While I'm at it, now that I've finally caught last week's Brazil vs Australia quarterfinal, can I just briefly note how un-fucking-believable the pace and tenacity of the Matildas is? They're like a grown-up version of the New Zealand girls who were so chin-up against Brazil, and both were a treat to watch. Brazil has the class to blow smaller teams out of the water, but their disorganization and lapses of concentration left a lot of opportunities for the Aussies to just tear them up with the lightning speed of Lisa De Vanna and Sarah Walsh. I thought Brazil was on their way to a rout with their early goals before De Vanna jumped on a lazy backpass streaking in out of nowhere to beat the keeper to it and tear Australia's way back into the game. In the second half the Aussies tied it up at 2-2 on a funky setpiece, taking free kick short and then sailing it in for the black blur that was blonde wisp Lauren Colthorpe flying in to snap a wicked header into goal a split second before Brazilian keeper Andreia would have snared it. It was epic, and had Sarah Walsh been able to get onto the end of just one of the long passes zipped ahead of the defense for her, this could have been the upset of the tournament. This is why I'm such a cheerleader for getting another proper women's league started in the United States: players like this should have a stage to play on, and we're the only market that can support them. until the summer of 2009 is going to be a long wait.
Brazil 3 - 2 Australia
'4 Formiga
'23 Marta (pen)
'36 De Vanna
'68 Colthorpe
'75 Cristiane
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Go Pack Go... and take the #&@$'ing Brewers with you!
Wisconsin sports fans are dirty, dirty people. This is confirmed to me every time they come to town, and as a whole they show no signs of sobriety by the kick-off or the first pitch is thrown. The Bears draw crowds of transplants and road warriors when they come to town, as did the Tigers this year, and they're all a lot of fun to have around for a friendly rivalry, but I really wish we could just blockade the bridges when the snot-colored horde starts weaving it's way westward. The big freak in front of me who decided he'd sit on the back of his chair with his foul hindquarters spilling over onto my knees was particularly unwelcome, and he was all taken aback when I told him his ticket only entitled him to one seat. They famously make beer in Wisconsin, but to my knowledge they don't make soap, and judging by the aged and fermented odor coming off of this man (and many like him) the reason is they only had room for one sudsy product in their lives and they chose beer... to be fair, it was raining and under the open sky at Lambeau field they would have gotten their bi-weekly shower. Perhaps the best way to protect Kelly Holcomb today (since the O-line couldn't be bothered) would have been soap on a rope around his neck.
Brett Favre did break Dan Marino's record for career touchdowns, and by a stroke of luck he did it early in the game without setting the other record he's fast approaching: George Blanda's career interception record. And by stroke of luck, I mean there were so many bullshit calls I went straight from the game to the Minnesota Zoo, reached into an enclosure and beat a confused zebra over the head with a broom. (I'm posting this from the Dakota County jail.) There won't be another decent game against the Packers until he retires, because every year Favre acts like he's retiring an the league rolls out the red carpet for his swan song (he's on at least his fourth or fifth retirement year). I believe the Packers have a better team this year, and a loss to them isn't an unfair result, but it's like watching Duke basketball: if it isn't going to be a proper game it's not even fun to watch.
On the plus side, while he may have taken on the human form of Adrian Caligulus Peterson, #28 is a god. One series alone illustrated how he makes a difference. Chester Taylor was in and got tripped up in the backfield for a loss when a prone Packer got a purchase on his ankle, then on the next play, Peterson made the same run and had the same problem, some commando-crawling lineman grabbing his ankle. Peterson stepped on him and charged through the rest of the Packers defense for a huge gain. He refuses to be brought down, at one point realizing after a huge run he was going to be cut off, Peterson slowed up near the sideline and waited for a Packer to come within reach, then basically punched him in the face and ran past him, gaining a few more yards before being dragged down. Of course as the game went on and Peterson cracked 100 yards rushing, our fearless (some say clueless) leader pulled him out. Unheralded rookie receiver Sidney Rice had what I believe is his first career touchdown, and some nice catches that have me thinking maybe we finally have the makings of at least one competent receiver on this team, which we haven't had since Randy Moss was run out of town (his short, half-blind replacement with a five-year old's hands doesn't count).
Packers 23
Vikings 16
Minneapolis area hotel complimentary soaps and shampoos: untouched
Brett Favre did break Dan Marino's record for career touchdowns, and by a stroke of luck he did it early in the game without setting the other record he's fast approaching: George Blanda's career interception record. And by stroke of luck, I mean there were so many bullshit calls I went straight from the game to the Minnesota Zoo, reached into an enclosure and beat a confused zebra over the head with a broom. (I'm posting this from the Dakota County jail.) There won't be another decent game against the Packers until he retires, because every year Favre acts like he's retiring an the league rolls out the red carpet for his swan song (he's on at least his fourth or fifth retirement year). I believe the Packers have a better team this year, and a loss to them isn't an unfair result, but it's like watching Duke basketball: if it isn't going to be a proper game it's not even fun to watch.
On the plus side, while he may have taken on the human form of Adrian Caligulus Peterson, #28 is a god. One series alone illustrated how he makes a difference. Chester Taylor was in and got tripped up in the backfield for a loss when a prone Packer got a purchase on his ankle, then on the next play, Peterson made the same run and had the same problem, some commando-crawling lineman grabbing his ankle. Peterson stepped on him and charged through the rest of the Packers defense for a huge gain. He refuses to be brought down, at one point realizing after a huge run he was going to be cut off, Peterson slowed up near the sideline and waited for a Packer to come within reach, then basically punched him in the face and ran past him, gaining a few more yards before being dragged down. Of course as the game went on and Peterson cracked 100 yards rushing, our fearless (some say clueless) leader pulled him out. Unheralded rookie receiver Sidney Rice had what I believe is his first career touchdown, and some nice catches that have me thinking maybe we finally have the makings of at least one competent receiver on this team, which we haven't had since Randy Moss was run out of town (his short, half-blind replacement with a five-year old's hands doesn't count).
Packers 23
Vikings 16
Minneapolis area hotel complimentary soaps and shampoos: untouched
Venom v Poison
I know the conflation of English words and the contraction of our vocabulary is inevitable, for instance "borrow" coming to mean "lend", and this has gone in waves throughout the development of the language: in medieval English "ring" could refer to a ring and what when through it. Nevertheless I'm going to keep trying to make one useful distinction about two conflated words that refer to different things. Animal Planet is whoring themselves out to promote a new DVD release of "The Jungle Book", showing features on all of the animals in that book framed as "Baloo's Birthday Bash", but while normally this would be some what nauseating in its commercialism, I actually don't mind since I love this channel and I don't begrudge them trying to make a buck if they stay on the air.
As an aside, I also appreciate them for defying a troubling observation made by Lord Robert May in a speech called "The Taxonomy of Taxonomists" I heard back at the '93 Nobel Conference at Gustavus, in which he lamented the focus of biology on "our furred and feathered friends" while explaining to all of us wide-eyed students the incredible and unexplored diversity of the biosphere. He was also the funniest, most engaging scientist I have ever heard speak on any topic, particularly in his comments on the lurking fungus population of the British Isles. So I was pleased to see Animal Planet as part of their homage to Kipling and Baloo was showing a Wild Kingdom documentary on Romulus Whitaker's work with king cobras set to Elvis music in tribute to his breeding pair Elvis and Priscilla. These cobras are fascinating and terrifying animals, and a significant part of India's wildlife, just as Kaa the rock python was a critical part of the Jungle Book. The best appearance of the rock python is that episode of Wildboyz where they dressed up in 80's metal band shirts and mullet wigs (for the python that rocks) while Chris Pontius tried to get the snake to bite him so he could rub ink into the wound and get a rock python tattoo. That was truly stupid, as arguably is Whitaker's work with cobras when he's been bitten so much he's developed an allergy to the antivenin.
But the point is, a scientific documentary should get this one little detail right: king cobras are not poisonous! Footage exists to easily prove this and appears in other shows Animal Planet has shown on cobras, specifically a sad little tale of a newly emerged baby cobra going for a drink of water and getting eaten by a lurking mammalian predator. They also eat each other, which is why they're part of the genus ophiophagus: snake-eaters. The entire point of those big fangs is to inject venom, which is not the same thing as poison: one works in the bloodstream, one works in the digestive system. You notice how you don't have to wait an hour to go swimming after being bitten by a cobra, and you don't have to wait for your dinner to settle for the respiratory failure to set in? Helpful tip: if air is forced into your lungs by helpful friends on your way to the hospital, you can keep enough oxygen in your system to get some antivenin (again... injected) and that pesky pulmonary paralysis will clear right up. I know it's more or less synecdoche at this point, but seriously people, venomous snakes are different from poisonous snakes, that's why you can serve rattlesnake chili and your guests don't all end up gasping on the floor staring at the ceiling.
In short, the Packers coming to town is poison, venom is what I'll be spewing all afternoon (I am completely dreading this game).
As an aside, I also appreciate them for defying a troubling observation made by Lord Robert May in a speech called "The Taxonomy of Taxonomists" I heard back at the '93 Nobel Conference at Gustavus, in which he lamented the focus of biology on "our furred and feathered friends" while explaining to all of us wide-eyed students the incredible and unexplored diversity of the biosphere. He was also the funniest, most engaging scientist I have ever heard speak on any topic, particularly in his comments on the lurking fungus population of the British Isles. So I was pleased to see Animal Planet as part of their homage to Kipling and Baloo was showing a Wild Kingdom documentary on Romulus Whitaker's work with king cobras set to Elvis music in tribute to his breeding pair Elvis and Priscilla. These cobras are fascinating and terrifying animals, and a significant part of India's wildlife, just as Kaa the rock python was a critical part of the Jungle Book. The best appearance of the rock python is that episode of Wildboyz where they dressed up in 80's metal band shirts and mullet wigs (for the python that rocks) while Chris Pontius tried to get the snake to bite him so he could rub ink into the wound and get a rock python tattoo. That was truly stupid, as arguably is Whitaker's work with cobras when he's been bitten so much he's developed an allergy to the antivenin.
But the point is, a scientific documentary should get this one little detail right: king cobras are not poisonous! Footage exists to easily prove this and appears in other shows Animal Planet has shown on cobras, specifically a sad little tale of a newly emerged baby cobra going for a drink of water and getting eaten by a lurking mammalian predator. They also eat each other, which is why they're part of the genus ophiophagus: snake-eaters. The entire point of those big fangs is to inject venom, which is not the same thing as poison: one works in the bloodstream, one works in the digestive system. You notice how you don't have to wait an hour to go swimming after being bitten by a cobra, and you don't have to wait for your dinner to settle for the respiratory failure to set in? Helpful tip: if air is forced into your lungs by helpful friends on your way to the hospital, you can keep enough oxygen in your system to get some antivenin (again... injected) and that pesky pulmonary paralysis will clear right up. I know it's more or less synecdoche at this point, but seriously people, venomous snakes are different from poisonous snakes, that's why you can serve rattlesnake chili and your guests don't all end up gasping on the floor staring at the ceiling.
In short, the Packers coming to town is poison, venom is what I'll be spewing all afternoon (I am completely dreading this game).
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Norge 1 - 0 中国
This was interesting, to see the Norwegians barely challenge the Chinese goal but still somehow thump the hosts. The Chinese dominated possession and took a lot more shots, but just did nothing useful, taking weak shots from distance or putting them over the cross bar into row Z. The Norwegians just drifted into a glacier like wall every time the Chinese threatened, keeping them nibbling around the box while the shifting Norwegians kept getting a leg in the way of every shot the Chinese made at the goal. The winner for Norway came on a fairly serious screw-up by the Chinese as a Norwegian pass went well off target, and the Chinese defender who rounded it up, facing her own goal, thought she had miles of space around her and experienced a moment of indecision as to whether she was going to pass back to her own keeper, put it out wide or turn back upfield, and Isabell Herlovsen zipped up behind her to strip the ball and set a billion eyes crying. The previously powerful Chinese are so far off their game these days, they made the same mistake in the closing minutes and surrendered a corner to Norway... and when the ref gave them a gift of a goal kick so they could start one more attack, they dallied so long the exasperated ref didn't give them a decent shot at an equalizer before blowing the whistle. Norway goes on to face the Germans in the semifinals (well, actually they already did, but I'm still catching up).
Norway 1 - 0 China
'32 Herlovsen
Norway 1 - 0 China
'32 Herlovsen
The Trenton Hassell Trade
This is somewhat mundane news, but the Timberwolves have traded Trenton Hassell, a defensive specialist and swingman, to Dallas. Hassell was part of a big log-jam of shooting guards on the roster but he could defend small forwards (who in the modern NBA are really just big guards). Hassell had been a run of the mill scoring guard when he came up with the Bulls, but he became a great defensive player to carve out a niche for himself, earning a long, lucrative contract from the Timberwolves. Then the league changed certain defensive rules and he became a lot less intimidating, and the Wolves had yet another guy signed to a long, lucrative contract for more than he was worth. The Timberwolves have had a lot of money tied up in role players like Hassell, Madsen, and Hudson, not to mention Garnett's contract (for more than the league's maximum salary) that they could never make any move to improve beyond mediocrity, so the prospect of moving these guys out and accelerating the youth movement has me a bit excited.
What's strange is the guy they got from the Mavs in the trade (Greg Buckner) plays the same position, only he's older and on paper has even less production than Hassell. The only purpose to the trade so far is the Wolves save $800K a year and that's enough to keep them under the luxury tax threshold after signing their draft picks. One potential upside is Buckner has less guaranteed years on his contract, even though he has more years left on it overall, so he can be cut a year earlier than Hassell and as his contract nears that point it gains trade value for others looking to dump salary. If this is what the Wolves had in mind as part of a multi-year rebuilding project, this is one baby-step closer to digging themselves out of the hole they were in. I liked Hassell and Madsen and some of the other Wolves of the last few years, but I was so frustrated by last year I would like to see a complete turnover of the roster. (For the first time in a decade, I didn't even enjoy the games I went to last season.) Supposedly Juwan Howard wants to be traded as well, despite only being a Timberwolf since June, claiming he doesn't want to stick around into his late 30's watching the young roster grow up... so more moves should be on the way.
(If it seems like I'm a little intent on a relatively minor transaction, it's because I'm focusing on any Minnesota sports story to keep my mind off tomorrow's Vikings-Packers game I'm basically dreading attending.)
What's strange is the guy they got from the Mavs in the trade (Greg Buckner) plays the same position, only he's older and on paper has even less production than Hassell. The only purpose to the trade so far is the Wolves save $800K a year and that's enough to keep them under the luxury tax threshold after signing their draft picks. One potential upside is Buckner has less guaranteed years on his contract, even though he has more years left on it overall, so he can be cut a year earlier than Hassell and as his contract nears that point it gains trade value for others looking to dump salary. If this is what the Wolves had in mind as part of a multi-year rebuilding project, this is one baby-step closer to digging themselves out of the hole they were in. I liked Hassell and Madsen and some of the other Wolves of the last few years, but I was so frustrated by last year I would like to see a complete turnover of the roster. (For the first time in a decade, I didn't even enjoy the games I went to last season.) Supposedly Juwan Howard wants to be traded as well, despite only being a Timberwolf since June, claiming he doesn't want to stick around into his late 30's watching the young roster grow up... so more moves should be on the way.
(If it seems like I'm a little intent on a relatively minor transaction, it's because I'm focusing on any Minnesota sports story to keep my mind off tomorrow's Vikings-Packers game I'm basically dreading attending.)
Friday, September 28, 2007
USA 3 - 0 Ingerland
England really came out firing in this game, with the kind of fearless, physical attacking game going right into the teeth of the US defense, like Tyr reaching into the mouth of the Iron Wolf. Unfortunately, they didn't have much sophistication in front of goal, and couldn't finish... Hope Solo (left) isn't telling England how many times they scored. England on both the men's and women's side seems handicapped by strange personnel decisions, and in this game playing a game-changing attacker like Kelly Smith in midfield didn't do much for them. A common feature of teams that under perform in big tournaments is playing some coach's darling up front and pushing out their most talented players, in this case England's lack of midfield depth was supposedly the problem, but Smith was invisible. On the other hand, Karen Carney was all over the field filling holes in defense and taking the ball into the US end, but the current US team gives up a lot of possession and just doesn't allow an end product before whipping back long counterattacks, and Carney rarely got enough space to do anything. The teams that gave them the most trouble were the swarming Koreans who were so quick to get back and prevent counters, and the physical Nigerians. I thought for a while England's strategy was to have Jill Scott hobble enough players to soften up the US and create some space for England, particularly on one infamous play where she and Alex Scott both went in for the same cross from Carney (for once allowed some breathing room). While Alex Scott was muscled out by Stephanie Lopez, Hope Solo came out of goal and Jill Scott attempted to beat her to the ball with some sort of mistimed Eric Cantona inspired flying kick... she missed the ball but did catch Lopez in the head with her cleat. It was a very physical game in which the refs swallowed their whistles, and despite the ostentatiousness of some of England's fouls (like that flying kick) both teams were about even on that front. The problem is that style of play really works a lot better for a pumped up, athletic American team than it does for the softer side of Europe. At one point when Kelly Smith wrapped up a US defender's arm and pulled her off balance forcing her to stumble, it looked like a subtle, well-executed foul... only before Smith could drag her down the US defender still took the ball away and blunted England's attack. The person who suffered the most was Karen Carney, a diminutive winger who created a lot of England's chances in the games I've seen, but protested loudly as she was pushed around today, while the nastiest aspect of the US game is Abby Wambach's persistent pounding on the opposition until she tears a hole, and she had to love this game.
