FIFTY EIGHT RIDERS KICKED OUT:
* Astana Würh: Michele Scarponi (ITA), Marcos Antonio Serrano (ESP), David Etxebarria (ESP), Joseba Beloki (ESP), Angel Vicioso (ESP), Isidro Nozal (ESP), Unai Osa (ESP), Jaksche Joorg (ALE), Giampaolo Caruso (ITA)
* CSC: Ivan Basso (ITA)
* Caisse D'Epargne-Iles Baleares: Constantino Zaballa (ESP)
* Saunier Duval: Carlos Zarate (ESP)
* AG2R: Francisco Mancebo (ESP)
* T-Mobile: Jan Ullrich (ALL), Oscar Sevilla (ESP)
* Phonak: José Enrique Gutierrez (ESP), José Ignacio Gutierrez (ESP)
* Valencia: Vicente Ballester (ESP), David Bernabeu (ESP), David Rodriguez (ESP), José Adrian Bonilla (ESP), Juan Gomis Lopez (ESP), Eladio Jimenez Sanchez (ESP), David Latasa (ESP), Ruben Plaza (ESP), José Luis Martinez (ESP), Manuel Llorent (ESP), Antonio Olmo (ESP), David Munoz (ESP), Javier Cherro (ESP), Javier Pascual (ESP, ex-coureur et actuel technicien)
* Unibet.com: Carlos Garcia Quesada (ESP)
* Und: Roberto Heras (ESP/Dopingsperre), Angel Casero (ESP/Karriereende), Santiago Perez (ESP/Dopingsperre), Tyler Hamilton (USA/Dopingsperre), Igor Gonzalez Galdeano (ESP/Karriereende)
Friday, June 30, 2006
World Cup:
Germany-Argentina:
This should be loads of fun, and I think it can go either way. I think that this may well be one of the best games of the entire tournament, and I'm not making any predictions. Can't wait!
England-Portugal:
Go England. I really, really dislike Christiano Ronaldo, so here's hoping his side exits now.
*****
Decision:
I'm rooting for Italy, despite really disliking half of their squad. If Germany wins today, I'll pull for them, too, but I'm going to back the Azurri regardless. There's a reason for this -- they win it all, the U.S. is the only squad that can claim they didn't lose to the Italians.
Hey, it's a dumb reason, but it's just good enough.
This should be loads of fun, and I think it can go either way. I think that this may well be one of the best games of the entire tournament, and I'm not making any predictions. Can't wait!
England-Portugal:
Go England. I really, really dislike Christiano Ronaldo, so here's hoping his side exits now.
*****
Decision:
I'm rooting for Italy, despite really disliking half of their squad. If Germany wins today, I'll pull for them, too, but I'm going to back the Azurri regardless. There's a reason for this -- they win it all, the U.S. is the only squad that can claim they didn't lose to the Italians.
Hey, it's a dumb reason, but it's just good enough.
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
Laird
When Malachi was ten years old, he assumed control over the watermelon patch on the little hill on the south side of the house. No one told him that it was his responsibility; it was just one of those things he decided he needed to be in charge of, and so without a word to anyone, he went out and started tending the patch after Boileau made me plant the seeds. I spent all day planting those things, making my point and registering my displeasure at the way Boileau watched me do everything to the letter. I measured every single hole to a depth of exactly one inch, with not so much as a thirty-second inch variance in a single hole. I used the old green yardstick, the heavy one that was taken to our behinds when we were younger, so chipped and faded that it was green only in memory, and measured the placement of each hole. The seeds went in exactly three foot apart, not an inch more or less. When I was done, I went back and covered everything with ripped up garbage bags. It was a fairly easy matter to slit them along the seam and open them flat, and since I’d marked the first seed in each hole with a little stick, it was fairly easy to cover everything up first and then measure out the slits later. I did have to rip out some of the budding radishes, though, since Boileau was careless in how he had those placed in the plot, but he never said a word.
Laird continues behind the cut
Periodically I checked over my shoulder, and there they were, watching, one amused, the other infuriated. Neither of them said a word; they may as well have been decorative ornaments artistically if sarcastically placed on the slab of concrete that served as a back porch.
Once the plants sprouted, I went out with what few row covers we had and chose what I thought were the most promising plants and covered ‘em up. He watched me do it, then went after dinner and stacked the covers neatly at the south end of the plot, down by the fence. The next day, since I got out of school earlier than he did, I put them back when I got home, only to find them leaning against the fence, each cover leaned up against a picket slat. I didn’t have the patience or the desire to make the statement and set the covers back, so I let him alone, and he let them alone, and there they stayed for the rest of the summer, neither of us feeling the need to touch them and alter their significance, Boileau as always untroubled by the idea that something may need to be taken care of.
He never said nothing about Malachi weeding the garden badly, neither. He went after any and all plants with a single-minded ferocity that was laughable to look at. He knew what watermelon plants looked like and exactly which flowers to look for – I saw the gardening book in his room with those pages creased and dog-eared – and he pulled everything else that grew, be it grass, clover, or radish. It became a minor battle between Boileau and he, though neither of them spoke of it that I know of. It was a good year for Boileau’s crew, they were working lots and putting in loads of ot, so he kept right on buying watermelons and radishes just as fast as anyone could eat them. I knew he thought he was making a point, but I knew too that Malachi was ignoring it. It was a sufficiently silly display of unconcernedness that it would have been laughable but for the reaction it provoked from Malachi, who stormed around the table and the vegetable drawer and pointedly turned his face away from anything that had touched either of the offending crops. I started to understand why after a while, when I saw him watching the cucumber beetles nibble at the melon flowers, while he chewed on the slight stem of a radish that he’d interrupted a few moments before. His blue eye blazed, his green eye a bit dull by comparison.
