This, That, & the Other

To start, we have a nice pair of Aiden stories to present. I was in bed the other night w/ Stephanie & the baby watching Sixteen Candles when he came into the room & started screwing around on the floor behind me. I need to preface this w/ the fact that I'd had some Indian food & was feeling a rumbley in my tumbley (as Winnie the Pooh would say). He had recently deuced so I thought little of it when he said he didn't think he'd wiped well, but as I rolled over to look @ him I was definitely not ready for the ol' brown eye, complete w/ Klingons & fudge, that was staring back @ me while he demonstrated his lack of wiping proficiency. The Saag & the Chick Pea Curry made a bee-line for my throat & it was all I could do to keep from hurling all over the bed. He & Stephanie cracked up, but I don't think I'll ever be the same.Then yesterday morning, I was tying my shoe when Stephanie made the obligatory "while you're down there" joke. Aiden then asked her if I was trying to see her "Woman Penis." Woman Penis??? Really? I thought we'd done such a good job raising them w/o these kinds of terms. While Freud would love it, Stephanie was quick to set him straight... which also made it possible for her to avoid the point of her little joke. Explaining cunnilingus to a 7 year old might be a bit more than he could handle. Especially considering that when I tried to explain contraceptives to Solstice the other day (in reference to the Seinfeld episode "The Sponge") she, & 9 years old, was horrified to learn that people have sex when they aren't trying to make a baby. At least she acted that way. When I was 9, I was already trying to do it, so maybe she just pretended to be shocked.The new Whitey Morgan CD, Honky Tonks and Cheap Motels, came out last week... it's fantastic. They recorded a new version of "If it ain't Broke" w/ some nice pedal steel work. It's a little slower than the previous version w/ a cool shuffle to it. Don't fret over the fact that Amazon added an "N" to his name, making him "Whitney Morgan," it's the same old Whitey w/ the 78s that you all know & love. And after the Visions of Ypsi endorsements sent so many candidates to their victory parties last month, maybe this one will send Whitey and the boys up the charts. Here's the track list:1. Hold Her When She Cries
2. Crazy (not the Willie Nelson song)
3. If It Ain't Broke
4. Back to Back
5. Cheatin' Again
6. Honky Tonk Angel
7. I'm on Fire (the Bruce Springsteen song)
8. Another Round
9. Goodbye Dixie
10. Love and Honor
11. Prove It All to You
12. Sinner
In soccer news, the kids did the same this week that they did last week. Solstice's team kicked ass (I had to switch from a 2-1-2 formation to a 3-1-1 to try to get them to stop scoring. I was afraid the other team was going to cry. If only Aiden's team had this problem. Practice went well last night though so maybe they're about to turn the corner. Speaking of turning the corner, Arsenal went down in a shocking 2-1 defeat to Hull City on Saturday. They need to turn things around too, if they don't want to make it 2 straight home defeats tonight when they face Porto in the Champions League. While they only lost by 1, my team lost 7-2 on Sunday. It wasn't a pretty sight. We seemed to be pulling things together by the last quarter, but we were certainly shaky. This after our goalie broke his ankle & tore all the ligaments the week before. We're now 3-1, w/ only 3 4 matches left, so @ the half-way point, we're still doing pretty well, but next week will be quite a test for us.

Just Like a New Dylan Tune: "Dreamin' of You"

Check out the new video... featuring Harry Dean Stanton as some weird ass crazy fan or something. After you watch it, do like Andre did and pre-order the new 2 disc set, Tell Tale Signs: Bootleg Series Vol 8, a collection of outtakes and live tracks from the last 20 years. This particular song is an outtake from Time Out of Mind, his Grammy winning album from 1998. If you don't think Stanton's appearance in the video is weird enough, check out the other video... Dylan, Harry Dean Stanton and some other dude on some Jewish telethon from the late 80s or earl 90s... I think.