It was anybody's game until the second half, when the US picked up the pace of the game and outran and out-muscled England, starting with Abby Wambach cracking them open on a set piece. Kristine Lilly floated a ball to the back post where Leslie Osborne made a dummy run, and Abby Wambach having ditched her marker came trailing in behind her, and with no regard for human life went up and over the back of Katie Chapman for the brutal header that put the US up 1-0. In the beginning of the second half, England looked physically and mentally beaten, and minutes later as England tried to start their own attack through Kelly Smith, she received the ball unaware of her surroundings and was dispossessed and taken down for style, and when Jill Scott recovered for England, Shannon Boxx ran right through Scott winning the ball back on the way and taking advantage of the chaos to put a shot just inside the post while Rachel Brown was both sexy in blue and screened by her defenders. The sluggish, confused play continued for England: a couple of minutes later Brown came way out for a ball over her head, misjudged it and ended up only knocking it down for an oncoming Kristine Lilly, who got behind Brown and walked the ball into goal to ice the game for the US. It was just a brutal stretch for England, but it was nice to see somebody other than the Scandinavians and Germans step up in Europe, and other than some brutal lapses England did look sharp.
USA 3 – 0 England
'48 Wambach
'57 Boxx
'60 Lilly
The US goes on to play the winner of the Brazil vs Australia game in the semi-finals, which somebody already told me is Brazil. (I was out of town, I'm a few games behind.)
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Deutschland 3 - 0 조선민주주의인민공화국
Whose house? Sandra's house... I know I'm a couple rounds behind, but I was in Chicago with my hands over my ears trying to avoid spoilers on all the WWC games I tivo'd. Nevertheless, it's still interesting to see Germany in action against tougher opposition than Argentina.
In the early going the Germans were off their game offensively, missing badly on their timing, and while they eventually started to get it together, they endured periodic bouts of sloppiness that a better finishing team than the North Koreans could have pounced on. Immediately before half time, Sandra Smisek found herself with the ball at her feet in a crowded midfield, and seeing Kerstin Garefrekes charging forward like a freight train, Smisek laid the ball off for her. The quick Koreans flew past Garefrekes but as the swarming flurry of red shirts tried to turn to meet her, Garefrekes cleared enough space in the middle of three Korean defenders to curl an unstoppable shot into the left post, putting Germany up at the half. Smisek set up Renate Lingor with another lay-off in traffic on a 1-2 play at the top of the box, which Lingor lofted into the far corner with no hope for the Korean keeper. The Germans bagged a third goal to ice the game and allow them to take off some key players when Melanie Behringer put a nasty corner into the box for Annike Krahn, who came in airborne crashing through the Korean back line and knocked the ball down with her thigh, bouncing off the line between a confounded Korean keeper and her far post defender.
The Koreans did get quick counters and poured on pressure whenever the Germans started to relax, but fell apart in front of goal. When the Germans did get it together, it was a sight to see... despite the speed of the Koreans, Melanie Behringer still got unreal separation on the left side to whip in crosses, and Sandra Smisek's quick combinations in traffic were nasty. The Koreans did lock down Birgit Prinz, invisible for the whole game, but Behringer and Smisek create too many nasty opportunities for unsung players... even Smisek's substitute nearly put Germany up 4-0 diving past the Korean back line to get her head on a Behringer cross. What really sank the Korean chances was the physical play of Nadine Angerer in goal, who endured at least two hard collisions with Korean strikers, flying in once like Superman and brushing away a striker like tissue paper, and taking one skull-to-skull shot that left a Korean down and Angerer on her feet looking for the rebound, her thick German skull apparently undented. Seeing the Wombat tangle with Angerer in a USA-Germany final would definitely be a blast.
Germany 3 - 0 North Korea
'44 Garefrekes
'67 Lingor
'72 Krahn
In the early going the Germans were off their game offensively, missing badly on their timing, and while they eventually started to get it together, they endured periodic bouts of sloppiness that a better finishing team than the North Koreans could have pounced on. Immediately before half time, Sandra Smisek found herself with the ball at her feet in a crowded midfield, and seeing Kerstin Garefrekes charging forward like a freight train, Smisek laid the ball off for her. The quick Koreans flew past Garefrekes but as the swarming flurry of red shirts tried to turn to meet her, Garefrekes cleared enough space in the middle of three Korean defenders to curl an unstoppable shot into the left post, putting Germany up at the half. Smisek set up Renate Lingor with another lay-off in traffic on a 1-2 play at the top of the box, which Lingor lofted into the far corner with no hope for the Korean keeper. The Germans bagged a third goal to ice the game and allow them to take off some key players when Melanie Behringer put a nasty corner into the box for Annike Krahn, who came in airborne crashing through the Korean back line and knocked the ball down with her thigh, bouncing off the line between a confounded Korean keeper and her far post defender.
The Koreans did get quick counters and poured on pressure whenever the Germans started to relax, but fell apart in front of goal. When the Germans did get it together, it was a sight to see... despite the speed of the Koreans, Melanie Behringer still got unreal separation on the left side to whip in crosses, and Sandra Smisek's quick combinations in traffic were nasty. The Koreans did lock down Birgit Prinz, invisible for the whole game, but Behringer and Smisek create too many nasty opportunities for unsung players... even Smisek's substitute nearly put Germany up 4-0 diving past the Korean back line to get her head on a Behringer cross. What really sank the Korean chances was the physical play of Nadine Angerer in goal, who endured at least two hard collisions with Korean strikers, flying in once like Superman and brushing away a striker like tissue paper, and taking one skull-to-skull shot that left a Korean down and Angerer on her feet looking for the rebound, her thick German skull apparently undented. Seeing the Wombat tangle with Angerer in a USA-Germany final would definitely be a blast.
Germany 3 - 0 North Korea
'44 Garefrekes
'67 Lingor
'72 Krahn
Friday, September 21, 2007
Group of Death: Dead by Dawn
With the US and North Korea matching each other shot for shot, Sweden and Nigeria came into today's games needing to win by three to be sure of advancing out of the group stage, which was exceedingly unlikely, but they both came out fighting... in Nigeria's case, almost literally. Meanwhile the US and North Korea were tied for the group lead and looking to avoid Germany in the quarterfinals. The US took the early lead off a Cat Whitehill throw-in flicked on by Abby Wambach into the path of Lori Chalupny, whose sliding shot took a handy deflection across the soggy ground into the corner to put the US up 1-0. It is still a bit odd after years of intimidation and bunkered down opponents to see the US field a counter-attacking team, but they ceded possession to Nigeria until they'd find space to blitz back into Nigeria's end. The shot that should have put this game out of reach came on a play like that at the end of the first half, as the entire US team sliced into the open spaces of the Nigerian defense, until a cross found Abby Wambach springing up in between the central defenders like a blonde cobra, but her header was weak and straight back into the arms of Nigeria keeper Precious Dede.
The US did hold on to the lead for the rest of the game, but with Sweden leading North Korea in the other game, the Nigerians had a shot and kept pressure up on the US, really bringing it in the last 15 minutes. I really thought they'd tie it up when Perpetua Nkwocha turned the corner on Cat Whitehill coming up the right side, but as Hope Solo came out to cut the angle, Nkwocha pushed it wide looking for the far post. The Nigerians are quick, and a ball across the box might have found a teammate, but there's too much individualism in the last third by African teams. They couldn't get anything past US keeper and clotheshorse Hope Solo, seen here with a message for quarterfinal opponents England. Sizzling in red, regal in green, but the royal blue jersey she wore in this game really brought out her eyes.
USA 1 – 0 Nigeria
'1 Chalupny
Sweden 2 – 1 North Korea
'4 Schelin
'22 Un Suk
'54 Schelin
With the Swedish win over North Korea, the US won the group of death, with the North Koreans joining them in the quarterfinals, which are as follows (paired by semi-final):
Germany v North Korea
Norway v China
USA v England
Brazil v Australia
The US did hold on to the lead for the rest of the game, but with Sweden leading North Korea in the other game, the Nigerians had a shot and kept pressure up on the US, really bringing it in the last 15 minutes. I really thought they'd tie it up when Perpetua Nkwocha turned the corner on Cat Whitehill coming up the right side, but as Hope Solo came out to cut the angle, Nkwocha pushed it wide looking for the far post. The Nigerians are quick, and a ball across the box might have found a teammate, but there's too much individualism in the last third by African teams. They couldn't get anything past US keeper and clotheshorse Hope Solo, seen here with a message for quarterfinal opponents England. Sizzling in red, regal in green, but the royal blue jersey she wore in this game really brought out her eyes.USA 1 – 0 Nigeria
'1 Chalupny
Sweden 2 – 1 North Korea
'4 Schelin
'22 Un Suk
'54 Schelin
With the Swedish win over North Korea, the US won the group of death, with the North Koreans joining them in the quarterfinals, which are as follows (paired by semi-final):
Germany v North Korea
Norway v China
USA v England
Brazil v Australia
Thursday, September 20, 2007
"So what do you do?"
I'm so sick of being asked “What do you do?” that before the Big Damn Wedding* I was going to come up with a lie, or multiple lies, to tell people, preferably obvious so I could later claim I was kidding. Of course I didn't, so here's my list so far, what do you guys think I should go with?**
1.What do I do? Well, let me put it this way, did you see that movie Desperado, where Antonio Banderas plays that mariachi with the wrecked hand who goes from town to town with a guitar case full of guns, shooting drug lords? Yeah, I just love that movie. Hey what's that over there?
2.I make home equity loans to homeless people using cardboard boxes as collateral, and then I package those loans into structured financial products, which I sell to hedge funds. It's not going too well at the moment, I'm afraid... hey, you don't have a copy of last Tuesday's WSJ, do you, because Amstelboy said I was mentioned in an editorial, and I used my copy to wrap up a dead fish I had sent to Ben Bernanke, and of course I didn't have time to read it first. The fish? Oh, that was a Sicilian message... it means “The US subprime lending market sleeps with the fishes.”
3.I'm a urologist. Why do you ask, do you need your prostate checked? No seriously, I have gloves out in my car, just come with me a minute. Wait, where are you going?
4.You know those awards at the Oscars nobody watches because nobody knows what the hell they are? Like have you seen the cinematography award handed out? No? Okay, then I'm an award winning director of photography, and you must have gotten up to go to the bathroom and missed my acceptance speech and bantering with Jon Stewart. Oh, it was such an obscure film even I don't remember what it was called, ha ha ha, that's my little joke... here, have some more champagne.
5.I was working on my PhD, but my theories on how every work in the English canon is about unusual sexual practices was too revolutionary for those assholes at... hey, where are you from? A small town in Connecticut? Like I said, those assholes at the University of Chicago drove me out of academia, so I'm in the midst of changing professions. I said Victor Frankenstein didn't create a monster, he was just out in Austria riding kangaroos and bare-backing Clerval, and they showed me the door. I'd take you down there and show you the campus, but unfortunately your upbringing in a quaint New England fishing village won't have prepared you for the South Side.
(This one I can run with, I really did submit that theory to multiple professors.)
6.I'm Vikadontis Rex, that purple dinosaur at Vikings games. Seriously, come to a game, I'll wave so you know it's me. If you know who that is, you're a Vikings fan, so have some more champagne and nexium (the purple pill).
7.I'm the air traffic controller at Burning Man. It's once a year, but it takes a lot of preparation, I'm building an airport in the desert FFS. Oh you were there? Well I was covered in mud the whole time, so you probably just didn't see me. Here, have some more peyote.
8.I was an inner city teacher until last week when I got stabbed again, and I decided to move on, so I'm just looking for new opportunities. You know, what with the stabbing, the attempted murder trial, and the multiple gangs who've got hits out on me since I was the only teacher brave enough to stand up to them and clean up the school, I'd really rather talk about something other than my employment in the last few years.
9.What do I do? Well what do you do? Why do I answer all questions with questions? Well let me ask you this, doesn't that sort of suggest to you what my job might be? Oh, so you would say I'm a therapist? So what do you think might have made you choose that conclusion? Are you not sure, or are you just not ready to talk about why that is? And do you want some more champagne?
10.I have a blog. What do you mean, that's not a job, do you know how much work it is to watch 32 women's soccer games and organize my insight and analysis in a timely way to create a valuable service to my readers and a platform for advertisers, all while contributing to the gross national product of this great country... but I guess you wouldn't understand that. (The first person who points out I do none of those things gets a 1-month ban from reading my blog.)
* - This and any other Big Damn Nouns are a reference to a show seen by few people, but beloved of almost all of them. It may be the TV equivalent of the Velvet Underground's last album, famously described this way: “only 5000 people bought “Loaded” in 1970 but each and every one of them went out and started a band.” Of course I can never remember who said that.
** - I'm just kidding, I know nobody's reading this.
1.What do I do? Well, let me put it this way, did you see that movie Desperado, where Antonio Banderas plays that mariachi with the wrecked hand who goes from town to town with a guitar case full of guns, shooting drug lords? Yeah, I just love that movie. Hey what's that over there?
2.I make home equity loans to homeless people using cardboard boxes as collateral, and then I package those loans into structured financial products, which I sell to hedge funds. It's not going too well at the moment, I'm afraid... hey, you don't have a copy of last Tuesday's WSJ, do you, because Amstelboy said I was mentioned in an editorial, and I used my copy to wrap up a dead fish I had sent to Ben Bernanke, and of course I didn't have time to read it first. The fish? Oh, that was a Sicilian message... it means “The US subprime lending market sleeps with the fishes.”
3.I'm a urologist. Why do you ask, do you need your prostate checked? No seriously, I have gloves out in my car, just come with me a minute. Wait, where are you going?
4.You know those awards at the Oscars nobody watches because nobody knows what the hell they are? Like have you seen the cinematography award handed out? No? Okay, then I'm an award winning director of photography, and you must have gotten up to go to the bathroom and missed my acceptance speech and bantering with Jon Stewart. Oh, it was such an obscure film even I don't remember what it was called, ha ha ha, that's my little joke... here, have some more champagne.
5.I was working on my PhD, but my theories on how every work in the English canon is about unusual sexual practices was too revolutionary for those assholes at... hey, where are you from? A small town in Connecticut? Like I said, those assholes at the University of Chicago drove me out of academia, so I'm in the midst of changing professions. I said Victor Frankenstein didn't create a monster, he was just out in Austria riding kangaroos and bare-backing Clerval, and they showed me the door. I'd take you down there and show you the campus, but unfortunately your upbringing in a quaint New England fishing village won't have prepared you for the South Side.
(This one I can run with, I really did submit that theory to multiple professors.)
6.I'm Vikadontis Rex, that purple dinosaur at Vikings games. Seriously, come to a game, I'll wave so you know it's me. If you know who that is, you're a Vikings fan, so have some more champagne and nexium (the purple pill).
7.I'm the air traffic controller at Burning Man. It's once a year, but it takes a lot of preparation, I'm building an airport in the desert FFS. Oh you were there? Well I was covered in mud the whole time, so you probably just didn't see me. Here, have some more peyote.
8.I was an inner city teacher until last week when I got stabbed again, and I decided to move on, so I'm just looking for new opportunities. You know, what with the stabbing, the attempted murder trial, and the multiple gangs who've got hits out on me since I was the only teacher brave enough to stand up to them and clean up the school, I'd really rather talk about something other than my employment in the last few years.
9.What do I do? Well what do you do? Why do I answer all questions with questions? Well let me ask you this, doesn't that sort of suggest to you what my job might be? Oh, so you would say I'm a therapist? So what do you think might have made you choose that conclusion? Are you not sure, or are you just not ready to talk about why that is? And do you want some more champagne?
10.I have a blog. What do you mean, that's not a job, do you know how much work it is to watch 32 women's soccer games and organize my insight and analysis in a timely way to create a valuable service to my readers and a platform for advertisers, all while contributing to the gross national product of this great country... but I guess you wouldn't understand that. (The first person who points out I do none of those things gets a 1-month ban from reading my blog.)
* - This and any other Big Damn Nouns are a reference to a show seen by few people, but beloved of almost all of them. It may be the TV equivalent of the Velvet Underground's last album, famously described this way: “only 5000 people bought “Loaded” in 1970 but each and every one of them went out and started a band.” Of course I can never remember who said that.
** - I'm just kidding, I know nobody's reading this.
Fix the F***ing Garage Door
I'd just like to take a moment to implore the people who maintain my building to find some way to keep the garage door opening and closing in a normal fashion, because whenever it breaks (which is often) it always seems to start a cascade of irritating events. For example, it only breaks down when I have hot food in the car, and often at times when cars start to pile up, and I have to wait five minutes with my reverse lights on for the genius behind me to do the math and figure out he needs to move his truck (it's only the SUV drivers who sit grinding their teeth apparently waiting for me to rev up the engine and drive my sedan through the door, the guy in a saab just waves and backs up). And backing up that incline blind over the sidewalk and back onto the street isn't a lot of fun either. My first opener worked for like a week before I had to replace it, by the way, and we're on our third design in four years (all three had about the same failure rate).
I'm obviously not the only one to have problems with the door, since about a week after people moved in to this building there was a giant dent in the door right where my right front bumper lines up, basically the exact point you'd hit if you shifted into reverse trying to back out, didn't get the clutch in fast enough, and rolled into the door. Or you were just an idiot and took your foot off the brake while looking for your garage door opener with your phone tucked against your shoulder.) I thought the worst was the time I came home at 1am and the door opener was broken so I just parked my car outside in guest parking, and the next morning at my association towed it to the street to resurface the drive. When I finally remembered my car, a meter maid, one of those damsels of damages, those ladies of levies, had left me a ticket, and she was a femme fatale of fines to swoop in right before I got there and write not one, but two tickets, leaving only one, so I could find out about the other one when I got angry letters from the county and phone calls from collection agents, and take a scenic trip to the courthouse to deal with it. Granted, a trip to the courthouse for me is less distance than Bruce Willis had to drag Mos Def in that awful, awful movie last year, but that was a truly irritating conclusion to the damn garage door not opening weeks earlier.
Today I may have it beat. As I came home with hot food, the door wouldn't open, so I got out to go in a side door, open the garage door manually, and try to dash into my car, start the engine, and drive under the door before it slammed down on my hood. It was a good plan, I think, but the side door wouldn't open either. So I parked in guest parking (after casting a wary glance for notices about towing) and tried to go in the front door... which of course wouldn't open either. So I went to the management office, and seeing that the front door to their building was propped open with a vice grip jammed under it, I had a bad feeling, which was confirmed by the staff: the whole system that controls all the doors was broken. So I sat outside in the sunshine and brightened up thinking it's at least a nice enough day to sit out here and eat my food, and I laughed off the recurring saga of our magic doors that would confound even Ali Baba's “Open, sez me.”