If Boileau was surprised the next year to find that Malachi let the melons grow, tended to the radishes and planted cucumbers on top of it, he neither said nor let on. He thought that he had won, that Malachi had learned some invaluable lesson about the rewards of hard work and the ability to overcome any adversity, however petty, however nugatory. That he had done no such thing was as lost on Boileau as was Malachi’s actual intent.
Malachi would have been put out to hear himself referred to as a gardener, which is not how he viewed his role. I told Liz that once, about three years into his stewardship, and she laughed. She didn’t understand the problem, and I couldn’t make her understand it. How could I tell her that there was just something about the word “gardener” that Malachi felt somehow distorted what he was doing, what he meant? I tried anyway, telling her how Malachi thought that “gardener” was either vocation or avocation, but neither was right in his case. She tried turning that around on me both ways, pointing out that Boileau upped Malachi’s allowance a couple bucks a week during the spring and kept it there through the fall, which made Malachi sort of a gardener by vocation, and also that since Malachi put an awful lot of effort into that plot (even though calling it a “plot” is pretty generous), which meant he thought of it as an avocation. She was right, both ways, but she was only right in word, not in fact. Malachi had a very different idea of what he was doing with that piece of land.
The yellow jackets never bothered him, either. He got stung a good dozen times a summer, but he barely seemed to notice. He’d always just stand up and shrug a little, brush himself off, even though he somehow managed to tend that plot without ever getting more than his fingers dirty, and casually walk away. It was seldom that he got one sting at a time; it was usually two or three. Probably would have been one more often had he reacted like a normal person would have, but he never seemed particularly put out by it. You could see something odd in the way he’d look at a jacket stinging him for the second time, hanging on to his ankle or whatever, tensing and stinging once, twice, three times in succession. I saw it once, when I provoked the jackets by running the lawnmower over the hole in the ground just above the plot that housed their nest. I ran the mower over the hole, let loose of the self-propel bar, and ran toward the porch, in the direction I’d run the mower. Once I was twenty or so feet away, I turned to see what was happening, and was surprised that the cloud mostly focused on the lawnmower, crowding the wheels and the engine, trying to figure out how to attack the beast that had disturbed them so. Only a couple had gone after Malachi, but this time he walked away from the plot, down toward the fence. He leaned back against the slat, grabbed at the back of his shirt collar with that casual intensity of his, and somehow pulled the shirt off all balled up in his right fist. He shook the shirt hard over the fence, toward the river, and I could see two jackets fly away. He walked sort of sidelong along the fence toward the porch, and when he got closer I could see the two welts swelling, like eyeballs on the base of his neck.
He didn’t say anything as he walked into the house, and he didn’t really look at me, either. I watched the bugs swarm around the mower for a few minutes more, then they gave up and went back down the hole. A couple of jackets buzzed in and out, maybe keeping watch on things above the nest, and I tried to weed the end of the plot Malachi had been working on. One buzzed around me a bunch, but never landed, and I didn’t take a sting, but I was thinking why I didn’t
About this time Boileau started talking about making improvements to the shed. The roof was in better shape then, but it was still pretty beat out, and the doors on the far side, opening to the fence adjoining Isaiah’s land, those were pretty dilapidated. Malachi and I used to drill the soccer ball against the south wall to practice our shooting before the rec league games, and that wall needed more than a new coat of paint could give it. Kicking off that wall was a dicey proposition, because the wrong angle could send the ball over either fence, either into the marsh or into Isaiah’s back corner, where he dropped his grass clippings and other detritus from yard work. Prime snake habitat either way, and even though I never saw one over there, Isaiah has killed a couple of moccasins. One of ‘em was almost as tall as he is. It was the talk of the neighborhood for a solid few days, how Isaiah got him a six-footer. Not often you see a moccasin in excess of five feet, and I’d never heard of one hitting six before. I wouldn’t have believed it except I saw Isaiah hold the beheaded body up by the tail, and danged if it didn’t almost stretch the length of him, and he at better than six-three.
Malachi never showed any fear of snakes, and he was always the one to go after the ball, regardless of who put it over. The high water He found oil that day, at least I thought he did. He stomped too hard into the mud under the water and a black trickle oozed out and diffused, but it diffused upward, which I took to be a sign that it was oil, since it was trying to ride the puddle. He just lobbed the ball back over the fence and ducked through the “secret passage” I’d stopped using when I stepped onto the nail. I was too big to fit through that hole by then anyway, but Malachi could still pop out that slat and shimmy through. That puncture in my foot got me a week or so of mom pouring peroxide into the hole, not to mention a nice tetanus shot.
The moistly moldering pile of grass clippings I’ve made at the end of the yard is my favorite place to go and look around. There’s something comforting about the damp, earthy scent of the grass, even though the wrong breeze will bring over a fetid, sweet stench that’s transfixing as long as it isn’t overpowering. It’s mostly wet, though, not fetid, and it’s comfortable. It’s a place that in August feels warm underfoot. I love stalking through the grass, sinking in up to my knees, feeling the warmth envelop my calf. Malachi likes it here, too, but he tends toward the absolute corner, where the wood pile used to be before Boileau swore off the fireplace forever. The cinder blocks that supported the two-by-twelves are still there, but Malachi has upturned them at some point and then reset the two-bys. The two-bys are sagging in the middle, giving in to that arc that old, waterlogged wood gets. Shaded by a young oak, it’s the one part of the yard that Boileau doesn’t even look at. It’s warm and comfortable, and it’s a connection. We feel different connections from this corner, Malachi and I, and I is going to pretend to understand his. I’m not sure I understand mine, either, I just know that it is.
Laird continues behind the cut
Periodically I checked over my shoulder, and there they were, watching, one amused, the other infuriated. Neither of them said a word; they may as well have been decorative ornaments artistically if sarcastically placed on the slab of concrete that served as a back porch.