Bruce Wayne v Clark Kent

You may recall the discussion of "Animated Hotties" a few months ago, but last night, on my way to work, I heard a story on All Things Considered that made me think of Batman and Superman. I honestly don't remember what the story was about or why it made me think about these characters, but regardless, my immediate thought was "that's bloggable!" In the Seinfeld episode, "The Stock Tip," Jerry suggests that Superman might have "super humor," that is, an advanced sense of silliness based on the reaction he has to the yellow sun of Earth. As a comedian, his reasons for being concerned w/ this aspect of Superman's super-powers are clear. But what about his IQ in general? A sense of humor is, in name anyway, a sense, & it seems that his senses are affected by the Sun. Intelligence isn't really a sense so much as a something else... I don't know what, but it's something else. He certainly seems to have great "common sense" as Clark is constantly trying to pretend he doesn't have it. How smart must he be? And is he smarter than Bruce Wayne? My 1st thought was that Bruce is smarter; he's a detective who relies upon research & the scientific method to solve crimes; Clark uses his brute strength to subdue criminals. I'm not as certain anymore though. If Clark has "super-intelligence," the case is closed, but if not, it's down to the evidence we get throughout the books, films, TV shows & radio dramas. Of course, if Clark were smarter, he'd have given up on Lois long ago... unless his interest in her is a cover just like everything else about his persona. Maybe he really wants Jimmy. Anyway, I'm certain they're both relatively smart, but we seem to get more specific evidence about Bruce's intelligence than we do concerning Clark. He apparently has a degree in Journalism which got him a top job @ the Daily Planet which seems to be the Metropolitan equivalent of the New York Daily News, always in the shadow of a bigger paper, but big none-the-less. My gut is saying Bruce is smarter, who do you, dear reader, think has the true super IQ? I doubt Bruce ever got to meet JFK When Commissioner Gordon tells Bruce & Dick to come... they come!

Camping (Sorta)

So w/ moving & the baby & everything we never had a chance to take a vacation this summer. The kids weren't too pleased by this (& really, we weren't either). To remedy this problem, we set up the tents in the backyard after the Arsenal match Saturday afternoon & had a fun little campout. We had a fire & cooked Smart Dogs on sticks. We had s'mores & peanuts before we finally went to sleep around 10:30. The kids had a blast, but I learned an important lesson... camping is a great way to spend the evening when one is far from home & vacationing on the cheap, but it isn't nearly as cool when one can see his or her bedroom from the tent. It was fun though, & the tent is still up so maybe we'll do it again this weekend after we check out Elizabeth & Dan's new house.

Super Soccer Saturday

I picked Solstice up from her friend's house & we went straight to her game yestermorn. Of course, as we got to the field, I got a call from Stephanie that went like this:
"Do you know where my keys are?"
"Shit! They're in my pocket."
20 minutes later we were back @ the field & Solstice's team was warming up. They played really well & notched up a W for the Panthers U9. The game ended 7-3 but for some poor refereeing decisions it could have been 8 or 9. Watching her start to enjoy the game is great. Her 1st couple seasons were a bit rough, but she always claimed to like it. This time she was really having fun. A few of the other kids on the team have been w/ us since she was in 2nd grade & their improvement has been fun to watch too. This year is their 1st w/ goalies & throw-ins, & it must be said that 1 of the kids is a top-class keeper in the making. He's kinda nuts... diving @ people's feet and throwing himself in front of the ball. At this level, I can't keep him in goal all the time, but soon enough he'll be our #1.

An hour after the match it was Aiden's turn to play. While they lost, they put in a great showing of themselves. I'm afraid he might be a bit frustrated this season because he's now the oldest on his team & by far the most experienced. He set up a few goals w/ great through-balls, but the rest of the team wasn't able to do the same for him yet. At practice this week, we'll have to work on getting the kids to pay attention. I think we'll play some sort of socceresque version Simon Says. On the positive side, none of them were afraid of the 2 HUGE kids the other team had, 1 of which was on Aiden's team when he was in kindergarten. He was a brute then, but now... he's enormous. All in all, the Jaguars U8 were a joy to watch too, & certainly by the end of the season they'll be on course to win a few too.

As a side-note, during the game we got word that a cop had shot a man @ the playground near the fields. The kids who'd been there were crying (obviously totally freaked out). Apparently, what happened was a man showed up to take his kids from their game (& away from his ex-wife) against the court ruling. They got into a huge fight, a cop was called, & he overreacted... shooting the guy w/ a tranquilizer in front of a playground full of kids who all thought he was dead. I understand the need to subdue people, but that was poor judgement. He was carted off in an ambulance & she was arrested. And people claim soccer is boring.

