe. The Blues are also rumored to be after Wigan striker Amr Zaki, but Steve Bruce insists that that will happen over his dead body.
You better believe that Roman Abramovich has mob contacts and can make that happen.
Chelsea was also rumored to be after Fluminese defender Thiago Silva, possibly to replace fellow Brazilian Alex, who reportedly wants to leave Stamford Bridge. However, it seems as if Silva to AC Milan is all but a done deal.
Sunderland's 4-0 win is certainly a positive for interim boss Ricky Sbragia, who is at the very least auditioning for future openings.
Not so much for Tony Mowbray at West Brom, who doesn't appear to be under any pressure. Presumably management knows that he's at the helm of one of the least talented sides in the league. At any rate, the Baggies better be preparing scouting reports on teams like Cardiff City and Burnley because they'll probably end up playing them next year. Actually, at this point Burnley has a better chance of being up next year than West Brom does.
Can West Brom say they've beated Fulham, Arsenal, and Chelsea this season. Didn't think so. Sure it was the Carling Cup, but still...
It will be fascinating to see how Luis Felipe Scolari lines up Chelsea tomorrow afternoon. Will he put Drogba and Anelka both in the starting lineup? I think he should, but the question then becomes who goes in midfield. I would line it up Cech, Bosingwa, Terry, Alex (or Ivanovic), A Cole, Mikel, J Cole, Lampard, Ballack/Deco/Kalou, Drogba, Anelka. It would be a 4-1-3-2 with Mikel in his holding midfield role and two strikers. The only question is how to line up the midfield. Joe Cole goes on one wing but do you put Lampard on the other? Or does Lamps go center? Kalou is more of a winger than Deco or Ballack but Deco and Ballack are higher in the pecking order, assuredly. Perhaps Big Phil will go with a basic 4-4-2 and put Mikel on the bench with Ballack and Lampard in central midfield. Or he may just stick with the 4-1-4-1 and leave either Drogba and Anelka as substitutes.

London: The Showstopping Finale! (Act One)

2008-12-09T15:28:00.003-06:00

I left my story on Wednesday with me preparing to head to Cadogan Arms for Chelsea's Champions' League match with Bordeaux. Apparently, the group's dinner plans went pear-shaped when some people showed up late and set the whole group back. That was going to make them late for the play so that they might not be able to be seated until intermission. Thus, Dan shuffled in the door just as I was about to leave. We left at the same time and it came out that Tom and Dan were heading to Riley's, the Chelsea bar that Tom and his friends frequent. I wasn't explicitly invited (perhaps because I had already stated my intent to go to Cadogan), but I took the liberty of inviting myself. After all, it's a Chelsea bar, Dan is an Arsenal fan, and Tom is a Chelsea fan but couldn't name more than three Chelsea players. I belonged as much as or more than either of them.

We arrived at the bar and it was still 10 minutes or so before the match so it was relatively empty. We had been warned by Tom that there might be some rough characters, but it was actually quite friendly and nobody troubled us at all. The music selections were odd, though. The first song I heard playing was an old country song, which I couldn't identify. The second was Jeannie C. Riley's hit "Harper Valley PTA." Keep in mind that we are in London, one of the world's poshest cities, in Chelsea, one of London's poshest neighborhoods, and on King's Road, Chelsea's poshest streets. And we are listening to Harper Valley PTA in a dive bar and drinking Strongbow. It was tremendous.

As the game started, the crowd started to shuffle in. Apparently, according to Tom many of the regulars weren't there, which I imagine can be chalked up to a midweek game as opposed to a weekend fixture. Chelsea began sluggishly. Bordeaux was playing beyond a loud home crowd and simply had more urgency. One of the ways you can tell how well a football team is playing is how much space there is in midfield. A motivated team is challenging everything in midfield while a lethargic one gives up tons of space to move. Bordeaux were having there way in that department. Neither team had many strong chances, though and all told it was a boring first half. The second half saw Nicolas Anelka put Chelsea in front. He beat the offsides trap and coolly slotted the ball past the goalkeeper. One on one's look easy when the striker handles them correctly but an unbelievable amount of them are botched. Arsenal missed four against Burnley. It's a testament to Anelka's quality that he handled his so easily. Chelsea seemed to be cruising to the final 16 of the Champions League, but no one goal lead is safe and a defensive laps allowed Bordeaux to equalize with a late header. All in all it was disappointing. Chelsea should have won and been in position to control their own destiny against Cluj. As it happened, they would need to wait until Matchday Six to secure qualification.

Thursday was Thanksgiving, but it wasn't very festive for me. Although things have greatly improved on all fronts since, it sure didn't feel like there was much to give thanks for at the time. I think I had a cottage pie, watched some TV, and that was the extent of my celebration.

I had hoped to go shopping on Friday and maybe pick up a few things from Zaavi and/or Lilywhite's but I wanted to talk to Emily, who was coming back from Cambridge, so I got delayed and didn't get around to it during the day. Emily texted me when she came back from Cambridge and I talked to her. Basically, I was still needing someone to talk to regarding the Laura situation (which is now happily resolved!) and I felt like she was the only one around who would listen. That proved therapeutic and I hoped curry and bowling, which was planned for later in the evening would, too. Emily had told me that Laura would be there, but I thought that it wouldn't bother me. After walking to the Tube and waiting for the train, I realized it would bother me to be able to see Laura having fun but not be able to have fun with her, and I came up with the idea to just get off at Picadilly Circus, go to Zaavi, and spend the night listening to my purchases. I bought Out of Control by Girls Aloud, Tangled Up by Girls Aloud, Reasons To Be Cheerful: The Best of Ian Dury, Prospekt's March EP by Coldplay, Greatest Day (single) by Take That, a Chelsea FC poster, and a Region 2 copy of Save The Last Dance for my London: City of Nations paper. Then, I went to Tesco and bought food and a couple bottles of Magner's. I spent the night surfing the net, listening to my music, and slowly drinking a bottle of Magner's. I heard that bowling was extremely fun and was sad to miss it because I love bowling, but I don't know that it would have been fun for me so I think I made the right decision.

Saturday was the day of the last weekend of rugby union's fall internationals. New Zealand was set to take on England with Australia to face Wales. Given the pounding that England took at the hands of South Africa, I took the liberty of assuming that they wouldn't put up much fight against the All Blacks of New Zealand, who are currently the world's top team. Thus, with the games being played simultaneously, I chose to watch Wales rather than England. Wales had been in the game against both Wales and South Africa before suffering narrow defeats, so it seemed there was a very real chance they could pull it out and beat South Africa. Basically, in rugby union, the three southern hemisphere teams are the powerhouses. Not that the other teams can't beat them, but they are the constants. For a European squad to beat one of the southern hemsiphere teams is a rare and meaningful accomplishment.

I can't remember the details of the game now except that Wales took the lead early and led all the way but never by very much. A quick google indicates that Wales ultimately won 21-18. As I recall, Wales recorded a late penalty to make it an eight point gap, which means that a converted try would still leave Australia short on points. However, Australia gave it a hell of an effort, scoring in the waning moments to cut the gap to three. Unfortunately for the Wallabies, Wales recovered and held on to close out the match. This was easily the best Rugby Union match that I saw while in London and was a perfect advertisement for the game. The players and fans were passionate, the game was intense and free-flowing, and it feature the full breadth of the Union game. There was great wide play, great tight play, excellent kicking (both goal and tactical), and all in all it was just a great showpiece game.

I had a mind that I should get out of the house on Saturday night. I didn't have anyone to go with and it was a pretty chilly night, but I still wanted to go to Warwick Avenue. For the unfamiliar, Warwick Avenue is the title of a number 3 hit by one of my favorite artists, Duffy. For me, Abbey Road held little appeal. Warwick Avenue was the musical location I wanted to see (having already been to Sloane Square, mentioned in the Morrissey song "Hairdresser on Fire"). So that's where I went. Warwick Avenue is on the Bakerloo line, which links with the Piccadilly line at Picadilly Circus.

The first thing I noticed about Warwick Avenue upon leaving the tube is that it is a pretty quiet, obviously residential neighborhood. It's the kind of place where people actually live, as opposed to Chelsea where only millionaires can afford to live. There are plenty of swank looking houses and the whole bit but not much action and much to see. To that end, I set off looking for something even vaguely resembling a high street where I might grab a bite to eat. I didn't really find it, at least not immediately. I saw the odd coffee shop, but I just wandered around until I ran into the canal and had to change direction. Eventually, I ended up on Harrow Road, which was quite busy. I felt a little bit sketchy on Harrow Road, though. I was alone, at night, in an unfamiliar part of an unfamiliar city, and judging by the amount of Arabic writing on the signs and the people walking the streets, I was the wrong color for this neighborhood. Still, it was a busy street so I didn't much fear a mugging if I minded my own business. I walked Harrow Road for a little while hoping I might find a suitable place to eat. There were a number of KFC/Harold's Chicken Shack type places, but I felt that knowing which one to choose and how to order is dependent on local knowledge that I don't possess, so I skipped it.

At this point, I had been walking for 45 minutes or so. It was my intention, in accordance with the song's lyrics, to spend "an hour but no more than two" around Warwick Avenue, so I decided it was soon enough to head back towards Warwick Avenue, which I was pretty far from at this point. I was briefly lost but soon found my way and arrived at the tube station. At this point, I decided to walk the other way from the tube station and see what there was. I arrived at little Venice, where two of the large canals meet each other. It's very pretty at night and would probably be a great place to visit on a summer night, but it being late November, everything was closed up. Still, it was pleasant, so I walked along the canal for a while. Eventually, I came to another Harrow Road-like high street, the name of which escapes me currently. Finally, my hands were numbed and I headed back home. All in all it was a pleasant night, but I couldn't escape the feeling that I would have rather shared it with someone else. Nonetheless, it was I'm sure worthwhile just to get me out of the dorm and seeing London.

I don't recall anything about Sunday or Monday. Tuesday, I finished my essay for Professor Hadley and watched Burnley v. Arsenal. Some of the others went to Avenue Q, but I missed the e-mail about tickets and it's just as well because I think Laura went I probably still wouldn't have been ready to face up to that. Burnley, as it happens, continued their incredible Carling Cup run by defeating Arsenal's youngsters 2-0. Arsenal's youngsters are absurdly talented, but Burnley's veterans just wore them out. They got the first goal, put the Gunners on the back foot, and never really looked in too much danger. That makes it three London clubs, Burnley has defeated in the Carling Cup: Fulham, Chelsea, and Arsenal. And they can make it four if they can manage to beat Tottenham. As for the essay, I thought it turned out decently. Perhaps, my argument was a bit of a stretch, but I got it done early enough that I hoped I could finish Royce's essay by the end of Friday. That did not happen.

Thursday we had been threatened with a double session of Royce's class. Royce, showing his merciful side, thankfully spared us that. In fact, not only did he cut it to a single session but he also only ran class until 1230 and let us out half and hour early. The poor guy was doing everything he could do to make up for earlier miscues in the class. Essentially, he set too ambitious of a syllabus and too large of readings. In addition, there were problems with the distribution of those readings, so doing the readings became incredibly difficult. Moreover, he at first seemed condescending and the class didn't take well to his teaching style of eliciting personal responses from students (hence the class's nickname of "Feelings"). All of this set the class against him early in the quarter and the demanding papers didn't help his case. However, in the last few weeks he realized his errors. He became very flexible about what sources he would allow to be used for the papers, he became very complimentary about us, he restructured his classes so as to make them more friendly and account for the difficulty of the reading, and generally tried to rectify his previous errors. I'm afraid he still got savaged on his evaluations, but I'm sure that it won't affect him too much. He's a good teacher that just needs experience. More annoyingly, many of the students were unnecessarily cruel with their IES evaluations, which led to resentment from the IES staff. Honestly, there were several issues with IES that were annoying, but they weren't things that badly damaged our experiences. That were just annoyances, but many of the people just ripped into IES. I feel like these people are probably rich and get spoiled at home or maybe they are just rotten people, but at any rate, I think they need to grow up.

Alright, that's enough typing for now...Act Two will come a bit a later.

HOME

2008-12-08T15:53:00.002-06:00

I finally got home today. More details to follow once I finish my Royce paper, get some good sleep, and take a few deep breaths.

I Finally Have My Computer Back...

2008-12-06T11:51:00.002-06:00

But it still does not work. The part that I was waiting for finally came in but it did not fix the problem. Apparently, the graphics card is shot. First thing Monday I'm making a phone call to India so that Dell will take care of it.

On the bright side, the guy at Chelsea.com only charged me for the parts and shipping and not for labor. That came to 67 pounds instead of the 105 pounds I was originally quoted. That seems fair to me so it saved me the trouble of having to haggle, which I was prepared to do.

Song of The Day -- The Loving Kind by Girls Aloud

2008-12-02T16:56:00.002-06:00

In the US, pure pop has been almost completely banished from the mainstream. High School Musical, the Jonas Brothers, and Miley Cyrus have done their parts to keep it alive. Also, Britney Spears and Pink still trade (mainly) in that type of music.

In Europe, where rap is far less dominant, pop remains a formidable force on the charts. Not only are there many successful solo acts but also girl groups and *gasp* boy bands (well, Take That and Westlife are hardly boys anymore) remain viable. Girls Aloud is one of the foremost acts in the European and certainly UK pop scene. Originally formed on the reality TV series Popstars: The Rivals, Kimberly Walsh, Nadine Coyle, Nicola Roberts, Cheryl Cole, and Sarah Harding have since put out five studio albums together and a greatest hits collection.

Their latest album is Out Of Control, which reached #1 on the UK album chart. The first single off of the album was "The Promise," which reached #1 on the singles chart. However, today's song of the day is "The Loving Kind." "The Loving Kind" is set to become the second single from Out Of Control.

First of all, the music is brilliant and bouncy and extremely danceable. That is not the reason why I want to spotlight it, though. The lyrics really speak to me and have been stuck in my head the whole week. Here are the full lyrics:

Sometimes
I watch you when you're sleeping
I wonder what you're feeling
Both wide awake and dreaming
Of yesterday

I want you
To kiss away the tensions
The issues never mentioned
With all the best intentions
But you turn away

Oh baby if you find
I'm not the loving kind
I'll buy you flowers
I'll pour you wine
Do anything to change your mind
I know you may be disinclined
To find the love you've left behind
So kiss me then make up your mind
I'm not the loving kind

I'd do anything
Sing a song that lover's sing
If I could change your mind
Then am I not the loving kind?
I'd do anything
Sing a song that lover's sing
If I could change your mind
Then I'm not the loving kind

Somewhere on a Monday morning
In a rush hour of another day
Standing on a crowded platform
Carelessly we lost our way
Sometimes
I watch you when you're sleeping
I wonder what you're feeling
Both wide awake and dreaming
Of yesterday

Oh baby if you find
I'm not the loving kind
I'll buy you flowers
I'll pour you wine
Do anything to change your mind
I know you may be disinclined
To find the love you've left behind
So kiss me then make up your mind
I'm not the loving kind

I'm not the loving kind
I'm not the loving kind

Oh baby if you find
I'm not the loving kind
I'll buy you flowers
I'll pour you wine
Do anything to change your mind
I know you may be disinclined
To find the love you've left behind
So kiss me then make up your mind
I'm not the loving kind

I'm not the loving kind
I'm not the loving kind

Basically, this sums up a lot of what I've been feeling about what happened with me and Laura. I know that we're done and I've accepted that. Still, I can't help but think about what I might have done that would have made things different. I just wonder maybe if I had been a little bit more romantic, maybe she would have found me "the loving kind". Of course, there's every chance that she wouldn't, but that doesn't stop me from wondering...

Anyway, the song is capital B Brilliant and if there's any justice in the music world it's a sure #1 when it's released. It's the kind of song that compels me to hit the "back" button on the computer as soon as it finishes.

You're Not In Good Hands With Heurelho Gomes (Fulham v Tottenham blog)

2008-11-28T16:22:00.002-06:00

Every term, IES runs sponsors (subsidizes) a trip to a Premier League football match. Typically, they get tickets to a Fulham match? Why? Well, Chelsea is actually the closer of the two southwest London clubs, but Chelsea is also top of the table. That means that Chelsea tickets are both absurdly expensive and quite difficult to come by. Fulham, on the other hand, is a middle of the road Premier League team at best. Tickets are reasonable (by Premier League standards) and readily available. Thus, booking tickets for a Fulham game was a very reasonable choice.

They made a more interesting choice in what game and section they chose. They chose the Fulham v Tottenham game and booked us in the neutral stands. Tottenham is another London club and is based on the north side of London. As one might expect, a large quantity of Tottenham fans made the short trip to southwest London and the away stands were completely full. And we were among them. The concept of neutral stands is that they are place for fans with no rooting interest in the game. IES decided that that included us. However, the truth is that there are really two sections of the stadium: Fulham fans and opposition fans. The neutral stands are tucked up against the opposition stands, which means that the neutral stands are functionally away stands. In that way, I came to attend my first Premier League match sitting in the away stands for a derby (European terminology for a crosstown rivalry). And I was rooting for Fulham.

Now, let me back up a bit. We met in the lobby of the res hall. Our group was IES Elaine, a bunch of Skidmore kids, Adam, Eugene, Dan, and Me. Dan is, of course, my roommate. Adam is a big Arsenal fan from New York City. He's really nice and generally good fun. Eugene is a Chelsea fan and is the kind of guy who makes everyone cringe when he enters the room. He single-handedly ruined the Chelsea-Liverpool match for me by asking me stupid questions about football and then not waiting for me to finish my answer before asking me another stupid question. Then, Dan walked into the room and he asked Dan the same stupid questions to which Dan gave (surprise!) the exact same answers as me.

We set off together from the Res Hall and took the District line to Putney Bridge. Some of the kids in the group had anxiety about the directions to Craven Cottage (Fulham's stadium). This anxiety was utterly unwarranted. The entire train was full of people going to the game and after getting off the tube there could be no doubt of the directions to Craven Cottage just follow the moving throng of fans towards the stadium. This is exactly what we did.

As we walked, loud, call-and-response cheers went up. At first, I couldn't make them out. Then, Dan told me what they were. Tottenham fans were yelling "YID ARMY!" and other Tottenham fans were calling back "YID ARMY!" You see, Tottenham is a historically Jewish club and many of their supporters are Jewish (many aren't). This led to other clubs' fans calling Tottenham supporters "yids". Yid is a ethnic slur against Jews. Instead of being offended, Tottenham supporters took ownership of the slur and now Tottenham supporters are known as the Yid Army.

In addition we heard some other Tottenham songs/chants. The main alternative was "We Are Tottenham". The lyrics are as follows: "We are Tottenham/We are Tottenham/Super Tottenham/From the Lane/We Are Tottenham/Super Tottenham/From the Lane". The Lane refers to Tottenham's home field, White Hart Lane. Also popular were "We Hate Chelsea". The lyrics to that would be: "We hate Chelsea/We hate Chelsea/We hate Chelsea/And we hate Chelsea/WE HATE CHELSEA!". The fact that Chelsea was not playing in the upcoming game doesn't have anything to do with anything mind you. West Ham also got the same song. Don't ask me why the didn't sing that with regards to the day's opponent Fulham. Apparently, they hate Chelsea and West Ham more. Finally, there were variations on songs about Dimitar Berbatov. Berbatov is a striker for Manchester United. However, before being transferred (sort of like traded) to Manchester in September he played for Tottenham. Word got out that he was looking to be transferred and Manchester United bit. This did not make him popular with Tottenham fans. That leads to mean songs. Most of them revolve around Berbatov's life story as a man who "played himself out of poverty." One I caught began: "Dim-it-tar Ber-ba-tov, his mother works as a window washer...".

This all happened on just the walk up to Craven Cottage, so I knew it would be an intense experience. As we neared the stadium, mounted police (as in, on horses) were everywhere and had megaphones to control the crowd. Things bottle-necked at the gates and we had to wait quite a while to get through. Finally, we got through and we made our way to our seats having missed the first five minutes of the match. Who was my ticket next to? On one side, I had a stranger. On the other, Eugene. On Eugene's left was Dan. On his left was Adam. On his left was a Tottenham fan. There we were, the four of us sitting in between a mass of Tottenham fans. You had Adam and Dan, both Arsenal fans and thus mortal opponents of Tottenham. Arsenal is also based in north London and Tottenham is Arsenal's biggest rival. Thus, they were rooting for Fulham. I am Chelsea fan but was rooting for the home team. Besides, I have a soft spot for Fulham because my favorite player, America's Clint Dempsey, plays for them. Eugene is a Chelsea fan but was rooting for Tottenham for no apparent reason. I should say that Eugene is a Chelsea "fan" loosely. He is the kind of fan with more money than brains. He has spent absurd money on Chelsea tickets and has all manner of Chelsea paraphenalia. He also probably could not name five Chelsea players. He in fact asked me: "Is Henry Chelsea's best player?" That's an utterly confusing question. Is he referring to Thierry Henry (pronounced AWN-REE) who plays for FC Barcelona and has never played for Chelsea or does he mean John Terry, Chelsea's captain. I had no clue. It was definitely an interesting seating situation.

The game itself was tremendous. We were nearly at field level and I can assure you live Premier League football looks nothing like it does on TV. When one watches on TV, it's easy to forget how fast everything takes place, how physical the game is, and how difficult everything is. On TV, it looks so easy, so automatic. Watching it live gives a sense of the speed and chaos of the game. We were right behind the goal that Fulham attacked in the first half, so we had a great view of all the corner kicks and other attacks on goal. In fact, we had a great view of the first goal. Fulahm's Simon Davies launched an extremely speculative long range shot at Tottenham's goalkeeper, Heurelho Gomes. It should not have presented any problems and should have been handled easily by Gomes as it hit him right in the chest. Instead, Gomes fumbled it and some how directed it into his own goal. Technically, Davies got credit for the goal. In actuality, Gomes basically scored on his own team. It was hilarious.