Once the plants sprouted, I went out with what few row covers we had and chose what I thought were the most promising plants and covered ‘em up. He watched me do it, then went after dinner and stacked the covers neatly at the south end of the plot, down by the fence. The next day, since I got out of school earlier than he did, I put them back when I got home, only to find them leaning against the fence, each cover leaned up against a picket slat. I didn’t have the patience or the desire to make the statement and set the covers back, so I let him alone, and he let them alone, and there they stayed for the rest of the summer, neither of us feeling the need to touch them and alter their significance, Boileau as always untroubled by the idea that something may need to be taken care of.
He never said nothing about Malachi weeding the garden badly, neither. He went after any and all plants with a single-minded ferocity that was laughable to look at. He knew what watermelon plants looked like and exactly which flowers to look for – I saw the gardening book in his room with those pages creased and dog-eared – and he pulled everything else that grew, be it grass, clover, or radish. It became a minor battle between Boileau and he, though neither of them spoke of it that I know of. It was a good year for Boileau’s crew, they were working lots and putting in loads of ot, so he kept right on buying watermelons and radishes just as fast as anyone could eat them. I knew he thought he was making a point, but I knew too that Malachi was ignoring it. It was a sufficiently silly display of unconcernedness that it would have been laughable but for the reaction it provoked from Malachi, who stormed around the table and the vegetable drawer and pointedly turned his face away from anything that had touched either of the offending crops. I started to understand why after a while, when I saw him watching the cucumber beetles nibble at the melon flowers, while he chewed on the slight stem of a radish that he’d interrupted a few moments before. His blue eye blazed, his green eye a bit dull by comparison.
If Boileau was surprised the next year to find that Malachi let the melons grow, tended to the radishes and planted cucumbers on top of it, he neither said nor let on. He thought that he had won, that Malachi had learned some invaluable lesson about the rewards of hard work and the ability to overcome any adversity, however petty, however nugatory. That he had done no such thing was as lost on Boileau as was Malachi’s actual intent.
Malachi would have been put out to hear himself referred to as a gardener, which is not how he viewed his role. I told Liz that once, about three years into his stewardship, and she laughed. She didn’t understand the problem, and I couldn’t make her understand it. How could I tell her that there was just something about the word “gardener” that Malachi felt somehow distorted what he was doing, what he meant? I tried anyway, telling her how Malachi thought that “gardener” was either vocation or avocation, but neither was right in his case. She tried turning that around on me both ways, pointing out that Boileau upped Malachi’s allowance a couple bucks a week during the spring and kept it there through the fall, which made Malachi sort of a gardener by vocation, and also that since Malachi put an awful lot of effort into that plot (even though calling it a “plot” is pretty generous), which meant he thought of it as an avocation. She was right, both ways, but she was only right in word, not in fact. Malachi had a very different idea of what he was doing with that piece of land.
The yellow jackets never bothered him, either. He got stung a good dozen times a summer, but he barely seemed to notice. He’d always just stand up and shrug a little, brush himself off, even though he somehow managed to tend that plot without ever getting more than his fingers dirty, and casually walk away. It was seldom that he got one sting at a time; it was usually two or three. Probably would have been one more often had he reacted like a normal person would have, but he never seemed particularly put out by it. You could see something odd in the way he’d look at a jacket stinging him for the second time, hanging on to his ankle or whatever, tensing and stinging once, twice, three times in succession. I saw it once, when I provoked the jackets by running the lawnmower over the hole in the ground just above the plot that housed their nest. I ran the mower over the hole, let loose of the self-propel bar, and ran toward the porch, in the direction I’d run the mower. Once I was twenty or so feet away, I turned to see what was happening, and was surprised that the cloud mostly focused on the lawnmower, crowding the wheels and the engine, trying to figure out how to attack the beast that had disturbed them so. Only a couple had gone after Malachi, but this time he walked away from the plot, down toward the fence. He leaned back against the slat, grabbed at the back of his shirt collar with that casual intensity of his, and somehow pulled the shirt off all balled up in his right fist. He shook the shirt hard over the fence, toward the river, and I could see two jackets fly away. He walked sort of sidelong along the fence toward the porch, and when he got closer I could see the two welts swelling, like eyeballs on the base of his neck.
He didn’t say anything as he walked into the house, and he didn’t really look at me, either. I watched the bugs swarm around the mower for a few minutes more, then they gave up and went back down the hole. A couple of jackets buzzed in and out, maybe keeping watch on things above the nest, and I tried to weed the end of the plot Malachi had been working on. One buzzed around me a bunch, but never landed, and I didn’t take a sting, but I was thinking why I didn’t
About this time Boileau started talking about making improvements to the shed. The roof was in better shape then, but it was still pretty beat out, and the doors on the far side, opening to the fence adjoining Isaiah’s land, those were pretty dilapidated. Malachi and I used to drill the soccer ball against the south wall to practice our shooting before the rec league games, and that wall needed more than a new coat of paint could give it. Kicking off that wall was a dicey proposition, because the wrong angle could send the ball over either fence, either into the marsh or into Isaiah’s back corner, where he dropped his grass clippings and other detritus from yard work. Prime snake habitat either way, and even though I never saw one over there, Isaiah has killed a couple of moccasins. One of ‘em was almost as tall as he is. It was the talk of the neighborhood for a solid few days, how Isaiah got him a six-footer. Not often you see a moccasin in excess of five feet, and I’d never heard of one hitting six before. I wouldn’t have believed it except I saw Isaiah hold the beheaded body up by the tail, and danged if it didn’t almost stretch the length of him, and he at better than six-three.
