World Cup « Kenny Smith | A remarkable thing happens …

World Cup

site / Tumblr / Wednesday / World Cup — Comments Off
7
Jul 10

If the swing is long and slow developing, I’m back in it.

The day didn’t seem to want to start. Oh it was going on out there. The world was moving. People, presumably, were moving either with or against the rotation of the earth. Or, perhaps the earth had stopped moving, gravity failed and everyone floated away. Maybe, I figured, I’m still here only because I was trapped in a snug blanket seal this morning. Being short-sheeted could have poss

More likely I couldn’t get to sleep last night, where the evening turned to morning and fatigue never found me. It took a while to adjust to a new day. Some time around noon the concept began to grow on me. Around 2 p.m. I found the strength for food. This was during the World Cup semifinal, and such a boring game too. It was disappointing, but not unexpected given the teams. Spain wins on a nice goal, which was one of the few opportunities of the game. At some point the people doing the scoring for television started inflated even the shots. No way Spain managed four in five minutes.

That was the fulcrum of the day, odd that the fulcrum happened so early, but such is a sunny summer day.

On the other hand, while I couldn’t sleep the last two nights I’ve created a survey to use next fall, so there’s something to be said for having a maladjusted sleep schedule.

Worked out late this evening. The Yankee swam while I rode the bike. She did almost a mile in the pool. I did 20 miles in the saddle. She burned more calories than I did. Not to get too detailed about this, but when I got home I discovered a blister from the toe bucket. A closer look shows a blister on a blister. That’s talent.

Tomorrow I’ll ride 30 or 40 miles, I hope. I’m ifnally back to riding hard (for me) and finding it invigorating (for me).

We picked up dinner at Chipotle. To go. I was still very sweaty and apparently offending the delicate sensibilities of one of the diners. Not that I wanted to be seen in that condition, but it was on the way home. As we discussed yesterday, there’s a certain order to these things. It just wouldn’t do to pass the burrito place, to go home, to turn around and go back to the burrito place.

Fussed with the site while watching American Pickers. Two guys drive all over and commit to television, and the inevitable History Channel DVD series, that old saw about one man’s junk is another man’s treasure. They seem like nice guys. They build a good rapport with people, hear their stories and buy their stuff. And then there’s the unfortunate part, where they show their projected profit. On the one hand that seems a bit cynical, but no one makes people sell to them. On the other hand, it seem like a great job, crawling through people’s stuff, making great discoveries. Maybe that can be my career in retirement.

Figured out the Tumblr import problem. There was an RSS feed that wasn’t doing anything. I found a widget that promises to do something. It is now in the rail to the right. I posted three images to Tumblr today. I scanned more this evening. You can follow that feed should you use the service, as there is a lot more to come. You’ll also be able to see the images as they appear on the site here. To be sure, you should check out both.

Tomorrow: I’ll be here. I’ll be at the gym. I’ll be donating old things I no longer need. There will be more on Twitter and on Tumblr, too. See you soon.

errands / movies / Tuesday / Tumblr / World Cup — Comments Off
6
Jul 10

Back to the future, at the post office

When out and about to accomplish things, always strategically plan the order of events. It would not do, of course, to visit the grocery store, buy frozen things and then leave them in the trunk for two hours while taking in a movie. You don’t go across town on no gas to pick up a rare book without stopping at the gas station.

I’m a great believer in pre-planning the round of events. There’s a certain order to things. Some stops just make sense A to B to C. Some stops just make sense for traffic patterns. Some sequences are purely psychological.

Like this: Visit the post office first, and then stop by the bank.

If yours is like mine you find little redeeming about the post office. The lines are long, painful and slow moving. The person you finally draw to help you with your transaction is doing you a favor. He or she is really bitter about this, but has yet to make an examination about the choices they’ve made in their life. And, no matter how many extra books of stamps you buy, you always walking away feeling dissatisfied.

At the bank, they’re dealing with your money. And they’re making money on your money. In fact, they are still running a great con that a few keystrokes costs six to 20 bucks of your money every time. Of course they’re happy to see you. And, if yours is like mine you find they’re going a little overboard to demonstrate your enthusiasm to see you.