While that isn't so bad, a couple hours later I was sitting on my balcony, engrossed in a book, when it began to rain, but due to the overhang, I just enjoyed the quiet patter of rain next to me and the absorbing stillness that comes with heavy midwestern rain, and the invariable dazzle of lightning on the horizon. Then I just about jumped out of my goddamn chair when I was reminded that I live downtown, and lightning regularly hits within blocks, sending a sudden shock of superheated air echoing off the buildings with a crack in the same instant as a purple electric flash washes over the neighborhood in some sort of aggressive homage to Zeus and Jimi Hendrix. And still, the storms out here in the vast, lonely plains really are beautiful, like the one raging over the Twins-Black Sox game earlier this year. (Although my family's scottish terrier who stood chin-up to german shepherds ten times his size used to disappear under my bed in a spinning black flash and shivered in terror with his paws over his ears during big storms, so he might have offered an alternate opinion. Or at least a baleful roll of his eyes.)
Still not too bad, and you may notice I seem to have completely forgotten the topic of my finicky garage door... and so had I, forgetting about my car entirely. Then the tornado sirens went off, and I found the storm's charm abated rapidly. I went inside and turned on the TV, which was having some of the most interesting storm coverage I've seen in a while, like a meteorologist nervously adjusting his necktie and saying “Boy, there are some colors on that map we don't usually see!” Usually it goes from blue for rain, to green for heavy rain, to yellow, orange, and red as the wind and rain pick up and more things are lifted off the ground, but apparently there's purple, and then when they exhaust the rainbow they go to black and white patches to indicate which areas of the city are beyond rain and into golf-ball sized hail. There was also this spinning circle to indicate the deep knot of low pressure where the sky was spinning as it dipped it's way to earth, to let those people know to put their heads between their legs and kiss their asses goodbye. Oh, and a line to indicate the likely path of the tornado already on the ground ripping it's way across the southwest suburbs. In the studio they were collecting quarter sized hail from the ground outside and showing how big it was relative to a motorola razr (seriously, they couldn't use change or something everybody has handy?) and making helpful comments like “Yes, this will indeed fuck up your car.” I'm paraphrasing that last part, but it did make me suddenly remember my car... which I left outside because of the perennially malfunctioning garage door.
The tornado sirens had shut off temporarily so I ran out to move it (please nobody mention to my mother that I went outside in between tornado sirens) and waited for any brief appearance of a gap in the the increasingly large chunks of ice clattering on the steps outside. As the ice clattered off the top of my head (and the roof of my car) and buckets of water sloshed all the way through my clothes ten steps out the door, sheeting off the roof and into the car as I got in, all I could think was, “Motherf***ing garage door!” And as I peered through the sheets of water on my windshield pulling out onto the street, nearly getting clipped by some idiot in an SUV careening by as she raced home, I thought if the garage door was broken, I was just parking there in the driveway pausing only long enough to leave a note in the window for the management company reading “F*** you.”
Okay, that last bit proved unnecessary, and I try not to be hostile towards the staff over things that they keeping having to fix that really aren't their fault, like the previous garage door opener remote that they used to have to open up and fix with a screwdriver and a tweezers for me every couple of weeks. But the only garage door I've ever seen that was more of a constant source of aggravation than this one was at a place where I used to work, and that was because truck drivers (including one of the ones we employed) kept driving into the walls, taking out the supporting walls or ripping their doors off, or one time dropping a whole trailer without cranking the supports all the way down first (couldn't get that one out for weeks). Or there was my coworker who drove a box van into a mirror and ripped a hole in the roof, although that one was a rental and he got the hell out of their lot before they noticed (also he didn't shower, so they may have just told him to leave the keys on the floor and back away). More often they'd rip chunks off the roof header when they'd see the door open and just pull in, apparently figuring the signs listing the clearance as 13'4” and telling drivers to put their wheels back were just some sort of practical joke I'd concocted, like Ashton Kutcher was going to come running out, do some fake karate moves, and announce “Ha ha you moved your wheels and it's really 13'6”! You've been punked! It's two inches bigger... that's what she said!” Anyways, if you maintain an apartment building... just fix the f***ing garage door.
I'm obviously not the only one to have problems with the door, since about a week after people moved in to this building there was a giant dent in the door right where my right front bumper lines up, basically the exact point you'd hit if you shifted into reverse trying to back out, didn't get the clutch in fast enough, and rolled into the door. Or you were just an idiot and took your foot off the brake while looking for your garage door opener with your phone tucked against your shoulder.) I thought the worst was the time I came home at 1am and the door opener was broken so I just parked my car outside in guest parking, and the next morning at my association towed it to the street to resurface the drive. When I finally remembered my car, a meter maid, one of those damsels of damages, those ladies of levies, had left me a ticket, and she was a femme fatale of fines to swoop in right before I got there and write not one, but two tickets, leaving only one, so I could find out about the other one when I got angry letters from the county and phone calls from collection agents, and take a scenic trip to the courthouse to deal with it. Granted, a trip to the courthouse for me is less distance than Bruce Willis had to drag Mos Def in that awful, awful movie last year, but that was a truly irritating conclusion to the damn garage door not opening weeks earlier.
Today I may have it beat. As I came home with hot food, the door wouldn't open, so I got out to go in a side door, open the garage door manually, and try to dash into my car, start the engine, and drive under the door before it slammed down on my hood. It was a good plan, I think, but the side door wouldn't open either. So I parked in guest parking (after casting a wary glance for notices about towing) and tried to go in the front door... which of course wouldn't open either. So I went to the management office, and seeing that the front door to their building was propped open with a vice grip jammed under it, I had a bad feeling, which was confirmed by the staff: the whole system that controls all the doors was broken. So I sat outside in the sunshine and brightened up thinking it's at least a nice enough day to sit out here and eat my food, and I laughed off the recurring saga of our magic doors that would confound even Ali Baba's “Open, sez me.”
While that isn't so bad, a couple hours later I was sitting on my balcony, engrossed in a book, when it began to rain, but due to the overhang, I just enjoyed the quiet patter of rain next to me and the absorbing stillness that comes with heavy midwestern rain, and the invariable dazzle of lightning on the horizon. Then I just about jumped out of my goddamn chair when I was reminded that I live downtown, and lightning regularly hits within blocks, sending a sudden shock of superheated air echoing off the buildings with a crack in the same instant as a purple electric flash washes over the neighborhood in some sort of aggressive homage to Zeus and Jimi Hendrix. And still, the storms out here in the vast, lonely plains really are beautiful, like the one raging over the Twins-Black Sox game earlier this year. (Although my family's scottish terrier who stood chin-up to german shepherds ten times his size used to disappear under my bed in a spinning black flash and shivered in terror with his paws over his ears during big storms, so he might have offered an alternate opinion. Or at least a baleful roll of his eyes.)
Still not too bad, and you may notice I seem to have completely forgotten the topic of my finicky garage door... and so had I, forgetting about my car entirely. Then the tornado sirens went off, and I found the storm's charm abated rapidly. I went inside and turned on the TV, which was having some of the most interesting storm coverage I've seen in a while, like a meteorologist nervously adjusting his necktie and saying “Boy, there are some colors on that map we don't usually see!” Usually it goes from blue for rain, to green for heavy rain, to yellow, orange, and red as the wind and rain pick up and more things are lifted off the ground, but apparently there's purple, and then when they exhaust the rainbow they go to black and white patches to indicate which areas of the city are beyond rain and into golf-ball sized hail. There was also this spinning circle to indicate the deep knot of low pressure where the sky was spinning as it dipped it's way to earth, to let those people know to put their heads between their legs and kiss their asses goodbye. Oh, and a line to indicate the likely path of the tornado already on the ground ripping it's way across the southwest suburbs. In the studio they were collecting quarter sized hail from the ground outside and showing how big it was relative to a motorola razr (seriously, they couldn't use change or something everybody has handy?) and making helpful comments like “Yes, this will indeed fuck up your car.” I'm paraphrasing that last part, but it did make me suddenly remember my car... which I left outside because of the perennially malfunctioning garage door.
The tornado sirens had shut off temporarily so I ran out to move it (please nobody mention to my mother that I went outside in between tornado sirens) and waited for any brief appearance of a gap in the the increasingly large chunks of ice clattering on the steps outside. As the ice clattered off the top of my head (and the roof of my car) and buckets of water sloshed all the way through my clothes ten steps out the door, sheeting off the roof and into the car as I got in, all I could think was, “Motherf***ing garage door!” And as I peered through the sheets of water on my windshield pulling out onto the street, nearly getting clipped by some idiot in an SUV careening by as she raced home, I thought if the garage door was broken, I was just parking there in the driveway pausing only long enough to leave a note in the window for the management company reading “F*** you.”
Okay, that last bit proved unnecessary, and I try not to be hostile towards the staff over things that they keeping having to fix that really aren't their fault, like the previous garage door opener remote that they used to have to open up and fix with a screwdriver and a tweezers for me every couple of weeks. But the only garage door I've ever seen that was more of a constant source of aggravation than this one was at a place where I used to work, and that was because truck drivers (including one of the ones we employed) kept driving into the walls, taking out the supporting walls or ripping their doors off, or one time dropping a whole trailer without cranking the supports all the way down first (couldn't get that one out for weeks). Or there was my coworker who drove a box van into a mirror and ripped a hole in the roof, although that one was a rental and he got the hell out of their lot before they noticed (also he didn't shower, so they may have just told him to leave the keys on the floor and back away). More often they'd rip chunks off the roof header when they'd see the door open and just pull in, apparently figuring the signs listing the clearance as 13'4” and telling drivers to put their wheels back were just some sort of practical joke I'd concocted, like Ashton Kutcher was going to come running out, do some fake karate moves, and announce “Ha ha you moved your wheels and it's really 13'6”! You've been punked! It's two inches bigger... that's what she said!” Anyways, if you maintain an apartment building... just fix the f***ing garage door.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Norge 1 -1 Australia
I was really fired up to see the mother country in action as Norway, one of the world's top teams, took on the manic Australian side I'd seen jump up and down on Ghana. Especially after the opening goal I thought Norway was going to dominate this game in style, after they broke down the Aussies with overlapping runs into the box and tight, perfectly timed passing to set up this total “We're better, fuck you” goal finished off by Ragnhild Gulbrandsen. Norway's traditional style of play has been very direct using long passes to get past defenders, and this was a new look for them.
The Matildas didn't give up without a fight though, and kept banging away at the Norwegians, getting more of the run of play. Their strategy apparently involved resting star strikers in the first half, and bringing them on for fresh legs late in the game. The last time I remember seeing a line-up turn into such an attack machine so fast was in Euro2000 when France finished the final with a line-up full of strikers and attacking midfielders described as something out of a Nintendo game, but it worked for them, and it worked for Australia too when a long free kick brought Norway too far forward, and Lisa de Vanna took the clearance deep into Norwegian territory. The Norwegian back line raced back ahead of her, passing her and turning to get organized but found De Vanna pivoting to use them as a screen and set up a shot to the upper right corner that gave Norway's keeper no chance to get a hand on it. The Matildas kept going for the win, but the draw was good enough to leave them on top of Group C with a cushion going into their decisive game against Canada. The Norwegians can't be feeling too bad about their chances, since Ghana has been terrible, but today's result may pair them up with Brazil in the quarters.
Australia 1 - 1 Norway
'5 Gulbrandsen
'83 De Vanna
Australia 4pts +3
Norway 4pts +1
Canada 3pts +3
Ghana 0pts -7
The Matildas didn't give up without a fight though, and kept banging away at the Norwegians, getting more of the run of play. Their strategy apparently involved resting star strikers in the first half, and bringing them on for fresh legs late in the game. The last time I remember seeing a line-up turn into such an attack machine so fast was in Euro2000 when France finished the final with a line-up full of strikers and attacking midfielders described as something out of a Nintendo game, but it worked for them, and it worked for Australia too when a long free kick brought Norway too far forward, and Lisa de Vanna took the clearance deep into Norwegian territory. The Norwegian back line raced back ahead of her, passing her and turning to get organized but found De Vanna pivoting to use them as a screen and set up a shot to the upper right corner that gave Norway's keeper no chance to get a hand on it. The Matildas kept going for the win, but the draw was good enough to leave them on top of Group C with a cushion going into their decisive game against Canada. The Norwegians can't be feeling too bad about their chances, since Ghana has been terrible, but today's result may pair them up with Brazil in the quarters.
Australia 1 - 1 Norway
'5 Gulbrandsen
'83 De Vanna
Australia 4pts +3
Norway 4pts +1
Canada 3pts +3
Ghana 0pts -7
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Annoying Theatre Update: Jane Eyre surprisingly watchable
In the face of snide comments about my snooty pastimes, and because of the last play I saw, I just want to take a moment to rave about the Guthrie. Most recently I've seen Private Lives, 1776, and last Friday night, Jane Eyre, and it's on the basis of that last play that I really had to realize how impressed with the place I am, because I hated that rotten book so damn much. And yet, they somehow managed to stage a decent play out of such dire, dire source material, largely due to the talent of the cast, without a whole hell of a lot of help from Charlotte Bronte's idiotic story. Seriously, how about an ending that makes any damn sense instead of just plunging headlong into the woods and counting on supernatural nonsense to drag you back? It's an achievement to extract a workable performance out of that nonsense (although it's still a slow-paced play about the most miserable person on earth and opens with a seemingly endless montage of child abuse).
Of course, no offense is intended to a certain Oldtown resident and Charlotte Bronte aficionado, but unlike Amstelboy I think I only passed the Jane Eyre unit in junior high by writing a paper about one of her sister's books for extra credit. So I read two books while failing all the quizzes on one of them because I didn't bother with the schedule the rest of the class was on, but I feel I achieved a sort of moral victory by showing my disdain for that over-romanticized tripe. I also had a certain student affectionately known as Eyeballs to take the heat off of me, because while I would read an entire novel just to piss on the class, he would just piss on the class. Our combined strategies for handling the requirement to highlight key passages really didn't endear us to our instructor: I claimed there was nothing so momentous that I needed to highlight for in fear my little brain couldn't contain it, and he just highlighted random passages, because like me he could knock the book out in a couple hours if he had to. When nobody did their homework one day, and sternly keeping the laughter out of his voice he asked our teacher if she graded on a curve, I think he drew all her accumulated wrath for the next two months.
But leaving aside my tortured adolescence, I do love the new Guthrie. Part of the charm of it is the whole atmosphere of the new building, built as a modern tweak to the ruined mills around which the early life of this city revolved, inserting itself as the new heart of the Mill City, with giant, ghostly murals of the playwrights whose work gives life to the building. And it has created a whole new street life on Second Street of outdoor restaurants and cafes to go with the Guthrie's own Cue (try the sheepsmilk ricotta ravioli). I still can't walk the halls without pausing to examine all the backlit pictures of over 40 years of Guthrie productions, with the young faces of all those actors some famous some not shining out the dark blue walls, or without stepping out onto the endless bridge. All the windows that hint at all the nooks and crannies of bars, lounges, and classrooms throughout the building are all mirrored, reflecting to the street below an inverted image of all the theater goers peering out.
The eccentric thrust stage with its irregular aisles and multicolored seats and alpine slope was toned down a bit in its transfer from the old building, but still keeps it grounded as one of the United States' theatrical landmarks, and it stands out that much more for the new proscenium theater, exhibiting the restrained wit of England and the ardent pathos of Ireland in plays like Deirdre, Major Barbara, and most recently, Private Lives. There's been a zany, sparkling brilliance to the works I've seen on the thrust stage from the hilarious ensemble that managed to elicit tears of laughter and chills of patriotism in 1776, or the bright comedy with a dark heart they made of The Merchant of Venice. And after a year I still have yet to go to the third theater in the building, the realization of Joe Dowling's dream to bring the Guthrie Lab home and have a building that offers a venue for every type of stage: setting actors back behind the wall of the traditional proscenium arch, the vivid intimacy of the thrust stage, and the experimental Dowling Studio, where each play creates its own theater and its audience's place in it.
It's a cool place, is all I'm saying, and the next time any of my loyal readership (all three of you on a good day) are in town, come have a drink. Because blue... is the new black.
Of course, no offense is intended to a certain Oldtown resident and Charlotte Bronte aficionado, but unlike Amstelboy I think I only passed the Jane Eyre unit in junior high by writing a paper about one of her sister's books for extra credit. So I read two books while failing all the quizzes on one of them because I didn't bother with the schedule the rest of the class was on, but I feel I achieved a sort of moral victory by showing my disdain for that over-romanticized tripe. I also had a certain student affectionately known as Eyeballs to take the heat off of me, because while I would read an entire novel just to piss on the class, he would just piss on the class. Our combined strategies for handling the requirement to highlight key passages really didn't endear us to our instructor: I claimed there was nothing so momentous that I needed to highlight for in fear my little brain couldn't contain it, and he just highlighted random passages, because like me he could knock the book out in a couple hours if he had to. When nobody did their homework one day, and sternly keeping the laughter out of his voice he asked our teacher if she graded on a curve, I think he drew all her accumulated wrath for the next two months.
But leaving aside my tortured adolescence, I do love the new Guthrie. Part of the charm of it is the whole atmosphere of the new building, built as a modern tweak to the ruined mills around which the early life of this city revolved, inserting itself as the new heart of the Mill City, with giant, ghostly murals of the playwrights whose work gives life to the building. And it has created a whole new street life on Second Street of outdoor restaurants and cafes to go with the Guthrie's own Cue (try the sheepsmilk ricotta ravioli). I still can't walk the halls without pausing to examine all the backlit pictures of over 40 years of Guthrie productions, with the young faces of all those actors some famous some not shining out the dark blue walls, or without stepping out onto the endless bridge. All the windows that hint at all the nooks and crannies of bars, lounges, and classrooms throughout the building are all mirrored, reflecting to the street below an inverted image of all the theater goers peering out.