The first half ended with the score Fulham 1 -- Tottenham 0. As the second half started, Tottenham brought on two substitutes. Luka Modric came off in favor of Aaron Lennon and Tom Huddlestone was replaced by Roman Pavlyuchenko. Apparently, our friend Eugene is Russian. Or has a man crush on Roman Pavlyuchenko. Either way, every time the ball got within two or three yards of Pavlyuchenko, we were treated to Eugene screaming "PAVLYUCHENKO!" It was a bit excessive. Thankfully, Pavlyuchenko is mainly used as a target man for service and Fulham defender Brede Hangeland used his impressive height to head any and all service away before it could even get to the Russian. Thus, he was a non factor and we were saved whatever god-awful celebration might have followed a Pavlyuchenko goal.

Fulham added another goal in the second half when Tottenham dealt poorly with a Fulham corner, allowing Fulham striker Andy Johnson to clean up the mess and slot home a goal. That put the score to 2-0 for Fulham with 20 minutes to go. Tottenham substitute Frazier Campbell pulled one back for the visitors in the 81st minute. Frazier Campbell is an interesting figure. As part of the Berbatov deal, Manchester United sent back Campbell on a full-season loan to Tottenham. Now, Campbell has became one of Tottenham's most dangerous attackers. Manchester United has accordingly decided that they may try to break their deal and take him back at mid-season. Say what you will, the Premier League is not without its intrigues. Fortunately for Fulham, it was too little to late. Final score: Fulham 2 -- Tottenham 1.

Not only did we hear songs before the game but we also heard them during. We got all the ones I mentioned previous to the game and a few more. There was "When The Spurs Go Marching In". That would be "When The Saints Go Marching In" with the lyrics changed to include Tottenham's nickname "Spurs," which derives from there full name Tottenham Hotspur. There was also "Come...On...You...Spurs!" sung slowly and repeatedly. From the Fulham side I could make out the old "Let's Go!" chant (da da da-da-da da-da-da-da LET'S GO!) with the Let's Go! replace with "Ful-Ham!" and singing of the tune to Frankie Valli's "Can't Take My Eyes Off You," which is played after the game.

Overall, it was an amazing experience that I enjoyed. It's a completely different experience from attending an NFL game or NHL game. It's slightly more like Wrestlemania (without the pyro, though) but actually the crowd is most similar to that of an indy wrestling show in terms of the involvement and the vocalness. When you combine that atmosphere with action from the world's best league of the world's most popular sport, you have special experience indeed. That's why Dan and I got tickets to Fulham's December 6 match against Manchester City (this time in the home seats). I'm very excited to go back and see what it's like to be in the midst of a home crowd.

Any Requests?

2008-11-26T12:06:00.001-06:00

If anyone wants a London souvenir or wants me to take pictures of some certain London thing, they should notify me quick-like. I'm going to do some personal shopping Friday and pick up a few things for myself, so if anybody wants anything that would be a convenient time to let me know that.

Catching Up and Cleaning Up

2008-11-26T11:30:00.002-06:00

Ok, so I'm finally about to get up to mentioning what's happened in the last 3 weeks. Of course, I've forgotten quite a few things but that will honestly just make it a better read most likely as I'll (finally) only mention the important things. First, however, some house-cleaning. Here are blogs that I intend to write soon.

* Yorkshire Field Trip -- I want to include pictures on this one because I took quite a few of them up there but I don't have my computer back yet.
* Fulham v Tottenham -- Just haven't got around to this yet.
* A Virtual Tour of the Neighborhood -- I've taken a lot of pictures of the views from our room and also what the walk from the dorm to the tube station looks like but here again I'm foiled by the lack of my computer.

Now, for the last three weeks. The last important thing that I did not mention was Election Night. Waiting for the returns to come in was somewhat painful. With the time difference of 5 hours, it meant that the first results did not come in until 12 AM local time. In the meantime, there was Champions League on. I'm not sure if I've mentioned Champions League before, but Champions League is the competition between the top teams of all the European football (or soccer, if you prefer) leagues. Liverpool was playing Atletico Madrid at Liverpool. I happen to dislike Liverpool. This is mainly because my favorite team is Chelsea. Chelsea is currently leading the Premier League. Second place? Yep, Liverpool. Even though this is a different competition, I wanted Liverpool to bite it. An early goal put Madrid in the lead and in the waning minutes of the game it looked as if the visitors would hold on and win both the game and the group. In the 94th minute--and I don't even believe that there should have been 4 minutes of stoppage time--Steven Gerrard, Liverpool's captain and star player, threw himself at the ball in the Madrid penalty area. He made contact with a Madrid defender and the penalty was given. Gerrard slotted it home and Liverpool salvaged a miracle draw. The problem? The foul should have been on Gerrard. The Madrid defender went straight up while Gerrard recklessly threw himself into the defender. I was just short of livid and screaming at the TV. Anyhow, it was fun but I was a little bit worried that Steven Gerrard might some how steal a miracle win for John McCain. It would be in character for him to do so.

As we all know, that did not happen. After the Liverpool v Madrid game, I went down to the dorm’s election night party where Mieke, the resident director, was so nice as to bring her Skybox in and hook it up to the TV so that we could watch CNN's election coverage. We watched election related youtube videos (mostly Daily show clips) to pass the time before results came in. Once results started, it was all eyes on the TV and the room was packed full. I had the pleasure of sitting next to Laura and chatting with her all night. She was mock indignant with me for confidently averring that Obama was sure to win. The reason for my confidence was that every poll and all reports about ground games indicated that Obama was in a much stronger position and that only some bizarre fluke could lead to a McCain win. Soon enough, it became clear that I was right as Obama racked up state after state en route to the Presidency. However, I was little able to enjoy this development because I made the mistake of divulging the fact that I didn’t vote. The reason I didn’t vote is simply because of how cumbersome it is to vote from abroad. Also, with Pennsylvania polling solidly in Obama’s camp, I felt that my vote would not be crucial. Even when Pennsylvania proved to be a landslide win for Obama, this fact was still held against me, which led to me unfortunately losing my temper at around 5 AM and barking at Ali.

That was my election experience. It was fun watching history be made but the polls sort of drained all suspense for me. Nonetheless, it was a good opportunity to bond with Laura. The worst part, though, was that not only did I end up dead tired the next day, but I also ended up voiceless. All the talking and Steven Gerrard-related yelling left me quite hoarse.

The next day my only major activity was scouting dinner locations for my date with Laura. First, let’s back up a bit. After starting as a unified 24, groups, as they tend to do, started to form. Mainly there are three groups. Caelyn, Greg, Andy, Josh, Gabe Cahn, Hilary, Margot, Blake, and Francesca constitute one group. Dmitri, Michael, Gabe Grossman, Marie, and Tom constitute another (Marie, as you might be able to guess, is a very attractive girl). Lastly, there is myself, Dan, Lisbeth, Laura, Katie, Michelle, Constance, and Ali. Given this state of things, I spent a good deal of time hanging out with and around Laura. On the way to seeing Chicago, Josh, Laura, Roderick, and I got a bit lost (or rather we got poor directions) in Piccadilly Circus. I misread a sign. Then we turned the wrong way because Josh and Laura decided to go right when I said we should go left. Finally, we picked out the restaurant that we were supposed to find. These navigational misadventures formed the subject of some playful arguments between Laura and me. Laura would make fun of me for misleading the group; I would counter that she misled us equally. These arguments were, I thought, rather flirtatious in character. I had long half fancied her and these arguments brought us a bit closer. As I detected what I felt was further flirtation from her, I became surer that I wished to ask her out. In fact, I’m rather sure that the day long illness I suffered was a consequence of my emotions making me both sleepless and nauseous. I resolved myself that I had to just man up and ask her.

So I did. She responded affirmatively. In fact, if you want to be technical, she asked me out. I simply pulled her aside and told her that I fancied her, which led to her catching my drift and asking if I wanted to go out on a date. Of course, I did. The Yorkshire trip being on Friday of that week prevented us from going out then. Saturday was to be reserved for Guy Fawkes Day celebrations (it turned out to be a miserable day and a washout). Sunday would be reserved for homework. Thus, my gratification was delayed. I formed a new plan. I bought tickets for Never Forget, which is the musical featuring the songs of one of my favorite pop artists, Take That. We would grab an early dinner and then follow it up with seeing the show. That was set for Friday. Hence, on Wednesday, I headed to the area around the Savoy Theatre to scout possible dinner locations. I settled on Garfunkel’s, a tacky, touristy, sort of diner. True, it was not the most romantic possible choice, but I wished to keep things cheap and was afraid that going too far over the top would come off as too forward.

Friday, then, was our date. Laura, as I had hoped she would, looked rather alluring. She was wearing a nice dress and her leather boots that I happen to think are incredibly sexy. I went with my dressiest possible attire: khaki pants, blue dress shirt. I was nervous beforehand, especially when she showed up three minutes late as a consequence of her cell phone clock being three minutes slow, but my nerves quickly went away. We conversed easily all the way to Garfunkel’s and then over dinner. Mostly, we just talked about family and how it was when we were a kid. I offered to pay, but she insisted on paying her share on account that she is a “modern girl”. I protested but was secretly pleased by her modernity. We made it just in time for the show to start. It was everything I hoped it would be. That is, it was a big, colorful, cheesy, sing-along sort of musical. I had never imagined that I would see “Once You’ve Tasted Love” as a burlesque number or a salsa rendition of “It Only Takes a Minute” but I did and it was brilliant. By the way, when (if) I get married, I hope that my bride will agree to use the lyrics to “Never Forget” as our vows. When we got back to the dorm, Laura commented (much to my relief) that she had a really great time and suggested that we see Quantum of Solace before she departed on Monday for 7th week break. Unfortunately, paper writing made that something of an impossibility.

Everyone left by Monday morning for interim break, which left me depressed. I had no computer, no companionship, and to top it all off it was a dreary, drizzly London day. Also, I realized that I had a lot of work to do. I needed to do plenty of reading for both Professor Hadley’s Slums and Slumming class and Professor Mahawatte’s course. This realization, combined with my unwillingness to travel alone, conspired to make me scrap my own travel plans. Thus, it was a rather miserable week. I simply read, played solitaire, watched tv, and waited for humanity to return to me. Friday night, Dan returned and with him so did relatively easy computer access. Saturday, we went to the Fulham v Tottenham game (which will get a separate blog). Sunday, the girls returned from their travels and Buffalo gagged another game.

I was hoping that the old adage would prove true and that absence would indeed make the heart grow fonder and lead Laura to eagerly seek me out upon her return. Perhaps because she didn’t spend the whole week alone, and thus wasn’t dying for companionship, this wasn’t the case. I convinced myself that I was just being paranoid, but now it seems that this should have struck me as the beginning of the end. Monday, I enquired if Laura wished to go out with me on a second date for my birthday. In retrospect, I regret this because I left her no choice but to say yes. I should have left that date until Friday so that she would not have to dance around my birthday. Regardless, I wished to make my 21st birthday special and could think of no better way to do so than going out with her. We would eat at the Stockpot before catching a showing of Quantum of Solace, which she had been wishing to see. Once again, conversation flowed easily and I was very relaxed. She insisted on paying for the meal on account of it being my birthday (another reason I feel bad for leveraging my birthday the way I did) but on the condition that I buy her dinner on her birthday. Then, we headed across the street to the film. UK films are preceded by a good 15 minutes of commercials and then a couple trailers so we were afforded plenty of opportunity to chat. Finally, the movie started. It was decent but the way it was cut made the plot hard to follow. Honestly, I had zero interest in the movie. It just seemed a convenient thing to do with Laura and I knew that she had wanted to see it. Overall, the date seemed to go well and she suggested that we do something on the weekend after our papers were due on Friday.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be like that. Thursday she found me in the lounge and told me that it wasn’t working for her and that she just wanted to be friends. I could go on and in fact wrote a lot more about this before deleting it because it just wasn’t fair to Laura to air it out over the internet. The gist of it is that we ended up talking and because I was pretty heartbroken I acted immaturely and selfishly and made things worse than they should have been. So, now things are a little awkward between us, but I’m making it my mission to rectify that and prove to her and to myself that I was even slightly worthy of her. The rest of Thursday and Friday were pretty difficult because I was still feeling down, but I muddled through.

Saturday, I stayed in and watched rugby all day and rugby did its best to cheer me up. The day began with the final of the Rugby League World Cup. Australia was heavily favored to win the World Cup by beating New Zealand. After all, they had defeated them 30-6 just a couple weeks ago during the group stage. Moreover, they had absolutely demolished England during the group stage and likewise crushed Fiji in the semifinals. It looked to the entire world that there was no team in the world capable of even challenging the Kangaroos. The Kiwis, however, didn’t get the memo. After Australia scored the first two tries to go up 10-0, it looked as if the rout was on. Australia was in fine form and was cutting through the New Zealand defense. New Zealand, however, showed an impressive fight back. They came back with two converted tries for a 12-10 lead and it went to half time 16-12 in favor of Australia. Surely, though, Australia would come back after the break, assert their dominance, and destroy New Zealand. Again, New Zealand had other ideas. A concerted Kiwi performance combined with several Australia miscues allowed New Zealand to win the second half 22-4 and win 34-20. This constitutes one of the biggest upsets in rugby history. New Zealand was given 10-1 odds against winning and won by 14.

Later, it was time for some Rugby Union fall internationals. First of all, it was time for England v. South Africa at Twickenham. The Springboks of South Africa are the defending World Cup champions. After winning the World Cup in 2007, their form has been somewhat patchy but they remain one of the world’s strongest teams. Such is their dominance that a 20-15 victory over Six Nations champion Wales and a 14-10 win over Scotland were considered signs of vulnerability. England was coming off an impressive win over the Pacific Islanders 39-13, which they followed with a 28-14 loss to Australia. They were looking to bounce back after that disappointing result. Instead, the Springboks embarrassed England. England frequently challenged the Springbok try line, but South Africa’s defense was stout and they simply could not be penetrated. Meanwhile, English miscues yielded easy points for the world champs. When all was said and done the score was South Africa 42, England 6. It was England’s worst ever defeat at Twickenham and it comes before next week’s clash with New Zealand, arguably a stronger side.

The third game featured New Zealand’s fearsome All Blacks against Wales, the grand slam champions of the Six Nations. Wales was looking to pull the upset just as New Zealand had done earlier in the day in Rugby League. In the first half, they looked up to it. The pack played powerfully and strong tactical kicking allowed Wales to jump out to a 9-6 half time lead. However, the All Blacks came roaring back in the second half of play. New Zealand grabbed control of the game and refused to let it go. All of a sudden, Wales could not get any possession. New Zealand repeatedly pinned them back in their own end forcing clearance kicks. Wales just simply couldn’t win the kicking battles and always ended up ceding ground and the ball. Wales put up a brave show of try line defense but New Zealand’s relentless pressure was eventually enough to crack them. If I recall correctly, the final score was New Zealand 22, Wales 9.

Sunday I woke up late and didn’t get around to doing too much before the NFL games came on. Miami v New England was on Sky so I watched that and Dan shouted out updates from around the league as he monitored them on the internet. Overall, it was a pretty relaxing day. As I write this, it is late Monday night. I have a report to do tomorrow and I haven’t started my part. Time to get on it. Anyhow, that has been my last three weeks.

Before I go, though, I have to mention one more thing. I owe a huge debt of gratitude that I will probably never be able to repay to Greg Nieder and Emily Ponder. Greg is about the best friend a guy could possibly ask for. He’s always there for me when I need him and he really helped me through things after I was feeling the disappointment of what happened between Laura and me. Emily is our course assistant and she also helped me gain some clarity after what happened. I took things pretty hard, not so much because of anything to do with Laura (who I can’t fault at all), but because it brought back a lot of old feelings of depression and inadequacy. Emily helped me see the bigger picture just as she did when I was feeling desperately depressed in Wales. I’m not sure what I would have done without Greg and Emily but I’m sure that it would not have been good, so I can’t thank them enough.

Postscript -- It's now Wednesday evening, tonight we have tickets to see Neil LaBute's play In A Dark Dark House. The wounds are still pretty fresh, so it's still difficult for me to be around Laura (and I already have to go to class every day). For that reason, I'm skipping the play (it does not sound like my cup of tea anyway) and am going to stay back, go to the local pub, and watch Chelsea play Bordeaux. Right now, I need something that will make me happy, not a play about a man who was abused as a child.

Also, frustratingly, I did my part of our report, which involved writing discussion questions about the Salvation Army, but Professor Hadley did not use them. She had her own questions for discussion and was hoping to get back around to mine but ran out of time. That means I stayed up an extra hour working on discussion questions that she never actually looked at. I could have wrote anything for those questions or, in all probability, nothing at all and it would have been the same to her! That's just how it's been for me these last couple weeks.

A Beginners Introduction To: The Premier League

2008-11-26T11:22:00.003-06:00

NOTE: This is all about 2-3 weeks out of date by now, but I’ll have a new entry on the recent developments in the Premier League up soon.

There are certainly many things that I will miss about London when I come home and there are some things that I will assuredly be glad to have back upon my return. For example, I will miss having public transport that actually runs on time, but I will be glad to have cheap fast food once again. There is something particularly heinous about a “value meal costing” £5 or roughly $8-9. Anyhow, the thing that I will probably miss most about London is the sport scene. Most of all, I will miss Sky Sports 1, 2, and 3.

Sky Sports fills 24 hours of programming time a day on three channels with a steady diet of football (that is, soccer), rugby (league and union), cricket (like baseball, only more tedious), golf, tennis, WWE, and American football (it’s just as easy to follow the Bills here as it is in Chicago). Mainly, it is the first three of those that dominate and provide the marquee events. Now, I can’t be bothered to watch cricket for long spells because it is incredibly boring. It makes baseball look fast paced and exciting. At least in baseball there are outs every so often. Cricket simply consists of long spells of batters lazily running out singles until finally, by the mercy of Zeus, the occasional ball is caught or wicket is hit. Don’t worry if that doesn’t make sense. Just trust me that it is only a sport for the patient who have too much time on their hands. On the other hand, I love rugby (probably my favorite sport of them all) and football. The problem with being a football fan in America is that besides ESPN showing the occasional Champions League game it is simply never on unless you have Fox Soccer Channel on the premium tier of your cable or satellite. It might, I suppose, be possible to get a Sunday Ticket sort of subscription to the Premier League (or at least it ought to be) but otherwise it is not to be found. ESPN also shows the occasional MLS game but there is one problem with MLS. The level of play sucks. There is a reason that the growth of MLS has been slow and painful. The quality of play is simply awful. There are, I’m sure, many football fans in America who simply won’t watch it because it’s so far from the top level of football. That said, I support the MLS and do take pleasure in the occasional game, but it is not in the same universe as the Premier League. To wit: Clint Dempsey is a USA international and was clearly our best player at World Cup 2006. He was, when he left MLS, arguably its best player. Currently he comes off the bench for Fulham, which is the 4th best team in London. Not the 4th best team in the Premier League but the 4th best team in London and that’s giving them the benefit of the doubt that they are better than West Ham, which is probably a 50/50 proposition. Clint Dempsey, one of America’s best players, formerly one of MLS’s best players can’t even crack the starting line-up at a mediocre Premier League side. That says about all you need to know about MLS and the quality of American football. On the other hand, Juan Pablo Angel currently is one of MLS’s most dangerous strikers. The Argentinean formerly was a solid, but relatively unheralded striker at Aston Villa, an average plus Premier League side. Then his career took a bit of a slide and he joined the New York Red Bulls. He immediately became one of the best players in the league.

All of this is to say that quality football is simply not to be seen in the US unless you find can find a pub in the States that will show the games. For that reason, I am trying to soak up as much Premier League goodness as I can while I’m here. Now, with the product so unavailable, you, the American, are probably ignorant of the happenings in the Premier League. Have no fear. I’m here to try to teach you the basics of the Premier League and get you caught up on the major stories of the season so far.

What is it? The Barclay’s Premier League is a 20 team football league. It is the top league of English (and Welsh, technically, although there are currently no Welsh sides in the league) football and arguably the best football league in the world. Only Spain’s 1st Division, more commonly known as La Liga is any competition for this honour. The league itself runs from fall through spring with each team playing each other team in the league both at home and away. With 20 teams, that means 38 weekends of football, leaving only summer as an off-season.
Premier League teams also compete in other competitions. The Carling Cup is the Football Association’s (FA) cup competition that is open to all teams in league football. That is, it is open to teams in the Premier League, Championship, League One, and League Two. The teams in these top four divisions of British football are all professional. In the lower leagues of the FA, the squads are a mixture of pro or, more commonly, semi-pro and amateur. The top 4 finishers in the Premier League each year qualify for the Champions League, which is a cup competition featuring the top sides in European football. Essentially, the champions of each league of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) qualify for the Champions League and more prominent leagues (England, Germany, Spain, Italy, France) are granted multiple qualifiers. Teams that fail to qualify for the Champions League may earn a spot in UEFA’s second tier cup competition, the UEFA Cup. This year, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool, and Manchester United are playing in the Champions League and Tottenham Hotspur, Aston Villa, and Manchester City are competing in the UEFA Cup. All of these competitions run concurrently. The Carling Cup, Champions League, and UEFA Cup have fixtures on weekdays so that they do not conflict with regular league play, which takes place on Saturdays and Sundays.

These other competitions, especially the Champions League, are fascinating and worthy of their very own primers, but our focus here is the Premier League itself.