Malachi never showed any fear of snakes, and he was always the one to go after the ball, regardless of who put it over. The high water He found oil that day, at least I thought he did. He stomped too hard into the mud under the water and a black trickle oozed out and diffused, but it diffused upward, which I took to be a sign that it was oil, since it was trying to ride the puddle. He just lobbed the ball back over the fence and ducked through the “secret passage” I’d stopped using when I stepped onto the nail. I was too big to fit through that hole by then anyway, but Malachi could still pop out that slat and shimmy through. That puncture in my foot got me a week or so of mom pouring peroxide into the hole, not to mention a nice tetanus shot.
The moistly moldering pile of grass clippings I’ve made at the end of the yard is my favorite place to go and look around. There’s something comforting about the damp, earthy scent of the grass, even though the wrong breeze will bring over a fetid, sweet stench that’s transfixing as long as it isn’t overpowering. It’s mostly wet, though, not fetid, and it’s comfortable. It’s a place that in August feels warm underfoot. I love stalking through the grass, sinking in up to my knees, feeling the warmth envelop my calf. Malachi likes it here, too, but he tends toward the absolute corner, where the wood pile used to be before Boileau swore off the fireplace forever. The cinder blocks that supported the two-by-twelves are still there, but Malachi has upturned them at some point and then reset the two-bys. The two-bys are sagging in the middle, giving in to that arc that old, waterlogged wood gets. Shaded by a young oak, it’s the one part of the yard that Boileau doesn’t even look at. It’s warm and comfortable, and it’s a connection. We feel different connections from this corner, Malachi and I, and I is going to pretend to understand his. I’m not sure I understand mine, either, I just know that it is.
Monday, June 26, 2006
Quick World Cup notes:
1. I'm all for Bruce Arena leaving the U.S. team, since it's probably time, but if Donovan gets the captaincy, I'm going to be very upset. He's a little punk who does not deserve it. Give it to Gooch.
2. The Mexico-Argentina game was breathtaking. Phenomenal match. It's also funny how arrogant the German fans are: after all, it was just Mexico, you know, a North American team, and if Argentina had problems with them, well, Germany will kill them. This double-speak on their part (after all, the South Americans are the best on any other day) is frightfully irritating, and I think it's very premature. Then again, I'm losing a majority of my picks, so I'll shut my trap for now and just hope for a great game (which I think it will be).
3. The Portugal-Holland slugfest was ugly.
4. Australia . . . you poor bastards. The Socceroos were fun to watch, but those wackos picking the Azurri aren't yet wrong.
2. The Mexico-Argentina game was breathtaking. Phenomenal match. It's also funny how arrogant the German fans are: after all, it was just Mexico, you know, a North American team, and if Argentina had problems with them, well, Germany will kill them. This double-speak on their part (after all, the South Americans are the best on any other day) is frightfully irritating, and I think it's very premature. Then again, I'm losing a majority of my picks, so I'll shut my trap for now and just hope for a great game (which I think it will be).
3. The Portugal-Holland slugfest was ugly.
4. Australia . . . you poor bastards. The Socceroos were fun to watch, but those wackos picking the Azurri aren't yet wrong.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Hell has frozen over:
First, let's get the mature part out of the way: Ghana has a hell of a team, and they played a hell of a game. They're tough, they're fast, and they have a killer instinct -- they're all ready to take shots when they can, and they launch from all angles. I give them respect for their ability.
I do not give them respect for their game. For the first time in I don't even know how long, I'm 100% pro-Brazil. I hope that they beat them badly. Usually, I root for the team that whups mine (had me rooting for the Bills in Super Bowl XXV when ordinarily I'd have been pro-Giants, for example) -- unless the team that whups mine plays a cheap game. Ghana played a cheap 2nd half. They spent a lot of time on the ground, feigning injury, killing clock, and sitting on a 2-1 lead. True, the U.S. was unable to equalize and put the pressure back on Ghana to open it up and stop sitting (despite easily the best fifteen-minute stretch the U.S. squad played in these three matches), but I can't respect out-and-out cheap play, and dropping when you're not even near the ball is cheap. Period.
Also, in 2010, the U.S. team could as well leave Landon Donovan at home. He had *ZERO* impact in any of the three games, and wouldn't even take a shot at a gloriously open net before him today. I'm disusted with how he played. Beazeley gets forgiven for his terrible play for the brilliant set up he gave Dempsey for the U.S.'s only offensive goal, but I probably wouldn't miss him much, either.
Maybe I'll root for the host nation now.
I do not give them respect for their game. For the first time in I don't even know how long, I'm 100% pro-Brazil. I hope that they beat them badly. Usually, I root for the team that whups mine (had me rooting for the Bills in Super Bowl XXV when ordinarily I'd have been pro-Giants, for example) -- unless the team that whups mine plays a cheap game. Ghana played a cheap 2nd half. They spent a lot of time on the ground, feigning injury, killing clock, and sitting on a 2-1 lead. True, the U.S. was unable to equalize and put the pressure back on Ghana to open it up and stop sitting (despite easily the best fifteen-minute stretch the U.S. squad played in these three matches), but I can't respect out-and-out cheap play, and dropping when you're not even near the ball is cheap. Period.
Also, in 2010, the U.S. team could as well leave Landon Donovan at home. He had *ZERO* impact in any of the three games, and wouldn't even take a shot at a gloriously open net before him today. I'm disusted with how he played. Beazeley gets forgiven for his terrible play for the brilliant set up he gave Dempsey for the U.S.'s only offensive goal, but I probably wouldn't miss him much, either.
Maybe I'll root for the host nation now.
Monday, June 19, 2006
World Cup Wishlist: Monday and Tuesday
Monday:
None of these games have any attraction for me whatsoever, but I'm rooting for Togo over Switzerland to see if an African team can advance. Togo 1-0. It's a pretty weak group, so they may get lucky. Other than that -- whatever.
