Yee. Freakin' Haw. Eastern Conference Final Tonight

The Demon Overlords of New England versus the Satanic Sissies of the Chicago Fire. ESPN2, 7:30 PM.

No, I'm not excited about. The degree of indifference I feel would SLAY them if they could feel it. S-L-A-Y. But I'm gonna watch it. Because I am *so* dedicated to seeing New England defeated, broken and bloody that I'll even cheer for Cuauhtémoc Blanco.

obligatory soccer hotties here

Do You Ever Get The Feeling

the universe is trying to tell you something? Something deep, something purposeful and profound, and you're looking at it all as through a glass darkly?

Yesterday, it was all about Nancy Sinatra. Specifically, it was all about cover versions of Nancy's signature song, These Boots Are Made For Walking. Steve Hartford of MIXX 105.5 - which does not play MY favorites of the 70's, 80's, 90's OR today, btw - and who is almost talented, got his Weird Al on with the tune to commemorate the Bootings in the 'Burg. Hearing that made me remember the Operation Ivy cover on their one and only recording, Energy, which I was in desperate need of, being the day after the Hour Comes Back and my sense of when to go to bed and when to get up being all fucked up. I do appreciate that hour back. Anyway, Energy lives up to its name. The Pump It Up factor of Billy Joel is thorazine, Elvis C ranges from unsweetened iced tea to Diet Pepsi. Operation Ivy is the musical equivalent of a couple of Yellow Jackets washed down by a Red Bull/Jolt Cola cocktail. Good stuff.

So, imagine my delight this morning when I realize what the Universe was trying to tell me: Energy has been re-released today.

So, maybe you think, big deal. Maybe you think I should try to fine tune my Universal receptive vibes. I say to you, listen. And learn.

(warning - some graphic images are shown)

Another Saturday Night

and I ain't go no trophy.

Or even a chance to get a trophy. Not this year anyway.


If it could have happened any other way, I could live with it. Team Red Bull played hard. A consistent solid effort up and down the field. Even after Àngel went down, they hung in there. But they just couldn't overcome the wind, the rain and the ugly yellow boots of New England's Most Hated (and, blessedly, not pictured), Taylor freakin' Twellman.

God, I hate that man. Couldn't it have been anybody else? Parkhurst, for instance. And it was such a crap goal. Conway had a hand on it. Vide threw his body at it. Hunter Freeman almost blocked it. The wind. The remnants of a hurricane. Piss on that.

The highlights, such as they are. And they have been through the matrix, because they show the goal first, and then Àngel's injury. I hope he'll be ok. At least he has lots of time to recover.

Unlike Bruce Arena, who either decided to walk or got his walking papers today.

Let the (mind) games begin.

DC Down. And Out!

Let's all give that a big
YEEEEEEEEEEHAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWW!

2-2 last night, 3-2 Chicago on aggregate. Gotta say "on aggregate" because that's this tournament's catch phrase. Or something. I think I complained about this last year - deja bitch!


Apparently, it was an awesome game. I saw the first half and dozed thru the second. I am thrilled with the results, I assure you.

Tonight's wish is for ... damn. I forgot. I believe I want Dallas to win, but really, it doesn't matter.

Come on, Red Bulls!

And because I did not post a gratuitous soccer hottie yesterday (although I thought the cat was pretty cute), I'll add another today.



and one more, just because...

The Fun Begins in

six hours and 50 minutes. As of right now.

What fun, you ask?

Football* Frenzy 2007. 7:30 tonight, ESPN2, the Chicago Fire travel to RFK to open a can of Whup Ass on D.C. United. At least, that is my prediction. So to make it come true, I'm employing the Power of Opposite, and placing $5 on D.C.

And that's just the start.

8:30 Friday, Dallas (Toja, yay! Ruiz! Boo hiss!) mosey down to Houston (De Ro Knows! Ching! is he well yet? and Ricardo Clark, who won't be playing but is everybody's hero).

Saturday. Josie will start things off with her final game of the season. With some luck, we'll win and our parents won't embarrass us. Then, a mad dash to the grocery store to stock up on chips, dip and suds because at 5 PM on FSC, Fulham takes on somebody in the Englishter Pissy League, and Mostest is due. 7:30 will find me at that same bat channel, watching (hopefully, prayerfully) the Red Bulls crucifying any hope New England ever had of a double. Here's hoping it's a good enough game I'm not tempted to check out Kansas City and Chivas at 8:30 on DK - no, wait. My mistake, it's not on until 10:30, so I can certainly watch it without interruption.

If I don't fall asleep first. Damn those West coast games.


Anyway, I'm all atwitter. It's the Blue Moon of MLS. The perfect alignment of the planets. The once a year Weekend That Matters. Win or go home.

Let's go, Red Bulls!




*borrowing the pissy englishter term for alliterative purposes.