The eccentric thrust stage with its irregular aisles and multicolored seats and alpine slope was toned down a bit in its transfer from the old building, but still keeps it grounded as one of the United States' theatrical landmarks, and it stands out that much more for the new proscenium theater, exhibiting the restrained wit of England and the ardent pathos of Ireland in plays like Deirdre, Major Barbara, and most recently, Private Lives. There's been a zany, sparkling brilliance to the works I've seen on the thrust stage from the hilarious ensemble that managed to elicit tears of laughter and chills of patriotism in 1776, or the bright comedy with a dark heart they made of The Merchant of Venice. And after a year I still have yet to go to the third theater in the building, the realization of Joe Dowling's dream to bring the Guthrie Lab home and have a building that offers a venue for every type of stage: setting actors back behind the wall of the traditional proscenium arch, the vivid intimacy of the thrust stage, and the experimental Dowling Studio, where each play creates its own theater and its audience's place in it.
It's a cool place, is all I'm saying, and the next time any of my loyal readership (all three of you on a good day) are in town, come have a drink. Because blue... is the new black.
Again with the secret filming in sports...
I was really just kidding and looking for an opportunity to amuse myself making salacious comments when I said Tom Brady should have filmed something other than the Jets practice, but I did find the new sports spying story ironic in light of that. Apparently the Danish women's soccer team was holding a strategy session in a hotel conference room, and they all found it curious that there was a giant mirror in the room, like a police interrogation room, and some jokes were made about the Chinese having cameras on the other side to spy on the nefarious Danish soccer team. After having a big laugh, they discovered that there were in fact two Chinese soccer officials spying on their team meeting. This is funny (and sad) for several reasons, one being that a global power with nuclear weapons who allegedly recently tried to hack the Pentagon would turn out to be so bad at spying on people. Didn't they see Die Another Day when James Bond breaks the mirror in his Hong Kong hotel room because he's been on to the Chinese spying on him through it for like 40 years? What are they, the great and powerful Oz, begging Dorothy to pay no attention to the man behind the curtain?
It's also kind of funny to me that these magnificently fit women, all in the prime of their youth and in peak physical condition would hit town, under the all-seeing eye of the Chinese government, and when they went too far, this is the best excess they could come up with. There are certainly different cultural cliches to consider, but when I heard female athletes were being spied on, I remembered that basically every other time I've heard that in America, it wasn't secret cameras in the team meeting, it was holes drilled into the walls of the locker room. The mythical women's locker room that lurks in the fantasy life of the American male, in which lithe female athletes experience a permanent shortage of towels and air dry while they massage each other's sore muscles and rub lotion on each other's bodies until getting carried away experimenting sexually in a steamy group shower... apparently that fantasy doesn't rank so high in the Chinese mind. Seriously China, if you're going to invade people's privacy, couldn't you come up with anything better than checking out marking assignments on corner kicks?
FIFA's reaction is the truly sad part... they suspended Denmark's coach. He said some things they found intolerable, but frankly, unless he threatened to rape their children, I can't think of anything he could have said that I would find objectionable when said in response to FIFA's decision to ignore the issue. As I said before, quoting David Stern, the entire point of sport is that everyone agrees to a set of rules and limitations, and I believe this is what separates sport from other competitions (like seeing who can roll the most tanks through Belgium) and makes it one of the safety valves of world culture. If the Chinese don't get that it's a game, why are we even bothering to play with them? I would guess FIFA's decision almost certainly has to do with a lucrative Olympic soccer tournament on the horizon and an ongoing tournament, but if they ever host another soccer event after skating on this, FIFA and the Asian Football Confederation are nuts.
It's also kind of funny to me that these magnificently fit women, all in the prime of their youth and in peak physical condition would hit town, under the all-seeing eye of the Chinese government, and when they went too far, this is the best excess they could come up with. There are certainly different cultural cliches to consider, but when I heard female athletes were being spied on, I remembered that basically every other time I've heard that in America, it wasn't secret cameras in the team meeting, it was holes drilled into the walls of the locker room. The mythical women's locker room that lurks in the fantasy life of the American male, in which lithe female athletes experience a permanent shortage of towels and air dry while they massage each other's sore muscles and rub lotion on each other's bodies until getting carried away experimenting sexually in a steamy group shower... apparently that fantasy doesn't rank so high in the Chinese mind. Seriously China, if you're going to invade people's privacy, couldn't you come up with anything better than checking out marking assignments on corner kicks?
FIFA's reaction is the truly sad part... they suspended Denmark's coach. He said some things they found intolerable, but frankly, unless he threatened to rape their children, I can't think of anything he could have said that I would find objectionable when said in response to FIFA's decision to ignore the issue. As I said before, quoting David Stern, the entire point of sport is that everyone agrees to a set of rules and limitations, and I believe this is what separates sport from other competitions (like seeing who can roll the most tanks through Belgium) and makes it one of the safety valves of world culture. If the Chinese don't get that it's a game, why are we even bothering to play with them? I would guess FIFA's decision almost certainly has to do with a lucrative Olympic soccer tournament on the horizon and an ongoing tournament, but if they ever host another soccer event after skating on this, FIFA and the Asian Football Confederation are nuts.
Danmark 2 – 0 Aotearoa
I'm starting to really like New Zealand, because they're so young and yet so gutsy. You can see the difference between them and their opponents just from a look at their faces or their bodies as they run, it's a team who are very much still girls standing up to some very formidable women. Seventeen year old Ria Percival is sprinting around in these yellow boots like a paddington bear, and they're all just so adorable. They're in way over their heads, but there's still this joy at playing the game that came shining through every time they held off another attack by the Danes. I'm really pulling for them to bag a goal against China before they go home.
In the first half, the Kiwis bunkered down and held off the Danes, with the best opportunities for both teams coming on the same run of play, when a miscue by a New Zealand defender led to a Danish corner. After a dangerous flick into traffic in front of goal, the kiwis cleared it but two midfielders collided fighting to bring down the clearance, and Emily McColl swooped in for it, burning into the Danish half but then slamming on the brakes and turning to maintain possession when she realized she had no support and no targets, fighting off multiple Danish midfielders. By the time her teammates got forward, the Danes had dispossessed McColl and the onrushing New Zealanders had left a lot of open space behind them, leading to a Danish counter-counter-attack. The Danes in true Scandinavian form used the long ball to try to squeeze in behind the New Zealand defense, getting some opportunities out of it.
To keep a clean sheet in the first half, kiwi keeper Jenny Bindon wore her ovaries on the outside, coming way off her line and out of the box to play long balls by the Danes, beating strikers to them by a half yard to make clearances with her feet. So far I haven't seen a keeper take control of the penalty area as authoritatively as Bindon did, covering for an inexperienced defense, as well as coming out and hauling down crosses and corners cleanly in amongst the forest of Danish attackers. She was also clearly having a hell of a good time, and so was I watching her. But eventually making that many risky plays off her line had to come back to haunt her, and when Bindon arrived late on a challenge outside the box, she was lucky one of her defenders hauled down the Danish attacker and drew a yellow card that could easily have gone to Bindon for sweeping out her opponent's legs. Bindon surprised me by getting a hand on the free kick by Katrine Pedersen, but could do little more than deflect it up into the top netting, and the Danes took a 1-0 lead after an hour.
After the hour mark, the kiwis were starting to show their youth and were visibly tired the rest of the way, while the Danes switched tactics a little and started using more controlled passes to break down the sagging New Zealand defense. A few minutes later, the Danes won another free kick, and Pedersen's kick to the far post found Paaske Sorensen beating her marker to get a head on it. Another kiwi defender mistimed her jump for a clearance, and Sorensen's header went back across the face of the goal to the other post, giving no chance for Bindon to get to it. I have to give the kiwis credit though, tired and discouraged as they had to be, within a minute they were right back swirling around the Danish box, tongues wagging but still looking to score. Young and outmatched, but these girls were still class.
Denmark 2 – 0 New Zealand
'60 Pedersen
'66 Sorensen
In the first half, the Kiwis bunkered down and held off the Danes, with the best opportunities for both teams coming on the same run of play, when a miscue by a New Zealand defender led to a Danish corner. After a dangerous flick into traffic in front of goal, the kiwis cleared it but two midfielders collided fighting to bring down the clearance, and Emily McColl swooped in for it, burning into the Danish half but then slamming on the brakes and turning to maintain possession when she realized she had no support and no targets, fighting off multiple Danish midfielders. By the time her teammates got forward, the Danes had dispossessed McColl and the onrushing New Zealanders had left a lot of open space behind them, leading to a Danish counter-counter-attack. The Danes in true Scandinavian form used the long ball to try to squeeze in behind the New Zealand defense, getting some opportunities out of it.
To keep a clean sheet in the first half, kiwi keeper Jenny Bindon wore her ovaries on the outside, coming way off her line and out of the box to play long balls by the Danes, beating strikers to them by a half yard to make clearances with her feet. So far I haven't seen a keeper take control of the penalty area as authoritatively as Bindon did, covering for an inexperienced defense, as well as coming out and hauling down crosses and corners cleanly in amongst the forest of Danish attackers. She was also clearly having a hell of a good time, and so was I watching her. But eventually making that many risky plays off her line had to come back to haunt her, and when Bindon arrived late on a challenge outside the box, she was lucky one of her defenders hauled down the Danish attacker and drew a yellow card that could easily have gone to Bindon for sweeping out her opponent's legs. Bindon surprised me by getting a hand on the free kick by Katrine Pedersen, but could do little more than deflect it up into the top netting, and the Danes took a 1-0 lead after an hour.
After the hour mark, the kiwis were starting to show their youth and were visibly tired the rest of the way, while the Danes switched tactics a little and started using more controlled passes to break down the sagging New Zealand defense. A few minutes later, the Danes won another free kick, and Pedersen's kick to the far post found Paaske Sorensen beating her marker to get a head on it. Another kiwi defender mistimed her jump for a clearance, and Sorensen's header went back across the face of the goal to the other post, giving no chance for Bindon to get to it. I have to give the kiwis credit though, tired and discouraged as they had to be, within a minute they were right back swirling around the Danish box, tongues wagging but still looking to score. Young and outmatched, but these girls were still class.
Denmark 2 – 0 New Zealand
'60 Pedersen
'66 Sorensen
Monday, September 17, 2007
Group of Death Day Two
USA 2 – 0 Sverige
'34 Wambach (pen)
'58 Wambach
Against North Korea the big story was the Wombat, Abby Wambach, leaving the game to get a gigantic gash in the back of her head stitched up so it wouldn't gush blood into her eyes, and the rush to get her back. Today she lived up to some of that attention, cracking Sweden to put the US on top of the Group of Death, in a game that was a lot more evenly matched than I would have expected. Ultimately the Swedes just got outplayed, and Abby Wambach appeared to be a big part of the difference, converting a penalty in the first half and just accelerating between two defenders to pound a cross home on the second half goal.
조선민주주의인민공화국 2 – 0 Nigeria
'16 Kim
'21 Ri
The North Koreans are quick: they're quick to get bodies up into the box, and they're quick to get back, swarming to the ball on defense. The Nigerians lined up defensively but didn't show much of a counter-attacking strategy, and didn't have the speed or desire to get forward faster than the Koreans could get back. Eventually they did start to push more players forward when the Koreans had them down 2-0 so early, but failed to make the passes they needed to get around the Korean defense, players were holding the ball too long trying to beat four defenders on their own and getting closed down. That kind of individualism has been killing the African Cup of Nations on the men's side where everybody's trying to sign a big contract in Europe, and it's sad to see such a lack of organization and teamwork when there's so much talent in Africa.
North Korea didn't get too organized on offense either, but got enough possession in the last third to create opportunities, particularly by winning corner kicks. On the first, Kim Kyong Hwa scored directly off the corner, exposing one of Nigeria's weaknesses: their keeper Precious “What's in my Pocket?” Dede has a tendency to go on walkabout, in this case straying from the back post and allowing Kim's corner to swing in. The second goal was off a corner as well, when nobody picked up Ri Kum Suk on the back side, and Dede and her defenders left the far post unguarded as well.
Group of Death
USA 4pts +2
PRK 4pts +2
SWE 1pt -2
NGA 1pt - 2
The Swedes can advance by staying organized on set pieces, and most importantly by putting the ball in the air to get behind the Koreans. I can't see Nigeria pulling the upset on the USA, who will go through, but they really need to outperform the Koreans to clinch first place and avoid the Germans in the quarterfinal.
'34 Wambach (pen)
'58 Wambach
Against North Korea the big story was the Wombat, Abby Wambach, leaving the game to get a gigantic gash in the back of her head stitched up so it wouldn't gush blood into her eyes, and the rush to get her back. Today she lived up to some of that attention, cracking Sweden to put the US on top of the Group of Death, in a game that was a lot more evenly matched than I would have expected. Ultimately the Swedes just got outplayed, and Abby Wambach appeared to be a big part of the difference, converting a penalty in the first half and just accelerating between two defenders to pound a cross home on the second half goal.
조선민주주의인민공화국 2 – 0 Nigeria
'16 Kim
'21 Ri
The North Koreans are quick: they're quick to get bodies up into the box, and they're quick to get back, swarming to the ball on defense. The Nigerians lined up defensively but didn't show much of a counter-attacking strategy, and didn't have the speed or desire to get forward faster than the Koreans could get back. Eventually they did start to push more players forward when the Koreans had them down 2-0 so early, but failed to make the passes they needed to get around the Korean defense, players were holding the ball too long trying to beat four defenders on their own and getting closed down. That kind of individualism has been killing the African Cup of Nations on the men's side where everybody's trying to sign a big contract in Europe, and it's sad to see such a lack of organization and teamwork when there's so much talent in Africa.
North Korea didn't get too organized on offense either, but got enough possession in the last third to create opportunities, particularly by winning corner kicks. On the first, Kim Kyong Hwa scored directly off the corner, exposing one of Nigeria's weaknesses: their keeper Precious “What's in my Pocket?” Dede has a tendency to go on walkabout, in this case straying from the back post and allowing Kim's corner to swing in. The second goal was off a corner as well, when nobody picked up Ri Kum Suk on the back side, and Dede and her defenders left the far post unguarded as well.
Group of Death
USA 4pts +2
PRK 4pts +2
SWE 1pt -2
NGA 1pt - 2
The Swedes can advance by staying organized on set pieces, and most importantly by putting the ball in the air to get behind the Koreans. I can't see Nigeria pulling the upset on the USA, who will go through, but they really need to outperform the Koreans to clinch first place and avoid the Germans in the quarterfinal.
Sunday, September 16, 2007
Lions 20 - 17 Vikings
In the second week of the season the Vikings and Lions gave to me:
19 penalties
7 interceptions
6 sacked passers
5 GOLD RINGS
3 recovered fumbles
2 injured QBs
2 missed field goals
1 defensive touchdown
and a really strange overtime loss
Seriously I don't know what the fuck that was all about, but I'm sure glad it's over.
19 penalties
7 interceptions
6 sacked passers
5 GOLD RINGS
3 recovered fumbles
2 injured QBs
2 missed field goals
1 defensive touchdown
and a really strange overtime loss
Seriously I don't know what the fuck that was all about, but I'm sure glad it's over.
日本国 1 – 0 Argentina
This was a lackluster game between two teams with no real distinctive style, so I can't say I paid too close attention to it, until the end when Argentina started making some slip-ups in injury time. In injury time, Japan found Kinga wide open at the upper right corner of the penalty area, with acres of space to settle and take a shot, which she put right on the ground right into the path of the slumping Argentine keeper. Unfortunately, as in many of these games, the keeper gave up a rebound as the ball dribbled back out of her arms, and the Japanese were the most alert in crashing the box, with Yuki Nagasato finishing it off. Continuing another theme, Nagasato headed a Miyama free kick into the post, barely missing putting Japan up 2-0, which could be critical, since England and Japan are likely to end up going down to goal differential to determine who advances out of their group along with Germany. And really, if they can't put away Argentina, the Japanese don't belong in the next round anyways.
Japan 1 – 0 Argentina
'90+ Nagasato
Japan 1 – 0 Argentina
'90+ Nagasato
Ligers 4 -3 Twins (gosh!)
Once again, the curse of Brad Radke struck the Twins, and their worst inning was the first, in which Johan Santana gave up all of the Tigers' runs. A lot of Twins games I've been to recently have had this pattern where they blow the first inning and then win the next seven, but unfortunately still lose the game. Crazy stuff continues to happen, providing entertainment, like in the seventh when the Twins hit into two double plays... with runners on first and second and one out, Jason Kubel hit into what should have been a 163 double play, but due to a high throw the Tigers missed getting Bartlett at second, and Kubel beat the throw to first. Since the Tigers expected the double play to end the inning, nobody was paying attention to Nick Punto at second so he just came home. Then Joe Mauer killed the rally hitting into another double play. It's kind of rough having a guy who's whole raison d'etre is hitting ground balls over second base when the whole league has him figured out. I had a good feeling when the dregs of the line-up were doing well, Punto had a couple hits and advanced a runner on a deep fly on his only out, and Luis Rodriguez hit a double for the power-challenged Twins, but it was not meant to be. On the plus side, the polka room at Nye's was really hopping after the game.
W - Bazardo
L - Santana
SV - Jones
W - Bazardo
L - Santana
SV - Jones
Saturday, September 15, 2007
中国 v Danmark
Despite a real serious slump in recent years, the Chinese dominated the early going on this game in the form I remember from the great Chinese team in 1999, swarming around the ball like bees: small, yellow, highly organized, and deadly. I saw Denmark play live once back in New York in '99, when the over-matched Danes lost the opener to the US, and a slew of cute little blonde Danish girls with red and white flags on their cheeks spent the afternoon commiserating with the slew of cute little Mexican girls with red, white, and green flags on their cheeks as the Tricolores got stomped by Brazil. I had to feel a little sympathy for the Danes opening against the hosts yet again. The Chinese took the lead on a free kick by Li Jie, proving again how important set pieces and long shots are, which may be why I like the women's game so much: tactical fouls are not good strategy with keepers that can't get to the corners on the resultant free kick.