Tuesday:
The Group A matches are tough calls for me. Costa Rica v. Poland is pointless, but I'm rooting for the (inferior) hemispheric team. Poland wins 2-0.
Germany-Ecuador: I don't necessarily want the Germans to play England in the first elimination game. On the other hand, I love Ecuador's defenders. I guess I'm pro-Germany in fact, but I'm pro-Ecuador at heart. 1-0 Germany.
The Group B matches are the big ones for me this day. I'm rooting for all of the teams that have worked their butts off to this point (and the U.S., too), and Trinidad is definitely in that number. If they and England both win by a combined margin of 4, Trinidad advances out of this group. I want a pair of 2-0 showings, but I have a feeling that Trinidad will have a tough time scoring two. England 2-0, Trinidad will draw Paraguay 1-1 (but here's hoping!).
I'll drop my other wishlists later.
None of these games have any attraction for me whatsoever, but I'm rooting for Togo over Switzerland to see if an African team can advance. Togo 1-0. It's a pretty weak group, so they may get lucky. Other than that -- whatever.
Tuesday:
The Group A matches are tough calls for me. Costa Rica v. Poland is pointless, but I'm rooting for the (inferior) hemispheric team. Poland wins 2-0.
Germany-Ecuador: I don't necessarily want the Germans to play England in the first elimination game. On the other hand, I love Ecuador's defenders. I guess I'm pro-Germany in fact, but I'm pro-Ecuador at heart. 1-0 Germany.
The Group B matches are the big ones for me this day. I'm rooting for all of the teams that have worked their butts off to this point (and the U.S., too), and Trinidad is definitely in that number. If they and England both win by a combined margin of 4, Trinidad advances out of this group. I want a pair of 2-0 showings, but I have a feeling that Trinidad will have a tough time scoring two. England 2-0, Trinidad will draw Paraguay 1-1 (but here's hoping!).
I'll drop my other wishlists later.
Upon further reflection:
The U.S. controls its own World Cup destiny.
I know everyone is saying that they need to root for Italy, or for a Czech rout, and need to win themselves, but only the last of these statements is true. The U.S. actually holds the key to its own advancement, however flimsy and brittle a key it may be.
The U.S. needs to win by 5. It's that simple (used with all intentional irony). They beat Ghana 5-0, 6-1, whatever -- as long as the margin is +5, they're in the second round regardless of the outcome of the Italy-Czech Republic game.
I don't think this very likely, but hey, it's possible.
I know everyone is saying that they need to root for Italy, or for a Czech rout, and need to win themselves, but only the last of these statements is true. The U.S. actually holds the key to its own advancement, however flimsy and brittle a key it may be.
The U.S. needs to win by 5. It's that simple (used with all intentional irony). They beat Ghana 5-0, 6-1, whatever -- as long as the margin is +5, they're in the second round regardless of the outcome of the Italy-Czech Republic game.
I don't think this very likely, but hey, it's possible.
Sunday, June 18, 2006
Hey, you don't say:
France scored in a World Cup match for the first time since their 98 Championship game against Brazil. That's not enough for the highlight of the day thus far, which goes to Yoshikatsu Kawaguchi for his save against Darijo Srna's 11m.
All in all, pretty far from the best of days. Brazil once again yawned its way to a victory against an inferior team that outworked them by far (#Q$%^Q#W$ Brazil!), the Japan-Croatia match, apart from the efforts of Kawaguchi and some other individual performances, was lackluster, and the France-Korea game is terrible to this point. Here's hoping tomorrow's matches will pick things up a bit.
All in all, pretty far from the best of days. Brazil once again yawned its way to a victory against an inferior team that outworked them by far (#Q$%^Q#W$ Brazil!), the Japan-Croatia match, apart from the efforts of Kawaguchi and some other individual performances, was lackluster, and the France-Korea game is terrible to this point. Here's hoping tomorrow's matches will pick things up a bit.
More thoughts from yesterday's game:
I keep seeing people I know saying that they're disappointed by the game Italy played. Were these people pure soccer fans, it'd be one thing, but they're casual fans. Here's my thinking: as little as I'm into the whole patriotism for the sake of patriotism thing, any American motivated enough to pay attention to the World Cup should at least pull for the U.S. The more interest, the better the quality game we'll get stateside.
I can't say I was disappointed by Italy, a team I used to root for until it was taken over by the thugs, the above notwithstanding, because I was really impressed by the way the U.S. played -- for the most part. Someone, or, more precisely, several someones are still too coward to rip a shot now and then (Donovan, glaring at you!), which they're going to have to start doing. And where, exactly, was Eddie Johnson? Still, they played hard and strong against a superior team, and it was one of the gutsier, more impressive performances I've ever seen from the U.S. team. In fact, the only better game I think I've seen them play at this level was the quarterfinal that they inexplicably lost against Germany in '02. Incredible game, and if there's a person in that locker room that doesn't believe they can beat Ghana and make it to the eighth final, leave 'em at home next time.
I did love Totti coming off early, though. The card he got was probably a reputation card more than anything, since it wasn't THAT hard a foul, but hey, he's Totti -- he's on the wrong side of calls by now. Taking him off was necessary for Lippi to preserve most of his lineup against the Czechs, in a game the Italians must at least tie to realistically advance. The Mastroeni card was a joke, period. Terrible, terrible call, and I wonder if that ref -- who was held out of the '02 WC by FIFA for his consistently inconsistent and sub-par performances -- will ref another game this tournament. Having witnessed what a bad ref can do to a game last night, I sincerely hope not.
Can't wait until Thursday, when I have to switch allegiances and root for Italy. Off to watch Croatia v. Japan now.