What’s at Stake? Ultimately, each team’s goal is to win the Premier League itself. For each fixture, three points are given for a win, one point is given for a draw, and zero points are given for a loss. At the end of the season, the team with the most points is the champion of the league. In the event of a tie, goal differential (or net goals—goals scored minus goals conceded—if you prefer) is the tiebreaker. For many clubs, this is not a realistic goal, however. There are four clubs who currently dominate the league by virtue of their wealth and corresponding powers of player procurement. Since there is no salary cap in football, the wealthiest clubs are free to spend as much as they please with their own budgets as their only constraint. The clubs of this “Big Four” are Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal, and Manchester United. These four teams are essentially the only ones who can legitimately be thought threats to win the league. That leaves other sides with different goals. For the next tier of clubs, sneaking in to a top 4 placement by edging out one of the Big Four and earning a Champions League berth is probably their highest reasonable aspiration. Otherwise, they compete for UEFA cup berths and also prestige. More successful clubs are more likely to attract star players during transfer season. Star players can hopefully help a club eventually crack the Big Four. For the lower tier teams, rivalry games and mere survival are probably the main concern. Local rivalry games are known in European football parlance as derbies (pronounced dar-bies not der-bies as in America). Fulham, for example, likely puts a special emphasis on games against their West London neighbors, powerhouse Chelsea. Note that Fulham Road actually is a road passing through Chelsea. Survival is also important. European football leagues operate on a promotion and relegation system. The Premier League is the top of the heap in English football and is the highest level of promotion (however Champions League spots function as promotions of sorts). However, the bottom three clubs in the Premier League each year are relegated to the Championship. That is, they will play the next season in the Championship. The top two Championship sides automatically earn promotion to the Premier League for the next season and a playoff is held for the third Premier League birth. This system functions throughout the FA. Championship teams, for example can be relegated to League One and replaced by League One sides and League One sides can be relegated to League Two and replaced by squads from that league. Since a Premier League spot means greater visibility, more money, and the chance to attract better players, relegation is bitterly feared and competition to avoid the bottom of the table is fierce. This unique system altogether eliminates the possibility of teams who are struggling giving up and tanking.

Who Plays? The best way to answer this is to throw up the table (or standings, if you prefer). Ideally, in a world where I had convenient internet access, I would have an up to date table. Alas, I have no such thing and so will have to settle for a table that is one week out of date. Here it is:

Team Played Won Drew Lost For Against Goal Differential Points
Chelsea 11 8 2 1 27 4 23 26
Liverpool 11 8 2 1 16 8 8 26
Manchester United 10 6 3 1 19 8 11 21
Arsenal 11 6 2 3 23 12 11 20
Aston Villa 11 6 2 3 19 14 5 20
Hull 11 6 2 3 17 18 -1 20
Everton 11 4 3 4 15 19 -4 15
Middlesboro 11 4 2 5 11 16 -5 14
Portsmouth 11 4 2 5 11 17 -6 14
Manchester City 11 4 1 6 23 18 5 13
West Ham 11 4 1 6 15 19 -4 13
Stoke 11 4 1 6 13 19 -6 13
Blackburn 11 3 4 4 13 20 -7 13
Newcastle 11 3 3 5 14 18 -4 12
Sunderland 11 3 3 5 9 16 -7 12
Fulham 10 3 2 5 8 9 -1 11
Wigan 11 3 2 6 13 16 -3 11
Bolton 11 3 2 6 10 13 -3 11
West Bromwich Albion 11 3 2 6 10 18 -8 11
Tottenham 11 2 3 6 13 17 -4 9

The major events of the past weekend were that Arsenal beat Manchester United 2-1 at the Emirates while Tottenham beat Manchester City 2-1. Chelsea beat Blackburn 2-0 while Liverpool dusted West Brom 3-0. The upshot of all this is that Arsenal has leapfrogged Manchester United for third place in the table. Chelsea and Liverpool retain their spots. Meanwhile, Tottenham finally climes out of last place by moving to 12 points. Note that European football grounds’ names often stand in for the team and are thrown around quite liberally. Arsenal formerly played at Highbury but now have a new stadium sponsored by Emirates Airlines and simply known as “the Emirates”. This works for almost all Premier League teams. Liverpool=Anfield, Chelsea=Stamford Bridge, Manchester United=Old Trafford, Tottenham=White Hart Lane, Fulham=Craven Cottage and so forth. This is especially important because football has a notably large home field advantage. Teams score more goals and have more fouls assessed against opponents on home grounds. This is not surprising considering the loud atmospheres featuring singing, chanting supporters that are peculiar to football stadiums. Now a few words about the teams (in table order):

• Chelsea – Chelsea is not historically as important of a club as Liverpool or Manchester United or even Tottenham. They recently rose to prominence after being acquired by Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich who used his deep pockets to assemble one of the most powerful clubs in the world. Chelsea beat Middlesboro, a team solidly ensconced in the upper half of the table, 5-0 on the road when missing seven top players. They were Petr Cech, Ricardo Carvalho, Michael Essien, Michael Ballack, Joe Cole, Didier Drogba, and either Ashley Cole, John Terry, or Deco who were in and out of fitness at the time such that I can’t recall who was the injured player that particular game. Cech is arguably the finest goalkeeper in the world. Ballack has long been Germany’s star player. Cole starts for England. Drogba is perhaps the best player from all of Africa. Essien is among his major competition for that distinction (along with Arsenal’s Adebayor and Barcelona’s Eto’o). These are players that would easily start on any non-Big Four Premier League side. Chelsea was without them all. They still won 5-0 on the road. That’s a testament to their depth and the depth of Abramovich’s pockets. It also makes them fun to watch and yes I am a bandwagon fan of the best team. I admit it at least and I hope that makes it less odious. In my defence, I am living in Chelsea itself right now.

• Liverpool – The most amusing thing I can think of about Liverpool is that they played Atletico Madrid in Champions League and actually started more Spaniards than Madrid. Madrid, while chock full of Brazilians, Portuguese, and Argentineans, only started 3 Spaniards. Liverpool started four (Reina, Arbeloa, Xabi Alonso, and one other who is escaping me at the moment). This is without Fernando Torres, who is their star striker and who scored the winning goal in the European Championship final for Spain against Germany, who was on the shelf with an injury. They are also managed by a Spaniard. This just underscores the international nature of the Premier League. That list of injured Chelsea players? They are from the Czech Republic, Portugal, Ghana, Germany, England, Cameroon (I think), England, England, and Portugal, respectively. Calling it the English Premier League really should only be done to differentiate it from the Scottish Premier League and other “Premier Leagues”. The Premier League is truly international in its player base. This is true not just of the rich clubs but throughout the league. Anyhow, Liverpool us one of the truly historic football clubs of the world and the Reds have been consistently dominant in recent years.

• Arsenal – Arsenal’s manager is Frenchman Arsene Wenger. Wenger is peculiar in his refusal to make consistent big moves in the transfer markets. Instead, Wenger’s way at Arsenal has been to acquire and develop the best young talent and use them as the basis of the team. This has been remarkably successful if somewhat controversial. While many Gunners fans assuredly would like some veteran talent acquisitions in hopes of reclaiming the glory days of 2003/2004, when Arsenal went undefeated in the Premier League, Arsenal’s youth strategy has allowed them to remain firmly in the Big Four without breaking the bank. It also leads to fun games like Tuesday’s Carling Cup fixture with Wigan. The Carling Cup, being the third priority for teams like Arsenal who are in the Champions League, tends to get short shrift. Top teams typically play watered down sides in the early rounds and rest starters. If they should get knocked out, they are hardly concerned. If they make the late stages, they may decide they’d like some silverware and bring out the big guns. This leads to upsets like Burnley, a Championship team, defeating top of the table Chelsea as they did Wednesday. Arsene Wenger basically pioneered this approach. Each year, he uses the Carling Cup to showcase and give experience to his young players. Tuesday his team featured no players older than 23 year old goal keeper Fabianski and an average age of just over 19. 16 year old Jack Wilshere was among the starting eleven. This is extreme even for Arsenal whose stars include 21 year old Cesc Fabregas and 19 year-old Theo Walcott. None of the players started against Manchester United on the weekend. Wigan, on the other hand, played 10 of the 11 players that took the pitch for them on the weekend. They played their A-team, a team load with experience at around 26 years of age on average. How did Arsenal’s kids do against Wigan’s top squad? They whipped them, 3-0. Young Jack Wilshere threaded the needled to find Jay Simpson for the first goal. Then, Carlos Vela found Simpson for his second. Finally, the 19 year old Mexican international Vela scored on a sublime chip for Arsenal’s third. A BBC commentator opined that this squad, essentially Arsenal’s youth team, could finish as high as 6th if they were a regular Premier League squad. I guess the kids are alright indeed in North London.

• Manchester United – Manchester United is frequently referred to by American sportswriters as the “Yankees of football” but more it is equally apt to say that the Yankees are the “Manchester United of baseball”. Simply put, they are the biggest brand name in European football. They have the mystique, the history, and, importantly, the results. Not content to live on the glowing memories of their glorious treble season—in 1999 (or so) they won the Champions, League, Carling Cup, and Premier League in the same year, which is as good as it gets—Manchester United pulled an impressive double last year. They captured both the Premier League and Champions League. This year, they are lagging slightly behind Chelsea and Liverpool but no one dares count them out of the title race. The best reason why may be Cristiano Ronaldo. The Portuguese superstar is arguably the world’s best player and is certainly in the top handful. When put together with lethal strikers like Dimitar Berbatov and Wayne Rooney, he is the key to an explosive offence that is also backed by a high-quality defence starring Dutch keeper Edwin Van Der Sar and long-time standout England defender Rio Ferdinand.

• Aston Villa – Villa are trying to upset the Big Four hierarchy by sneaking in and stealing a Champions League position, and so far they are doing an excellent job of it. Gareth Barry as already established himself as a key part of Fabio Capello’s England squad and striker Gabriel Agbonlahor gives him a capable target man. Villa are no early season fluke. They look to be in it to win it (it being 4th place).

• Hull City – Hull are exhibit A in “the magic of promotion and relegation”. Just a few years ago Hull was a struggling League Two club. Now, Hull has risen through the ranks and is competing in the Premier League. Not only are they competing, but so far they are also avoiding the relegation yo-yo game that plagues newly promoted clubs. It may be a tall task to ask them to remain in the top half of the table, but with Brazilian midfielder Geovanni is sparkling form, relegation for Hull seems a long shot indeed.

• Everton – The other team from Liverpool. American Tim Howard stars in goal.

• Middlesboro – Managed by Gareth Southgate, who looks to be approximately 25, at most, Middlesboro is proof positive that sides relying mostly on homegrown, English players can survive in a Premiership where Arab sheiks (Manchester City) and Russian billionaires (Chelsea) are constantly buying up foreign stars.

• Portsmouth – Inexplicably known as “Pompey” (I’m sure there’s an explanation, actually. I just don’t know it), Portsmouth is fairly boring, but I like their uniforms (or kit, in British lingo).

• Manchester City – City was recently purchased by Arab billionaires, who have vowed to spare no expense in making City a threat to the Big Four generally and their crosstown rivals, Manchester United, particularly. First purchase: Brazil’s Robinho who is what is technically known as “really freakin’ good” and has made City a dangerous offensive club. Man City’s problem: they concede far too many goals. Possible solution: rumours indicate that City may be preparing to offer Juventus a whopping £50-60m for star goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon in the January transfer window. I have a feeling that Man City will be going toe to toe with the Big Four soon enough. It’s just a matter of how soon their owners can buy up enough talent.

• West Ham – Barack Obama has a standing invitation for tickets at Upton Park, West Ham’s home ground. Why? Obama apparently has been to Upton Park before because his sister’s husband (if I recall correctly) is a Hammers fan. I just can’t believe the leader of the free world would be caught watching a game of the team that I consider to be the 5th best club in London (although the table doesn’t reflect that just yet).

• Stoke – Newly promoted, Stoke has drawn headlines for the way some of their goals have been scored. Rory Delapp’s powerful throw-ins have become true weapons for Stoke. Essentially, every time stoke wins a throw-in near the opposition penalty area, it is functionally equivalent to having won a corner. Since teams are not quite sure how to defend such a tactic, many cheap goals have been scored by this method.

• Blackburn – Yawn. The descriptions are getting (mercifully) shorter as I go. Why? There simply isn’t anything to say about Blackburn. Mediocrity is chronically uninteresting.

• Newcastle – Rumours persist that Newcastle will be sold and that manager Joe Kinnear will be replaced. Kinnear is supposed to stay on as long as the owners remain, but his contract comes up every month. Will he be resigned for another month? Only Newcastle management knows.

• Sunderland – I’m convinced that Sunderland is the coolest name of the Premier League teams. I love it. I’m also convinced that manager Roy Keane has the best beard in the Premier League.

• Fulham – One of two southwest London clubs, Fulham is significantly less successful and less well-bankrolled than Chelsea. However, the Cottagers are perhaps more accessible (read: their tickets are both affordable and possible to acquire) making them the friendly home team that you actually have to root for instead of just watching their inevitable, clinical domination. American Clint Dempsey, is, as previously mentioned, a sometimes starter.

• Wigan – Boring.

• Bolton – I appreciate their full name. Bolton Wanderers. It doesn’t sound intimidating but it does give them a certain…something.

• West Brom – I would put money on them getting relegated if you could get decent odds anywhere. Don’t worry, though. I’m sure they’ll be back for 2010-2011 after a spell in the Championship.

• Tottenham Hotspur – Oh, Tottenham. I have a lot to write about Tottenham but I wish to save most of it for my Fulham v Tottenham blog entry. The bare-bones facts are this. Tottenham was seriously underperforming until Juande Ramos was sacked and Harry Redknapp was hired away from Portsmouth. Suddenly, Spurs players starting justifying their salaries and playing markedly improved football, leaving the world to wonder how much of a jackass Juande Ramos must have been. Given Tottenham’s history, a spot in the relegation zone has to be considered an embarrassment but it appears that it will be quite temporary.

The Stories of the Season…So Far
• Chelsea and Liverpool off to a flying start – Despite injuries, the two clubs have been remarkably consistent and have set a torrid pace atop the league table

• Inconsistent Arsenal – Arsenal has been all over the shop. One week they are looking invincible the next week they fall prey to their inexperience and lose to an inferior team. With each bad loss and each Liverpool and Chelsea win, the Gunners title challenge becomes more of a longshot.

• Can Villa Crack the Top Four? – Aston Villa appears to be capable of mounting a serious challenge for a Champions League birth.

• Surprising Hull – Given little chance to stay up by pundits, Hull has been huge surprise. Can they keep it up?

• Tottenham Turnaround – Spurs have been sensational since bringing on Harry Redknapp. Darren Bent is in incredible form and Spurs are firing on all cylinders. How high can Tottenham rise after handicapping themselves with such a poor start?

Song of the Day--Things Can Only Get Better by D:Ream

2008-11-21T09:54:00.002-06:00

After a truly awful week, today is a really hard day. It's just one of those days where you don't want to get out of bed. To cheer myself up, I've been listening to the Beautiful People soundtrack. The act of listening to the soundtrack is sort of bittersweet itself because Beautiful People will always have some strange associations for me now. Nonetheless, the soundtrack fits my musical sensibilities perfectly and is mostly peppy and upbeat. Thus, it is good for cheering up.

One of the songs on the soundtrack is Things Can Only Get Better by D:Ream. It was a #1 hit in 1994 and rose to prominence again after being used by Tony Blair and Labour during their 1997 campaigns.

To be honest, I can't make heads or tales of the lyrics, but the chorus is just a belter and it's great to sing along to. Following it on the album are Don't Cry Out Loud and Confide In Me. It's like a three track sequence programmed for specially for a depressed Europop fan. Which I am. So it totally works.

Youtube link: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Dl-ai9HuR60

Computer Update

2008-11-17T14:28:00.003-06:00

It is still not fixed! I'm now officially angry about this. The technician was going to order the cable 2 Thursdays ago. Now, nearly two weeks later I haven't heard back. I went to the repair shop today and the technician was not in. The guy working the desk did not know anything about my computer. He told me to come back tomorrow. If I don't get a call tomorrow from them, I'm going to be furious. This is costing me far too much money for them to go nearly two weeks (and almost four in total!) without getting a simple repair done. That's totally unforgivable, as I see it.

Wales Day Four: The Long Awaited Anticlimax

2008-11-14T10:46:00.000-06:00

Way back when, shortly after the Wales trip actually ended, I wrote about the first three days of said journey. Well, there were actually four days, and I’m only getting around to writing about day four now. Better late than never, eh?

So, if you’ll recall (which I don’t imagine you will because I scarcely do) we were at Baskerville Hall, setting of Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of the Baskervilles, a book that I have never read but have seen the Wishbone episode of. Anyhow, I managed to wake up early enough on Sunday (for Sunday it was) to catch the tail end of breakfast. It was only after I sat down that I realized there is quite a good reason why I don’t normally eat breakfast. I’m never actually hungry at that hour of the morning. For that reason, I didn’t so much eat breakfast as stare wistfully at breakfast. Anyhow, it passed the time before we were to get back on the bus.

Our first destination for the day was Hay-on-Wye, which is well known for having the highest amount of bookstores per capita in the country (or something like that). As the horde got of the bus and headed in one direction to overcrowd tiny bookstores in packs, Dan and I headed in the other and found a nice little record store. I looked around a little and eventually snagged Everything Must Go by the Manic Street Preachers for £5, which is an absolute steal. This should sound familiar if you read my Song of the Day blog for “Australia”. After that, we continued down the road until we hit a horse auction where we stopped in out of sheer curiosity. Instantly it reminded me of a county fair. It was really quite charming, yet being possessed neither of sufficient money to buy a horse nor a need for a horse nor the capability of caring for a horse, we continued walking. Eventually, we found some paths that went by a river. After moseying around some, we ferreted out a beautiful little waterfall. Unfortunately, my camera was out of batteries and I neglected to rectify this problem the last time we were in contact with civilization (which is to say, when we were in Cardiff). Thus, I have no pictures of said waterfall. It’s just as well because Dan did take pictures of the waterfall and watching him do so I thought there was a legitimate chance he could fall into the water. In order to get an unobstructed view of the waterfall, Dan had to stand on the edge of a very bare and muddy ridge. It would have been easy for him to slip off and down into the water. I know that only one thought was running through my mind: “I can’t swim, so if he goes down, he’s a goner.” He got a beautiful picture, though. But you’ll have to take my word for it.

After the waterfall, we headed back to the centre of town so that we could grab something for lunch before it was time to once again board the bus. Having accomplished that, it was back on the bus for a ride to Tintern Abbey. Tintern Abbey is a massive and beautiful old abbey founded in 1131 AD. It survives only in fragments mainly because it was pillaged for its stone before any note was taken of the need to preserve such a historical site. It is especially famous because Turner painted it and Wordsworth composed poetry about it. We were left off to amble around for an hour or so, and that’s what we did. There’s not much to tell about it really. The reason you go to such a place is to see if for yourself up close and personal. It’s hard to convey a sense of it in words, and Wordsworth has already done it better than I ever could hope to. Again, I have no pictures of this due to my lack of battery life. Of course, since this is a famous site, a simple google image search will undoubtedly yield plenty of results if you feel the need for such a visual aid.

From there, it was time for a long bus ride back to Cardiff. Tintern Abbey is—if memory serves—quite far into the west of Wales and quite in the middle of nowhere. The most amusing thing about travelling to the Abbey was that we wound around some of the narrowest roads in Wales in our monster coach bus for a good 45-60 minutes only to arrive at the Abbey and see that it is located not far off a main road that has a Best Western, of all things, on it. I have no idea why we had to take the back way in but take it we did. Anyhow, being so far out of the way meant a long ride back to London. Also, London is quite like Chicago in that getting to London’s city limits is one thing, getting to specific spot in London is quite another. That is to say, when we got to London our journey was only ½ done because it still remained to get from outer London to Chelsea on a Sunday evening when everyone returning from holiday was flooding the highway. We arrived at about 7 or 7:30 back to the residence hall and most of the ride was simply spent sleeping/listening to music/hearing Josh, Greg, and Andy babble on about The Essence of War, which is the variant on the classic card game War, which they invented. To their credit, it is quite fun and dramatic although not nearly so strategic as they would like people to believe. Dan made the argument that eventually player skill would become irrelevant once an optimal playing strategy was discovered. Everyone would simply use that strategy and the game would then become essentially random. He was thinking way too far into things. Like War itself, The Essence of War is almost entirely random. I would explain the rules if it seemed worth my time or I could remember them. At any rate, it was something to do. After so many long bus rides, we were all going a little crazy. And that was Wales. I give Wales 9/10 and my heartiest recommendation.

My Computer

2008-11-06T13:09:00.002-06:00

It is still not fixed. This is very frustrating. I find it difficult to blame the guy who is fixing it. He has replaced both the inverter and the backlight lamp, each of which he determined to be faulty and it STILL isn't working.

The worst of it is that my roommate Dan has been nice enough to let me use his computer, but he is leaving tomorrow for Paris with his parents, which means that I'll be left completely without internet access for all of 7th week unless my computer gets fixed sometime during it.

They're going to try to replace the cable that provides power to the inverter, but if that does not work he says that it means that it's a fault in the motherboard. Basically, that means that if replacing this cable does not do the trick then I will be without use of my computer for the rest of the program. I know that I've already gone two weeks without it, but I'm really not prepared to go another four.

It's just really annoying and to be honest it sort of drives my blood pressure up, which is not a good thing. I need to stay as relaxed as possible so that I'm in good form for tomorrow, which has already got me nervy enough.

Song of the Day -- Australia by Manic Street Preachers

2008-11-03T15:57:00.004-06:00

Today's song (and note that there won't necessarily be a song every day, but hopefully more often than not) is Australia by Manic Street Preachers.

The song was a single from the 1996 album Everything Must Go. There are two stories about this album. One of them is personal and one relates to the context of the song. I'll try to keep both brief.

The first story is how I acquired the album. We were on the fourth day of our Wales trip, which I promise I will eventually get around to blogging about, and we stopped in Hay-On-Wye. Hay-on-Wye is a small town that is mainly known for having a huge population of bookstores. As we got off the bus, most of the group headed towards a couple of bookstores. Now, these stores are SMALL, so when 10 people mob one, it's literally impossible to so much as turn around. For that reason, Dan and I headed in the opposite direction and ended up popping into a small record store. I don't mean record store as a store that sells music, generally. He actually sold mostly records. However, he did have some CDs, which I perused. Finally, I saw something that caught my eye. It was Everything Must Go. I had heard of the Manics before and strongly liked their singles "Your Love Alone is Not Enough" and "Autumnsong" from their recent album, Send Away the Tigers. Also, I had heard that Everything Must Go was their masterpiece. At 5 pounds, it was a steal, so I picked it up.