The rest of this game proved the adage that the most vulnerable time for a team is immediately after they've scored a goal. It also highlighted some of the difference in style of play for me, when Bi Yan scored the second Chinese goal through controlled short passes in the midfield, setting up Bi in space for a dipping shot from 25 yards out. The Danes got back upfield quickly, winning a corner, and Anne Got Eggers Nielsen took advantage of indecision by the keeper to head a ball back across into the net. The Danes played a much more up-tempo Scandinavian game after that, keeping the ball in the air making long passes and looking for headers, and it paid off late in the game when Paaske Sorensen headed a cross off a Chinese player and into the goal to tie it up at 2-2. Even a draw against the hosts would be a huge upset for the Danes, but again, another goal came within seconds, on a long shot by Xiaoli Song at the top of the box when nobody closed her down.
I was crushed, because I was really pulling for the Danes with the upset to make things interesting in some of these silly groups FIFA drew up, but if you don't close down players at the top of the box, you're going to have some problems.
China 3 – 2 Denmark
'30 Li
'50 Bi
'51 Nielsen
'87 Sorensen
'88 Song
Disclaimer: By “yellow” I of course am referring to the yellow stripes on their shiny red uniforms. And if I got anybody's name backwards, I apologize but I'm working off of American TV, where sometimes they say Asian names the Asian way, sometimes the Western, and occasionally even the players in Western leagues give up and just switch them around or just don't fuss about it (see Zheng Haixa and Yao Ming).
The rest of this game proved the adage that the most vulnerable time for a team is immediately after they've scored a goal. It also highlighted some of the difference in style of play for me, when Bi Yan scored the second Chinese goal through controlled short passes in the midfield, setting up Bi in space for a dipping shot from 25 yards out. The Danes got back upfield quickly, winning a corner, and Anne Got Eggers Nielsen took advantage of indecision by the keeper to head a ball back across into the net. The Danes played a much more up-tempo Scandinavian game after that, keeping the ball in the air making long passes and looking for headers, and it paid off late in the game when Paaske Sorensen headed a cross off a Chinese player and into the goal to tie it up at 2-2. Even a draw against the hosts would be a huge upset for the Danes, but again, another goal came within seconds, on a long shot by Xiaoli Song at the top of the box when nobody closed her down.
I was crushed, because I was really pulling for the Danes with the upset to make things interesting in some of these silly groups FIFA drew up, but if you don't close down players at the top of the box, you're going to have some problems.
China 3 – 2 Denmark
'30 Li
'50 Bi
'51 Nielsen
'87 Sorensen
'88 Song
Disclaimer: By “yellow” I of course am referring to the yellow stripes on their shiny red uniforms. And if I got anybody's name backwards, I apologize but I'm working off of American TV, where sometimes they say Asian names the Asian way, sometimes the Western, and occasionally even the players in Western leagues give up and just switch them around or just don't fuss about it (see Zheng Haixa and Yao Ming).
Australia 4 -1 Ghana
There sure were some quick girls in this game, especially Anita Amankwa and Sarah Walsh running around behind both defenses and scaring the hell out of every one, and Florence Okoe and Lisa de Vanna did quite a job setting them (and themselves) up on some nice runs. Unfortunately, the Ghanaians didn't get forward with much support on counters in the first half, and the Australians didn't get much support for Walsh when she burned Ghana up the flanks. When the Matildas did get up into the box, they were able to lay off a cross for Walsh with space to to settle and shoot, with Ghana's keeper screened by her own defenders. The Matildas continued to push on Ghana's defensive formation until halftime.
In the second half this game burst into an end to end shoot-out, with Australia getting the better of it by far, but with the emergence of Amankwa as a serious threat for the Black Queens. I have no idea how Australia got their second goal, because ESPN cut away to show goals from the Brazil game, but the Matildas were clearly getting better organized and getting some players up into the box, and Heather Garriock flicked a cross off her head to the back post off her head to put the Aussies up 3-0. Then it really started to get interesting, as Anita Amankwa ran on to a chip over the Aussie defense, showing some nice tactical sense holding up and cutting behind the last defender to shoot around her, screened from the keeper, and got one back for Ghana, and she nearly tied it up moments later getting free again, only to be nearly tackled to the ground by Aussie keeper Melissa Barbieri. For the next stretch of the game Amankwa and Lisa de Vanna traded shots running in behind each other's defenses, until the Australians made an-off target pass intended for De Vanna, and no doubt due to miscommunication by exhausted Ghana defenders nobody chased it down, the keeper came way off her line for it but didn't get to it before De Vanna did, and Australia went up 4-1 scoring o the empty net. Walsh should have made it 5-1 in injury time, but after burning the defense got in too close to the keeper and lost the ball.
So at long last, five time World Cup participant Australia finally popped their cherry and won a game. Since I'm pulling for the mother country (Norge) in this group, I'm concerned about the speed of Walsh in turning the corner, but I really hope they finally get a proper league going again in the US to get players like Amankwa playing on a bigger stage.
Australia 4 – 1 Ghana
'15 Sarah Walsh
'57 De Vanna
'69 Garriock
'70 Amankwa
'81 De Vanna
In the second half this game burst into an end to end shoot-out, with Australia getting the better of it by far, but with the emergence of Amankwa as a serious threat for the Black Queens. I have no idea how Australia got their second goal, because ESPN cut away to show goals from the Brazil game, but the Matildas were clearly getting better organized and getting some players up into the box, and Heather Garriock flicked a cross off her head to the back post off her head to put the Aussies up 3-0. Then it really started to get interesting, as Anita Amankwa ran on to a chip over the Aussie defense, showing some nice tactical sense holding up and cutting behind the last defender to shoot around her, screened from the keeper, and got one back for Ghana, and she nearly tied it up moments later getting free again, only to be nearly tackled to the ground by Aussie keeper Melissa Barbieri. For the next stretch of the game Amankwa and Lisa de Vanna traded shots running in behind each other's defenses, until the Australians made an-off target pass intended for De Vanna, and no doubt due to miscommunication by exhausted Ghana defenders nobody chased it down, the keeper came way off her line for it but didn't get to it before De Vanna did, and Australia went up 4-1 scoring o the empty net. Walsh should have made it 5-1 in injury time, but after burning the defense got in too close to the keeper and lost the ball.
So at long last, five time World Cup participant Australia finally popped their cherry and won a game. Since I'm pulling for the mother country (Norge) in this group, I'm concerned about the speed of Walsh in turning the corner, but I really hope they finally get a proper league going again in the US to get players like Amankwa playing on a bigger stage.
Australia 4 – 1 Ghana
'15 Sarah Walsh
'57 De Vanna
'69 Garriock
'70 Amankwa
'81 De Vanna
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Why couldn't you just make a sex tape like a normal person, Tom Brady?
Tom Brady is famous for having three Superbowl rings and two very deep notches on his bedpost, Bridget Moynahan and Giselle Bundchen (who has cut a few notches of her own). Given the celebrity sex tapes that circulate as soon as we get bored or a rich girl with more connections than talent decides she should be famous (who the the fuck is Kim Kardashian?) and has her unkempt parolee boyfriend film her acting bored while going down on him. (I probably shouldn't be so familiar with this genre but there's something fascinating and amusing about how boring these women are even in bed.) I would think that the sexy sidekick of such films as I, Robot and The Recruit would be a prime candidate to leak a tape and come off strong off of childbirth, especially since she had Tom Brady to film it. Working off the pregnancy weight and getting naked worked for Charisma Carpenter... okay, maybe not so much.
I think there are any number of reasonable objections to this, because it turns out Tom Brady has been making videotapes, and he wasn't gentlemanly about it either. He was filming people without their consent, when they believed no one was watching, and then he went out and shared it with his teammates. The really sick thing is he wasn't filming himself with Giselle and Bridget. (I guess that should be “or”, but I prefer my way.) No, that filthy bastard was filming the New York Jets.
Before I get more Tom Brady related flames from strangers who've googled my blog*, Brady wasn't making sex tapes with the New York Sack Exchange, his team was just filming other team's practices to steal their defensive signals, but the Patriots are in deep shit over this (and it's more amusing to me to picture Peeping Tom Brady and his camcorder than an underpaid, faceless scout and his unpaid intern doing it). This calls into question the unlikely continued dominance of the New England Patriots. When the outcome of a football game is determined by things that happen off the field, and results are retroactively reversed so the win you paid money to see was actually a loss... that's death to a sport. So what really makes me angry is that with access to Bridget Moynahan and Giselle Bundchen, he could have at a stroke dramatically improved the quality of celebrity sex tapes, but instead he made videotapes that ruined football... what the hell is wrong with him?
The other reason I'm so upset is if it wasn't for the Patriots stealing their defensive signals, the Vikings might have lost by less than 24 points in that godawful game last year where my back was killing me and some drunk woman screamed at me for leaving early as I limped up the stairs because I couldn't sit up straight and the muscles on my left side were locking up. Now that was a miserable day... and I blame Tom Brady.
*-I made a brief entry last spring on Brady's reported status as fertility god, and I was kind of shocked to find irascible strangers arguing about it in the comments section.
I think there are any number of reasonable objections to this, because it turns out Tom Brady has been making videotapes, and he wasn't gentlemanly about it either. He was filming people without their consent, when they believed no one was watching, and then he went out and shared it with his teammates. The really sick thing is he wasn't filming himself with Giselle and Bridget. (I guess that should be “or”, but I prefer my way.) No, that filthy bastard was filming the New York Jets.
Before I get more Tom Brady related flames from strangers who've googled my blog*, Brady wasn't making sex tapes with the New York Sack Exchange, his team was just filming other team's practices to steal their defensive signals, but the Patriots are in deep shit over this (and it's more amusing to me to picture Peeping Tom Brady and his camcorder than an underpaid, faceless scout and his unpaid intern doing it). This calls into question the unlikely continued dominance of the New England Patriots. When the outcome of a football game is determined by things that happen off the field, and results are retroactively reversed so the win you paid money to see was actually a loss... that's death to a sport. So what really makes me angry is that with access to Bridget Moynahan and Giselle Bundchen, he could have at a stroke dramatically improved the quality of celebrity sex tapes, but instead he made videotapes that ruined football... what the hell is wrong with him?
The other reason I'm so upset is if it wasn't for the Patriots stealing their defensive signals, the Vikings might have lost by less than 24 points in that godawful game last year where my back was killing me and some drunk woman screamed at me for leaving early as I limped up the stairs because I couldn't sit up straight and the muscles on my left side were locking up. Now that was a miserable day... and I blame Tom Brady.
*-I made a brief entry last spring on Brady's reported status as fertility god, and I was kind of shocked to find irascible strangers arguing about it in the comments section.
Brasil 5 - 0 Aotearoa
I never would have thought the All-Whites could hang with Brazil, but they kept it close in the first half by staying organized on defense, while Brazil kept breaking down in the last third, kind of a common problem in the early games of this tournament: lots of long shots, but poor teamwork and timing on passes. (One exception was Germany running up the score on Argentina.) Daniela took a long, dipping shot early on to slip one over Kiwi keeper Jenny Bindon and put Brazil up 1-0, but the Brazilians looked a bit clumsy throughout the rest of the half. New Zealand bunkered down and held them off for quite a while, but could barely hint at a counterattack.
Over the course of the second half, the Brazilians started to get their act together with better teamwork, and started taking advantage of the growing exhaustion of the All-Whites, who no longer had the energy to venture out of their own half. With her defenders wilting and failing to close on Brazilian strikers, four more went past Bindon to make it a blow out. New Zealand has a very young team, as one can tell from one look at their freshly scrubbed little faces, so I look forward to more from them since as the Queens of Oceania, they'll be a fixture in every WWC until FIFA gets a clue and folds them into Asia. Brazil better pick it up a bit if they're going to be a credible threat in this tournament, though.
Brazil 5 – 0 New Zealand
'11 Daniela
'54 Cristiane
'73 Marta
'86 Renata
'90+ Marta
Over the course of the second half, the Brazilians started to get their act together with better teamwork, and started taking advantage of the growing exhaustion of the All-Whites, who no longer had the energy to venture out of their own half. With her defenders wilting and failing to close on Brazilian strikers, four more went past Bindon to make it a blow out. New Zealand has a very young team, as one can tell from one look at their freshly scrubbed little faces, so I look forward to more from them since as the Queens of Oceania, they'll be a fixture in every WWC until FIFA gets a clue and folds them into Asia. Brazil better pick it up a bit if they're going to be a credible threat in this tournament, though.
Brazil 5 – 0 New Zealand
'11 Daniela
'54 Cristiane
'73 Marta
'86 Renata
'90+ Marta
England 2 - 2 日本国
That was certainly a puzzling result for what I would have thought were two "real happy to be here teams". In such a lop-sided group, the winner of this game was certain to join Germany in the second round, now it will come down to goal difference against Germany and Argentina, barring some sort of miracle. In truth I may have underestimated England, and their core of Arsenal Ladies. England absolutely dominated the run of play, to a greater degree as the game went on, but still gave up the first goal early in the second half on a free kick from 23 yards by Aya Miyama. After that, the Three Lionesses really kept hammering away at Japan, with Arsenal striker and fit brunette Karen Carney really controlling play up the right wing, but through eighty minutes England absolutely could not finish. Given great opportunities, balls went over the crossbar, were headed wide, or were just sent weakly back into Japan keeper Miho Fukimoto's arms, as England squandered a ridiculous number of chances.
I don't know what kind of politics put Eniola Aluko up front for England, but after she came off, Arsenal striker Kelly Smith took a through ball into the box, and pivoting on her feet in traffic and holding off Japanese defenders, turned and fired past Fukimoto into the corner to put England back in it. Two minutes later, Smith cracked the Japanese defense again, and after trying to fake out Fukimoto from an oblique angle, tried to power a shot past her off her left foot, and when Fukimoto couldn't handle the ball, Smith pounded the rebound back at the corner with her right foot, deflecting off Fukimoto's feet and into the back of the net. After each score, in a move likely to spur foot fetishes in England for years to come, Smith took off her boots and kissed them in celebration, which actually isn't much weirder than some of the other things the English do to celebrate (Robbie Fowler snorting the end line at Goodison Park comes to mind).
England had some problems to finish the game, starting when keeper Rachel Brown took a rough collision in injury time. Apparently England's cupboard is equally bare of keepers on the women's side (Brown was trained at Pitt) and the somewhat woozy looking Brown stayed in, nearly giving the store away when she tossed the restart right back into the path of a Japanese player. A couple minutes later with time running out, Japan was awarded a controversial free kick, and Kelly Smith got herself a yellow card attempting to run down the clock further, when England can't afford to go without Kelly Smith. Miyama's kick was out of the reach of Brown, but from the confines of my armchair it appeared she might have been a bit slow to react and not well positioned. On the other hand, Miyama had a couple nasty free kicks, and those kinds of set pieces are an even bigger weapon in the women's game where the goal plays a little wider. From my armchair it also looked like the foul could have gone either way as well, so while England whine every time they lose, this time they might have a case: the Three Lionesses got screwed. I hope they pull through, because given the choice of seeing more of Karen Carney and Rachel Brown in shorts vs Eriko Arakawa's J-fro, I'm rooting for the English ladies.
England 2 -2 Japan
'55 Miyama
'81 Smith
'83 Smith
'90+ Miyama
Germany 3pts +11 11 - 0
England 1pt 0 2 - 2
Japan 1pt 0 2 - 2
Argentina 0pts -11 0 - 11
I don't know what kind of politics put Eniola Aluko up front for England, but after she came off, Arsenal striker Kelly Smith took a through ball into the box, and pivoting on her feet in traffic and holding off Japanese defenders, turned and fired past Fukimoto into the corner to put England back in it. Two minutes later, Smith cracked the Japanese defense again, and after trying to fake out Fukimoto from an oblique angle, tried to power a shot past her off her left foot, and when Fukimoto couldn't handle the ball, Smith pounded the rebound back at the corner with her right foot, deflecting off Fukimoto's feet and into the back of the net. After each score, in a move likely to spur foot fetishes in England for years to come, Smith took off her boots and kissed them in celebration, which actually isn't much weirder than some of the other things the English do to celebrate (Robbie Fowler snorting the end line at Goodison Park comes to mind).
England had some problems to finish the game, starting when keeper Rachel Brown took a rough collision in injury time. Apparently England's cupboard is equally bare of keepers on the women's side (Brown was trained at Pitt) and the somewhat woozy looking Brown stayed in, nearly giving the store away when she tossed the restart right back into the path of a Japanese player. A couple minutes later with time running out, Japan was awarded a controversial free kick, and Kelly Smith got herself a yellow card attempting to run down the clock further, when England can't afford to go without Kelly Smith. Miyama's kick was out of the reach of Brown, but from the confines of my armchair it appeared she might have been a bit slow to react and not well positioned. On the other hand, Miyama had a couple nasty free kicks, and those kinds of set pieces are an even bigger weapon in the women's game where the goal plays a little wider. From my armchair it also looked like the foul could have gone either way as well, so while England whine every time they lose, this time they might have a case: the Three Lionesses got screwed. I hope they pull through, because given the choice of seeing more of Karen Carney and Rachel Brown in shorts vs Eriko Arakawa's J-fro, I'm rooting for the English ladies.
England 2 -2 Japan
'55 Miyama
'81 Smith
'83 Smith
'90+ Miyama
Germany 3pts +11 11 - 0
England 1pt 0 2 - 2
Japan 1pt 0 2 - 2
Argentina 0pts -11 0 - 11
Sverige 1 - 1 Nigeria
Usually my attitude towards Sweden is “thanks for the Chef, now fuck off”, but I was looking forward to seeing Sweden because I wanted to see Hannah Ljungberg in action, having previously enjoyed the work of underwear model and former Arsenal striker Freddie Ljungberg. Unfortunately when I looked her bio up on the internet I found that the two Ljungbergs are in no way related, and I keep misspelling her name with an extra “h”. Freddie sported a red mohawk and ran around like a maniac on the right wing at Arsenal, with this unlikely knack for finding seams in defenses. For Sweden last summer, I'd forget he was even on the field and then a ball would find him wide open between two stunned defenders, a trick former Arsenal striker Thierry Henry kept trying to pull for France as well, popping up like a duck at a shooting gallery. Hanna Ljungberg as it happens has a much more subdued personal style as Victoria Svensson's striker partner for Sweden, and I gather plays more like a mezzapunta than a sneaky midfielder a la her countryman and namesake Freddie.