I can't say I was disappointed by Italy, a team I used to root for until it was taken over by the thugs, the above notwithstanding, because I was really impressed by the way the U.S. played -- for the most part. Someone, or, more precisely, several someones are still too coward to rip a shot now and then (Donovan, glaring at you!), which they're going to have to start doing. And where, exactly, was Eddie Johnson? Still, they played hard and strong against a superior team, and it was one of the gutsier, more impressive performances I've ever seen from the U.S. team. In fact, the only better game I think I've seen them play at this level was the quarterfinal that they inexplicably lost against Germany in '02. Incredible game, and if there's a person in that locker room that doesn't believe they can beat Ghana and make it to the eighth final, leave 'em at home next time.
I did love Totti coming off early, though. The card he got was probably a reputation card more than anything, since it wasn't THAT hard a foul, but hey, he's Totti -- he's on the wrong side of calls by now. Taking him off was necessary for Lippi to preserve most of his lineup against the Czechs, in a game the Italians must at least tie to realistically advance. The Mastroeni card was a joke, period. Terrible, terrible call, and I wonder if that ref -- who was held out of the '02 WC by FIFA for his consistently inconsistent and sub-par performances -- will ref another game this tournament. Having witnessed what a bad ref can do to a game last night, I sincerely hope not.
Can't wait until Thursday, when I have to switch allegiances and root for Italy. Off to watch Croatia v. Japan now.
Saturday, June 17, 2006
World Cup ramblings:
I have a couple of rules for watching the World Cup:
1. I almost always root for the hemisphere teams, with two exceptions: Brazil and Argentina, whom I almost always root against. (See also: France.) In this light, I'm a raging Trinidad & Tobago fan right now, especially as well as they've played thus far.
2. I love the underdogs -- not surprising. Rooting for the African teams is always fun, because they're always underdogs, and they tend to play a really attractive game.
3. I always root for the Scandinavians. Except for Sweden -- I just don't care about Sweden for some reason as far as FIFA is concerned. Norway and Denmark, though, I'm all for.
4. Even if I think that your team has a great shot of winning the whole bag (Holland), if you play dirty or act like a team full of Vlades, I will root against you. Looking at you, Holland. Italy, if it weren't for your next match . . .
5. Everything else is conditional, based on who is playing whom.
It's been a blast of a week, and I'll pop up some more thorough notes later, but for right now, some general thoughts:
- The U.S.-Italy match was the worst officiated match of the tournament I've seen thus far. It was horrible, all across the board.
- Speaking of same, 1 point probably isn't enough for the Americans, but to earn that draw a man down the entire second half is pretty impressive. While it needs help to advance, the U.S. effectively controls its own destiny, but to advance, it MUST score some goals of its own.
- Ecuador is awesome. I love watching them play, because their defenders are unbelievable.
- Poland is a letdown, but I was rooting for them against Germany, both to mess with the standings in that group and especially after seeing them play like they did. Hey, when the ball pinged off the crossbar twice in four seconds, I thought that was a sign. It was. The sign read: "only a matter of time . . . " Shame that Boruc had to lose a game like that, though.
- I mentioned it before, but Trinidad is by far awesome. There are ways they can get to the 8th final, and I sincerely hope they do.
- The Brazil-Croatia game is a prime example of why I hate Brazil. They played the least inspired, least coordinated, laziest, most disinterested game of the tournament so far, and they WON. This despite the Croats playing absolutely out of their minds. If Brazil is THAT good, I'm going to keep rooting against them.
- For Thursday: Go Italy (you dirty bastards). Go USA. Win and probably in -- anything else, and it's been fun, y'all.
1. I almost always root for the hemisphere teams, with two exceptions: Brazil and Argentina, whom I almost always root against. (See also: France.) In this light, I'm a raging Trinidad & Tobago fan right now, especially as well as they've played thus far.
2. I love the underdogs -- not surprising. Rooting for the African teams is always fun, because they're always underdogs, and they tend to play a really attractive game.
3. I always root for the Scandinavians. Except for Sweden -- I just don't care about Sweden for some reason as far as FIFA is concerned. Norway and Denmark, though, I'm all for.
4. Even if I think that your team has a great shot of winning the whole bag (Holland), if you play dirty or act like a team full of Vlades, I will root against you. Looking at you, Holland. Italy, if it weren't for your next match . . .
5. Everything else is conditional, based on who is playing whom.
It's been a blast of a week, and I'll pop up some more thorough notes later, but for right now, some general thoughts:
- The U.S.-Italy match was the worst officiated match of the tournament I've seen thus far. It was horrible, all across the board.
- Speaking of same, 1 point probably isn't enough for the Americans, but to earn that draw a man down the entire second half is pretty impressive. While it needs help to advance, the U.S. effectively controls its own destiny, but to advance, it MUST score some goals of its own.
- Ecuador is awesome. I love watching them play, because their defenders are unbelievable.
- Poland is a letdown, but I was rooting for them against Germany, both to mess with the standings in that group and especially after seeing them play like they did. Hey, when the ball pinged off the crossbar twice in four seconds, I thought that was a sign. It was. The sign read: "only a matter of time . . . " Shame that Boruc had to lose a game like that, though.
- I mentioned it before, but Trinidad is by far awesome. There are ways they can get to the 8th final, and I sincerely hope they do.
- The Brazil-Croatia game is a prime example of why I hate Brazil. They played the least inspired, least coordinated, laziest, most disinterested game of the tournament so far, and they WON. This despite the Croats playing absolutely out of their minds. If Brazil is THAT good, I'm going to keep rooting against them.
- For Thursday: Go Italy (you dirty bastards). Go USA. Win and probably in -- anything else, and it's been fun, y'all.
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
Elizabeth
I never figured that the two of them would amount to much. They’re just not a natural pairing, either pair. Don’t know why they ever fought over her. Don’t know why I ever bothered, neither.