To be fair, the guy at the post office today was helpful, full of sirs — every third word of the conversation between us was “sir” — and generally competent. The life hadn’t been beaten out of him yet. At the bank the teller was a very nice lady. She reminded me of someone from a lifetime ago and had the same first name, but she was younger and nicer. Could be because she was getting my money.

See?

Uruguay’s run came to a close in the World Cup. They’ll still play in the consolation game, of course, but Netherlands handled them effectively enough, 3-2. The cheap goal at the end didn’t mean much in the scheme of things. The Oranje are right where they want to be heading into the final weekend f the tournament. I’ve always liked the Dutch style of play and it is nice to see them do well here.

Now, who will they meet for the championship game? Germany or Spain? We’ll find out tomorrow. Could be a good game, could be a snoozer.

Pedaled 10 miles this evening. I just ran out of gas right at 10. Could be the absence of protein for the day. So instead of riding more I did a few ab exercises and called that a workout. Tomorrow I’ll eat better and ride more, promise.

We had delicious pork chops for dinner, after which I started scanning things. And then I started editing them a bit in Photoshop. Tomorrow the Tumblr blog returns. The first several dozen things that will appear will be things I brought back from Europe. I have a big stack of water bottle labels, funky business cards and odd looking pamphlets that I picked up along the way. I lugged them halfway around the world, I’m sharing them with you.

Now I just have to figure out the problem with the Tumblr section on the right side of the blog. That’s never worked right, and I’m at a loss on a good widget. It isn’t enough that you see these things on a separate site, you should be able to find them here.

No, I won’t tie it all back into my Twitter account. Though I have found a way to write in my Tumblr, cross-post to Twitter, call it into Facebook and then publish back here. I’m only one step away from what Doc Brown cautioned against, creating “a time paradox, the results of which could cause a chain reaction that would unravel the very fabric of the space time continuum, and destroy the entire universe! Granted, that’s a worse case scenario. The destruction might in fact be very localized, limited to merely our own galaxy.”

I had to look that up on IMDB, not to worry. Also on IMDB, I’ve just learned that Carl Sagan and I have something in common, we both like Back to the Future.

It seems I’ll do anything to put myself with a prominent scientist.

friends / movies / weekend / World Cup — 1 Comment
3
Jul 10

A thoroughly predictable (but lovely) day

I had figured last night that we’d have a sandwich from Publix for lunch. By the time I woke up that had been decided. The Yankee asked what I’d like to eat today as she was already heading for the door. It’s nice to know someone shares your thoughts. It’s odd to think they have to be in your head to do that.

But you can’t make little coincidences like that into big productions. People will begin to question your taste in entertainment if you start yelling “Scanners. Scanners!”

That movie, incidentally was set in the far off future of 1985. Did you know there were two sequels? Me either. And a few spin offs. And, of course, somewhere the inevitable relaunch is being fussed over. (Thankfully it has missed it’s release date by two years. Maybe someone got to them.)

The second movie has a complete summary on Wikipedia, but few details on IMDB. The third one has a one-sentence blurb on Wikipedia. It is as if the writers there watched this for 20 minutes and then ejected the VHS knowing no one would ever feel the need to read about the film in great depth. They would be right.

Which is, I’ll grant you, a random way to start a Saturday. Especially since I’ve never even seen the films. But I did enjoy that sandwich. The nice lady at the counter, after she put cheese on The Yankee’s side of the sandwich by mistake said “Well you’re paying for it, so I’ll put it on this side.” My side had extra provolone. It was already an excellent day.

In the World Cup Germany pummeled Argentina, 4-0. It had to catch up to La Albiceleste eventually. They play passionately and freely and without a lot of defense this time around and the Germans just picked them apart. At least they didn’t mentally implode and pout quite like Brazil. Spain swatted away Paraguay 1-0 after that bizarre exchange of three penalty kicks (that were really two) that yielded no goals. David Villa later found himself alone in the box long enough to touch the ball three times and then rattled the post to send Paraguay home.