So it was a bit ironic to me that Victoria Svensson scored Sweden's only goal today by sneakily slipping in behind her Nigerian defenders as they moved forward to chase the ball, and one of her Swedish teammates spied Svensson and put a sliding foot on the ball to squirt it forward to her for the easy finish. It was a very smart “don't mind me, I'll just be over here” sort of play, to put Sweden up 1-0, and it's exactly the kind of thing Freddie did for Sweden last summer, or Henry's ninja like antics jumping on and offside for France.
So it was a bit ironic to me that Victoria Svensson scored Sweden's only goal today by sneakily slipping in behind her Nigerian defenders as they moved forward to chase the ball, and one of her Swedish teammates spied Svensson and put a sliding foot on the ball to squirt it forward to her for the easy finish. It was a very smart “don't mind me, I'll just be over here” sort of play, to put Sweden up 1-0, and it's exactly the kind of thing Freddie did for Sweden last summer, or Henry's ninja like antics jumping on and offside for France.
The Swedes were looking good for a dominant position in the Group of Death, probably needing just one result againt the USA or North Korea to squeak through. Unfortunately the game is 90 minutes and the ball is round, and Nigeria sent 2006 African Player of the Year Cynthia Uwak on a blazing run down the right line to slip in behind the Swedish defense and tie it all up. Now the Group of Death has been rebooted, everyone has 1 point, the only tie-breaker is the Americans and Koreans have each scored an extra goal.
Nigeria 1 – 1 Sweden
'50 Svensson
'82 Uwak
USA 1pt 0 2 – 2
PRK 1pt 0 2 – 2
Nigeria 1pt 0 1 – 1
Sweden 1pt 0 1 – 1
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Movies nobody I talk to has ever heard of, volume 2
Since somebody went 4/5 on my last list of obscure movies, here are a few more (and I know you must have seen Serenity, Nobo):
The Big Blue
Possibly the best movie ever made about holding your breath, The Big Blue is loosely based on the life of free diver Jacques Mayoll and his friendship and rivalry with Enzo Molinari, the first to go below 100m without any breathing equipment, leapfrogging each other's records while doctors warned that at the depths they were aiming for they were passing the limits of the human body. Jean-Marc Barr's childlike portrayal of Mayoll is like a dolphin out of water, fascinated by but unable to fathom the human beings around him. I instantly became a huge fan of Jean Reno after I saw him in his role as Enzo, the grand and boisterous son of Italy around whom the world of free diving revolves (and an affectionate send-up of Italians by a French actor and director). The last scene the two have together is a practical test for the full range of human emotion, if your SO can't squeeze out a single frosted tear they may be a sociopath... run before they put on Huey Lewis and the News.
There are two versions of this film available, the director's cut and the chopped down American release that cuts out an hour and in so doing makes an entirely different movie. The implication and emotional tone of the ending is strikingly different with the scenes missing from the American release, which goes even farther in tacking on a cloyingly happy dolphin montage, to the point where the entire genre of the film goes from tragedy to romance. I enjoyed both, but the happy ending of the American edit would probably seem cloying after seeing what the director intended, and Luc Besson's reaction to it was reportedly “They ruined my movie.” Make of that what you will, but I enjoyed both versions.
Gods and Monsters
I have raved endlessly about this film to any and all who would listen, because I think it's a remarkably underrated film that should stand out as a highlight in several careers. It's a largely imagined account of the last days of James Whale, the director who created some of the most iconic images in film: Frankenstein's monster and the bride of Frankenstein. There are three brilliant movies permanently linked in my mind as the children of Whale's original 1931 film Frankenstein, all works of art that expand on it in spectacular and subtle form: Bride of Frankenstein for it's visual craft and for the fascinating subtext in every gesture, Young Frankenstein because it's quite possibly the funniest film ever made (and is certainly the pinnacle of Mel Brooks' lofty career), and Gods and Monsters. The dramatic tragedy punctuated by mystery and wit is enough to make it a brilliant and tragically underrated film, as is Sir Ian McKellen living it up playing Whale as alternately elder statesman of film and winking, crumbling queen, an old man in his last days confronted with a man to whom he cannot seem to lie, and layer by layer the lies from which he constructs his facade and his dignity are all stripped away. What makes it a bit special is the way all the characters are based on Whale's cast from Bride of Frankenstein: Whale is Dr. Pretorius (McKellen), his housekeeper is Igor (Vanessa Redgrave), his brooding, flat-topped gardener is the Monster (Brendan Fraser), and his ex-boyfriend channels Colin Clive's closet-case Dr. Frankenstein from Bride, to name a few. After Gods and Monsters, I couldn't watch Bride of Frankenstein with out bursting out laughing at almost every pleading look Colin Clive gives the rest of the cast while Ernest Thesiger plays his mad scientist buddy as a screaming queen giving jealous glares to Frankenstein's naïve wife, and they sneak off to the laboratory for unnatural acts of procreation.
The Dreamers
This may not actually be so underrated, but I still like it. It's the last film (so far) by Bernardo Bertolucci, director of such films as The Last Tango in Paris and Il Conformista, and other movies I've never gotten around to watching. The film is about three students in Paris in 1968 amidst rioting and piles of garbage in the street, a pair of French siblings whose relationship is so close as to be incestuous, and an American kid who becomes absorbed into their circle as they camp out in their parents' empty flat over the summer. The independence and presence of an outsider changes the dynamic between the two siblings, who have never faced certain consequences of their adolescence and growing sexual desire, where no matter how many layers of art and film and pretension they pile on to themselves, they are being painfully forced by biology to confront the question of whether they will continue to grow up or remain where they are. For all three, the images they have of themselves and of each other begin to come apart as they find there is no way to put all three pieces together, the American pacifist who dreams of Paris as an intellectual refuge and these beautiful French children as stimulating lovers, the sister who has one man too many, and the brother who finds himself reaching farther out into the world than his companions can handle. But really, the only reason I saw it is because Eva Green is naked for like half this movie. It's fairly adventurous in what it presents sexually, so if you don't want to see a buck naked Eva Green digging for Michael Pitt's half-erect manroot, consider yourself warned, but I still enjoyed it.
Children of Men
I raved about this movie before but nobody took this as inspiration to go see it. In fact I've only ever met one other person who's admitted to seeing this movie, but she said it should have won an Oscar for best picture, squeaking past The Departed. I wouldn't go that far, but this is a case of a good movie turned into something special by its cinematography. The entire film is shot in extremely long takes with extensive movement through real locations, where for instance the camera follows Clive Owen through houses until he finds a spot to eavesdrop on an ongoing conversation, and this makes it one of the most engrossing films I've ever seen. In the opening, we follow Clive Owen for a few minutes out of a coffee shop and into the street where he adds a little eye-opener from a flask, and this makes it feel so real when the shop explodes in the next instant. The last movie I saw that was this grounded was Dead Man's Shoes, also seen by nobody. Michael Caine seems to have a ball as an aging hemp-clad hipster, Julianne Moore is effervescent as a terrorist cell leader, Chiwetel Ejiofor hits another near perfect mark as a fanatical nemesis, and it's just a generally all-round incredibly well-executed film. The theme of this film uses the premise of no children being born for eighteen years and the resultant breakdown of society as a metaphor for a declining Western culture that talks of nothing but death and immigrants, and it puts a chilling face on the future in the manner reminiscent of Blade Runner's polluted, filthy neon cage.
Serenity
I don't think you get to be a nerd without seeing Serenity. That may or may not be an appealing distinction, unless you're the self-described “nerd-slut” I was dancing with at the Wittemaus-Dragonlady wedding last week after my uncoordinated dancing style that requires a stiff vodka tonic in my hand scared away all the straight girls... but I digress. Serenity is the brilliant farewell to Joss Whedon's “Firefly”, killed before its time after being pre-empted for baseball almost every night of it's run on network TV. It does what so many of these types of properties fail to do: it finds a story to tell that shows a men and a women changed by their experiences, in a story big enough to justify breaking out of the small screen, telling the tale of Captain Malcolm Reynolds finding the human heart has an undeniable craving for something greater than ourselves, and uncovering the dirty little secret of a society that delivers piece and love only at the point of a sword. The series combines two stories and four genres: Mal's post-civil war western and River's noir spy thriller and sets them both amongst stars circled by ravenous degenerate zombie pirates for a touch of horror, in this half-Blade Runner, half-Unforgiven Chinese American neon punk western. Plus Summer Glau's ballet-trained martial arts showdown is a thing of beauty, as Joss Whedon said, “She told me she could wrap her leg backwards around a pillar and kick somebody in the head so we built her one.” I know it sounds ridiculous, but it is an amazing mix of grand adventure, human drama, politics and espionage, and above all some really laugh out loud visual humor. This film will probably stand as the best work of almost all the people who were part of making it, even if it takes a long time to be properly appreciated. I was hooked by the title card alone, the lonely cello playing over the name Serenity painted on Mal's ship, given all it that represents in the context of this film, and that shot as she hits the atmosphere and fires her engines with the flames firing past the cockpit where Nathan Fillion stands in this grand Captain's pose... I think it just took me back to watching “Albator” on Belgian TV as a kid (Albator was the coolest space pirate ever). If that sounds confusing and terrible, let me give one mainstream description: Firefly/Serenity was described as Star Wars if it had been about Han Solo instead of Luke Skywalker.
Anything with Christian Bale in it
Despite a long string of commercial failures, Christian Bale finally cracked the US market in Batman Begins, resurrecting the role George Clooney left for dead, in the best Batman film since 1966. Before that, and after, he's had a smattering of captivating performances in some intriguing films and some horrible misfires, none of which seem to have been viewed by anybody. Previously the only identification I could offer anyone was “he's the guy from American Psycho”, which was a great performance with a judicious use of the moonwalk, because his mainstream projects sank without a trace. I'm not going to tell anybody to rush out and see the movie where he and Matthew McConaughey are fighting dragons or that tragically forgettable remake of Shaft, but there is some interesting stuff mixed in, like some fine nude bathing work with Emily Watson in Metroland and frolicking naked in a fountain with Ewan MacGregor in Velvet Goldmine, if you're into that sort of thing. And I'll defend both Metroland and Velvet Goldmine as interesting, and The New World as absolutely beautiful if somewhat impenetrably dull. Equilibrium was the quintessential Christian Bale project that apparently played for a week with no advertising so nobody knew it existed until it came out on video, but it's a surprisingly well executed attempt to mix George Orwell and the Matrix, with martial arts, prozac, and more wide-eyed Emily Watson. I'll defend Batman Begins as the best superhero movie I've ever seen, crammed with brilliant British and Irish actors (and a couple from Holland and America thrown in for equal opportunity) and Christopher Nolan, Michael Caine, and Christian Bale got back together to do The Prestige, which I found to be tragically underrated and a hell of a lot of fun, beginning at the end then moving back to the beginning through two men reading each other's diaries in a relentless quest to penetrate each other's misdirection and illusion. Despite repeated jealous suggestions by ex-girlfriends that my enthrallment with Mr. Bale had reached entirely unnatural levels, I have yet to see all of his work, but I still say he's tragically underrated. I still think his scenes in American Psycho with Reese Witherspoon, where he's this dour, evil presence and she's all bubbly and unable to register that he's confessing to being a serial killer are grimly hilarious, and enough reason to make me go see the remake of 3:10 to Yuma.
Local Hero
Because I haven't seen it in a while, I'll throw in an honorable mention for Local Hero, the tale of a Houston oil man called Mac (played by that one guy from Animal House who was on the Sopranos) who goes to Scotland to buy land for a refinery, treading lightly so as not to tip his hand and provoke the locals into protesting the destruction of their town. The locals also tread lightly so as not to seem to eager, because they can't wait to dump their property and cash in. Meanwhile this whole town is such a fascinating collection of strange characters that part of Mac wants to settle down and run the local inn. It's a quirky movie full of dry humor that amongst other things knows how to tell a running joke, and it's quite charming, with a beautiful soundtrack by Mark Knopfler, who for years played the theme from Local Hero to close all his concerts. And you don't eat a rabbit that has a name... or two names!
The Big Blue
Possibly the best movie ever made about holding your breath, The Big Blue is loosely based on the life of free diver Jacques Mayoll and his friendship and rivalry with Enzo Molinari, the first to go below 100m without any breathing equipment, leapfrogging each other's records while doctors warned that at the depths they were aiming for they were passing the limits of the human body. Jean-Marc Barr's childlike portrayal of Mayoll is like a dolphin out of water, fascinated by but unable to fathom the human beings around him. I instantly became a huge fan of Jean Reno after I saw him in his role as Enzo, the grand and boisterous son of Italy around whom the world of free diving revolves (and an affectionate send-up of Italians by a French actor and director). The last scene the two have together is a practical test for the full range of human emotion, if your SO can't squeeze out a single frosted tear they may be a sociopath... run before they put on Huey Lewis and the News.
There are two versions of this film available, the director's cut and the chopped down American release that cuts out an hour and in so doing makes an entirely different movie. The implication and emotional tone of the ending is strikingly different with the scenes missing from the American release, which goes even farther in tacking on a cloyingly happy dolphin montage, to the point where the entire genre of the film goes from tragedy to romance. I enjoyed both, but the happy ending of the American edit would probably seem cloying after seeing what the director intended, and Luc Besson's reaction to it was reportedly “They ruined my movie.” Make of that what you will, but I enjoyed both versions.
Gods and Monsters
I have raved endlessly about this film to any and all who would listen, because I think it's a remarkably underrated film that should stand out as a highlight in several careers. It's a largely imagined account of the last days of James Whale, the director who created some of the most iconic images in film: Frankenstein's monster and the bride of Frankenstein. There are three brilliant movies permanently linked in my mind as the children of Whale's original 1931 film Frankenstein, all works of art that expand on it in spectacular and subtle form: Bride of Frankenstein for it's visual craft and for the fascinating subtext in every gesture, Young Frankenstein because it's quite possibly the funniest film ever made (and is certainly the pinnacle of Mel Brooks' lofty career), and Gods and Monsters. The dramatic tragedy punctuated by mystery and wit is enough to make it a brilliant and tragically underrated film, as is Sir Ian McKellen living it up playing Whale as alternately elder statesman of film and winking, crumbling queen, an old man in his last days confronted with a man to whom he cannot seem to lie, and layer by layer the lies from which he constructs his facade and his dignity are all stripped away. What makes it a bit special is the way all the characters are based on Whale's cast from Bride of Frankenstein: Whale is Dr. Pretorius (McKellen), his housekeeper is Igor (Vanessa Redgrave), his brooding, flat-topped gardener is the Monster (Brendan Fraser), and his ex-boyfriend channels Colin Clive's closet-case Dr. Frankenstein from Bride, to name a few. After Gods and Monsters, I couldn't watch Bride of Frankenstein with out bursting out laughing at almost every pleading look Colin Clive gives the rest of the cast while Ernest Thesiger plays his mad scientist buddy as a screaming queen giving jealous glares to Frankenstein's naïve wife, and they sneak off to the laboratory for unnatural acts of procreation.
The Dreamers
This may not actually be so underrated, but I still like it. It's the last film (so far) by Bernardo Bertolucci, director of such films as The Last Tango in Paris and Il Conformista, and other movies I've never gotten around to watching. The film is about three students in Paris in 1968 amidst rioting and piles of garbage in the street, a pair of French siblings whose relationship is so close as to be incestuous, and an American kid who becomes absorbed into their circle as they camp out in their parents' empty flat over the summer. The independence and presence of an outsider changes the dynamic between the two siblings, who have never faced certain consequences of their adolescence and growing sexual desire, where no matter how many layers of art and film and pretension they pile on to themselves, they are being painfully forced by biology to confront the question of whether they will continue to grow up or remain where they are. For all three, the images they have of themselves and of each other begin to come apart as they find there is no way to put all three pieces together, the American pacifist who dreams of Paris as an intellectual refuge and these beautiful French children as stimulating lovers, the sister who has one man too many, and the brother who finds himself reaching farther out into the world than his companions can handle. But really, the only reason I saw it is because Eva Green is naked for like half this movie. It's fairly adventurous in what it presents sexually, so if you don't want to see a buck naked Eva Green digging for Michael Pitt's half-erect manroot, consider yourself warned, but I still enjoyed it.
Children of Men
I raved about this movie before but nobody took this as inspiration to go see it. In fact I've only ever met one other person who's admitted to seeing this movie, but she said it should have won an Oscar for best picture, squeaking past The Departed. I wouldn't go that far, but this is a case of a good movie turned into something special by its cinematography. The entire film is shot in extremely long takes with extensive movement through real locations, where for instance the camera follows Clive Owen through houses until he finds a spot to eavesdrop on an ongoing conversation, and this makes it one of the most engrossing films I've ever seen. In the opening, we follow Clive Owen for a few minutes out of a coffee shop and into the street where he adds a little eye-opener from a flask, and this makes it feel so real when the shop explodes in the next instant. The last movie I saw that was this grounded was Dead Man's Shoes, also seen by nobody. Michael Caine seems to have a ball as an aging hemp-clad hipster, Julianne Moore is effervescent as a terrorist cell leader, Chiwetel Ejiofor hits another near perfect mark as a fanatical nemesis, and it's just a generally all-round incredibly well-executed film. The theme of this film uses the premise of no children being born for eighteen years and the resultant breakdown of society as a metaphor for a declining Western culture that talks of nothing but death and immigrants, and it puts a chilling face on the future in the manner reminiscent of Blade Runner's polluted, filthy neon cage.