I wasn't sorry. Top to bottom, it's a fantastic album and "Australia" is just one standout song from an album full of them. Not only that, but I'll always remember it for finding it in that out of the way record store in small-town Wales. Incidentally, the Manic Street Preachers (and I didn't know this at the time) are from Blackwood, Caerphilly in Wales, which is about 25 miles from Hay-on-Wye, so I was practically in their backyard.

The story surrounding the context of the song is that Richey James, who had been the lyricist and guitarist for the band, disappeared after their commercially unsuccessful but critically acclaimed album The Holy Bible. The Holy Bible was noted for its dark musical and lyrical content, which was largely driven by James' fragile mental state. To this day, it reminds undetermined what happened to James (and some maintain hope he is still alive) but it is generally assumed that he committed suicide. The rest of the band, now reduced to a four-piece, was left to finish the album. Bassist Nicky Wire wrote the rest of the songs and finished some that James had started. What results is a fascinating album. It's essentially half written by the suicidal James and half by the grieving Wire, who had lost his close friend and bandmate. Lyrically, it is often startingly bleak and/or angry, but musically it is suprisingly optimistic. They are, by and large, triumphant songs of despair.

"Australia" fits this description perfectly. Written by Wire it is often considered to be a statement of Wire's grief over the loss of his friend and his desire to escape Wales. The concept is that Australia is about as far as one can get from South Wales. The chorus says it all: "I want to fly and run till it hurts/Sleep for a while and speak no words in Australia/In Australia". Despite that somewhat depressed sentiment, the music is powerful and quite honestly uplifting.

Sometimes, I just have days where I don't feel like dealing with people, when I don't feel like facing the day. Sometimes, I'm just tired or frustrated or fed up or all of the above. On those times, the chorus of Australia plays in my head, and somehow just by hearing the song it makes things just a little more bearable.

What a TUNE! Here's a youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sP390yQ36wY

By the way, this reached #7 on the UK singles chart.

The Power of Thought (and Action)

2008-11-03T15:30:00.002-06:00

You'll probably be entirely lost by this post unless you are familiar with the Series 3 finale of Dr. Who. Here's a refresher, if necessary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdeF8eg8bIU (sorry 56k people). Basically, Martha heals the Doctor and eventually defeats the Master by traveling around the world and rallying humanity with the power of thought. She gets an assist from the Archangel network, which harnesses the telepathic power of thought, but the implication is clear and uplifting. Millions of people thinking one thought at one time can change the world.

Tomorrow we, as Americans, can change the world. Tomorrow, to use a great Obama line, we confront the fierce urgency of now. We are the ones we've been waiting for and tomorrow we can bring the change that we've waited for. Tomorrow, we decide whether we are content to stick with the same old policies and politics or whether we want to take a chance and dare to be great. We decide whether we want to make a choice that is bold, decisive, aggressive.

Make no mistake about it. Tomorrow, the fate of the world lies in the hands of American voters. This is a pivotal moment in history and the selection that voters make will change history forever.

That's why tomorrow all of us who are committed to change, committed to changing the status quo, committed to changing the White House culture of the last 8 years, committed to taking our destiny into our own hands, and most of all committed to Obama need to come together. Yes, he is not the messiah. Yes, he is just a man. Yet, he is also more. He is a movement. He is a movement that we all own a part of. He is a movement of hope and empowerment. He is the movement that tells us "yes we can" and shows us how. He is us. And tomorrow he needs.

He needs us, the millions and millions of Obama supporters of all colors, creeds, origins and faiths to come together and think one thing at one time: OBAMA. He needs the black man, the atheist, the plumber, the Muslim, the Jew, the college student, the immigrant, the grandfather, the college student, and anyone else who is interested in the belief that the power of thought and dedicated action can change the world. He needs us to all get out and vote and encourage all our fellow supporters to vote.

Remember: only we can change the world. Tomorrow, for one day, let's all think one thought for the day: OBAMA. Then go out and vote and be the change we wish to see in the world.

Song of The Day -- Everyone's At It by Lily Allen

2008-11-02T05:52:00.002-06:00

I've had it in my mind to do "regular features" to give my blog some structure before and it never quite worked out that way. That's more or less because I'm too lazy/forgetful to do anything with regularity. Anyhow, we'll give this a spin and see if it sticks.

Basically, I've always got a song in my head, so instead of keeping it there I'll just throw it up on the blog with a short write-up and if possibly a link.

Today's song: Everyone's At It by Lily Allen

Everyone's At It is either the first single of off Lily's forthcoming sophomore It's Not Me, It's You or the first track on the album. I had been under the impression and Lily had herself posted on her blog that it would be the first single. However, the NME is reporting that it's the first track off the album and that the first single will be "The Fear" aka "I Don't Know," which is another track that she has already posted to Myspace. Given my generally low opinion of the NME, I'm going to assume it's the lead single until I hear more definitively otherwise.

On to the song itself. It builds from silence into drums and sirens before Lily comes in spitting her typically acerbic couplets. The subject this time? Britain's drugs problem. Of course, Lily, noted boozer, is hardly the one to be calling for temperance and sensibility, which she is quick to point out. "I'm not trying to say I'm smelling of roses/but when will tire of sticking s*** up our noses?" It's essentially a call for sensibility and *gasp* accountability. "Why can't we all/all just be honest/admit to ourselves/that everyone's on it?" she fairly pleads. The lyrics are pure Lily: straightforward, no punches pulled, bluntly poetic. It's like a PSA, only highly melodic, and with sirens.

My opinion is that it's easily in the class of Lily's best songs like LDN and Everything's Just Wonderful. If this is what the future of Lily's music holds, the future is bright indeed.

Listen to it on Lily's myspace: myspace.com/lilymusic

Taxing the Ole Memory

2008-10-30T11:41:00.003-05:00

I can assure you that things, very interesting and perhaps even important things, have happened in my life in the last two weeks. Nonetheless, I have, to this point, failed to blog said things. I shall attempt to rectify that now. Where were we? Or more accurately, when were we? Ah yes, two Mondays ago.

Nothing happened Monday. Tuesday, however, we had a night at the theatre for Chicago. I find the irony of University of Chiacago students going to London to see an English production of "Chicago" overpowering. Still, I hadn't seen it and was therefore excited. Beforehand, we were supposed to head to a Indian restaraunt for dinner. This led to a bit of fun and even some controversy.

I'll save the long version for another day and just give the short version. Essentially, the train was too full for all of us to get on the tube, so Roderick, Laura, Josh, and I were one train behind. We knew which stop to get off at but not directions from there. They didn't wait for us at the tube stop, so we were left in Piccadilly Circus with no real idea of how to get where we needed to. This led to some misadventures regarding directions. Eventually, we got there. The controversy relates to Laura mocking me for misreading a sign and perpetrating the outrageous slander that I didn't know the name of the restaurant (Imli) when I very much did. Ah well, such are the perils of leadership.

Anyhow, we got there. The food was merely ok. The appetizer was passable. The entree was a bit too spicy for my tastes. The mango ice cream was incredibly delicious.

Then, we headed off for Chicago. The theatre wasn't actually a very nice theatre but since the staging for Chicago is sparse it worked out well enough. As for my thoughts on Chicago, I think of it this way. It's pointless to say whether on not I think it is a good show. Obviously, the musical going public has decided that it's a classic musical. As to whether it's a good production of it, I can't say because I haven't seen it before. As to whether I enjoyed it, I did but not as much as I would something campier like Mamma Mia. I like my musicals big, campy, and colorful. Chicago is muted, jazzy, and low key (relatively). Hence, I didn't love it but merely liked it.

Wednesday we went to Lynley Sambourne and Leighton houses after class. Edward Linley Sambourne was a cartoonist for the British humour magazine Punch! which earned him a reasonable living but didn't make him fabulously wealthy. Linley Sambourne house is one of the only surviving examples of a middle-class Victorian home with original furniture and art. It was quite interesting. The Victorian design sense is quite ecletic and busy. They enjoy putting lots of art items together in order to show the variety and quality of their tastes.

Leighton house was a bit less interesting. Fredick Leighton was fabulously wealthy, so his house was huge and opulent but it isn't in original condition in the same way that Linley Sambourne's house is. Original furnishings and art have been removed. It's still interesting to see the beauty of his Arab room, for example, but it just isn't as authentic and for that reason not as interesting as a more well-preserved house would be.

Friday we took a trip through the legal area of London. First up was a trip to the Old Bailey Criminal Courts. The unique think about these courts is that they allow visitors to sit in and observe trials. Actually, I'm not entirely sure it's unique. It's just cool, either way. We were split into two groups because the first courtroom's visitor area got full. I was in the second group. We witnessed about an hour of what we think was an axe-murder trial. It was at the very least, an axe-attack trial. Here's the rough outline of what we got. There are rival Sri Lankan regions. Some people from one Sri Lankan region did in a car owned by a guy from the other region. Other guy and posse game back with the intent of responding in kind. Things apparently got out of hand and, allegedly, and axe attack occured. It was fascinating stuff.

After that, we walked through some of the areas described in Charles Dickens' Bleak House. Bleak House has a plot that heavily features the Court of Chancery and characters involved with it, so we went to see the areas were those characters were depicted as living and working at. I found it all quite boring, to be honest. It was nice to be able to more fully envision what Dickens was writing about, but things look so much different than they would have then so the impact is lessened.

Our tour left us off in Covent Garden, which is a great eating/shopping district. We got lunch Emily's expense account at Just Falafs, which is, not surprisingly, a falafel restaurant. Then, a bunch of different groups split off to go their seperate ways. I went with Laura, Jodie, and Roderick to see High School Musical 3: Senior Year. I had never seen either of the other two HSM films, but I got the distinct impression that I would like them on the basis of their campy Disney ridiculousness. I wasn't wrong. I don't know that I can call HSM3 objectively good, but I enjoyed it more than I enjoyed seeing Chicago. Highlights include Troy doing choreographed dance moves during the state championship game in the opening number, Sharpay and Ryan's brilliant "I Want It All" number, Troy's spinning room and basketball rain on "scream," and Chad and Troy's bro-love ode to child hood in a junkyard.

Saturday was pretty quiet. We (and by we I mean myself, Katie, Katie's friend Steve, Dan, Lisbeth, Michelle, Laura, and Ali, hereafter known as "The Doctor Who Gang") ended up watching some Dr. Who and then playing Apples to Apples because Steve had never played. I won't get into explaining Apples to Apples, but suffice it to say that it's a fun party game and we had fun playing and drinking a bit. Ali in particular got smashed, which was hilarious because she had only one glass of merlot.

Sunday was not fun for me. I woke up at about 6 am and had to use the bathroom. At that point, I started throwing up in the sink. It was then I knew that I was in for an interesting day. I went back to sleep after cleaning up after myself and when I woke up I still felt horrible. I had a headache, backache, no energy, and couldn't keep food down. And I had to write a paper for Monday. I'm not, in fact, sure that those facts aren't related. I'm pretty sure my illness was just a combination of not eating right, getting poor sleep on these horrendous beds of ours, and being generally nervewracked over the paper and other personal matters. At any rate, I was laid up all Sunday and the Bills lost to boot. Not a good day.

Monday, I woke up feeling fine, but I hadn't ate anything all Sunday (or rather I had but it didn't stay down), so I was weak. I took the day to simply work on my paper and get healthy and skipped class. My paper, I'm happy to say, seemed to come out very well and I finished it before midnight, which is some kind of miracle for me I think. I even finished in time to watch Dr. Who, which was an extra bonus.

Tuesday was rather non-descript, mostly. Just more Dr. Who and such. There is one thing that happened but that's probably best saved for another time.

Wednesday was likewise quiet except for our screening of "The Buddha of Suburbia." Our London: City of Nations course aka "Feelings," includes weekly movie screenings. This week's selection was "The Buddha of Suburbia," a miniseries adaptation of the Hanif Kureshi novel of the same name. It's essentially the tale of the coming of age of a boy who is the son of a white mother and a Pakistani father. Given that it is the late 70s, sex, drugs, and rock & roll feature prominently. Especially sex. There was a lot of sex. Basically, Royce, our professor, expected us to all watch this bizzare 4 hour miniseries about a young mixed-race man's voyages of (often sexual) exploration and then be prepared to discuss it in class. There was not much chance of that happening. People will abide by a two hour film for class. Not many will abide by a four hour one.

Emily sweetened the pot some by putting pizza on her expense account and serving that before the screening. Not surprisingly, many people came for the pizza and then simply left or left after the first of four parts. Only four of us, Katie, Laura, Constance, and I (along with Emily to the extent that she counts) finished the film. It was alright as a whole, but it was quite frankly bizzare and nothing really makes sense until the end. There's no real plot to bring the movie together. Nonetheless, I got a major kick out of being able to mention in class an orgy scene in 4th part and have it be both a) pertinent to the discussion and b) completely shocking to people who didn't watch it.

Thursday night featured more Dr. Who and, of course, our thursday standbys of Nevermind the Buzzcocks and Beautiful People. Nevermind the Buzzcocks was great on account of the appearance of Australian feminist Gemane Greer. You would not expect an aging feminist to be the one to completely deconstruct and embarrass host Simon Amstell, who has more or less made a career of doing the same to his guests, but she did and it was hilarious. Beautiful People also had it's best episode yet, so good times were had by all.

That's basically where things stand at this point. Friday was our Yorkshire trip, which deserves a special blog of it's own. Saturday was yesterday and nothing really happened. I slept in. There was a fire alarm. I watched Everton beat Fulham. It rained, so I didn't go to Battersea Park for Guy Fawkes fireworks. We watched Dr. Who. We saw the fireworks from the comfort of the Res Hall lounge. That is all.

So, I'm pretty caught up on general happenings now (thank goodness). Hopefully, I can get some more blogs up that aren't simply recountings of events. Also, maybe I'll finally get around to blogging the fourth day of that Wales trip, which I at this point barely remember. Stay tuned.

2 Starbars for 70p = Win

2008-10-30T10:38:00.002-05:00

In my experience, when you tell people that you're going to a foreign country, one of the first things they will talk about is the food that that country is known for. England is know for not really having that good of food, but there are definitely major differences in the kinds of food they eat here and the way food is sold here as opposed to in America. This blog will be the depository for all my thoughts on food so far. Time for some bullet points!

People will tell you that in England they call french fries "chips," but that's not strictly true. They don't (except at American fast food chains) have french fries widely available here. Their chips are what we would call "homestyle" french fries or even "potato wedges." They are thick chunks of potato and they aren't as heavily fried or seasoned as french fries are.
While they'll also eat chips with ketchup, the English are just as likely to eat their chips with malt vinegar. Other popular choices would be mayonnaise or possibly even mushy peas or gravy. I haven't actually seen the latter two. I'm just taking wikipedia's word for it on that one.
I have seen mushy peas with meat pies, which is very common. Sadly, I haven't had any mushy peas (yet).
I have had a steak and kidney pie. Not a good one, but one nonetheless. I cooked up a storebought one that was sold in a tin in the section with the corned beef. It was, as I imagined it would be, too salty, but otherwise delicious.
In general, the English mode of cooking tends towards heavy meals with plenty of starches, meat, and gravy. I approve.
When you buy a sandwich with pickle on it, you're not getting a dill pickle. Instead, you're getting a sweet pickle relish.
The cheese here is unbelievable. It's almost mind-blowing how good the cheese that even Tesco serves on their ready-made sandwiches is compared to any cheese that you would get back home.
A word about grocery shopping. In the neighborhood, we have Tesco and Waitrose. Some people also swear by Sainsberry's, which is somewhat out of the way. Waitrose is rather a posh grocery store. Tesco is...not, but it is open good hours and has a pretty decent selection. To my mind, grocery prices are not ridiculous here, especially if you are looking for bargains. My dinners, while modest, are still filling and usually cost only 2-3 pounds at most.
For lunch, I spend 2-3 pounds, also. Two pounds for a ready made Tesco sandwich and perhaps another pound to satisfy my sweet tooth or buy a drink if I'm so inclined.
I often am inclined to satisfy my sweet tooth because the chocolate is very good here. Most (myself included) think it is far better than the chocolate back home. Cadbury's makes an amazing chocolate bar, the Starbar. It has a sort of peanut butterish substance and caramel on the inside with milk chocolate outside. They are delicious. They are 2 for 70p at Tesco. Can't beat that.
I managed to snag some English rock for Craig. Well, technically it was Pembroke rock from Wales, but it's the same principle. English rock is the generic name for a type of hard candy that is something akin to candy canes only bigger and better. Generally, it's either call just "rock" or a local prefix is attached, which is to say that "Pembroke" and "Blackpool" and various other rocks are the same except for they put the name of the area into the rock with dye, which looks quite cool. At any rate, it was Craig's request and it shall be fulfilled.
Actually, I have to go back to Covent Garden because I saw some BIG sticks of rock candy, much bigger than the Pembroke Rock that I already got him.
As you may be aware, our potato chips would be called "crisps" over here. In general, the crisps here are inferior to ours back home. Also, they are sold differently. Instead of selling big bags, they sell big bags that contain a quantity of smaller bags, so you might buy a 8 bag pack of chips. The bags inside are individual servings like you would get out of a vending machine.
They have some interesting flavors of crisps over here. One of their standard flavors is cheese & onion, which is tremendous. They also are quite fond of salt & vinegar. Sour cream & onion and BBQ, staples back home, are conspicously absent. What we would call "regular" are called "ready salted" here. I've also had steak & onion (not good), sweet chili (delicious), prawn cocktail (I like them, but some hate them because well, they taste of fish).
The main brand of crisps is Walker's, which is the UK version of Lay's. It's the same logo and everything. It's just Walker's rather than Lay's on the bag.
Soda is less popular here than back home and there are less varieties to choose from. You can still find Pepsi, but Coke rules here. It's much like the South, where Coke can be taken to mean soda (or pop, depending upon your chosen vernacular) in all it's various forms.
Their ginger ale is quite a bit different from ours. Thus, you can find "ginger ale" and "American ginger ale". Tesco also sells "Jamaican ginger ale" which contains honest to goodness Jamaican ginger.
They have many of the same cereals here that we do, but in general they have less sugared cereals. Also, many of the cereals have different UK names. Frosted Flakes are called simply Frosties here.
They love their Indian food here and understandably so. Given the history of the British Empire, Indian culture has had a large impact on England generally and London more acutely and specifically.
I do not, however, like Indian food. I cannot handle all the spice. That said, I am fond of a good Tesco Chicken Curry, which costs only one pound and is a nice quick dinner. It was the two Indian restaurants that I've been to so far that have put me off it, generally.
I don't know if American grocery stores have a ready-made sandwich selection like Tesco does, but if they don't they need to. It's brilliant. You need a quick lunch, so you just pop into Tesco grab your favorite sandwich off the shelf and away you go.
A word about fast food. I met Mark aka Sixteen Degrees, who is someone I know from the Ring of Honor Wrestling message board. He lives a couple hours from London but was in town, so we ended meeting at a pub. He put it best about English fast food. To paraphrase: England takes the two best things about fast food, the price and the speed, and eliminates them so that you just end up paying too much for poor quality food.
I don't know this from my own experience, but it appears to be true. Fast food here is not cheap. In general, restauarants are much more expensive relative to grocery prices than they are in the States.
Pizza Huts are oddly nice here. They actually look classy. Also, all the Pizza Huts here are being renamed Pasta Hut. I don't know if that's happening back home or not.
McDonald's are nowhere near as prevalent here as back home. Instead, Pret a Manger is the dominant fast food vendor. Pret stocks ready-made sandwiches that are a grade up in quality from those that Tesco and other supermarkets sell. They're also a grade up in price, about 70p more for a sandwich. That's counter-acted by the fact they generally seem to be fresher, healthier, and made with better ingredients.
Starbucks are pretty common here. Also common: Costa and Caffe Nero, which are probably even more prevalent than Starbucks. The popular coffee joint among the group actually is none of the above. It's Hummus Bros, which is place near where we take classes. They serve 50p cups of coffee (we're talking 6 oz. cups) at certain times a day.
We do not have blackcurrant prodcuts back home. This is sad because blackcurrant jam is delicious. Don't ask me what exactly a blackcurrant is. It just makes good jam.

That's all I have for now.

Spacing

2008-10-30T10:12:00.001-05:00

I can't get the spacing right for the life of me on that last post. Sorry.

19 Princelet Street and Last Weekend

2008-10-23T18:16:00.006-05:00

As mentioned before, Thursday’s “Feelings” class was dominated by a discussion on a film I didn’t watch as well as an article that I didn’t read because I was working on my paper. That class was followed by an hour break before we reconvened at the IES Centre to travel to the Immigration Museum that we were scheduled to tour. A group of us headed over to a pub that serves fancy nachos during the break. I wasn’t much interested in the nachos because I had already had lunch. I was, after what had transpired that day, interested in a beer and enjoyed a relaxing break before the nightmare that was to come.

It all started with us taking the Northern Line from Holborn to Liverpool Street. Liverpool Street station is HUGE and magnificent. It was really impressive. Then we walked to 19 Princelet Street, which is just off Brick Lane and right on the boundary between downtown and the East End. 19 Princelet Street is an “immigration museum” supposedly, but in all actuality it’s something more akin to an art exhibition space devoted to the topic of immigration.

Our tour began with the guide asking us to look towards the central city and describe what we saw, which was odd enough. Then it was followed by her asking us why the doors were the shape they were. This actually happened. I still have no idea what in tarnation it has to do with immigration, but many things about this place defy logic. Then, we went inside. 19 Princelet Street began as a house but eventually evolved into a Jewish temple, which is apparent when one enters. The space of the room is filled with art projects done by 4^th grade students such as letters as the students imagine they might have been written by immigrant children, fake newspapers, and a video sketch of the kids’ interpretation of the Irish potato famine and subsequent immigration to England. Don’t get me wrong. It was cute. For about five minutes. But there is only so much interest that college students are going to have in children’s art projects and the museum staff seriously overestimated that amount.

Ah yes, the museum staff. They were overbearing in an almost creepy way and were careful at all points to make it known to you exactly what every project was and how the kids made it and so forth. Personally, I just wanted to be left alone to peruse the exhibits at my own leisure, but that clearly wasn’t happening. After looking at the first room, the head guide gave us a long, rambling speech that told us…nothing in particular. It was basically a list of what groups immigrated to England and when. I was exhausted, so I fell asleep briefly.