Continued behind the cut . . .
Laird’s the one. He’s the ringleader, such as that’s a ring. He doesn’t know it, not really, but he is. Malachi follows him more’n anything else, but Laird just won’t see it. I tried to tell him the other day, while they were running around getting everything battened down before the storm, but he wasn’t listening. He was very methodical, counting off to himself in the German he picked up in school. Eins, zwei, drei, vier. He was counting off steps like he was going somewhere, or like he was measuring, or like he was trying to keep a rhythm, which couldn’t possibly be the case whatever his intentions. Back in sixth grade at our first school dance he asked me to dance, and even then, even with the kind of dancing we did at that age, he had no sense for rhythm whatsoever. He just sort of shuffled his feet with a hangdog expression, his head drooping and his eyes periodically daring to dart a glance at me ever so often. It was cute the way he tried to hop his hips in time with the song, but he just couldn’t manage. He was usually just about a half a step behind, though not reliably, and he occasionally wound up on time for a measure or two completely by accident. He popped his hips by jerking his knee and yanking on the whole works. Something he thought he was s’posed to do, I guess. Lots of things we thought we was s’posed to do that we didn’t know how.
Course, all of that was before. Folks say he blames Malachi, and he does, but not for what they think. Sometimes I think I’m the only one understands him. He hasn’t been the same since it happened, that much is plain, but folks don’t understand why. Malachi couldn’t a helped it, but folks say that’s small consolation in a case like that. I s’pose it is, but that’s not what he blames Malachi for. He don’t blame himself, neither, not like people think he does. Not that way, not for Kevin. Boileau wanted to ship him off, I think to be rid of him finally more than to help, but his mother stepped in and stopped that one. I don’t think she quite knew what to make of him after that, either, though, and so she didn’t, but he kept trying to be close to her like he was before.
It’s not as bad over here today as it is there. We just had a couple of trees scorched, and the dock needs some work. Dunno where the canoe is, but that’s our fault for leaving it out there just tied up. I’m not even going to bother counting the cattails, but we have to do some work round the back of the house. The brick held up pretty well, and the oak’s in better shape than it should be after whipping around like it did, but daddy’s going to call someone to sound the tree. He says it may not be there come spring. It’s the doghouse that we have to rebuild, though; a branch done dropped straight into the middle of the roof and collapsed the front and back end around it like a hot dog bun. Not sure exactly where the branch came from, though, since it’s a pine and we don’t have any of those. Laird’s family does, and our neighbors on the other side do, too, but there’s no way of telling which way it blew in from. Both sets of trees are busted up pretty good.
I seen three snakes so far today, which is more than I’ve seen all summer. Well, the little baby garter snakes that pop up in the back yard are nothing special and I don’t count them. I think that rat snake that took on Asmund was one of them, because it’s the only snake I’ve ever seen that black and that long. One was a moccasin, very aggressive and disturbed from last night, sliding around I guess just checking things out. His tongue was all over the place, and he smelled something he didn’t like, because he essed up and hissed an awful lot. I couldn’t see his mouth, since he kept coiling and showing his white to the river or the reeds, but there’s no mistaking that heavy body and mud-brown coloring.
The last one looked to be a canebrake, but I’ve never seen one this far out before. Heard him before I saw him, and it was just like with the cottonmouth, something was spooking him but good, because he rattled on and off for a good ten minutes. Probably went on longer than that, but I was s’posed to clean up the yard, so I had to get back to it. I could see him in flashes, though, behind the low stone wall that edges the yard where it drops down in the mud, sliding on the water, which is still up over the stone wall and ankle deep up near the house. The spreading vees behind him looked like they were tracking in on him, rather than away, and soon as he found a log to coil up on, he did, and rattled loud and long.
So I kept cleaning the yard, while daddy and everyone were over next door. The fire was out by then. We all have things to do right yet, so I don’t figure there’d be no bother if I just tend to our mess and let others to theirs. They never told me. Snakes used to come up out of the marsh more frequently, but they never bothered me, not like they bothered Malachi. A rattlesnake might not be kind enough to warn, he said once.
So I never had to tell him. We could have talked about it, could have tried to discuss options like we knew we were supposed to, could have pretended to know what we were talking about when we did, could have come to some sort of decision, we, together. So we would have known what to do next. So we would be ready to tell. And he knew anyway. And he knew again, immediately. So that was that. But I still think.
Someone will have to tell me what all the fuss is about over there. It’s a little too quiet over here, even after the storm and fire. There he is, and there he is. I don’t see Spes, though. She would be cleaning, I suppose, or working with Boileau. Then again, no one ever works with Boileau. When the time comes for work, Boileau loves to plan.
I’ll go over there later, once I’ve finished here. The tide must be coming in now, and a good thing, too. If it had been just a few hours later the storm hit, I don’t know what we’d be looking at. Can’t go into the street as it is, what with the downed power lines, but if it’d been high tide and the water pushed into the street around the power lines, what then? Fire might’ve been worse, or not got started at all, I don’t know. Six feet past the wall, looks like. It’s only a little rise to the back of the house, not more than a few feet higher than the wall, but I hope it’s enough. There’s enough to worry about without having to fish water out from around the foundation. That ditch Laird dug yesterday makes a lot more sense right about now. I saw him at it all afternoon, while Malachi worked at getting everything loose somewhere fixed or otherwise away.
Continued behind the cut . . .