Halloween - the aftermath, Part One

Part One, because I failed to get a photo of Josephine in her Elizabeth costume (Eastern version). My camera was dead! And by the time it had a little battery power, she was on a mission to capture as much candy as humanly possible. So, we will Do Over tonight.

These are our pumpkins. Mine is the skull, Josie's the evil looking jack o'lantern. Austin was puny and did not participate. Katie went off with her friends. Next year, we won't have any Halloweeners at our house.

*sob!*

It's True.

You can find anything on the web.*

I mean, who would have thought that Rancid, those righteous dudes carrying, nay, hurling the nuclear missile that is punk rock into the New Millennium (and beyond...), could be caught posing as Beach Boy Wannabes? Aruba, Jamaica, ooo I wanna take ya...

Help me, Rhonda.

I found it on RancidPunx.net, which is one cool place to find maybe not everything Rancid, but lots of things Rancid. I spent my lunch hour sifting through Getty Images to find that no, they weren't being the Beach Boys, they were being the cheesy wedding band for Tony Hawk's wedding in Fiji.

Cool!



*everything except a pattern to carve a mohawked jack o' lantern!

Say What?

Goals? We don't need no stinking goals.

Well, yes, we do guys. One or two, anyway. This was "our" leg. Our chance to smack New England around. It was me, wasn't it? I could not be there in nationally televised togetherness and you suffered for it.

But that was way that the playoffs went 'round, this opening weekend. Chivas is downed 1-0 by Kansas City. Dallas puts one by Houston for a win. Chicago snuck - well, that was a sneaky rocket, wasn't it? - one by D.C. Only this little scuffle in Estadio Rojo Toro managed to be goal free.

The next games are the do-or-die ones.

I say, bring it on. This is New York's year.

Hitting the Wall...

202 posts in.

Do I have iron-poor blood? A stagnant imagination? The curse of mediocrity? Maybe it's the granola and soy milk I've been breakfasting on for the last month. My mind seems to be made of mush. Mush. As in, I can't get a complete thought thunked. I used to blame this on my kids and their constant interruptions (which is kind of any oxymoron, I suppose - constant interruptions?). Maybe my thoughts are so inured to interruption, that they just automatically reset halfway through. Maybe it's My Age, and That Time in My Life. Could the mood have swung so far that it ain't swinging back? I haven't been doing my crossword puzzles - has my intellect (such as it is) gone fallow? Am I reading too much pulp fiction and not enough literature? Too much Law & Order and not enough Masterpiece Theatre? (Not that there ever was any Masterpiece Theatre). I'm just stuck and I can't seem to jostle my way out of it.

So, apologies in advance. The next few posts (few is a hopeful word here) are likely to be mindless soccer regurgitations, but I will throw in photos of soccer hotties to make them more palatable. The playoffs begin Saturday.

I shall meditate on that.

And this. *I* still think he's cute.

When Life Gives You Lemons

You stomp on Cuauhtemoc Blanco.

I like your attitude, Peter Vagenas.

Ok, so it was a metaphorical stomping, in the most metaphoricalest sense. The Gals could not find a way to win yesterday. And we, the entertainment-starved and Beckham-deprived soccer fans of America, are pretty darn pissed about it. It could have been a perfect Cinderella story, with Dave leading his sorry band of brothers to an improbable - nay, inconceivable! - run at that second best league honor: the MLS Cup.

Well, maybe next year.

I'm just sad. Sad that I won't see another Red Bulls/Gals smackdown this year. Sad that Dave's Inaugural Year was such a bust. Sad that I can't post Tim Armstrong's Oh No video again because I'm in love with Los Angeles. I'm in love with her sooooooooouuuuuuullllll.

Well, who's to say I can't? It's my blog, ain't it?




And I'll add a little something to keep the home fires burning, so to speak -

What Happens in Vegas...

Too bad these guys are in Yverdon-les-Bains, Switzerland. I understand everything about this picture except the tennis ball and the tightness of Cherundolo's swim trunks, which somehow evoke one of Jean-Claude Van Damme's more alternative roles.


I applaud their security in their masculinity.

And I hope they're "skins" when they play Switzerland Wednesday.

The (Soccer) Weekend in Pictures

or, would I be able to express myself without parentheses?

(not that anyone would notice!)

Kevin Hartman makes a desperate attempt to crawl out of Giants Stadium as Juan Pablo Angel makes it 2-1, Red Bulls. JPA was also my fantasy captain, and with 69 points X 2, put me ahead of Austin AND Josie for the first time this year. Go, mom!




I think this photo sums up Saturday's slaughter (which is, of course, a relative term) of New England for the Columbus Crew. Something Faulknerian via Shakespeare - a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing, because in the end, it didn't matter that they'd learned to score, that they'd learned how to come from behind or even that they'd learned how to win on the road. To the Big Show, they don't go. Again. I'm not calling for Sigi's head. Mostly, because I'm afraid he might EAT me. But it is my sincere hope that they can hold on to Schelotto and Gaven this winter.