After that, we were led downstairs for another room where we saw a video of children performing a Yiddish folk tale. Personally, I was in a humorless mood and didn’t find it funny, but the rest of the group found the video to be full of unintentional comedy. To be honest, I have to admit that kids simulating an anti-Semitic mob, while it in principal may sound poignant, actually turns out to be ridiculous to the point of near hilarity. Let’s just say that the staff weren’t amused that we were amused. That led to two more rooms full of art before we finally got out of there. At one point, transitioning between rooms, Blake and I were stopped by the guide and she told us that children from Serbia were the first ones to review the museum rather than any journalists. Then she asked us if we knew where Serbia is. Seconds later, she asked us if we knew what Al-Jazeera was. Blake and I were just gobsmacked that she thought we wouldn’t know about Serbia and Al-Jazeera but then we shouldn’t have been surprised. Everything about that “museum” was insulting to our intelligence. The rest of Thursday passed uneventfully. I took a nap as soon as I got home and then got up for our Thursday ritual of Never Mind the Buzzcocks and Beautiful People on BBC2. Hopefully, I’ll get around to writing about TV shows one of these days and can explain those shows.

Friday, I just took as a me day. I was feeling quite ill at this point, which was encouraged by not getting any sleep Wednesday night. I too the opportunity of a free day to sleep in and then run to Tesco for groceries and to the chemist (British for pharmacy) for a multivitamin to make sure my defenses were strong. Saturday was similarly lazy. I managed to get my laundry done, which was much needed and then late in the day decided to take a walk down King’s Road just for something to do. Dan joined me. Inadvertently, we ended up basically walking the route of the Piccadilly line. We went through Hyde Park Corner, alongside Buckingham Palace, along GreenPark and then down to Piccadilly Circus. Upon reaching Piccadilly Circus, Dan and I made it our mission to find an eating establishment. We found Ultimate Burger. Ultimate Burger, while it sounds like a fast food joint, is a sit-down restaurant that serves really fancy hamburgers. I had a minted lamb burger, which was delicious. It was a bit expensive, but it was some place that I had meant to try and was worth a Saturday splurge.

Sunday was also pretty quiet. I pretty much whiled away the day until 6PM and the Bills game rolled around. Sky Sports 3, in preparation for this Sunday’s Chargers-Saints game at Wembley, was showing Bills-Chargers. At least, they were trying to. The power outages at the game stopped that plan and frustrated the hell out of me. I dialed up Field Pass, but my internet was on the fritz, so that was a no go. I tried to go to the lounge with my computer, but Dan was already occupying the only working internet jack. Eventually, I just resigned myself to sitting in the lounge with Dan and he intermittently gave me updates on the games. Still, all things considered I was happy because the Bills won to go to 5-1. I’ll have what’s happened in the last few days in the next post.

Birthdays, Football, and Debates: Last Week Pt. 1

2008-10-19T16:52:00.001-05:00

Last week was a pretty quiet week because we had the specter of our 10-15 page final papers for Professor Murrin's class hanging over our heads, but I did manage to get and do some fun things and those things shall be related here.

On Saturday the 11th, I was eating a steak and kidney pie from Tesco for dinner when Caelyn and Francesca asked if I wanted to go to a club with the gang. I said I did want to go, so I shoved my pie down my throat about as quick as I could and got changed. When I went into the kitchen that they were hanging out in, it became clear that they had already got a pretty good start to their night. I know that from the empty cans of Foster's and the fact that Josh's friend Daniel and Andy, who are both Asian, were displaying the familiar "Asian glow" and were strawberry red. For this reason, it was pretty jubilant atmosphere as we headed towards South Kensington station to get on the tube.

We got off at Holborn, which is the same stop that we get off at to go to class. Only this time we headed in the opposite direction of class and towards the area occupied by the London School of Economics (LSE). We eventually arrived at our destination, the After Skool Klub. It's basically a college hangout where all the LSE kids come to blow off steam and dance to indie rock on the weekends. We had to pay a 3 pound cover to get in, which as things go didn't seem too heinous.

The weird thing about the whole situation was that I just came out to get out of my room, get out of Chelsea, and have fun dancing. However, there were definitely some subplots playing out as the night progressed. One of them, I had foreseen becoming an issue before we arrived at the club. Standing next to Josh on the tube as he talked to his friend Daniel, it became clear to me that Josh was, not to put too fine a point on it, wasted. At the club, he started dancing erratically, which is not to say poorly but to say that several times he risked running into walls. Without the knowledge of about half of us, Gabe, Daniel, and Josh headed back to the dorm. This caused a bit of confusion because it took the rest of us a good 30 minutes to figure out where the hell they were. In the meantime, Hilary had been flirting with a guy from the LSE, who eventually scheduled a lunch date with her. In addition to that, some of the other people in the gang started to couple up and engage in awkward, U of C style, flirting. I just danced. Nonetheless, it was fun. Also, it was informative because I got to witness things firsthand that I would otherwise have never heard. We had some trouble getting home, but thankfully Francesca can read a night bus map unlike the rest of us.

Sunday, I just tried to work on my paper (mostly unsuccessfully) and listened to the Vikings game on Field Pass. That's not as random as it seems because my roommate Dan is from Minnesota and a thus a Vikings fan.

Monday the only thing that happened was Dan and I forgetting what time class was. Class is at 10 Tuesday through Thursday. However, on Monday it's at 1:30. This is not a fact that we remembered before we prepared to leave for a class that we thought was at 10. Dan left a little ahead of me and made it all the way to Holborn before he realized what the situation was. I realized it just as I had to cross the street to get to South Kensington station and I saw Michelle walking away from the station.

Tuesday was highlighted by Jodie's birthday. Jodie, being the lovely, wonderful person she is, decided that her birthday was the occasion to inaugurate a tradition of study breaks by baking cookies and supplying other store-bought treats. For her own birthday. Needless to say, her birthday celebration was well attended. It was a welcome distraction from our papers. They were due on either Wednesday or Thursday (which means Thursday, naturally). I (finally) finished my outline on Tuesday, but I faced the prospect of writing my whole 10-15 page paper the next night, which is what I did.

Wednesday was swallowed by my paper, but that's not to say that I didn't procrastinate an unhealthy amount too. My writing flow was interrupted by madly refreshing the live text updates for the England-Belarus World Cup qualifier. England had beat Kazakhstan, which is inexplicably a part of the European qualifying region, 5-1 on Saturday at Wembley and were looking for a perfect 4 and 0 start to qualifying Wednesday in Minsk. This is a big deal (and I'll explain this more later in a separate post on sport) because England failed to even qualify for last summer's European Championships, which was widely (and rightly) considered a national embarrassment. In the end, England managed to put away Belarus 3-1 thanks in large part to Wayne Rooney being in spectacular form. My paper, however, did not fare as well as England although I did knock out a page or two during the game. The kicker is that we had a movie that we were supposed to watch for "Feelings" that was shown at the same time as the game and that I skipped to work on my paper. I call Royce Mahawatte's "London: City of Nations" class "Feelings" because it wastes a ridiculous amount of time on Royce giving us an abstract concept and then telling us to write down how we feel about it. Sometimes, we then share our feelings in small groups. I kid you not. Of course, I paid dearly for skipping this movie, as half of the next day's class proved to be us discussing our feelings on the movie.

Also, I broke my writing to watch the final presidential debate, and I'm glad I did. It was fascinating and it was good to see them really go after each other and finally debate. I had two different reactions to it. The first was that I thought that, despite the odd weird moment or two, McCain won the debate. Of course, down nearly 8 points nationally, McCain had to win the debate or he could have basically quit right then and there. McCain was really sharp with his attacks and made his points very well. Obama often appeared unable or unwilling to hit back and I was disappointed with that. The other reaction I had was that I found Obama's performance reassuring. He easily parried away the questions about ACORN and Bill Ayers and seemed firm and resolute about his policy proposals. I was also glad that he stated a commitment to cutting spending. Fiscally, I'm more of a conservative than a liberal. I support balanced budgets, a (somewhat) smaller government, and free trade. John McCain could score major points with me if he could clearly explain how he expects to cut taxes and still balance the budget. Sadly, he is consistently unable to do so and usually lapses into a tangent about pork barrel spending, which is utterly besides the point. I want to hear concrete things. Cuts to cabinet departments, entitlement reform, cuts to defense spending. Something meaningful. Obama at can vaguely ramble on about cutting programs that don't work even though he never says which ones. All of this is to say that I felt like McCain won the debate but he didn't draw enough distinctions to really make a difference in a race that may be too far gone for him to salvage. I'll probably through up a politics post later if I can get around to it where I'll write more about this.

Throughout the debate, I was sucking on a Red Bull, which was to come in handy in the following hours as I got to the business of finishing my paper. That feat was accomplished at 9:30 on Thursday. Keep in mind that it's a 30 minute commute to class and that's if you are MOVING. I wasn't fully satisfied with my paper, but a didn't have the time I might have liked to have for the purpose of refining it. Instead, I saved it to my flash drive and hurried out the door at 9:35. I'll pick up with the rest of Thursday in the next post. The horror of 19 Princelet Street deserves a fresh post. And an arson (only half kidding).

Wales Day Three--Even The Church Has A Gift Shop

2008-10-13T11:49:00.014-05:00

To start my Saturday, I got up early enough to head to the oceanfront for a relaxing moment of zen. It would have been significantly more zen if there hadn't been a blustery wind and spitting rain blowing in, but it was still pretty peaceful.

Then, we left the hostel in Broadhaven for the short jaunt over to Pembroke Castle. Pembroke Castle is the most castle-ish castle we visited, which is to say that it most greatly conforms to the preconceived notions I had of what castles are. We took the tour, which was delivered by a delightfully eccentric gentleman in a hat and sporting a magnificent beard. Combined with Professor Murrin, who is quite eccentric himself at times, they were a pretty spectacular team of Welsh historians. Most of the info went in one ear and out the other, but the visual feast was far more memorable. In the gift shop afterwards, I snagged some Pembroke rock for Craig and then a stocking cap for myself. I wanted a keepsake from Wales and I thought, "What's more practical for a U of C student than a good hat."

That dark one is patently a horrible picture, but hey we were in a cave. More importantly, it captures our tour guide's amazing enthusiasm.

Another bus ride took us out of Pembroke and towards St. David's Church, which has the distinction of being, well, really old and yet still very much an operational house of worship. That makes it a weird combination of tourist attraction, cathedral, and museum. And yes, it has a gift shop. Does your church have a gift shop? Was it recently visited by Prince Charles? Thought not.

After just a short stop at St. David's, it was a *surprise* bus ride that took us to Baskerville Hall, which is a hotel that was the inspiration for the Sherlock Holmes' novel The Hound of the Baskervilles. We were split up into only two rooms. All the boys were in one room and all the girls in another. That sounded like nightmare potential, but somehow it actually worked out well enough. They had a fancy dinner prepared for us in the "music room." I wasn't much impressed but they were trying to be fancy at least. There was a vegetable soup followed by a chicken entree and then capped by a slice of chocolate cake that was so nauseatingly rich that I couldn't bear to even take one bite. The soup was fine but the chicken was far too dry, which not even the gravy could reclaim. The conversation was far worse than the food for me, though. I came to realize that I'm about the worst dinner party guest ever. Inevitably, it seems these kind of conversations seem to turn to movies or books and I'm more or less clueless as regards both. It may seem strange for an English major to be clueless about books but as far as modern books go it's true.

After that dinner we headed out for some dancing. Actually, we didn't really have to go out at all. The interesting thing about Baskerville Hall is that it also has a dance club attached to it and since it's pretty much in the middle of nowhere and there is nothing around to do, chavs from all around the area are bussed in to get drunk are dance there. Unfortunately, I was a feeling a bit down and couldn't properly enjoy the absurdity of drunken Welsh hicks dancing but what I did see was pretty funny indeed. Thankfully, our trusty Emily was around to talk some sense in to me and cheered me up a little bit before I took a long, hot shower and headed to bed. Here's a very poor picture of Baskerville Hall that I took from the bus to go out on.

Things That Have Happened Since Wales

2008-10-11T04:54:00.003-05:00

I still have two days of Wales trip stuff to post, and I'll get around to those eventually, but they take a long time to post because it takes a while to upload photos. In the meantime, I thought I'd bang out a small post about what I've got up to since we got back from Wales.

Sunday night was party night in the dorm for sure. After the Bills were well and truly crushed, I went out in to the hall and saw not one but two kitchen parties. I went into one where Josh, Andy, and Francesca were playing their newly "invented" card game The Essence Of War, which is in actuality just a few (relatively major) rules tweaks to the basic game of War. Then we ended up playing cards and having a few drinks and a good time was had by all. The next morning class was interesting to say the least. At least two people (though not me, don't worry) showed up to class obviously hungover. Classy.

Monday we also had to buy our new monthly tube passes. We were hoping to get student passes, but our program doesn't run long enough for us to be eligible, so we just had to by regular monthly passes for 93 pounds (!). This caused quite a delay because when we did so we had to register our cards which caused many of us to be late for class.

Mostly, it has been a slow week. We had a paper prospectus due on Wednesday and our final paper for our first class is due this coming Wednesday, so there is a fair bit of freaking out going on. Monday afternoon a few of us did get out to Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese for a pint. Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese is a pub that was supposedly frequented by Dickens and Samuel Johnson way back when. They also have, by far, the cheapest beer, we've seen. I had my first pint, as 2.10 didn't seem as unreasonable as the 3.50 you'll pay elsewhere. And it was, to my uneducated tastebuds, pretty good beer anyhow.

Tuesday night, Emily ordered pizza for us on the expense account before we headed downtown to the Wyndham's Theatre to see Kenneth Branagh play the title role in Anton Chekhov's play, Ivanov. We were definitely in the nosebleed section, but we couldn't complain too much. At least we didn't have to stand for the whole performance like at the Globe. The play was decent. It starts REALLY slow. I fell asleep at the beginning, partly from boredom and partly from extreme tiredness. After intermission, however, things got very good indeed. Kenneth Branagh upped the intensity as Ivanov starts to quick into full nervous breakdown and it looked as if we were headed for a real cracker of an ending. Unfortunately, the climactic will they or won't they seen at Ivanov and Sasha's wedding draws on way too long and kind of kills the suspense. All in all, not a bad night at the theatre.

Wednesday after class, 6 of us went for fish and chips at Fryer's Delight, which is a rather small fish and chip shop in Holborn that is pretty well known as the place for authentic fish and chips. For 7 pounds, you get a fried fish and an ample portion of chips. Not bad, especially considering that most pubs will charge you a pound or two more for inferior food. It was a very filling lunch, indeed and quite tasty.

Basically, since then it's been pretty quiet. We did have a good time staying in Friday night. First we watched Nevermind the Buzzcocks, a pseudo game show which is basically just an excuse for host Simon Amstell to rip the show's (minor) celebrity guests to shreds. That was followed up by Beautiful People, a truly and utterly strange sitcom that seems to be about male models, I think. It was hilarious, at any rate. Then, we watched the Graham Norton Show before capping the night with a viewing of a so-bad-that-it-is-amazing Beowulf movie. Even though I feel somewhat lame staying in in such a vibrant city, I think it still counts as taking advantage of being in London when watching hilarious British TV shows.

That's the week that was. More or less. More Wales posts and pics to come.

Wales Day Two -- Mind Your Head

2008-10-09T10:55:00.010-05:00

We woke up on Friday and had to say goodbye to Cardiff. Our first stop on the day was the Museum of Welsh Life located just a short 15 minute drive from central Cardiff. The museum is more of a park than a traditional museum. It's open air and basically consists of sprawling fields where old Welsh houses and buildings have been reconstructed. It also features a castle (sort of) and the much more impressive garden that accompanies the supposed castle. Much of the group didn't find this stop very interesting but I really liked it. It was nice to get out into the fresh air and I've been conditioned to like this sort of thing by visiting places like Cades Cove in Tennessee. Now for some pictures:

There are some places in this world that legitimately have more sheep than people. Wales is one of them. Hence, no Museum of Welsh Life can be complete without large amounts of sheep.
This is one of those old, reconstructed Welsh houses that I was talking about. They're pretty garden variety, but also just plain pretty.
Another, different old Welsh house.
What might you guess this building is? Did you guess cockfighting pit? If so, you are correct. It's more obvious what it is from the inside, but I had to preserve battery, so I didn't get that shot.
That is from left to right Roderick, Laura, and Katie looking at a meetinghouse. It was sort of a club hall, as in a Moose club or something of the sort. There's a theatre in the upstairs, pool tables and other things like that in the downstairs. It's an interesting building and if Santa can swing this, I'd like it for Christmas. It's probably to big to fit in his sleigh, though.

This is the obscenely beautiful, Italian-style castle garden.

After the Museum of Welsh Life we headed to a Tesco to grab lunch. This had to have been the biggest grocery store I've ever seen. It had an upper level for a cafe and the lower level was the size of a Sam's Club or Wal-Mart Supercenter and was ALL groceries. I also found at that prices in Wales are much cheaper than in London, which shouldn't come as a surprise but is frustrating nonetheless.

Then, we rode up to the northeast corner of Wales for our trip down a coal mine, which was just awkward from the get go. As we were getting "kitted-out" or what Americans might called dressed up with coal mining hats and rescue breathing kits in case of carbon monoxide issues, the guy putting on my helmet had to go to a third hat because the first was too small for my head. The third one was also too small and it basically strangled my forehead for the whole time. Then the next guy asks me where we're from. The following is the conversation as I recall it.

Miner: Where are you guys from?
Me: Chicago
Miner: Oh, so you know Frank.
Me: *puzzled look*
Miner: You know. Frank.
Me: Frank...
Miner: Didn't he sing that song about Chicago? Frank Sinatra?
Me: I guess...

I think he must have been referring to the song "Chicago, My Kind of Town" but I didn't have the heart to tell him that Frank's from Jersey. And dead. Next, we packed into the lift to take us down into the mine. I do mean packed. I think we all became closer friends on the way down. Once we got down there the tour itself was fine. It was all stuff that I had either heard before, didn't find interesting, or didn't really shock me. But it was fine. The part about the way they used horses in the mines was probably the most interesting. The bothersome part of the experience was that, well, I'm tall. The mines are not. I really don't mind ducking. It's one of the hazards of being tall. I get that. What annoyed me was that the guide looked at me EVERY SINGLE TIME we went to a place with a low clearance and said "Watch your head, young man." He didn't mean any harm by it and was almost apologetic about it at the end of it all, but at the time I really didn't appreciate be singled out time after time. Here's the view from the coal mining site.
After we got out of the mine, there was an aboveground museum that by that point I was too tired to care much about. After so many museums, you just get burned out on reading informational plaques.

Then, we got back on the bus and headed for Pembrokshire, specifically the town of Broadhaven. There was much to do at the hostel in Broadhaven. It's on the coast, which is nice, but it's nicer when it's not pouring down rain as it was when we arrived. The nearest town to it is a bit of a hike and is pretty sleepy. Supposedly, it had a nice pub, but I didn't bother to check it out. Dinner was a bust for me. We had heard about this great pasta buffet we were going to get. In reality, it didn't turn out that way. I got to dinner ten minutes ahead of time, which seemed to me to be ample, but actually everyone had got their long before me and my table of late comers was last to get to the "buffet". By the time I got there, all the lasagna had gone. All that was left was some vegetarian lasagna or spaghetti. I chose spaghetti and was given a HUGE portion, but I hardly ate any of it, as the sauce was very poor. In retrospect, I should have got it without sauce, but that's neither here nor there. Bottom line, don't expect very good food from Welsh hostels in the middle of nowhere. Actually, desert was fine but that was kind of tempered by having to bus our own tables.

After dinner, I stayed in while some went out to the pub. We flipped around the tube and eventually settled on a Welsh quiz show. And by Welsh quiz show I mean a quiz show conducted in Welsh. Not English. We had fun guessing at the answers when we couldn't read the questions. Jodie and Laura had a running competition going and were both doing poorly (naturally). Jodie then left the room briefly and missed a round of five questions which Laura by sheer dumb luck guessed correctly. Of course, I insisted that I saw no such thing as her getting all five right. This lead Laura to memorably explain that she had had a "warp-spasm" and proclaim "I am the Cuchulainn of Welsh game shows." This is only funny if you have read the The Tain, but trust me it was hilarious.

Then we played Catchphrase. Catchphrase, for the uninitiated is a game where one person gives clues an the other players have to guess the phrase by the given clues. Once the phrase is guessed, the clue giver passes it to another person. When the buzzer goes off, the player or team in possession of the machine loses. I, of course, immediately began a fairly constant stream of trash-talking and then started intentionally taking a long time with my clues to irritate the other players. To use wrestling terms, I was getting massive heel heat from the other players. When we were playing an individual round and when I finally bit the dust, (but only after destroying everyone to my right because of my stalling, both intentional and unintentional) a huge cheer of celebration went up. Good times. Being the enemy can be great fun.

Once Catchphrase got played out, there was NOTHING to do. Finally, I sat down with Emily, our TA who is affectionately known among us by her e-mail handle "eponder," Hipster Gabe (as opposed to Big Gabe), and Dan for a chat about academic things. Eventually, some Welsh youth services workers came in and we had a chat. We found out that people from Cardiff evidently find Dan's pronunciation of "gorgeous to be hilarious" and that Flares, the disco we went to the night before, is not a gay bar and just seems like it is. Eventually, we got into a rather in depth conversation with these ladies focusing on the criminal justice systems of the UK and US, especially as pertains to pedophiles. There's nothing quite like talking at length about pedophilia to drunken Welsh women at 2 AM. It was highly entertaining. At the end of our conversation, the leader of the group, Heather shook my hand and then leaned in. I was confused as to what she was leading in for. She ended up planting a kiss on my neck. I don't know if that's how they say goodbye in Cardiff (although I suspect it isn't) but it definitely caught me by surprise. And that was day two.