Laird’s the one. He’s the ringleader, such as that’s a ring. He doesn’t know it, not really, but he is. Malachi follows him more’n anything else, but Laird just won’t see it. I tried to tell him the other day, while they were running around getting everything battened down before the storm, but he wasn’t listening. He was very methodical, counting off to himself in the German he picked up in school. Eins, zwei, drei, vier. He was counting off steps like he was going somewhere, or like he was measuring, or like he was trying to keep a rhythm, which couldn’t possibly be the case whatever his intentions. Back in sixth grade at our first school dance he asked me to dance, and even then, even with the kind of dancing we did at that age, he had no sense for rhythm whatsoever. He just sort of shuffled his feet with a hangdog expression, his head drooping and his eyes periodically daring to dart a glance at me ever so often. It was cute the way he tried to hop his hips in time with the song, but he just couldn’t manage. He was usually just about a half a step behind, though not reliably, and he occasionally wound up on time for a measure or two completely by accident. He popped his hips by jerking his knee and yanking on the whole works. Something he thought he was s’posed to do, I guess. Lots of things we thought we was s’posed to do that we didn’t know how.
Course, all of that was before. Folks say he blames Malachi, and he does, but not for what they think. Sometimes I think I’m the only one understands him. He hasn’t been the same since it happened, that much is plain, but folks don’t understand why. Malachi couldn’t a helped it, but folks say that’s small consolation in a case like that. I s’pose it is, but that’s not what he blames Malachi for. He don’t blame himself, neither, not like people think he does. Not that way, not for Kevin. Boileau wanted to ship him off, I think to be rid of him finally more than to help, but his mother stepped in and stopped that one. I don’t think she quite knew what to make of him after that, either, though, and so she didn’t, but he kept trying to be close to her like he was before.
It’s not as bad over here today as it is there. We just had a couple of trees scorched, and the dock needs some work. Dunno where the canoe is, but that’s our fault for leaving it out there just tied up. I’m not even going to bother counting the cattails, but we have to do some work round the back of the house. The brick held up pretty well, and the oak’s in better shape than it should be after whipping around like it did, but daddy’s going to call someone to sound the tree. He says it may not be there come spring. It’s the doghouse that we have to rebuild, though; a branch done dropped straight into the middle of the roof and collapsed the front and back end around it like a hot dog bun. Not sure exactly where the branch came from, though, since it’s a pine and we don’t have any of those. Laird’s family does, and our neighbors on the other side do, too, but there’s no way of telling which way it blew in from. Both sets of trees are busted up pretty good.
I seen three snakes so far today, which is more than I’ve seen all summer. Well, the little baby garter snakes that pop up in the back yard are nothing special and I don’t count them. I think that rat snake that took on Asmund was one of them, because it’s the only snake I’ve ever seen that black and that long. One was a moccasin, very aggressive and disturbed from last night, sliding around I guess just checking things out. His tongue was all over the place, and he smelled something he didn’t like, because he essed up and hissed an awful lot. I couldn’t see his mouth, since he kept coiling and showing his white to the river or the reeds, but there’s no mistaking that heavy body and mud-brown coloring.
The last one looked to be a canebrake, but I’ve never seen one this far out before. Heard him before I saw him, and it was just like with the cottonmouth, something was spooking him but good, because he rattled on and off for a good ten minutes. Probably went on longer than that, but I was s’posed to clean up the yard, so I had to get back to it. I could see him in flashes, though, behind the low stone wall that edges the yard where it drops down in the mud, sliding on the water, which is still up over the stone wall and ankle deep up near the house. The spreading vees behind him looked like they were tracking in on him, rather than away, and soon as he found a log to coil up on, he did, and rattled loud and long.
So I kept cleaning the yard, while daddy and everyone were over next door. The fire was out by then. We all have things to do right yet, so I don’t figure there’d be no bother if I just tend to our mess and let others to theirs. They never told me. Snakes used to come up out of the marsh more frequently, but they never bothered me, not like they bothered Malachi. A rattlesnake might not be kind enough to warn, he said once.
So I never had to tell him. We could have talked about it, could have tried to discuss options like we knew we were supposed to, could have pretended to know what we were talking about when we did, could have come to some sort of decision, we, together. So we would have known what to do next. So we would be ready to tell. And he knew anyway. And he knew again, immediately. So that was that. But I still think.
Someone will have to tell me what all the fuss is about over there. It’s a little too quiet over here, even after the storm and fire. There he is, and there he is. I don’t see Spes, though. She would be cleaning, I suppose, or working with Boileau. Then again, no one ever works with Boileau. When the time comes for work, Boileau loves to plan.
I’ll go over there later, once I’ve finished here. The tide must be coming in now, and a good thing, too. If it had been just a few hours later the storm hit, I don’t know what we’d be looking at. Can’t go into the street as it is, what with the downed power lines, but if it’d been high tide and the water pushed into the street around the power lines, what then? Fire might’ve been worse, or not got started at all, I don’t know. Six feet past the wall, looks like. It’s only a little rise to the back of the house, not more than a few feet higher than the wall, but I hope it’s enough. There’s enough to worry about without having to fish water out from around the foundation. That ditch Laird dug yesterday makes a lot more sense right about now. I saw him at it all afternoon, while Malachi worked at getting everything loose somewhere fixed or otherwise away.
Strange compliment:
So on Saturday I was at the gym working out, and there was an athletic-looking chap that I wound up trading off the machines with, since we were both doing the same work in roughly the same pattern.
After a couple of rounds back and forth, he pointed at my Raiders towel and asked me if I was a football player. Turns out he plays for one of the German teams (not NFL Europe, one of the smaller pro leagues here) and was impressed that I work out like they do.
Hey, it's not Ray Lewis telling me that, but I liked it anyway.
After a couple of rounds back and forth, he pointed at my Raiders towel and asked me if I was a football player. Turns out he plays for one of the German teams (not NFL Europe, one of the smaller pro leagues here) and was impressed that I work out like they do.
Hey, it's not Ray Lewis telling me that, but I liked it anyway.
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