Serenity
I don't think you get to be a nerd without seeing Serenity. That may or may not be an appealing distinction, unless you're the self-described “nerd-slut” I was dancing with at the Wittemaus-Dragonlady wedding last week after my uncoordinated dancing style that requires a stiff vodka tonic in my hand scared away all the straight girls... but I digress. Serenity is the brilliant farewell to Joss Whedon's “Firefly”, killed before its time after being pre-empted for baseball almost every night of it's run on network TV. It does what so many of these types of properties fail to do: it finds a story to tell that shows a men and a women changed by their experiences, in a story big enough to justify breaking out of the small screen, telling the tale of Captain Malcolm Reynolds finding the human heart has an undeniable craving for something greater than ourselves, and uncovering the dirty little secret of a society that delivers piece and love only at the point of a sword. The series combines two stories and four genres: Mal's post-civil war western and River's noir spy thriller and sets them both amongst stars circled by ravenous degenerate zombie pirates for a touch of horror, in this half-Blade Runner, half-Unforgiven Chinese American neon punk western. Plus Summer Glau's ballet-trained martial arts showdown is a thing of beauty, as Joss Whedon said, “She told me she could wrap her leg backwards around a pillar and kick somebody in the head so we built her one.” I know it sounds ridiculous, but it is an amazing mix of grand adventure, human drama, politics and espionage, and above all some really laugh out loud visual humor. This film will probably stand as the best work of almost all the people who were part of making it, even if it takes a long time to be properly appreciated. I was hooked by the title card alone, the lonely cello playing over the name Serenity painted on Mal's ship, given all it that represents in the context of this film, and that shot as she hits the atmosphere and fires her engines with the flames firing past the cockpit where Nathan Fillion stands in this grand Captain's pose... I think it just took me back to watching “Albator” on Belgian TV as a kid (Albator was the coolest space pirate ever). If that sounds confusing and terrible, let me give one mainstream description: Firefly/Serenity was described as Star Wars if it had been about Han Solo instead of Luke Skywalker.
Anything with Christian Bale in it
Despite a long string of commercial failures, Christian Bale finally cracked the US market in Batman Begins, resurrecting the role George Clooney left for dead, in the best Batman film since 1966. Before that, and after, he's had a smattering of captivating performances in some intriguing films and some horrible misfires, none of which seem to have been viewed by anybody. Previously the only identification I could offer anyone was “he's the guy from American Psycho”, which was a great performance with a judicious use of the moonwalk, because his mainstream projects sank without a trace. I'm not going to tell anybody to rush out and see the movie where he and Matthew McConaughey are fighting dragons or that tragically forgettable remake of Shaft, but there is some interesting stuff mixed in, like some fine nude bathing work with Emily Watson in Metroland and frolicking naked in a fountain with Ewan MacGregor in Velvet Goldmine, if you're into that sort of thing. And I'll defend both Metroland and Velvet Goldmine as interesting, and The New World as absolutely beautiful if somewhat impenetrably dull. Equilibrium was the quintessential Christian Bale project that apparently played for a week with no advertising so nobody knew it existed until it came out on video, but it's a surprisingly well executed attempt to mix George Orwell and the Matrix, with martial arts, prozac, and more wide-eyed Emily Watson. I'll defend Batman Begins as the best superhero movie I've ever seen, crammed with brilliant British and Irish actors (and a couple from Holland and America thrown in for equal opportunity) and Christopher Nolan, Michael Caine, and Christian Bale got back together to do The Prestige, which I found to be tragically underrated and a hell of a lot of fun, beginning at the end then moving back to the beginning through two men reading each other's diaries in a relentless quest to penetrate each other's misdirection and illusion. Despite repeated jealous suggestions by ex-girlfriends that my enthrallment with Mr. Bale had reached entirely unnatural levels, I have yet to see all of his work, but I still say he's tragically underrated. I still think his scenes in American Psycho with Reese Witherspoon, where he's this dour, evil presence and she's all bubbly and unable to register that he's confessing to being a serial killer are grimly hilarious, and enough reason to make me go see the remake of 3:10 to Yuma.
Local Hero
Because I haven't seen it in a while, I'll throw in an honorable mention for Local Hero, the tale of a Houston oil man called Mac (played by that one guy from Animal House who was on the Sopranos) who goes to Scotland to buy land for a refinery, treading lightly so as not to tip his hand and provoke the locals into protesting the destruction of their town. The locals also tread lightly so as not to seem to eager, because they can't wait to dump their property and cash in. Meanwhile this whole town is such a fascinating collection of strange characters that part of Mac wants to settle down and run the local inn. It's a quirky movie full of dry humor that amongst other things knows how to tell a running joke, and it's quite charming, with a beautiful soundtrack by Mark Knopfler, who for years played the theme from Local Hero to close all his concerts. And you don't eat a rabbit that has a name... or two names!
2007 Hugo Award Winners
Just as a public service announcement, here are the Hugo Award nominees and winners for television and film, since those are the ones I've seen:
Dramatic Presentation (long form)
Pan's Labyrinth (winner)
Children of Men
The Prestige
V for Vendetta
A Scanner Darkly
Dramatic Presentation (short form)
Doctor Who - "The Girl in the Fireplace" (winner)
Doctor Who - "Army of Ghosts" and "Doomsday"
Doctor Who - "School Reunion"
Battlestar Galactica - "Downloaded"
Stargate SG-1 - "200"
Of those, I've seen everything but the SG-1 episode, because everyone must draw a line in the sand. Of the remaining nine films and television episodes, Children of Men and The Prestige are some of the most fascinating cinema I saw last year, V for Vendetta had its moments (it's like Titanic, everything not involving the two leads is great), and I really could have done without A Scanner Darkly and Pan's Labyrith. (The links are to Rotten Tomatoes where I wrote about these movies back when I first saw them.) All four Doctor Who episodes were brilliant, and the two-parter "Army of Ghosts" and "Doomsday" was a brilliant farewell to the dynamic of first two years of the show. "Downloaded" was a really interesting twist for Battlestar Galactica turning the perspective completely around to the Cylons. Finding that Six has a hallucination of Baltar to match his hallucination of her, each half sex kitten half coy prophet, was the first sign that a lot of assumptions would be shattered in the next season, but of course the whole thing wouldn't make any sense if you haven't seen the rest of the show... which is in my opinion the most fascinating thing on television besides Hugh Laurie's headlong plunge into crippling neurotic bitterness on House.
So there's one more reason to see Children of Men, The Prestige, or pretty much any episode of the new Doctor Who series, which had multiple Hugo nominees and two winners in the first two seasons alone, and has produced at least one equally cool spin-off in Torchwood, with the jury still out on the second spin-off until I find a way to watch it. Torchwood, by the way, is like a British X-Files, only the man in charge is Captain Jack Harkness, who's basically the positive side of the European stereotype of Americans, intrusively enthusiastic or enthusiastically intrusive depending on how you look at it, wearing a big grin and a WWII aviator's cap, and one of the only bisexual characters on TV not played for laughs. It is delightfully cool, dark, and a bit strange.
Dramatic Presentation (long form)
Pan's Labyrinth (winner)
Children of Men
The Prestige
V for Vendetta
A Scanner Darkly
Dramatic Presentation (short form)
Doctor Who - "The Girl in the Fireplace" (winner)
Doctor Who - "Army of Ghosts" and "Doomsday"
Doctor Who - "School Reunion"
Battlestar Galactica - "Downloaded"
Stargate SG-1 - "200"
Of those, I've seen everything but the SG-1 episode, because everyone must draw a line in the sand. Of the remaining nine films and television episodes, Children of Men and The Prestige are some of the most fascinating cinema I saw last year, V for Vendetta had its moments (it's like Titanic, everything not involving the two leads is great), and I really could have done without A Scanner Darkly and Pan's Labyrith. (The links are to Rotten Tomatoes where I wrote about these movies back when I first saw them.) All four Doctor Who episodes were brilliant, and the two-parter "Army of Ghosts" and "Doomsday" was a brilliant farewell to the dynamic of first two years of the show. "Downloaded" was a really interesting twist for Battlestar Galactica turning the perspective completely around to the Cylons. Finding that Six has a hallucination of Baltar to match his hallucination of her, each half sex kitten half coy prophet, was the first sign that a lot of assumptions would be shattered in the next season, but of course the whole thing wouldn't make any sense if you haven't seen the rest of the show... which is in my opinion the most fascinating thing on television besides Hugh Laurie's headlong plunge into crippling neurotic bitterness on House.
So there's one more reason to see Children of Men, The Prestige, or pretty much any episode of the new Doctor Who series, which had multiple Hugo nominees and two winners in the first two seasons alone, and has produced at least one equally cool spin-off in Torchwood, with the jury still out on the second spin-off until I find a way to watch it. Torchwood, by the way, is like a British X-Files, only the man in charge is Captain Jack Harkness, who's basically the positive side of the European stereotype of Americans, intrusively enthusiastic or enthusiastically intrusive depending on how you look at it, wearing a big grin and a WWII aviator's cap, and one of the only bisexual characters on TV not played for laughs. It is delightfully cool, dark, and a bit strange.
USA 2 - 2 조선민주주의인민공화국
This was nearly a real shocking upset. Nobody really knew how good North Korea was coming into this game, because they close all their practices and only really appear outside of their country to play in Asian qualifiers, but I have to say they looked pretty sharp to me, dominating possession with a quick, controlled passing game in the pouring rain, with that up-tempo high endurance style I've seen from the South Korean men. They really challenged US keeper Hope Solo, and came pretty close to winning the game outright. In a Group of Death, with the USA, Sweden, and Nigeria, North Korea just dropped a bomb. As the Captain might say, by doing so well against they US ladies they proved they're real Weapons of Miss Destruction. (Okay, I'm done now.)
One of the most striking differences between men's and women's internationals beyond the significant increase in ponytails is the difference in goalkeeping... it makes a big difference when you can't throw into goal a 6'6" Edwin van der Sar who has the range to reach both posts and touch the crossbar without leaving his feet. (To borrow a line from Bill Cosby the freakishly tall and thin Van der Sar looks like you could grab him by the ankles and use him to retrieve your ball out the storm drain.) Hope Solo, the US keeper who is a fine athlete in every sense of the word, had a couple balls go off her hands today to dangerous effect, one deflecting into the goal behind her for Korea's first goal, and it's not clear if it was the muddy ball or just her small, manicured hands, but she was being tested from long range all day. The second Korean goal came off a deflection recovered by Kim and fired into the corner, not giving Solo much of a chance.
The US hasn't lost a game in like three years, so it's actually a blast to see them go down a goal to the PRK and have to battle back, and really be challenged, unlike in the past when teams would bunker down and play 10 women behind the ball. The Group of Death is certainly living up to its name out of the gate, and I hope starting out against somebody who isn't afraid of them gets this generation of US women fired up to win the whole thing in style.
USA 2 – 2 PRK
'50 Wambach
'58 Kil
'62 Kim
'69 O'Reilly
One of the most striking differences between men's and women's internationals beyond the significant increase in ponytails is the difference in goalkeeping... it makes a big difference when you can't throw into goal a 6'6" Edwin van der Sar who has the range to reach both posts and touch the crossbar without leaving his feet. (To borrow a line from Bill Cosby the freakishly tall and thin Van der Sar looks like you could grab him by the ankles and use him to retrieve your ball out the storm drain.) Hope Solo, the US keeper who is a fine athlete in every sense of the word, had a couple balls go off her hands today to dangerous effect, one deflecting into the goal behind her for Korea's first goal, and it's not clear if it was the muddy ball or just her small, manicured hands, but she was being tested from long range all day. The second Korean goal came off a deflection recovered by Kim and fired into the corner, not giving Solo much of a chance.
The US hasn't lost a game in like three years, so it's actually a blast to see them go down a goal to the PRK and have to battle back, and really be challenged, unlike in the past when teams would bunker down and play 10 women behind the ball. The Group of Death is certainly living up to its name out of the gate, and I hope starting out against somebody who isn't afraid of them gets this generation of US women fired up to win the whole thing in style.
USA 2 – 2 PRK
'50 Wambach
'58 Kil
'62 Kim
'69 O'Reilly
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Deutschland 11 - 0 Argentina
I'm just watching the Deutschevoetbalfrauen jump up and down on Argentina, and I'm so aghast and aroused I don't care if that's really a word. I know there isn't a lot of parity in the women's game right now, despite the emergence of zee Germans as a credible contender. More than a contender really since they won the whole Enchilada in California four years ago. Here's all I can say to Argentina: stop fouling, because zee Germans are killing you on set pieces!
Zee Germans took an early lead on a corner kick when Argentina's keeper tipped the ball over her head into her own net. This was the first of two own goals for Correa, which is just horrifyingly bad. She's Argentina's #2 keeper, but when you're trying to blood a new keeper, Germany are one of the worst opponents you could do it against. Linda Bresonik's momma didn't raise no fool, so she kept testing Correa with long shots and forcing corners when the Argentine keeper couldn't field them cleanly. As a result, the goals kept flowing for zee Germans, when Correa punched corners into her own net (2x), nobody picked up a German player running onto a free kick into the box or on the back side of a cross (3x), all the Argentine defenders were watching the ball and nobody picked up Sandra Smisek running behind them to pick up a through ball (2x), superstar striker Birgit Prinz just outplayed everybody for a header (2x).
My favorite was the second German goal, when Melanie Behringer beat a fullback to a ball out on the flank, beat two defenders on her way to the goal, and then coming up in from the left leaned out to make Correa commit to blocking a pass across the box and then she raked the ball back into the near post. Behringer was running through Argentina's right flank at will, getting a huge amount of space for some nasty crosses. Renate Lingor's goal was started by one of Behringer's runs and a pass across the six-yard box, cleared by Argentina but rounded up by Lingor outside the box, who lobbed it to the far post over everybody's head. Behringer also helped zee Germans to a clean sheet, covering the near post on a corner and staying on the line to clear out a ball that had Nadine Angerer beat. I'm telling you, #7's a redhead with some nasty moves on the left for Germany, and I think I'm in love.
I really thought Argentina would do a bit better even if they were killed by the German offense, and they looked to have some opportunities but settled for long shots and long balls... it's a big change from the Argentine men who are famous for passing combinations in the box. Germany's future opponents may do better by closing down Bresonik and Behringer rather than giving them acres of space to work, and better exploit some weakness at the back with Silke Rottenberg apparently not available in goal. Nevertheless, I'm pretty excited to see more of Germany... and a lot more of Melanie Behringer.
Zee Germans took an early lead on a corner kick when Argentina's keeper tipped the ball over her head into her own net. This was the first of two own goals for Correa, which is just horrifyingly bad. She's Argentina's #2 keeper, but when you're trying to blood a new keeper, Germany are one of the worst opponents you could do it against. Linda Bresonik's momma didn't raise no fool, so she kept testing Correa with long shots and forcing corners when the Argentine keeper couldn't field them cleanly. As a result, the goals kept flowing for zee Germans, when Correa punched corners into her own net (2x), nobody picked up a German player running onto a free kick into the box or on the back side of a cross (3x), all the Argentine defenders were watching the ball and nobody picked up Sandra Smisek running behind them to pick up a through ball (2x), superstar striker Birgit Prinz just outplayed everybody for a header (2x).
My favorite was the second German goal, when Melanie Behringer beat a fullback to a ball out on the flank, beat two defenders on her way to the goal, and then coming up in from the left leaned out to make Correa commit to blocking a pass across the box and then she raked the ball back into the near post. Behringer was running through Argentina's right flank at will, getting a huge amount of space for some nasty crosses. Renate Lingor's goal was started by one of Behringer's runs and a pass across the six-yard box, cleared by Argentina but rounded up by Lingor outside the box, who lobbed it to the far post over everybody's head. Behringer also helped zee Germans to a clean sheet, covering the near post on a corner and staying on the line to clear out a ball that had Nadine Angerer beat. I'm telling you, #7's a redhead with some nasty moves on the left for Germany, and I think I'm in love.
I really thought Argentina would do a bit better even if they were killed by the German offense, and they looked to have some opportunities but settled for long shots and long balls... it's a big change from the Argentine men who are famous for passing combinations in the box. Germany's future opponents may do better by closing down Bresonik and Behringer rather than giving them acres of space to work, and better exploit some weakness at the back with Silke Rottenberg apparently not available in goal. Nevertheless, I'm pretty excited to see more of Germany... and a lot more of Melanie Behringer.
Monday, September 10, 2007
The Subprime Lending Crisis part four: How do I get mine?
Amstelboy and I were discussing how to make a buck off of the subprime lending crisis and the general “Why am I paying you 2% + 20% of return + 'fund of funds' administration fees so you can loan all my money to homeless people?” atmosphere surrounding the hedge fund industry, so I've been brainstorming some potential ventures. And as I said, even if we can't get into this crisis on time, there's always another one three years away, and most of these are applicable to a variety of global financial meltdowns. I've divided them into several areas we should explore:
1. Providing liquidity and pissing off the SEC
One of the issues under examination right now relates to accounting practices, and there's a pretty standard yet almost certainly illegal way to make a buck off of it, and a perhaps revolutionary perfectly legal way to do so as well. I'll start with the illegal one, since Jim Cramer assures us the SEC are far too stupid to pick up on market manipulations even when he announces them on the radio, so I'm sure they'll never see unusual activity and run a google search. As an aside regarding Cramer's bragging about market manipulations, I just watched that movie “Zodiac”, and apparently the Zodiac got away with murdering several people all whilst mocking the law enforcement agencies pursuing him like Cramer does the SEC. The difference is nutty as he was Zodiac just sent cryptic letters, even he didn't go on MSNBC and say “I'm the Zodiac and the FBI are st00pid”.
One of the big issues right now is large institutions in dire need of liquidity can't afford to discount assets because their accounting practices require that they discount all their remaining holdings as well... in other words, if they figure they have about $10b in Austrian treasury bonds and sell 10% of them at half price to raise $500m in a hurry, they have to record that they now own $4.5b of Austrian treasury bonds and $500m in cash. When the company loses $5b in one day, nobody gets their bonuses, so they don't want to do that. Arguably, if they valued the bonds at $10b before the sale, they should still have $9b in treasury bonds and $500m in cash, so they only lost $500m, the exact amount they came down off their price to move some bonds. It's like the depreciation on a new car, are you really poorer the second you turn the ignition because the market says you are, or richer by the difference between the value of a vehicle less the price you paid? The entire principle of market economics is that wealth is created in trades: both parties are better off, or the trade would not occur, so this type of instantaneous market accounting, while a useful tool, cannot accurately measure wealth. This isn't just me rambling, Bear Stearns has been cited as unwilling to liquidate assets because of the resultant effect on the market value of the rest of their holdings. And really if these crises are on a three year cycle, if you can get a 25% discount on liquidated assets and sell them at full value anytime before the next crisis, that's good for a 10% annual return.