Katie's Photos

2008-10-06T14:39:00.003-05:00

I didn't get to take as many pictures as I would have liked to so far because of my only laziness and because I forgot to bring extra batteries to Wales. However, fear not! My friend and fellow Macleaner Katie took enough pictures for the both of us and they're on the web at http://picasaweb.google.com/JasaLondonPics/LondonAndWales#

Take a gander, there's some good shots in there and she got some things that I didn't get at all such as Tintern Abbey and Big Ben.

Wales Day One -- Put Your Hands Up For Cardiff

2008-10-05T16:56:00.021-05:00

Dan and I woke up literally 15 minutes before our scheduled 8:30 departure and Ceri made a special point in his e-mail to emphasize punctuality, so we didn't dare take showers or anything. We just stuffed clothes into our bags and ran out the door so as not to be late. And we made it. Then the professors were late so we had to wait for them. That did not make me happy at all.

We rode to Cardiff, which is about 3 1/2 hours or so from London by bus. It's the capital of Wales (not that Wales has much autonomy at all) and it's 2nd biggest city after Swansea. It's home to 500,000 people and is cultural center of Wales. Feel free to fact check that, by the way. I'm just taking our program director Ceri's word for it. He should know. He's Welsh.

We stayed at a hostel right next to Millennium Stadium, which is the main landmark in Cardiff. A football (and by football I mean "soccer") and more especially rugby stadium, Millennium Stadium is home to the Cardiff Blues rugby team as well as the Wales National Rugby team which is the champion of this year's Six Nations Rugby competition which pits the Rugby Union teams of England, Scotland, Wales, France, Ireland, and Italy against each other.

We dropped our belongings at the hostel and then took the short walk to Cardiff Castle where Ceri bought our admission tickets. Then, we were released to enjoy Cardiff. A group of us decided that lunch was in order and we found and Indian buffet, which was disarmingly empty. However, the food was very good. Unfortunately, spicy food does not agree with me and the food was too hot for me to enjoy. Other than that, it was quite tasty, especially the chicken wings. This buffet was slightly odd in that instead of getting a clean plate each time we were told to reuse the same plate.

Then we headed for the National Museum Cardiff, which I enjoyed greatly. A couple days before, a group of us went to the National Gallery in London, which is an absolute treasure trove of art complete with paintings from all the great European masters. The only problem with it is how HUGE it is. It's hard to take it all in. This museum is of an accessible size but still boasts works by Manet, Monet, Picasso, and Renoir (who incidentally is my personal favorite).

It is also next door to what I think was City Hall and together those buildings and the surrounding grounds are absolutely beautiful. Here's the evidence, the last one is from a garden around the corner:

After the Museum we headed back for Cardiff Castle to take our tour. At the castle, we learned about the Goat Major, which is the soldier who trains the goat mascot of the Welsh Regiment. Yes, the Welsh Army has a goat for a mascot. The natural choices for a mascot for Wales would seem to me to be a red dragon or sheep. However, seeing as how the former is mythical and the latter is, um, a sheep, they go with a goat. Then, we saw a short video ostensibly introducing us to Cardiff Castle. I say ostensibly because it made no sense whatsoever and was extremely trippy. Basically, it featured a girl reading a book which causes random people on the streets of Cardiff to turn into figures from history. What this has to do with the Castle, no one could figure out. Then we toured the Castle. Unfortunately, I have no interior castle pictures because they aren't allowed. Basically, an obscenely rich family owned it as a summer home, which they used for 6 weeks a year. All the rooms are incredibly ornately decorated and each adheres to a theme. One room features great poets, another fables and fairy tales, another signs of the zodiac. It's about as beautiful as could possibly be. Then we went and explored the more military aspects of the castle on our own. Castle shots upcoming:After Cardiff Castle, we had the notion to go through the covered market, which is like a mall except not completely enclosed but just roofed in. Unfortunately, all the shops had already closed. We did, however, stop by Spillers Records, which bills itself as the world's oldest record store, established 1894. Apparently, this is actually true and it began as a phonograph shop. Then, they kicked us out because it was closing time and headed back to the hostel before dinner.

Dinner was at Giovanni's, an Italian restaurant. It was 17.95 for a three course meal and it was already paid for, which makes it all the more delicious. I had prosciutto with melon to start, followed by breaded veal and then tiramisu for dessert. The best thing about the meal was that wine was bought for both tables (of 12) and so there was plentiful wine, both red and white. It probably goes with saying that you don't have to twist college students' arms to drink free alcohol and by the end of the meal, we had all had at least two glasses of wine and some had 4 or more. That led to some, um, interesting, conversations to say the least. Of which, many were definitely R rated and not what would generally be considered appropriate dinner table topics by sober people.

After dinner, it was time to explore the nightlife of Cardiff on a Thursday. First, we hit a bar playing house music, but apparently some people within the group felt that the other patrons were a bit sketchy, so that was scuttled and we headed to Flares, an 70s and 80s themed club for drinking and dancing. We thought it might be a gay club based on the large amount of middle aged women paired off, but some folks from Cardiff later dispelled that notion. After Flares, we headed next door to cap off the night and then went back to the hostel. All said, it was legitimately one of the best days in my life and I plan on making it a point to get back to Cardiff, if not during this term than at some point in the next 5 or so years.

Non-London Note -- Music

2008-10-01T12:21:00.002-05:00

This is one of the best songs I've heard in a long while. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjQOMaN9np0.

The video isn't the official one, but was done by a fourth grade class. It's just about the cutest thing ever and better than the official one.

A Few Things

2008-10-01T09:58:00.002-05:00

We're going to Wales until Sunday. Weather is expected to be pretty rough and we'll be on buses quite a bit, but it should be fun nonetheless. I'll actually start taking pictures which I haven't been good about so far.
Meant to mention this before but I'll just do it know. We live in the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea, which is basically one of the swankiest neighborhoods in all of London. And one of the most expensive. We have some famous neighbors as a result of this. Hugh Grant lives in the neighborhood (although I don't know where), Mick Jagger might (not 100% sure on that) and probably some other famous people do too.
How do you know if you're in an expensive area? The Lamborghini dealership across from the tube station is a good indication.
We ate today at this pub which is built where the real life Sweeney Todd's shop was. Not suprisingly, the signature dish is a meat pie. I opted not to spend 10 pounds on lunch however and had a sandwich instead. Easily the best food I've had since we arrive.

Bullet Points London Thoughts

2008-09-28T17:05:00.002-05:00

I think everyone in the program is going to end up with recurring back problems. The mattresses are incredibly uncomfortable. You can feel every spring.
I have taken some pictures. I just haven't got around to uploading them to my computer just yet.
Quiz Call is AMAZING. Quiz Call is a show that runs late night on Channel Five. Basically, callers call in and try to guess answers based on a category. The category last night was "Films R". Callers had to guess films beginning with R. We watched for about 3 hours and NO ONE won until someone finally won when they gave the clue that one of the answers was a "Rocky" film and they correctly guessed Rocky V. The suspense is just tremendous as are the hosts talking like auctioneers and drunken callers spouting nonsensical answers.
We have like 10 channels in the lounge, including Sky Sports One, Two, and Three. There will be plenty of chances to watch soccer and rugby, no doubt about that.
You will drive yourself crazy converting pounds to dollars. For example, today I had a chicken sandwich for lunch at a pub. It was 4.25. That's like $8.50, which is pretty absurd. However, that's just what things cost here. In a lot of cases, things cost the same as they do back home only in a more expensive currency. You just have to get a sense of what things cost here and go with that.
Tesco is actually pretty reasonable in terms of grocery prices. Some people swear by Sainsbury but I have been there just yet.
Tesco Limeade may seem like a good deal at 46p for a 2 liter, but it really isn't. It's sugar free and it's pretty disgusting.
Soda over here contains actual sugar not high fructose corn syrup. Some people swear they can taste the difference. I really can't.
Today we played "World Cup" today at St. James' Park with a guy we met there. For some reason me and my partner Blake dominated. I felt all athletic and manly. I guess when you are playing with people who aren't really used to playing competitive sports it makes things a bit easier.

Culture Overload

2008-09-28T16:11:00.002-05:00

I can't do my reading for class while I'm listening to the (frustrating so far) Bills game, but I can do a blog update and actually be somewhat useful. So I shall.

We started Friday by heading over to the IES Center and doing orientation there which was followed by lunch (yay, free lunch). Following that, there was a bus waiting for us to do a sightseeing tour. We hit all the major landmarks including St. Paul's Cathedral, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace (although, we didn't stop there) and ended up at the British Museum. At the British Museum, we split up into two groups for "highlights" tours. Unfortunately, our tour guide didn't really move at a fast pace. The British Museum has a huge collection and all sorts of impressive things but she really dwelt on each item she showed us. You really don't need to tell University of Chicago students about the Choice of Paris or about what the Rosetta Stone is. Nonetheless, we had to listen to her tell us in excruciating detail. We ended up seeing the Rosetta Stone, sculptures from the Parthenon, "Ginger" the natural mummy, the Portland Vase, and artifacts from the Sutton Hoo burial. It was all interesting, but it something that we'll have to come back to and investigate at our own leisure.

Friday night, Dan and I chose to stay up until 4 AM local time to watch the debate, which meant we got up late on Saturday. However, we got up plenty early to me with the gang in the lobby and go to Timon of Athens at the Globe Theatre. The Globe is definitely a great environment to see a play in and they really use the space well by having actors come through the crowd, which, by the way, is mostly standing. Unfortunately, standing for 3 hours isn't really agreeable to one's back and it certainly wasn't agreeable to mine. I was in serious pain by the end of the play. Still, I can't say anything bad about the play. It was highly entertaining.

Very near to the Globe (like, next door) is the Tate Modern art museum. After the play, we headed for lunch at the Tate Modern's cafe, which is rather ritzy. Thankfully, Emily, our course assistant has an expense account for use on group outings and she put the whole thing on her expense card. After this, we went into the Tate itself. This presented a problem. I was tired at this point (still suffering a bit from jet lag, probably) and my back was still bothering me. So, while I enjoyed the Tate somewhat, I wasn't able to enjoy it as much as I might have. I'm really not a big fan of modern art, but I want to gain a greater appreciation for it, so I'll probably go back to the Tate sometime when I have a chance. The nice thing about both the Tate and the British Museum are that they are free except for special exhibitions.

Heading home, I managed to catch up with Katie, Emily, and Dmitri as we were crossing the Millennium Bridge aka "The Wibbly-Wobbly Bridge". This proved to be very fortuitous, as we couldn't go back the way we came because the tube line was closed. Emily had a map and led us to Leicester Square where we caught the Piccadilly line back home. I would have really been up a creek without a paddle had I not run into them.

All of this goes to prove the point that when it comes down to it, it's hard to imagine a more culturally rich city. You can see Shakespeare at the Globe for only 5 pounds. You can go to the Tate and British Museum for free. There are all kinds of statues all over the city. It's just unbelievable the cultural riches this city contains.

I Can See the London Eye from My Kitchen

2008-09-26T16:19:00.002-05:00

The visual proof on that is yet to come, but you’ll just have to take my word for it for now. I arrived at the IES center and checked in, hobnobbed, tried to nap, etc. Also, I group of us went on a short excursion with Greg the IES guy to South Kensington tube station to buy Oyster cards for the week. It was all going smoothly with one guy ringing up the same thing for each of us when a new cashier opened and a gentleman began to berate us for not going to him. Or berate me, as I was at the front of the line. The problem was that he didn’t know exactly what to ring up, so IES Greg had to swoop into my rescue and promptly inform him. I managed to sneak in a chat with Greg on the way back. He’s a nice chap. Originally from the North of England, grew up in Wales, went to uni in London. He says that he likes the country but after a while it gets “claustrophobic”.

Around 1:00, my roommate Dan arrived and shortly after a group of us (Dan, Andy, Tom, Greg, and myself) headed to a nearby pub for drinks/food. I abstained from drinking but did order a chip butty, or what we would call a “French fry sandwich” in America. It was relatively filling and at 3.75 pounds one of the cheaper items on the menu. After a good long chat session at the pub, we headed to the Waitrose grocery store that’s just around the corner and down the street. They bought food while I just opted to check out what situation was. As in America, store brand is the way to go. Waitrose brand cereals and vegetables looked very reasonable indeed. Meat, as could be expected was rather pricey. Then we headed back to hall.

We went through the standard “dorm rules” meeting with the Resident Director, Mieke. Afterwards, a return to the pub was made, but I sat it out in favor of sleep. So far, the rest of the night has passed uneventfully except for a fire alarm. The odd things about fire alarms in this building are that they are rather common, that steam can set the alarms off, and that the Chelsea Fire Brigade is legitimately no more than a 30 second walk from the hall. So they drive over 2-3 trucks with sirens on about 500 feet to investigate a false alarm. Brilliant. That’s it so far.

London Travel Pt. 2: Mind the Gap

2008-09-26T16:18:00.002-05:00

The flight itself was pretty much what I expected. I was a bit cramped in there because the guy in front of me was reclining and, well, even if he wasn’t it would have been a tight fit. I had to have my knees constantly at an angle so that they weren’t jammed into his seat. Instead, they were jammed awkwardly into the aisle. The in-flight entertainment system was pretty good. There was a robust choice of movies and music. I ended up watching Toy Story before settling in to listening to some of the music, jumping here and there as my whims dictated. While listening to the music, I caught maybe 30 minutes or so of sleep but it was really very uncomfortable for sleeping and I knew that I wouldn’t be able to sleep much. Finally, we were approaching London. Probably the moment it all started to seem real to me was when we could finally see the ground and you realize that, yes, that’s actually England you are looking at. When all was said and done, we were on the ground around 9:00, a full two hours late. On the plus side, customs was a breeze.

Having landed, I called Ali who I had hoped to meet up with upon touchdown. I figure that she would probably have left Heathrow already given that I was so delayed. I was correct. No matter, I knew my plan. I immediately went for a Heathrow Express ticket. The machine didn’t really want to play nice. Eventually, thanks to a helpful employee, we got the ticket. He was of the opinion that the ten pound notes were “too new” for the machines. Then, I boarded the train, making sure to get off at Heathrow Central (Terminals 1, 2, 3) to get on the Express. I did that successfully and then settled in to a nice Heathrow Express ride to Paddington.

Paddington is a very intimidating place. There are just throngs of people shopping, eating, waiting to by train tickets, boarding trains etc. I was momentarily a bit overwhelmed, but soon enough I saw the sign pointing the way to taxis and headed in that direction. The cab stand is very organized. They really do a great job of marshalling people to taxis and really move them out. I told the driver Manresa Road and he knew it. It was just a 9 pound cab ride from Paddington to the IES Hall. Overall, I think I chose the right travel option. All told, it only cost me 26.50 pounds from Heathrow to the residence hall. That’s including a pound tip to the driver. I could have saved an extra 10 pounds if I had taken the Heathrow Connect but it's only half as fast..

Gary the IES guy told us that, all things considered, the tube is easily the cheapest way to go, but hauling luggage around the tube sounds like a pain and this was very easy indeed.

A word about “Mind the Gap.” On the trains, there is a gap between the train and the platform. In America, we would say “watch your step”. Here the term is very definitively “mind the gap”. I find this very charming.

London Travel Pt. 1: Ryan vs. Northwest Airlines

2008-09-26T16:16:00.002-05:00

Even though it’s Thursday night it really feels like one whole long blur of a day since I left Erie. I’ll have to break things up a bit. Here goes.

I got up Wednesday morning and still had plenty of work to do. My suitcase was packed but I still had to find some of the things for and pack by bookbag. Also, I wanted to print the PDF readings that I’ll need for the course. Most of the packing went swimmingly after a small problem with finding my camera cable. Printing the PDFs, however proved more of a challenge. Loading PDFs on 56k is painfully slow, so it quickly became evident that printing ALL the PDFs would be nigh impossible. Then, my printer ran out of black ink and I had no replacement cartridge, which made me shift printing downstairs to my Dad’s computer. In the end, it was time to go and I had to get the bag fully packed and shut so I just stopped printing where I was. I’ll just have to print the rest out in London.

Then, we left for the airport, making a detour on the way to say goodbye to my Grandma. The Erie Airport, as per usual, was a breeze to get through. I had no trouble at all with security and ticketing. I said goodbye to the parents and shortly after was in the air en route to Detroit.

The flight was the most pleasant Erie-Detroit connection I’ve ever had. It left on time, arrived early, and I wasn’t crammed into too awkward of a position. I hit ground in Detroit and headed towards my gate, noting on the way the location of the currency exchange. On the way to my gate I noted a flight boarding to Amsterdam with a huge line of people waiting to board and it was nearly an hour prior to scheduled departure. I knew I would need to be at my gate at least 60 minutes before departure. Still having plenty of clearance, I went to the currency exchange for some pounds. The guy at the exchange was either ornery or unable to hear me because he fairly yelled at me when I forgot to specify whether I wanted to change $100 or to buy 100 pounds. We got that sorted, though, and I got my money. By the way, it turns out British banknotes are wider than US notes.

Now comes the fun part. I got to the gate with plenty of time and we boarded with nothing out of the ordinary. We were scheduled to depart at 6:10 PM. At 6:15, we are told there is a slight maintenance issue, nothing major, and that we’ll get going as soon as it’s sorted. At about 6:45, we get the message that, in fact, the problem will take a bit longer to fix. We’re now aiming for 8:00 as a departure time and we may have to switch planes. At this point we had already been waiting for upwards of an hour and were quite frustrated. Five minutes later or so, we get the message that yes, we will switch planes. We all had to deplane and then go from A66 to A28 where our new plane would be. We were still aiming for an 8:00 departure.

On the way to the new gate, I discover that my headphones have suddenly stop wanting to work properly. Thankfully, there’s a headphone store right by the new gate and I plunked down for new headphones before waiting to board. While waiting to board, I realized that my old boarding pass seemed to have disappeared, so I had to go to the counter to get a new boarding pass. Finally, we boarded and at around 8:05 we took off...

Packing

2008-09-23T16:23:00.003-05:00

for London is in progress. I'm working on trying to get everything into either one smallish suitcase or my backpack. Otherwise, I'll have to lug a large suitcase to and fro and I've heard that London Black Cabs are small. It's all very exciting, I know.

Actually, as I'm packing it's starting to actually feel real so I'm getting excited/nervous, but not too much of either.

Week 3 Quick Picks in Review

2008-09-23T10:20:00.002-05:00

See below for original predictions

Kansas City @ Atlanta -- Nailed it.

Oakland @ Buffalo -- In the end, Oakland's dysfunctional ways did catch up to them. They managed the game terribly at the end and were not able to put any pressure on Trent Edwards. However, I was surprised that it was Buffalo that was in the deep hole. Fortunately, they came out of it.

Tampa Bay @ Chicago -- I was right about it being a toss-up and Chicago SHOULD have won. I'm going to consider myself half right.

Carolina @ Minnesota -- I didn't see Minnesota's defense so completely dominating Carolina in the second half. Kudos, Vikings D.

Miami @ New England -- I can be forgiven for this one because nobody really expected Miami to pull it off. How was I supposed to know that Miami would throw in the Wildcat formation and Ronnie Brown would account for five TDs?

Cincinnati @ NY Giants -- Called it right but Palmer and the Bengals offense played surprisingly well. It was nice to see Cincinnati in the game until the very end.

Houston @ Tennessee -- Nailed it.

Arizona @ Washington -- I should have used my own rule here. Toss-ups go to the home team. I knew this would be close and indeed it was. Jason Campbell is looking right now.

New Orleans @ Denver -- Nailed it.

Detroit @ San Francisco -- Nailed it.

St. Louis @ Seattle -- Nailed it, but Seattle had an easier go of it than I expected.

Cleveland @ Baltimore -- Joe Flacco wasn't particularly competent, but he didn't have to be. Baltimore just ran it down their throats, and Derek Anderson was much worse than Flacco.

Jacksonville @ Indianapolis -- Nailed it.

Pittsburgh @ Philadelphia -- Nailed it. Pittsburgh can't stand up to a good pass rush and it cost them dearly.

Dallas @ Green Bay -- I did not realize how good Dallas really is. They just dominated Green Bay. Clearly, they are the best team in the league at this point.

NY Jets @ San Diego -- Nailed it.

This is just a test

2008-09-21T10:14:00.001-05:00

Watch out! Bruno's coming to get you! I just wanted to practice throwing an image into a post so feast on this glorious image of legendary wrestling champion Bruno Sammartino at his manly best. Looks like he's practicing the deadly trapezius claw

Week 3 NFL Quick Picks

2008-09-20T20:29:00.002-05:00

Kansas City @ Atlanta -- Last week KC surrendered 300 rushing yards to the Raiders who have almost no passing game. Atlanta fits the same profile and they are at home. Michael Turner has a big day here.

Oakland @ Buffalo -- Oakland is dysfunctional to say the least. Buffalo won't give up 300 rushing yards and will make Jamarcus Russell win the game. He can't do it.

Tampa Bay @ Chicago -- This is basically a toss-up. When in doubt, the home team wins. Chicago takes it at Soldier Field.

Carolina @ Minnesota -- How bad is your offense when Gus Frerotte is the answer? Carolina is on a roll right now and is a very good road team. Also, Adrian Peterson is questionable for the Vikes.

Miami @ New England -- New England = perennial play-off team. Miami = 1-15 last year. Advantage: New England

Cincinnati @ NY Giants -- Remember when Carson Palmer used to be an elite QB? Those were the days. Now the Bengal offense is ailing and Justin Tuck and the Giants D is not the team to get healthy against.

Houston @ Tennessee -- Houston is not a particularly good road team and struggled against Pittsburgh's aggressive D. Tennessee should be able to keep them on their heels and pull out this win at home.

Arizona @ Washington -- This will be a close one, but Arizona seems to be feeling it right now and their defense will present Jason Campbell with a much stiffer challenge than New Orleans did.

New Orleans @ Denver -- Neither team can play pass D well, but Denver has home field advantage at Mile High and is very confident after their big win versus San Diego.

Detroit @ San Francisco -- San Francisco has looked competent. Detroit has not. I can't predict Detroit to win a road game until they show signs of life.