So we have a good mix of teams going into the semifinals next week. Netherlands will face Uruguay who are still in it on a prayer. Spain and Germany will face off in what should be a fantastic match.

Moved stuff around in the garage today. It’ll be clean by the middle of the week. This is the big push. Do I still need my eighth grade protractor? Do I still need so many VHSs since I don’t own a VCR? (A sentence which will be an ambiguous mystery far more quickly than we realize.) Many boxes of old things I’ve stored for years will be donated or dumped.

So we moved and shuffled and cleaned a bit down there today. Just getting started.

Then The Yankee and I introduced Wendy to DeVinci’s in Homewood. She had the manicotti. The Yankee had the gnocci. I branched way out and tried the lasagna. (It’s cheap, there, and filling.)

We visited the bookstore, because Wendy wanted to pick up some things. She’s preparing to go back to school and is studying for the GMAT. (Go Wendy!) We bought a kids’ book for a friend and some Mad Libs for us.

I know, I know.

We played those far into the night. We played enough that one of them actually made contextual sense. The law of averages demands to be recognized, occasionally.(Monkeys are typing this, just now, as part of their warm up for Shakespeare. That’s why this started with Scanners.)

Did you see that coming?

Friday / friends / Pie Day / World Cup — Comments Off
2
Jul 10

Friday is Pie Day

It isn’t especially surprising to me that Netherlands beat Brazil. That Brazil would look so bad in falling was unexpected, to say the least. Brazil played defense this Cup, for a change, but got conservative in every other way and didn’t really find a rhythm to reach their potential. That always seems to be the problem whenever Brazil lose. If they win, they can be majestic; if they lose they can’t find their ability.

And then Uruguay beating Ghana in perhaps the most heartbreaking fashion was tough to watch. Ghana are one of the youngest teams in the tournament, so they’ll be back, but how badly will this haunt them?

Missing the penalty kick to win in the final moment of the game to bring on the penalty kick tiebreakers. To lose after 120 minutes — where they largely controlled the game — must be devastating. Uruguay should be crushed in the semifinals, Ghana are crushed in one of the most bizarre finishes you could conceive.

Spent the afternoon at the pool. Met some neighbors with an almost-five-year-old who’s learning to jump off the side and a two-year-old who has no fear in the water. We were swimming with The McAlisters before dinner. We got out of the pool in time to catch a late seat at Jim N Nicks, where the kitchen was slow, the restaurant was dead and we filled out fake comment cards.

When you’re starving after the pool a slow kitchen isn’t what you’re hoping for. That just means more cheese biscuits. Elizabeth found a recipe for them the other day. You can steal it here. The barbecue house now offers, under “scratch-made trimmings,” fresh cut fruit. Frut at a barbecue house. That’s crazy talk.

Tuesday / video / World Cup — Comments Off
29
Jun 10

Your basic Tuesday at home

Just house cleaning today. And laundry. Do you want details?

I have a lot of clothes. On those rare occasions when everything I own is clean I realize I need more closet space and a few more hangars. This is an excellent excuse to not do the laundry too often. And it is also an excellent reason why I don’t need more clothes.

I vacuumed this afternoon. The Yankee bought one of those fancy machines on sale last year, the kind that requires you to empty the plastic container every so often rather than the bag you can ignore for weeks on end. I’ve finally figured out how to remove the thing without pouring out all of the dusty findings back onto the floor. It is rare that you find successes in something as mundane as vacuuming the floor, but there it is. I did it today.

I danced a little jig, pouring some of the dust and debris back onto the floor.

Good thing I’d yet to vacuum.

In the World Cup Paraguay and Japan played to zeroes and added on an additional 30 minutes. After two full hours of play they had to go to penalty kicks. Spain faced their Iberian neighbors and gave Portugal the defeat they had coming to them. I’m now hoping to see Spain and Netherlands in the final.

And since Portugal is out, I offer you this tribute to Ronaldo:

Anyway. Tomorrow, I pick up The Yankee from the airport. From the U.S. to Europe to the U.S. to Asia and back to the U.S. in a month … we’ll just have to get her sleep schedule back to normal.