And finally, let us now sing the praises of the Bright Blue Boot.



These belong to Damarcus Beasley (you can tell by the "Beas" there above the swoosh). All the cool kids are wearing them, from Landon D to the Mostest from Nacogdoches himself, Clint Dempsey.

Fun With Wigs

In the beginning was Juan Toja.


And in his hair, was power and strength and glory. And other things best left unnoticed.

The people saw this and said it is good. And a great craze swept Pizza Hut Park.



Soccer. It's all about the hair.

Between a Rock and a Hard Place

or, How Hard Was It To Cheer For ANYBODY at the Lamar Hunt Open Cup Final?

On the one hand, you've got this twit scampering (yes, scampering!) up and down the field like God's Gift to American Soccer. I know his mama loves him. A lot of people think he's good looking. I just want to backhand him a goodun and wipe that smirk off his face.




On the other hand, how could I not enjoy the suffering of Carlos Ruiz?

I was all twisted in side. I like Toja (note to self: schedule haircut). I hate Ruiz. I like Michael Parkhurst. I despise Jay Heaps.

In the end, it was Viva la Revolution, death to FC D (a/k/a First Class Divers - well, Diver, anyway).

Bring on the playoffs.

meet the fam, v. feline

Meet Speck, the legless wonder.

No, he's not really legless. We call this pose "meatloafing" because, well, he looks like a fluffy white meatloaf. With a couple of burnt spots. Speck is our special needs kitty. He's got that idiot savant thing going. While he's a genius at killing small mammals and presiding lion-like over our yard, his vocalizations need work. His meow is like one of those silent dog whistles, just at the edge of human hearing. And his purr - well, I can purr better than Speck. He also has issues with doors. If he is in, he wants out and if he's out, he wants in. I think he would be driven mad by having a pet door at his disposal, so we don't have one. We call him Speck not because of the specks (otherwise, we'd call him "Specks" now wouldn't we?) but because our first sight of him as a little white speck hopping through the tall weeds next to our yard. He plays bigger than he is.


This is my little black boy Socks. My son always calls me a racist when I call him that. I don't mean to be. I call his brother my little white boy, so I guess I'm being equally racist, which in the confounding algebra of political correctness might reduce down to non-racism. I hope so. It would be difficult to stop calling them 'the white cat' or 'the black cat' at this point in their lives. Socks likes to hang out on the windowsill. His evil white brother only allows him the freedom of the living room and the master bedroom. Everywhere else, he gets attacked just for breathing. By the way, unlike his brother, he *can* purr. Quite nicely, the sound of which is one of the great pleasures of cat companionship. Many evenings we snuggle up together reading and/or watching tv. The only problem is he drools when he's happy.

So, those are our cats. Not great literature, sure. But a post! A post! My kingdom for a post!

Unlike Generalissimo Francisco Franco

I am still alive.

but buried in work. I will get back to slacking shortly. Here's a gratuitous soccer hottie, just cuz.



Mr. Clint Dempsey, show us your ...

...

...

well, whatever you want, sweet pea.

Don't Go Getting the Big Head, Clint

Now that you're Fulham's Player of the Month.

Big ups, Deuce!

Big Soccer Sunday!

USA 2, Brazil 4. Ok, we lost. But Brazil did not score one run-of-play goal. Not one. And we did. So, I give us a solid B and say that was some serious hotness on the field: Kaka, Benny Feilhaber, Clint Dempsey (with a very nice goal, but no dancing, dammit!), Little Michael Bradley, Josh Wolfe, Oguchi Onyewu... Serious heat, peoples.

Out on the left coast, the Red Bulls got pounded by Chivas USA. Yes, you read that right. All I can think right now is 'least said, soonest mended.' Let's hope so.

So, It was my birthday

and this is what Josie gave me. The Nemo she won at the fair, to remind me to 'just keep swimming, just keep swimming - what do we do? we swim swim swim' and this lovely poster that declares her love for me, adds 10 years to my age and calls me Oldelocks to boot.

If she had been born first, she'd be an only child.

That's My Boy

And his Balto.

Took the gang to the Sevier County fair last night.

Josie beat her older sister in the water gun game and won a stuffed Nemo.

Austin took $2 over to the basketball game. He paid and the guy kept giving the ball to this other kid who could not sink a shot and kept handing the guy another $2 to try again. I was just about to go postal on him when he realized he was ignoring Austin, apologized and gave him the ball. Austin moved a step forward. He got into his "shot stance" (I don't know what else to call it, so I apologize - apologies are contagious!). I was trying to say bounce it a couple of times just to get a feel for it and have a little more of a chance at it, but he was already arm back and throwing.

Nothing but net, baby.

Fortunately, we had a pedestrian witness. The guy had gone back to LoserDude and was paying absolutely no attention. In fact, he seemed quite incredulous that it had gone in. Like that never happened at his game...


Anyway, Austin has his Major Prize. I'm glad it's not a leg-shaped lamp.