St. Louis @ Seattle -- Seattle is hurting at WR, but they will pound the rock with Julius Jones and impose their will on D. It won't be pretty, but they'll grab their first win here.

Cleveland @ Baltimore -- For reasons unknown, the NFL denied Erie's CBS affiliate's request to broadcast Pittsburgh @ Philadelphia and is making them show this game. Never mind that Cleveland has looked awful or that Erie is in PA, much like Pittsburgh and Philly. Cleveland will grind out a boring win thanks to Joe Flacco's inexperience.

Jacksonville @ Indianapolis -- I just have a feeling about this one. Jacksonville's O-line should improve and Indianapolis is not a run-stuffing team. Taylor and Jones drew will do enough to help Jacksonville outscore Indianapolis in a must-win situation.

Pittsburgh @ Philadelphia -- Philadelphia is battle-tested after Monday night in Dallas. Pittsburgh hasn't really been challenged yet. Eagles pull it out.

Dallas @ Green Bay -- Just because. And also because Rodgers will continue to prove that he's much better than Brett "God" Favre. And because Green Bay is at home.

NY Jets @ San Diego -- San Diego is PISSED at this point. They will have vengeance and NY will pay the price.

Scattered Thoughts: Music

2008-09-17T19:33:00.009-05:00

I heard "Little Bit" by Lykke Li on a Victoria's Secret commercial. I was happy enough to hear Lykke Li get some exposure, but I didn't see that one coming.
I'm pleased that the greater the breadth of music I listen to, the more tunes in commercials I recognize. For example, there is the Ford ad that uses LES Artistes by Santogold and a beer commercial that uses Creator by Santogold. Fun stuff.
Lykke Li's "Youth Novels" is great for going to sleep to. Not because it's boring but because it's just pleasingly mellow. It really helps me unwind.
Lately, I've settled into a rotation of Kylie, Robbie Williams, Robyn, and Morrissey (mostly when I'm sad). Those are pretty much the lynchpins of my iPod.
Lily Allen's new album drops in February. I can't wait. The demos we have so far (Who'd Have Known, Guess Who Batman, I Could Say, I Don't Know) are brilliant.
The Sugababes and Girls Aloud both have new tunes coming out for the Christmas rush. Color me excited. "About You Now" and "Call the Shots" are about as good as pop songs get, so I'm looking forward to both.
I have $15 in Best Buy reward certificates. I'm going to buy a CD most likely, but I'm not sure what. It's going to be a tough decision. Recommendations are welcome.

Can The Bills Make The Playoffs?

2008-09-17T19:33:00.006-05:00

Right now, the Buffalo Bills are 2-0 for the first time since 2003. In 2003, Buffalo finished the season 6-10. As a Bills fan, I know not to get overly optimistic. Two wins are nice, but in the long run they don't mean much of anything. The question is: are these two wins just flukes to begin another mediocre year or can Buffalo actually break their playoff drought of 8 (I think) years?

The Case For:

Buffalo's two wins are over teams that both made the playoffs last season, Seattle and Jacksonville. On paper, these were two of the toughest teams on Buffalo's schedule, which is one of the easiest in the league. Now, Buffalo gets in consecutive weeks Oakland at home and St. Louis on the road. Oakland may fire Head Coach Lane Kiffin any day now and St. Louis is the worst team in the league after two weeks. Buffalo should coast to 4-0. From there, a record of 6-6 in the last 12 should get the job done.

How realistic is that? Consider that even lowly Oakland stomped Kansas City, who the Bills will play later this season. Also on tap are games against San Francisco (mediocre at best), Miami 2x (rebuilding and struggling), and NY Jets 2x (a team Buffalo swept last season). Throw in wins against KC, SF, Miami, and a split against NY and you're looking at four more wins. Then then Buffalo would need to win 1-2 games more of off this roster of teams

Denver
San Diego
New England (without Brady) 2x
Arizona
Cleveland

Denver has no D. San Diego can't win close games. New England is without Brady. Arizona is well, Arizona. They may be better but they have a history of well, sucking. Cleveland has looked awful through two games.

Now for the football reasons for. Trent Edwards is playing very, very well. He's not throwing INTs. He's playing careful, efficient football, and through two games he's been better than any Bills QB since Bledsoe's first year in town. If he keeps playing like this, he'll take the pressure off Marshawn "Beast Mode" Lynch and Fred "Action" Jackson and give the Bills a chance to win each and every Sunday.

On defense, Marcus Stroud and Kawika Mitchell have strengthened the Bills front seven, which previously had been easy to rush upon. Both Seattle and Jacksonville found it difficult to run on Buffalo, which made them one-dimensional and forced many 3rd and longs.

The Case Against:
Buffalo doesn't have a history of winning in recent years and it may take time to learn how to win, especially with such a young team. It's easy to say what games they "should" win on paper, but can they focus hard for 17 weeks and not suffer lapses against inferior teams? Can they continue to make plays in the clutch? This remains to be seen.

Also, it remains to be seen whether Trent Edwards can maintain his strong play at QB. He's only a second year player and growing pains are to be expected. If he starts throwing picks or loses his accuracy, it's over for the Bills, plain and simple.

Furthermore, both of the offenses Buffalo has faced so far have experienced severe injury problems. Seattle was without top WRs Deion Branch, Bobby Engram, and Ben Obomanu and lost Nate Burelson during the game. Jacksonville was without C Brad Meester, G Vince Manuwai, and G Maurice Williams. Sure, it's easy to stop offenses that are in such a shambles but can the Bills new look front hold up against full strength squads.

VERDICT: Yes, the Bills can make the postseason, but in doesn't guarantee that they will. The bottom line is that this is a cohesive, motivated, and (for now at least) healthy team that is looking at a very easy schedule. If they maintain the current level of play (and Dick Jauron's Bills squads have tended actually to be slow-starters that get hot late), Buffalo can absolutely expect to see action beyond Week 17. For Bills die-hards like myself, that would be an exciting development indeed.

Getting Back In The Saddle

2008-09-17T19:33:00.002-05:00

So, there's been no posts all summer. Basically, I figured that no one was reading this and then I left it for dead. Now, I have new incentive to get back at it. I'll be studying abroad in London for ten weeks starting one week from today. Hopefully, I'll see plenty of cool stuff and take plenty of interesting pictures and that will make for some captivating updates. At any rate, I'll try to be regular with updates.

I've added a blogroll, as you may notice. I'll break down the membership

--Music blogs: Popjustice, Please Don't Stop The Music, Love Kylie, What Became of the Likely Broads, Let's Have Text

--Blogs from votefortheworst.com folks (if you don't know what vftw is and you're reading this, go there now): Idletard, Insaneinthesfv, Badass Knitting With Llamas, Villaintech, Adam's World

--Politics: FiveThirtyEight, which is absolutely indispensable for following the presidential race.

The good news is that I have plenty of thoughts, so hopefully I'll throw up some posts in the next few days. Or hours. Stay tuned.

Ting Tings Rip Off Ali Love (Both Are Quite Good)

2008-05-29T06:45:00.005-05:00

So the Ting Tings excellent "Shut Up and Let Me Go" has been all over US TV, making them the latest act that nobody in the US would pay any attention to until Apple gave them a commercial and Voila! made them cool. They join Feist, CSS, and Yael Naim in that club.

The always insightful Popjustice made an interesting point today about "Shut Up and Let Me Go." Namely, that the opening guitar bit seems to be exactly the same one that Ali Love used in his incredibly unappreciated "Late Night Session"

Ali Love, despite being a really fun artist, is probably best known for doing vocals on the Chemical Brothers' modest hit "Do It Again". That would be because his own songs don't even register as modest hits. Why? No other reasons than these most likely:

1. Gay people only have so much money to spend on records
2. Radio 1 only had Late Night Session on the C list. Radio 1 can pretty much make whatever songs successful they want.
3. NME and the indie cool brigade snobs didn't decide that Ali Love is uber cool and hip and indy.
4. Apple didn't put "Secret Sunday Lover" in a commercial with dancing silhouettes.

Despite all that, both Ali Love and the Ting Tings remain Quite Good (TM Popjustice) and worth your time. I encourage everyone to illegally download or, if you must, buy the Ting Tings' "We Started Nothing," which is on iTunes now and should be in stores soon. Or you could just hit up vampydoesntstopthemusic.blogspot.com or letshavetext.blogspot.com and download it. Your choice.

50 Gayest Songs Ever!

2008-05-28T04:04:00.002-05:00

Contrary to what Dan Juilfs might think, I am not gay. But I must say, gay people have tremendous music taste. To wit: this fabulous list of the 50 gayest songs ever, which I have blatantly stolen from vampyloveskylie.blogspot.com, which is pretty much the best blog ever. Take a look:

To help celebrate the 30th Anniversary of Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, last month Samesame.com.au asked readers to vote for what songs out of the vast catalogue of musical history they thought deserved to be called camp classics.

Here are the TOP 50 Gayest Songs:

50. Elton John and George Michael “Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me”
49. Dead or Alive “You Spin Me (Like A Record)”
48. Pet Shop Boys “New York City Boy”
47. Diana Ross “Chain Reaction”
46. Deborah Harry “I Want That Man”
45. Cher “Strong Enough”
44. RuPaul “Supermodel (You Better Work)”
43. KD Lang “Constant Craving”
42. Culture Club “Do You Really Want To Hurt Me”
41. Chaka Khan “I’m Every Woman”
40. Wham “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go”
39. Paul Lekakis “Boom Boom (Let’s Go Back To My Room)
38. Kym Mazelle “Young Hearts Run Free”
37. George Michael “Outside”
36. Donna Summer “I Feel Love”
35. Dannii Minogue “This Is It”
34. Belinda Carlisle “Summer Rain”
33. Peter Allen “I Go To Rio”
32. Sylvester “You Make Me Feel Mighty Real”
31. Heather Small “Proud”
30. CeCe Peniston “Finally”
29. Madonna “Express Yourself”
28. Cyndi Lauper “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun”
27. Charlene “I’ve Never Been To Me”
26. Tim Curry “Sweet Transvestite”
25. Barry Manilow “Copacabana”
24. Barbara Streisand and Donna Summer “No More Tears”
23. Whitney Houston “I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)”
22. Sister Sledge “We Are Family”
21. Queen “I Want To Break Free”
20. Dolly Parton “9 to 5”
19. Coming Out Crew “Free, Gay and Happy”
18. Village People “In the Navy”
17. Frankie Goes To Hollywood “Relax”
16. Village People “Macho Man”
15. Judy Garland “Over The Rainbow”
14. Bronski Beat “Smalltown Boy”
13. Diana Ross “I’m Coming Out”
12. Cher “Believe”
11. Gloria Gaynor “I Am What I Am”
10. Alicia Bridges “I Love The Nightlife”
9. Madonna “Vogue”
8. Olivia Netwon-John “Xanadu”
7. Kylie Minogue “Better The Devil You Know”
6. Pet Shop Boys “Go West”
5. Kylie Minogue “Your Disco Needs You”
4. The Weathergirls “It’s Raining Men”
3. Gloria Gaynor “I Will Survive”
2. Village People “YMCA”
1. ABBA “Dancing Queen”

As you can see, quite a bit of disco, three Minogue sister appearances, and a few George Michael tracks, which is what you'd expect.

OMG I MET ROBYN!

2008-05-08T00:14:00.001-05:00

That is all. Details to come. For now: http://youtube.com/watch?v=yLKvrH-4rwM

Unexpected Wisdom from Popjustice

2008-05-06T21:33:00.002-05:00

If there's one websiteI can't go a day without reading, it's Popjustice, the excellent blog on all musical things "pop," especially those tending towards electro and synth-heavy sounds. Basically, if they pimp it, I end up liking it. I know it sounds robotic, but I've almost giving up on trying to find new music on my own because Popjustice's recommendations are great almost 100% of the time.

But I go there to find new pop acts or read snarky comments about the world of music. Not to get statements of philosophical truth. But I ended up getting both today.

The news item was about the new Taio Cruz single "I Can Be," which basically carries these messages, as summed up by Popjustice:

"1. The prettiest things can come out of the coldest night
2. Even with broken wings sometimes you find your way to fly
3. It's time to be bigger, stronger, harder
4. Sometimes the pain is what we need for us to grow"

So pretty much it's standard inspirational stuff, and the song itself is quite good (TM). But get a load of Popjustice's commentary on the subject matter:

"Unfortunately the sad fact of the matter is that for every person who succeeds in turning their life around through positive thinking, there are ten people whose lives never really improve and whose lives may in fact be even more packed with disappointment and perceived failure thanks to nonstop daydreaming about how great things really could be. 'These things' are not sent 'to try us' - 'these things' are usually shit events in and of themselves. Sometimes life is just terrible and no amount of positive thinking will change that fact. Nothing changes. It's just day after day of struggling to keep your head above water until one day you die, the only tragedy being that you're not alive to feel relief that it is all finally over. Still, put your fist in the sky and sing along with Taio..."

Agree? Disagree? I know it's a pretty bleak perspective, but it really struck a cord with me, and I felt like sharing it.

Here's the youtube link for the "I Can Be" video. Check it out. It's worth your time. http://youtube.com/watch?v=Ar2pKa1fp98

Album Review: Kylie Minogue "X"

2008-04-11T20:00:00.003-05:00

I haven't done a blog post in a long time, but you know how things go. First there was Spring Break, and then there was the onset of Spring Quarter, which brought a crush of work. The bottom line is that I just haven't had the time to write any new material. I have plenty of ideas for posts, I just need the time to write them. Hopefully, I'll get that time and be able to churn out something at least once a week.

On to the business at hand. I was going to review Kate Nash's "Made of Bricks" but I have much more fun listening to Kylie, so I'm not going to spend my precious time reviewing Nash's album if I still have to review Kylie's.

Kylie, for the completely unaware (and if you are unaware, welcome out from under your rock), is an international pop superstar. Long before Britney Spears and Paula Abdul were covering up their complete lack of musical talent by passably warbling of elctro-pop tracks and long before Madonna tried to extend her career by turning to dance pop, Kylie originated the trend of women with little real musical talent selling shiploads of records to the general public thanks to incredible marketing.

Minogue originally achieved success on the Australian TV soap opera Neighbours. After a concert were she performed an impromptu version of Little Eva's "Loco-Motion," it was suggested that she record the song and release it as a single. So it was that Kylie's "Locomotion" became a worldwide hit. She soon allied with the songwriting team of Stock, Aitken, and Waterman and released "Kylie" which was led out by the debut single "I Should Be So Lucky". "I Should Be So Lucky" was a smash hit and Kylie was established as a bona fide pop star. After four albums, she left Stock, Aitken, and Waterman to join the Deconstruction label where she took on a more serious "indie" persona on "Kylie Minogue" and "Impossible Princess". The albums were met with mixed reviews and decreased sales, so Kylie joined Parlophone and went back to her bread and butter: dance pop. It worked. "Light Years" produced the hits "Spinning Around" and "Kids," a duet with fellow pop superstar Robbie Williams. That was followed by "Fever," which spawned the international hits "Can't Get You Out Of My Head," which received heavy US airplay, and "Love at First Sight". That was followed by the popular, but somewhat less successful release of "Body Language."

In 2005, Kylie was diagnosed with breast cancer, forcing her highly anticipated "Showgirl Homecoming" tour to be postponed and altered. "X" marks Kylie's first album after her battle with breast cancer and her highly publicized breakup with French actor and longtime boyfriend, Oliver Martinez.

What then are we to expect? A dramatic perspective shift or a classic Kylie return to form?

What we get is a essentially a paint-by-numbers Kylie album in the best way possible. As per her usual, Kylie is heavily leaning on her sex appeal, which at age 39 still remains possibly her best asset, in order to cover up her thin, mediocre voice. The album is full of an array of electro and disco sounds. Pitchfork will tell you that she doesn't settle on a style. They've obviously been listening to too much electropop. To anyone who doesn't spend all day listening to and comparing the relative merits of Daft Punk, Goldfrapp, and the Scissor Sisters, "X" is a collection of fairly similar numbers. All are relentlessly happy in lyrical content. Most are upbeat in terms of tempo and let Kylie simply vamp over all sorts of electronic bells and whistles. As she approaches 40 (cougar alert!), Kylie seems to have realized what works best and has settled into a groove of just doing upbeat pop, the critics be damned. What follows is a track by track review:

Note: Since all Kylie songs are more or less manufactured pop of a certain quality, I'm splitting hairs to come up with rankings. The rankings aren't empirical, but based on the standards that Kylie has set with her music. 10 denotes a classic Kylie song, i.e. "Better the Devil You Know" or "I Should Be So Lucky". 1 denotes a disappointing effort, ala "Chocolate".

1. "2 Hearts" -- The lead single everywhere except for the US, 2 Hearts has a nice, funky drum beat that really carries it into the chorus. But the chorus, replete with background "Woo!" sounds isn't anything special. Thus, the song never gets out of second gear. It's pleasant, but not brilliant.
Rating: 6

2. "Like A Drug" -- This song carries more of a hip hop attitude. Here the problem is reversed from "2 Hearts". The verses are very boring, but the chorus has a interesting, danceable rhythm. Kylie picks up the intensity a bit in the second verse, but the song is really all chorus and just doesn't stand out.
Rating: 4

3. "In My Arms" -- This starts promisingly, with a spoken word intro building into a strong emphatic start over Calvin Harris's distinct style of production. But the production quickly gets monotonous. It's just the same thing over and over throughout the whole song. The tone of the instruments changes a bit to make things downbeat and sensuous in the well-constructed chorus, but the verses don't help the song stick out and while passable it's destined to be forgettable.
Rating: 5

4. "Speakerphone" -- "Speakerphone" stars with a bit of harp then goes to something that sounds like a sitar before jumping into the body of the song, which features a HEAVY does of electronic sounds and what sounds like voice distortion. This song just moves and doesn't stop. It's definitely designed to fill floors. The lyrics are patently absurd. "Drop your socks and grab your mini boom box"? Really? But Kylie songs aren't meant to be listened to and that goes double for this one. You will dance to it. You will get it stuck in your head.
Rating: 6

5. "Sensitized" -- My musical vocabulary is not strong enough to properly describe how this song sounds, but it definitely has a unique feel. Most of all this song is just plain sexy. It's not as overtly sexual as say, "Nu-di-ty," but it's far sexier with Kylie hissing over lyrics like "Every touch/Whatever you do/Baby, you trip the switch/I turn on for you. Meanwhile the beat is a toe-tapper, so this one works on all levels. Good stuff here.
Rating: 8.5

6. "Heartbeat Rock" -- This is the other truly sexy song on the album. The lyrics tend to paint visual pictures of girls in "tight skirts" and "figure-hugging blue jeans" and the boys that look admiringly at that. The chorus is highly repetitive, but the sexy beat covers up some of the flaws here and ties it all together.
Rating: 6

7. "The One' -- This track just doesn't work for me. The beat has the sort of futuristic sound I tend to like, but the verses are snooze inducing and lyrically empty and the choruses aren't good enough to pull it together. This is usually a skip on the iPod for me.
Rating: 2

8. "No More Rain" -- Probably the song most resonant of Kylie's personal struggles, "No More Rain" has the most meaningful lyrics on the album. As Kylie speaks of passing up the bad things in live and taking "second- hand chances," this is a really a celebration of the beauty of the good things in life. The melody plays playfully along to make this a total feel good song.
Rating: 7

9. "All I See" -- The version of this song that features Mims, is the lead US single. The song is a bit of a fusion of pop and R&B. The llyrics are pretty standard lovey-dovey fare such as "My baby/Doesn't matter what's going or who's around us/All I see is you". The song is fine but it seems to be blatantly produced for a US audience, so I'm downgrading it because it doesn't feel like a proper Kylie song.
Rating: 5

10. "Stars" -- "Stars" features some futuristic music in the beginning as it slowly pulses to an emphatic chorus where Kylie sings "You'll never know what you'll find/Because stars don't shine in singular places". It's all about taking your opportunities because you never know what could happen. It's a triumphantly happy song that is just infectious. Great tune.
Rating: 7.5

11. "Wow" -- If any song shows the pure exuberance and sheer fun of Europop better than "Wow", I have not heard. The song is just a non-stop rump. The beat is funky and insistent and the chorus has a manic pace. It all builds up to the titular exclamation of the chorus and getting there is so much fun.
Rating:8.5

12. "Nu-di-ty" -- Here is a song where the intent, as the title indicates, is definitely to create a sexy feel, and it really fails, perhaps because it's so overt. Sometimes mystery is sexier and there is no mystery in these lyrics. Also, the production leaves quite a bit to be desired.
Rating: 2

13. "Cosmic" -- I LOVE this song, and it's the best on the album for me. It's a nice change from the general electro-disco tone of the album. The tone is dramatically slower and the arrangement is almost orchestral with the softer verses building into big, bold sounds in the choruses. It's a tremendous sing-along and assuredly the best song ever to feature the phrase "satiate my crave".
Rating: 9.5

14. "Magnetic Electric" -- Incidentally, "Magnetic Electric" was once the working name for this album before "X," for Kylie's tenth album, was decided on. There's not much to say about this one. The lyrics are typical Kylie sexy purring but they aren't particularly captivating. The production is typical thumping electro, but isn't particularly unique or fun. This song is good and should appeal to Kylie fans but it's utterly average.
Rating: 5

15. "All I See" ft. Mims -- See above. This isn't significantly different from the version without Mims. The only real difference is that Mims contributes a rap verse here. Same song. Same rating.
Rating: 5

Average Song Rating: 5.8

Album Rating (not an average): 7.9

Duffy Reigns Supreme (Again): Extremely Late UK Chart Update

2008-03-21T18:19:00.003-05:00

For the 5th consecutive week, Duffy has the top single in the United Kingdom with "Duffy" and for the second weekend in a row her album "Rockferry" holds the top placing on the album charts. What makes this week a special triumph is her competition for the top slot. The #2 single was "Better In Time/Footprints in the Sand," a double A-side for Leona Lewis and also the official Sport Relief single. Charity singles tend to do very well in the UK as evidenced by two different Comic Relief singles making the top spot. Both "Walk This Way" by the Sugababes and Girls Aloud and a comedy version of the Proclaimers' song "I'm Gonna Be" with television characters Bryan Potter and Andy Pipkin hit #1 in 2007. That combined with the massive promotional effort behind the single made "Better In Time" a formidable opponent, indeed, but Duffy managed the top slot again by the skin of her teeth.