So what's the point, how do we cash in? Simple: we form two corporations, Shortshorts Financing and the Waffle Group, one of which buys Austrian treasury bonds from the fictional institution I alluded to at a discounted rate, getting $1b (long term value) for $500m and offering much needed liquidity to the sellers. The reason they will sell to SSF when they can't risk selling on the open market and devaluing their remaining holdings is that SSF immediately sells all their bonds to the Waffle Group for $1b, and then the two firms transfer the bonds back and forth at that price until there is sufficient volume that the original seller can claim the rest of their holdings are in fact worth $9b and their managers all get their bonuses. The sellers get a shot of liquidity without ruining their entire portfolio, we get Austrian treasury bonds at a steal. While I can't pinpoint who is hurt by this, I am pretty sure the SEC would come knocking, so step three is packing plenty of Swiss Navy in your overnight bag before they send us off to Joliet.
The legal thing to do, and my vast experience in the world of international corporate finance allows me to speak with authority on the subject, is for the shareholders of firms to start awarding bonuses on a different basis. Paying large bonuses based on these short-term valuation leads to foolish decisions by managers who need to prop up positions to insure they get their compensation. Make bonuses payable over the course of five years (or just longer than one boom credit cycle but likely to contain at least one crisis) based on continued portfolio health. The shareholders and investors have longer-term interests than who's getting a bonus in February, so give the person who manages their money a check for the next five Februaries for getting it where they need it, not where she does. Nobody would want to work for a fly-by-night operation that might trash all your positions when you moved on, but is that really a bad thing if more stable institutions have an advantage in attracting talent? Also the long-term vision of managers might reduce their stress level, and less coked up and jumpy managers might actually beat index funds by playing off of trends instead of diving right after them. Anyways, if you have two potential assets, one of which is about to become highly undervalued, and one which is about to be come highly overvalued, do you buy now and ride the over-valuation to its likely peak, or buy later when the under-valuation may hit its nadir? Everybody loses when that decision is based on a fat check that gets cut halfway through. Just a thought from somebody who keeps a salmon-colored paper next to the toilet and over-inflates his own insight.
2.People moving into their parents basements
Whenever there's a huge crisis, a lot of people have to make some lifestyle changes, for instance a whole lot of people with teaser loans are about to need a place to live, as are a lot of suddenly redundant personnel in Greenwich, CT who will be scaling down their lifestyles. Here are some possible secondary markets to get into:
a) Locksmiths, as a lot of empty nesters have more keys made for the kids they thought they were rid of
b) Mini-fridges, so you can keep some beer in the house
c) Weed, since if you can't offer to show a girl the view of the city from your loft, you can at least try “Er, I got weed back at the crib!”
d) Air freshener (see c)
e) Small stepladders, for when you're sneaking cakes in the bathroom window after your granny goes to bed (as it was so eloquently put by one of my recycling plant coworkers). Also probably some hospital slippers or something so she can slip off those heels before making her escape through the garden.
f) Headphones, so you won't get told to “Turn down that racket”
g) Futons: uncomfortable couch by day, and at night, folds down to become an uncomfortable bed
h) wireless internet adapters, so you can get broadband down there and skype your friends who've all moved back into their parents basements but get no cell phone reception
i) Cleaning products to get rid of some of that mildew, and I'd go long on dehumidifiers
j) Tanning salons, since a lot of basement dwellers are going to be fighting off SADS
3. Fashion
A few brief notes on what I consider to be a very significant area. I believe indications are good Ermenegildo Zegna is about to sell a lot of neckties as the hedge fund trader in his open-necked shirt becomes the new bogeyman of international finance, and all those guys are heading out for job interviews. Also, a lot of people just went from sipping champagne waiting for a table at Charlie Trotter's to having a High Life at Hideaway's, and they're going to need a whole new set of hipster shirts, chains, and short plaid skirts to wear over there. Also there may be a run on fishnet and clear heels, as well as mesh shirts... more on that later.
4. Privacy
Pulling the bentley back into the driveway at one's parents' home amidst a liquidity crisis means a couple things for a refugee from the hedge fund industry who escaped with nothing but a collection of open-necked shirts : a lot of creditors are going to be looking for you, and you're probably way out of practice at foiling the instinct for snooping your mother refined during your adolescence. If like me you have a retired father who takes a flashlight and the family dog and forms a search party to look for the mailman if he's five minutes late, you don't stand a chance. Mailboxes, etc. will be making a fortune off of the problem of nosy parents and noisome creditors. Beyond that, I'm investing heavily in those who offer services to those going cash only after their interest only loan on a 10,000 sq ft condo didn't work out so well: 24 hour check cashing, prepaid cellphones, prepaid credit cards, and even Vivid has prepaid cards to buy online porn (should you fail to convince some club rat to sneak in your basement window).
5. Liquidity
People as well as institutions are going to need cash quick, so look into traditional outlets for quick cash: there are pawn shops and used CD shops to consider, and I'd consider a short position on any one-hit wonders... if you'll recall during the Asian currency crisis, shops were telling hopeful sellers to consider using their Alannis Morissette CDs as coasters (“Thank you India, thank you Thailand, tha-ha-hank you currency speculation!”). For a more straightforward play, there's one hot stock I'd consider as as a lever to profit off of financial ruin: Dixie, who make all the little paper cups for panhandlers. Also consider Minute Maid, because when broke people donate blood, they always get that free OJ afterwards. To chase the big returns, my big sector play is pimping: there are going to be a hell of a lot of rent-boys in open necked shirts mulling around Greenwich, CT, which is why I suggested earlier going long on makers of mesh shirts, and anyone with a stake in clear heels is going to make a killing when their coked-up girlfriends and female co-workers realize all those mornings they got high and went jogging will really pay off when they're auditioning down at The Admiral to make next month's interest-only mortgage payment.
6. Education
For those heading back to school to do coke (apparently it's great way to drop the freshman five) and get an MBA, they'll definitely need a cool new (knock-off) messenger bag, which they can later bring to football games... yes, you're cool for having a giant burberry bag, but no, bringing it to a Vikings game and hitting me with it while drunken lunatics pour beer and ketchup on it is not a great way to show it off. (By the way, she was just walking around bumping her burberry duffel into everyone, I didn't actually do anything to make a woman beat me over the head with her bag.) Also important services in today's multicultural, globalist business environment are my handy guide to re-writing a paper with five people who don't speak the same language, based on the my notes on the papers Amstelboy asked me to take a look at where he was trying to integrate five people's edits of a document into a single, cohesive presentation in something recognizable as business Engrish. Seriously, a list of eight items shouldn't be numbered “1 2 * * 4 a b 7”, as explained in chapter 6: “Pick a system and go with it please”. Also in that vein, I would recommend investing in English-Whatever language dictionaries, because of the philosophy of several multinational organizations that using a common language as a medium for translation reduces the costs of that translation: translate Mandarin to Italian by translating Mandarin to English, and English to Italian, thus eliminating the need for rare Mandarin-Italian dictionaries. And obviously to cash in on all those who will blow their financial aid stipends on blow and can't spend more than 16 cents on dinner I'd go short on sushi, and long on Top Ramen.
7. The Wages of Sin
There are also several plays to be made based on the despair of those poor souls who heard Jim Cramer thumbing his nose at the SEC on the radio and thought they could be invincible too, monetizing their growing despair and misfortune. For anyone who's going to prison for defrauding their investors by selling them on CDOs of handshake loans to homeless people, I recommend shorting the 1.5 oz tubes of Swiss Navy and going long on 48 oz cans of Crisco, because after a couple weeks they'll realize they're only pulling down 7 cents an hour making license plates and have to give up some luxuries. I'd also suggest looking at makers of lightweight chairs and short lengths of rope that are strong but thin enough to be easy to tie, but if a hedge fund goes down, none of them know how to tie a windsor knot, I doubt they'd have much luck with a noose, so just go long on Sanofi-Aventis and Fortune Brands (makers of Ambien and Jim Bean).
So that's how to make your fortune off of economic despair. That last part may seem cruel, but I suppose it's because the people I know in that industry to the best of my knowledge aren't so frighteningly short sighted and ethically challenged that I'm too worried about them.
1. Providing liquidity and pissing off the SEC
One of the issues under examination right now relates to accounting practices, and there's a pretty standard yet almost certainly illegal way to make a buck off of it, and a perhaps revolutionary perfectly legal way to do so as well. I'll start with the illegal one, since Jim Cramer assures us the SEC are far too stupid to pick up on market manipulations even when he announces them on the radio, so I'm sure they'll never see unusual activity and run a google search. As an aside regarding Cramer's bragging about market manipulations, I just watched that movie “Zodiac”, and apparently the Zodiac got away with murdering several people all whilst mocking the law enforcement agencies pursuing him like Cramer does the SEC. The difference is nutty as he was Zodiac just sent cryptic letters, even he didn't go on MSNBC and say “I'm the Zodiac and the FBI are st00pid”.
One of the big issues right now is large institutions in dire need of liquidity can't afford to discount assets because their accounting practices require that they discount all their remaining holdings as well... in other words, if they figure they have about $10b in Austrian treasury bonds and sell 10% of them at half price to raise $500m in a hurry, they have to record that they now own $4.5b of Austrian treasury bonds and $500m in cash. When the company loses $5b in one day, nobody gets their bonuses, so they don't want to do that. Arguably, if they valued the bonds at $10b before the sale, they should still have $9b in treasury bonds and $500m in cash, so they only lost $500m, the exact amount they came down off their price to move some bonds. It's like the depreciation on a new car, are you really poorer the second you turn the ignition because the market says you are, or richer by the difference between the value of a vehicle less the price you paid? The entire principle of market economics is that wealth is created in trades: both parties are better off, or the trade would not occur, so this type of instantaneous market accounting, while a useful tool, cannot accurately measure wealth. This isn't just me rambling, Bear Stearns has been cited as unwilling to liquidate assets because of the resultant effect on the market value of the rest of their holdings. And really if these crises are on a three year cycle, if you can get a 25% discount on liquidated assets and sell them at full value anytime before the next crisis, that's good for a 10% annual return.
So what's the point, how do we cash in? Simple: we form two corporations, Shortshorts Financing and the Waffle Group, one of which buys Austrian treasury bonds from the fictional institution I alluded to at a discounted rate, getting $1b (long term value) for $500m and offering much needed liquidity to the sellers. The reason they will sell to SSF when they can't risk selling on the open market and devaluing their remaining holdings is that SSF immediately sells all their bonds to the Waffle Group for $1b, and then the two firms transfer the bonds back and forth at that price until there is sufficient volume that the original seller can claim the rest of their holdings are in fact worth $9b and their managers all get their bonuses. The sellers get a shot of liquidity without ruining their entire portfolio, we get Austrian treasury bonds at a steal. While I can't pinpoint who is hurt by this, I am pretty sure the SEC would come knocking, so step three is packing plenty of Swiss Navy in your overnight bag before they send us off to Joliet.
The legal thing to do, and my vast experience in the world of international corporate finance allows me to speak with authority on the subject, is for the shareholders of firms to start awarding bonuses on a different basis. Paying large bonuses based on these short-term valuation leads to foolish decisions by managers who need to prop up positions to insure they get their compensation. Make bonuses payable over the course of five years (or just longer than one boom credit cycle but likely to contain at least one crisis) based on continued portfolio health. The shareholders and investors have longer-term interests than who's getting a bonus in February, so give the person who manages their money a check for the next five Februaries for getting it where they need it, not where she does. Nobody would want to work for a fly-by-night operation that might trash all your positions when you moved on, but is that really a bad thing if more stable institutions have an advantage in attracting talent? Also the long-term vision of managers might reduce their stress level, and less coked up and jumpy managers might actually beat index funds by playing off of trends instead of diving right after them. Anyways, if you have two potential assets, one of which is about to become highly undervalued, and one which is about to be come highly overvalued, do you buy now and ride the over-valuation to its likely peak, or buy later when the under-valuation may hit its nadir? Everybody loses when that decision is based on a fat check that gets cut halfway through. Just a thought from somebody who keeps a salmon-colored paper next to the toilet and over-inflates his own insight.
2.People moving into their parents basements
Whenever there's a huge crisis, a lot of people have to make some lifestyle changes, for instance a whole lot of people with teaser loans are about to need a place to live, as are a lot of suddenly redundant personnel in Greenwich, CT who will be scaling down their lifestyles. Here are some possible secondary markets to get into:
a) Locksmiths, as a lot of empty nesters have more keys made for the kids they thought they were rid of
b) Mini-fridges, so you can keep some beer in the house
c) Weed, since if you can't offer to show a girl the view of the city from your loft, you can at least try “Er, I got weed back at the crib!”
d) Air freshener (see c)
e) Small stepladders, for when you're sneaking cakes in the bathroom window after your granny goes to bed (as it was so eloquently put by one of my recycling plant coworkers). Also probably some hospital slippers or something so she can slip off those heels before making her escape through the garden.
f) Headphones, so you won't get told to “Turn down that racket”
g) Futons: uncomfortable couch by day, and at night, folds down to become an uncomfortable bed
h) wireless internet adapters, so you can get broadband down there and skype your friends who've all moved back into their parents basements but get no cell phone reception
i) Cleaning products to get rid of some of that mildew, and I'd go long on dehumidifiers
j) Tanning salons, since a lot of basement dwellers are going to be fighting off SADS
3. Fashion
A few brief notes on what I consider to be a very significant area. I believe indications are good Ermenegildo Zegna is about to sell a lot of neckties as the hedge fund trader in his open-necked shirt becomes the new bogeyman of international finance, and all those guys are heading out for job interviews. Also, a lot of people just went from sipping champagne waiting for a table at Charlie Trotter's to having a High Life at Hideaway's, and they're going to need a whole new set of hipster shirts, chains, and short plaid skirts to wear over there. Also there may be a run on fishnet and clear heels, as well as mesh shirts... more on that later.
4. Privacy
Pulling the bentley back into the driveway at one's parents' home amidst a liquidity crisis means a couple things for a refugee from the hedge fund industry who escaped with nothing but a collection of open-necked shirts : a lot of creditors are going to be looking for you, and you're probably way out of practice at foiling the instinct for snooping your mother refined during your adolescence. If like me you have a retired father who takes a flashlight and the family dog and forms a search party to look for the mailman if he's five minutes late, you don't stand a chance. Mailboxes, etc. will be making a fortune off of the problem of nosy parents and noisome creditors. Beyond that, I'm investing heavily in those who offer services to those going cash only after their interest only loan on a 10,000 sq ft condo didn't work out so well: 24 hour check cashing, prepaid cellphones, prepaid credit cards, and even Vivid has prepaid cards to buy online porn (should you fail to convince some club rat to sneak in your basement window).
5. Liquidity
People as well as institutions are going to need cash quick, so look into traditional outlets for quick cash: there are pawn shops and used CD shops to consider, and I'd consider a short position on any one-hit wonders... if you'll recall during the Asian currency crisis, shops were telling hopeful sellers to consider using their Alannis Morissette CDs as coasters (“Thank you India, thank you Thailand, tha-ha-hank you currency speculation!”). For a more straightforward play, there's one hot stock I'd consider as as a lever to profit off of financial ruin: Dixie, who make all the little paper cups for panhandlers. Also consider Minute Maid, because when broke people donate blood, they always get that free OJ afterwards. To chase the big returns, my big sector play is pimping: there are going to be a hell of a lot of rent-boys in open necked shirts mulling around Greenwich, CT, which is why I suggested earlier going long on makers of mesh shirts, and anyone with a stake in clear heels is going to make a killing when their coked-up girlfriends and female co-workers realize all those mornings they got high and went jogging will really pay off when they're auditioning down at The Admiral to make next month's interest-only mortgage payment.
6. Education
For those heading back to school to do coke (apparently it's great way to drop the freshman five) and get an MBA, they'll definitely need a cool new (knock-off) messenger bag, which they can later bring to football games... yes, you're cool for having a giant burberry bag, but no, bringing it to a Vikings game and hitting me with it while drunken lunatics pour beer and ketchup on it is not a great way to show it off. (By the way, she was just walking around bumping her burberry duffel into everyone, I didn't actually do anything to make a woman beat me over the head with her bag.) Also important services in today's multicultural, globalist business environment are my handy guide to re-writing a paper with five people who don't speak the same language, based on the my notes on the papers Amstelboy asked me to take a look at where he was trying to integrate five people's edits of a document into a single, cohesive presentation in something recognizable as business Engrish. Seriously, a list of eight items shouldn't be numbered “1 2 * * 4 a b 7”, as explained in chapter 6: “Pick a system and go with it please”. Also in that vein, I would recommend investing in English-Whatever language dictionaries, because of the philosophy of several multinational organizations that using a common language as a medium for translation reduces the costs of that translation: translate Mandarin to Italian by translating Mandarin to English, and English to Italian, thus eliminating the need for rare Mandarin-Italian dictionaries. And obviously to cash in on all those who will blow their financial aid stipends on blow and can't spend more than 16 cents on dinner I'd go short on sushi, and long on Top Ramen.
7. The Wages of Sin
There are also several plays to be made based on the despair of those poor souls who heard Jim Cramer thumbing his nose at the SEC on the radio and thought they could be invincible too, monetizing their growing despair and misfortune. For anyone who's going to prison for defrauding their investors by selling them on CDOs of handshake loans to homeless people, I recommend shorting the 1.5 oz tubes of Swiss Navy and going long on 48 oz cans of Crisco, because after a couple weeks they'll realize they're only pulling down 7 cents an hour making license plates and have to give up some luxuries. I'd also suggest looking at makers of lightweight chairs and short lengths of rope that are strong but thin enough to be easy to tie, but if a hedge fund goes down, none of them know how to tie a windsor knot, I doubt they'd have much luck with a noose, so just go long on Sanofi-Aventis and Fortune Brands (makers of Ambien and Jim Bean).
So that's how to make your fortune off of economic despair. That last part may seem cruel, but I suppose it's because the people I know in that industry to the best of my knowledge aren't so frighteningly short sighted and ethically challenged that I'm too worried about them.
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