On another note, following on the heels of her Oprah performance, "Bleeding Love" is the top single on the US iTunes chart, which tells us two things. First, never discount the power of Oprah. Leona Lewis is the real deal and may end up *gasp* actually cracking America. While Kelly Clarkson is a true international star, The X-Factor has yet to produce a major worldwide success, but Leona seems poised to change that and could well be the next Whitney. Personally, I find her bland and her music utterly sterile, but there is no denying her immense talent and she is at worst a pleasant bore.

The full Top 10 Singles look like this:
1. Mercy --Duffy
2. Better In Time/Footprints in the Sand --Leona Lewis
3. What's It Gonna Be --H two O ft. Platnum
4. Stop and Stare --OneRepublic
5. Rockstar --Nickelback
6. Fascination --Alphabeat
7. Low --Flo Rida ft. T-Pain
8. Come On Girl --Taio Cruz ft. Luciana
9. Something Good 08 --Utah Saints
10. Now You're Gone --Basshunter

Recommended: 1, 2, 6, 8, and 9

By the way, I just bought "Rockferry" and "Mercy" on iTunes. There are no excuses anymore. Jump on the Duffy bandwagon. There's still plenty of room.

The full album top ten looks like this:

1. Rockferry -- Duffy
2. Dreaming Out Loud -- OneRepublic
3. All The Right Reasons -- Nickelback
4. Spirit -- Leona Lewis
5. Back to Black (Deluxe Edition) -- Amy Winehouse
6. Seventh Tree -- Goldfrapp
7. Thriller 25 -- Michael Jackson
8. Classic Soul Hits -- The Temptations
9. This Is The Life -- Amy Macdonald
10. Version -- Mark Ronson

If Duffy is to make it 6 weeks at #1, she'll once again have to fend off some tough competition. In addition to Leona Lewis she'll have to take on:

"Nine in the Afternoon" -- Panic at the Disco (#13 this week, it got it's full physical release on Monday)
"Can't Speak French" -- Girls Aloud (#16 this week and was also physically released on Monday)
"Denial" -- Sugababes (#15 this week and another Monday shop release)
"American Boy" Estelle ft. Kanye West (Digitally released Monday, it's due for a full release on next Monday)

According to Popjustice, the mysterious midweek charts indicate that Duffy is looking good for another week at #1, but one would be foolish to count out chart juggernauts like the Sugababes and Girls Aloud. Should be interesting...

By the way, you can listen to the Chart Show live from 4 PM-7PM London Time (12 PM-3PM EDT until England springs forward at which point it will revert to the normal 11AM-2PM EDT) by going to bbc.co.uk/radio1 and clicking on "Listen Live" or you can always use the "Listen Again" tool to listen to last week's chart.

I Now Respect George W. Bush

2008-03-14T18:54:00.003-05:00

It's Friday night and I have some free time, so I thought I do some bullet point style thoughts from the top of my head.

I've been running a mock draft game on the Buffalo Bills message board. I now respect Bush and really anyone else in a leadership position. I'm always weighing things, trying to be fair to everyone but also trying to do what I think will work best and what is the best interest of the game and it's hard. No matter how hard you work or what you try, there are always people clamoring that you're not doing it right and giving you flak about it. Not fun.
Right now, I'm listening to the Mark Ronson and Lily Allen version of "Oh My God." It's such a brilliant tune and I still think it's the best one on "Version" over "Valerie".
I just got ROH's Undeniable in the mail yesterday and I'm going to pop it in as soon as I get done with this. I can't wait to see Nigel's title win.
I've also started to watch all the GHC Heavyweight Championship changes that I can find. Right now I'm on Ogawa vs. Takayama. I've never seen Ogawa but it should be fun. Takayama is one of my favorite heavyweights.
I don't quite have five songs that I want to go in depth on right now, but I will say that I really like Sam Sparro's "Black and Gold". Popjustice has been pimping him heavily, but I didn't care for the single at first. It's a grower though, and I've came around on it in a big way.
Also watch out for Robyn's terrific "Who's That Girl?" come April. Itunes may actually get this. They have the Rakamonie EP and a With Every Heartbeat EP, so there's an outside shot they could get this single.
Oddly, I really have no opinion on who the Bills should draft come April. I think WR is the biggest need but I'm not really sold on Devin Thomas, Limas Sweed, or Malcolm Kelly. The CB class is good this year, but again, there's no one I'm dead set on.
This is almost sacrilegious for a sports fan to say, but I have very little interest in the upcoming NCCA basketball tournament. It'll be fun to bandwagon on the Tar Heels for a few games, but I honestly couldn't care less about NCAA basketball.
Or NBA Basketball
Or NASCAR
Or Major League Baseball
Or the NHL
Some sports fan I am, eh?
I'm actually more excited about things like the Champions League and Six Nations Rugby (England vs. Ireland this weekend) because of Radio 1's sports reports hyping them.

That's enough for now.

He Screams Calling LONDON!

2008-03-13T15:14:00.003-05:00

That's right, I'm going to London! I just got my acceptance e-mail for the London Study Abroad Program. I'll be spending next fall quarter in London studying British literature and history. In related news, I am now profoundly poor as every cent I can possibly get my hands on will have to be set aside for London (darn exchange rate!), but I don't care. London! London! YES!!!!

Never Fear, Fed is Still a Superior Swiss

2008-03-10T20:54:00.002-05:00

This is supposed to be a quick post. It will almost assuredly not be. Oh well.

One of the major stories in tennis this year as been the surprising mortality of the normally god-like Roger Federer. The Swiss star, he of the 12 slams including 5 straight Wimbledons and 4 consecutive US Opens, struggled with relative unknown Janko Tipsarevic in an epic early round match at the Australian Open (that kept me up until 3:30 in the morning) before exiting in surprisingly meek fashion against eventual champion Novak Djokovic. Recently, he suffered a 1st round lost to Andy Murray. Now, Murray has beaten Federer before, but Murray hasn't exactly torn things up lately and Fed, well let's just say that Fed doesn't lose very many first round matches, or matches, period.

Federer is now perilously close to losing his #1 ranking to his eternal rival, Rafael Nadal. Why such an uncharacteristic lapse from the man who is well on his way to being the best tennis player ever? I had thought it was just burnout. He's tired of the tournament scene so he hasn't been playing much tennis. Consequently, he's rusty and needs to play his way back into form. The Aussie Open can be attributed to adjusting to the new court surface and Djokovic's strong play. It turns out that I had it all wrong.

Reports surfaced on ESPN.com recently that Federer suffered a bout with Mono during January. Um, yikes! Suddenly, his play at the Australian Open becomes altogether more explicable and his run becomes impressive rather than disappointing. Now that he's well, he's still rusty, hence the first round loss to Murray. I'm just relieved that it wasn't because Fed just wasn't good enough that he struggled down under. In a world where little makes sense from day to day there is one thing that you can still hang your hat on. Roger Federer is still awesome. Here's to getting lucky slam 13 on the red clay at Roland Garros and forever shaking the notion that he can't get it done at the French Open!

Now, some thoughts on the early goings on of NFL free agency presented in ever popular "winners and losers" format.

WINNERS

Miami Dolphins--Despite being initially puzzled by the release of Zach Thomas, I have to say that I'm very impressed with the way Bill Parcells has gone about rebuilding the Dolphins. The Phins began free agency with a flurry, landing WR Ernest Wilford, OG Justin Smiley, QB Josh McCown, and DT Randy Starks among others. All of these guys are under 30 and none of them broke the bank. Parcells rightly realized that this team has a long way to go and wisely eschewed pricey, highly hyped free agents, for cheap, young ones with upside.

Buffalo Bills--Yes, this is a homer choice. No, I don't care. The Bills desperately needed help on the defensive line and they got it in the shape of Marcus Stroud. The Bills had plenty of cap to fit him under and extra picks to deal for him. Will they get the Pro Bowl version of Stroud that was once the best DT in the league. Probably not, but if they get anything close it will be better than what the Bills played with last season. DT Spencer Johnson will compete for the starting spot at the 3 technique and OLB Kawika Mitchell will replace Keith Ellison at the "Will" LB spot and along with the return from injury of MLB Paul Posluszny should dramatically enhance the Bills' LB performance. Now, if the Bills would only sign Bryant Johnson, almost all their major offseason needs will be filled

WINNERS-ISH

Cleveland Browns--Just looking at the list of players, it's no doubt that they had an impressive offseason. WR Donte Stallworth, DT Shaun Rogers, DT Corey WIlliams, re-sign QB Derek Anderson, re-sign RB Jamal Lewis. That looks very good on paper. However, Corey Williams cost a 2nd round pick and Rogers cost a 3rd and CB Leigh Bodden. That's a pretty stiff price for two DTs who have never played in a 3-4 and of whom one is a noted loafer (Rogers). Combined with the Quinn trade, the Browns have no picks in the first 3 rounds of this years draft, which makes it highly unlikely that they will find a contributor for the draft. Most teams still have the draft to improve after the free agents are all picked over. The Browns are pretty much done. To justify the money and picks spent on these players they need to go probably 12-4. That's a hight burden for them. Those kind of big moves make sense if the team is close to a Super Bowl win, but the Browns, as I see it, are not close.

New York Jets--They've certainly spent a great deal of money, but let's look at how they spent it. OLB Calvin Pace is awful expensive for a guy who has never been a real dominator. Damien Woody is a solid offensive lineman, but he's on the wrong side of his career to give a big deal to. Kris Jenkins actually has been a dominator but that was a while ago and he's never played in a 3-4. He might turn out to be a terrific 3-4 NT, but the Jets paid a big time premium to find out. Alan Faneca, at least, is a All Pro level player with still a few good years left, but overall they spent too much for a team that is so far away from championship caliber.

LOSERS

Tampa Bay Buccaneers--GM Bruce Allen has done a solid job building a team and I totally respect the strategy of building through the draft...but they're $40 or so million under the cap and have to get up to the salary floor and yet have done next to nothing in free agency. I'm not saying they should go out and spend for the sake of spending, but the Buccaneers have been alarmingly inactive.

Oakland Raiders--Overpaying slightly for S Gibril Wilson is perhaps forgivable. He's a young defensive stud that would be a major asset to any secondary. But $7+ million per year for DT Tommy Kelly, who is coming off a major knee injury? $9+ million per year for WR Javon Walker who has never really played a full season of dominant football? Those are just laughably ridiculous deals.

Chicago Bears--First, the Bears resign Grossman. Then they let Bernard Berrian walk and release Mushin Muhammad. Who do they replace Muhammad and Berrian with? Perpetual underachiever Brandon Lloyd and a far past-prime Marty Booker. The Bears offense is now set to be worse than it was last year and that's saying something.

Duffy Does The Double! (UK Chart Report)

2008-03-09T14:47:00.004-05:00

For the fourth consecutive week, the fantastic Duffy reigns supreme over the UK singles chart. This week her newly released album, Rockferry, also shot to the top of the album charts on its first week of release. Big ups to Duffy and here's to making it five!

Here's the full top 10 singles:

1. Mercy--Duffy
2. What's It Gonna Be?--H two O ft. Platnum
3. Rockstar--Nickelback
4. Stop and Stare--OneRepublic
5. Come on Girl--Taio Cruz ft. Luciana
6. Now You're Gone--Basshunter
7. Fascination--Alphabeat
8. Us Against the World--Westlife
9. Low--Flo Rida ft. T-Pain
10. Don't Stop the Music--Rihanna

I particularly recommend numbers 1, 5, and 7.

And the top 10 albums:

1. Rockferry--Duffy
2. Back To Black (Deluxe Edition)--Amy Winehouse
3. All The Right Reasons--Nickelback
4. Dig Lazarus Dig--Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
5. Seventh Tree--Goldfrapp
6. Version--Mark Ronson
7. Thriller 25--Michael Jackson
8. Life In Cartoon Motion--Mika
9. 19--Adele
10. This Is The Life--Amy MacDonald

I own Version, Back to Black (regular edition), and Life in Cartoon Motion and they are all tremendous and all out in the US. I can't see how Adele's and Duffy's albums can be anything but brilliant and reviews have been almost all favorable for both. I don't think you can get either in the US just yet.

Nigel/Dragon & Barack/Hillary: Two Great Blood Feuds

2008-03-08T17:49:00.005-06:00

I'm back with a Saturday smattering of thoughts. Hopefully, this will show the variety of what I will try to include in the content here and that the blog won't be about only, or even primarily, music (Dan Juilfs take note)

I just got back from watching the first three Nigel McGuinness vs. Bryan "American Dragon" Danielson encounters. For those non-wrestling fans out there (most of you, probably). Dragon and Nigel are the top two wrestlers in Ring of Honor (ROH), which is the #3 pro wrestling promotion in the United States. I won't belabor this, but I'll just do one sentence on each match.

Weekend of Champions, Night Two--Starts a bit slow with some excellent holds and reversals, but ends brilliantly when Dragon hits a springboard dive that proves to be his undoing.

Generation Now--Similar to the first match except for here it's Nigel who looks poised to win before Dragon pulls out a clever, unexpected finish.

Unified--My favorite match ever. Just totally un-freaking-believable.

END WRESTLING

Ok, all you non-wrestling fans can come back. I promise.

So, Texas and Ohio had to go and mess up everything Tuesday by voting for Hillary and prolonging the nomination process. Now, I make no bones about being an Obama suppoter, but even from an objective point of view I think it's hard to see Hillary's triumph as a good thing for Democrats. Why?

Quite simply, Hillary has almost no chance of winning. As long as she keeps winning states she has a legitimate spot in the race, but the math just doesn't work. Barring a total collapse from Obama, there simply aren't enough delegates out there for Hillary to catch up. RealClearPolitics shows Obama up 123 total delegates and 155 pledged delegates. Hillary can certainly make up some ground, but even in a best case scenario she'll end up 80 or so pledged delegates behind. The superdelegates simply won't overturn that kind of a deficit and make her the nominee. Her only hope is that the Florida and Michigan delegates are seated according to the results of their January contests.

The American people, however, are not stupid. That would be widely, and I believe rightly, viewed as a blatant attempt to steal the election. Florida could plausibly be counted because Obama was at least on the ballot there, but for Michigan to have it's delegates seated, they'll have to hold another nominating contest, likely a caucus. Given that recent polling indicates Obama and Clinton are nearly even with Michigan voters and that Obama has dominated caucus all nomination season, it seems doubtful that Michigan can provide Clinton with a strong margin.

The media wants to say that Clinton is "back in the game" and "has momentum" but the evidence suggests that many of the upcoming states should be fertile ground for the Obama campaign. Indeed, just today Obama won a 19 point victory in Wyoming. He's also up in the polls in Mississippi and North Carolina. There is really no such thing as momentum in this campaign and never has been, except perhaps in Wisconsin. Each candidate has a solid voting bloc. Clinton needs to win everything from here on out and my large margins in order to win. It won't happen.

If there's one good thing that may come out of this prolonged struggle, it's that Clinton is eliminating one of the weaknesses that she criticized Obama for. Her campaign claims that she is vetted and that there is nothing new that the Republicans can slam her with that she hasn't heard before but that Obama will be fresh meat for the GOP attack machine. Well, at this point I think it's clear that he'll be pretty well vetted by the time Mark Penn and the rest of Clinton's attack dogs get done with him.

By the way, here's my take on the whole Rezko business. Obama wasn't the only one caught with his pants down, so to speak, when Rezko got indicted. I know for a fact that the University of Chicago had ties with Rezko. Does it mean that the University was doing something sketchy. No, they were dealing on good faith with a donor, as they always do. The same is true for Obama. There's no proof that he did anything but associate himself with someone less than reputable. Dealing with someone who turns out to be a crook does not make one a crook by association. My understanding of the Rezko hubbub is that Obama got a good deal on his house because Rezko bought some adjacent land from the sellers at full price. This isn't illegal in any way. It does raise some eyebrows because one has to wonder what Rezko expected in return for doing this favor, but in reality he probably just bought himself some extra attention from Obama. Sort of a "I'll do this for you, and you'll remember me when you're the President, okay?" deal. You have to be pretty naive to believe that Clinton or McCain don't have their favorites who they'll be taking care of if they win. You just don't win the Presidency because well, gee golly you're the best person in America, and you deserve it! It takes more than the work of one to get to the top and nobody does anything for free. How do you think Clinton and Obama are sweet-talking superdelegates (ahem, I mean "automatic delegates")? Certainly there not doing it by convincing them of the relative merit of their health plan. All of this is to say that Obama got unlucky that Rezko is crook but really this is all much ado about nothing.

P.S. I know there are a bunch of proofreading errors in there and probably some in the first postings, too, but I really can't be bothered to proofread them. I barely make an effort to proofread term papers let alone blog posts.

5 Songs I'm Digging Right Now and More...

2008-03-07T21:26:00.007-06:00

In an effort to give this blog some structure, I'm instituting a couple of regular features. First is "5 songs I'm digging right now." I love listening to music, especially Radio 1 and I love to chat with people about it. My hope is that maybe people will search out some of the songs I spotlight and that I can introduce folks to some cool music that they aren't familiar with. So, without further ado...

1. American Boy ft. Kanye West --Estelle

I'm pretty new to Estelle but as I understand it she is a 28 year old rapper/singer from London. Her first album came out in 2004 to critical acclaim and...widespread public apathy as it basically tanked. Estelle then went back to square one and got together with John Legend and some other American hitmakers and cooked up her sophomore album "Shine".

"American Boy" is the second single off the album but it might as well be the first, as lead single "Wait A Minute (Just a Touch)" received almost no promotion. "American Boy" is getting much more support including B List status on Radio 1, likely thanks to Kanye's presence on the track. The song itself is actually plagued by a little too much Kanye, but his somewhat weak rhymes aren't enough to take away from the track because Estelle is at her sexy, flirtatious best with lines like "Don't like his baggy jeans/But I'ma like what's underneath them.

2. That's How People Grow Up--Morrissey.
Morrissey is, of course, the lead singer of the long defunct band The Smiths, who defined an era in British rock and whose influence is clearly seen today in the styles of bands like Maximo Park and the Arctic Monkeys. His solo career has been a bit uneven without Smiths' guitarist Johnny Marr's music to match Morrissey's lyrics, but there have been moments of brilliance as evidenced by the recent UK release of a new Morrissey Greatest Hits collection.

This track is a new one included on the album and it more than fits in alongside his best solo efforts. This is more traditional than most Morrissey songs and features a normal verse-chorus structure, but Morrissey's lyrics are cutting as always and nobody, and I mean nobody, emotes like Morrissey. The lyric "I was driving my car/I crashed and broke my spine/So yes there are things worse in life/Then never being someone's sweety" is classic Morrissey.

3. Come on Girl ft. Luciana--Taio Cruz

Taio Cruz is a London based R&B singer and "Come on Girl" comes from his forthcoming debut album "Departure" Most of the "black music" (Radio 1's term, not mine) on the UK charts comes from America, but Come on Girl is homegrown and it shows in its dance influence. This an upbeat song that you just can't help but dance to. Just an amazingly fun record to listen to and Luciana adds some sexiness with her all-too-brief guest turn, vamping over a verse including the lyrics"You wannna take a bite/Come wet my appetite!". Yes, Ma'am!

4. Mercy -- Duffy

Duffy is a 23 year old Welsh soul singer who is part of the post Amy Winehouse resurgence of soul music in the UK. For those that don't like Amy, don't fear. Duffy actually isn't all that much like Amy. Whereas Amy's style is based in R&B and jazz sounds, Duffy seems to be channeling Aretha Franklin and Dusty Springfield. Moreover, she's not just some record company clone brought in to capitalize on the latest hot trend. She's a singer-songwriter with immense talent who is only getting a chance now to showcase her skills.

"Mercy" is the second single from the album "Rockferry" that was released in the UK last Monday. However, it's her first proper release since the lead single, also titled "Rockferry" was a limited release. It's been number 1 in the UK charts for the last 3 weeks and looks poised to run that streak to 4 on Sunday and with good reason. It has a funky, retro sound that perfectly matches Duffy's powerful voice. The song is actually a bit thin on content, but that's for the best as it allows Duffy to spend the majority of the song dancing over the choruses in all sorts of different interpretations, each one of them exquisite. Duffy is my favorite new artist of 2008 and despite the UK press's love affair with Adele (as evidenced by the special made-up BRIT they gave her) she seems poised to be the breakout UK music star of the year. Let's hope that she catches on as well stateside as Amy did.

5. Something Good 08 (Van She Radio Edit)--Utah Saints

Utah Saints are a UK DJ duo and "Something Good," which features a vocal sample from Kate Bush, was a #4 chart hit for them way back in 1992. Now, 16 years later, they are back with several remixes, a slightly altered song title, and a fresh dose of chart success. Already at #21 and still on its way up, Something Good 08 is a feel good dance song with manic energy. Try not to dance to it. I dare you. It makes you burst into a spontaneous running-man, as evidenced by its video.

The second new feature will be significantly shorter. Unapologetically stolen from Popjustice, the RT almighty will give a ranked list of 5 artist that I'm high on right now and one who has earned by burning hatred.

THE RT ALMIGHTY
1. Duffy
2. Alphabeat
3. Maximo Park
4. Estelle
5. Girls Aloud

666. T-Pain

Hey y'all, I've got a blog!

2008-03-07T20:30:00.003-06:00

That's right. I, Ryan Tryzbiak, aka ROHOrangutan, aka billsorangutan, aka kookyorangutan, aka "that kid that looks like Napoleon Dynamite" have a blog. Basically, periodically I get the urge to make posts about things that interest me like wrestling, music, sports, television, movies, and politics. I would make these posts on Facebook, but nobody wants to see "Ryan has just written a new note" on their newsfeed constantly. This way I can keep it to one location and if you're interested you can read and if not you won't be bothered.

I'm not delusional; I don't think this will draw high traffic but hopefully friends and family will check in here periodically for a little window into my brain.