Aiden's match started @ 11:45 & the Arsenal v Bolton match started @ 12:30 so I set the old DVR & after the game my dad & I raced home to watch it. After going down 1-0 due to a poor no-call when Almunia was hammered, the Gunners came back & it was 2-1 Arsenal by half-time courtesy of Eboue's 1st goal for Arsenal & then a nice finish by Bendtner. Bolton recovered well after the break, but Almunia & the Arsenal defense played well keeping things under control before Denilson slotted in a nice goal after a great run by Walcott & a fantastic cross from Adebayor. This 3-1 win sends Arsenal to the top of the table... @ least until the Chelsea Man U match in a 1/2 hour. If Chelsea doesn't win, Arsenal will remain a point clear of Liverpool... of course if Chelsea do win, Arsenal will only be a point out of 1st & some 8 points & 13 place ahead of Man U. Either way, it's a win-win for the Gunners.
Afterwards, we set up tents in the yard & had a little camp out... more to come on that later when I have the pictures.

It's Pirate Day Again

That's right folks, it's International Talk Like a Pirate Day. Have you talked like a pirate yet? You still have a few hours left... unless you're the person from Hawaii who reads this once in a while. In that case, you've got a lot of time left. I celebrated today by working @ Plum Market from 8:00-3:00, getting Solstice from school, & then coaching her practice this evening. She is spending the night @ her friend's house now so the rest of us will finish off the grand celebration by eating the pizza (how is it Piratesque you ask? Pineapple makes it tropical). We'll be watching The Three Musketeers. I know it's not technically a pirate movie, but Porthos is referred to as a pirate & it made my list of swashbucklers a couple years ago. Here's the link to the 1st part of the list, & here's the link to the rest of it. Oh, & here's your obligatory Arrrrr.

"The Galveston Flood"

It was the year of 1900
that was 80 years ago
Death come'd a howling on the ocean
and when death calls you've got to go
Galveston had a sea wall
just to keep the water down
But a high tide from the ocean
blew the water all over the town.

Wasn't that a mighty storm
Wasn't that a mighty storm in the morning
Wasn't that a mighty storm
It blew all the people away.

The sea began to rolling
the ships they could not land
I heard a captain crying
Oh God save a drowning man
The rain it was a falling
and the thunder began to roll
The lightning flashed like Hell-fire
and the wind began to blow

Wasn't that a mighty storm
Wasn't that a mighty storm in the morning
Wasn't that a mighty storm
It blew all the people away.

The trees fell on the island
and the houses gave away
Some they strived and drownded
others died every way.

The trains at the station were loaded
with the people all leaving town
But the trestle gave way with the water
and the trains they went on down
Old death the cruel master
when the winds began to blow
Rode in on a team of horses
and cried death won't you let me go.

Wasn't that a mighty storm
Wasn't that a mighty storm in the morning
Wasn't that a mighty storm
It blew all the people away.

The flood it took my mother
it took my brother too
I thought I heard my father
cry as I watched my mother go
Old death your hands are clammy
when you've got them on my knee
You come and took my mother
won't you come back after me?

Wasn't that a mighty storm
Wasn't that a mighty storm in the morning
Wasn't that a mighty storm
It blew all the people away.

---John Duffy, Tom Rush

3 Mavericks

The word "maverick" has been thrown around so often lately in reference to the GOP's rather unmaverick like maverick, John McCain, people are actually starting to believe it. If voting w/ GWB 90% of the time is a mavericky thing to do, I suppose that makes GWB a maverick too so if being a maverick means towing the standard GOP party line, I guess he's done a good job of that, but to vote for him because he claims he's gonna shake things up is ridiculous. Yet, I'm getting more & more afraid his "maverick" claims will work making him the next President & Palin the next VP. I also don't think the Obama attacks on Palin's ignorance of the Bush Doctrine will work as most people say things like "I don't don't know what that is either so she's just like me." I, for one, don't actually want a President (or VP) "just like me." I want my leaders to be smarter & better versed in the issues... JFK won a Pulitzer, Carter has written more books than Toni Morrison, Clinton was a Rhodes' Scholar... W is the guy we want to drink a beer w/ & McCain is the guy to go bowling w/... Absurd! After 8 years of this, an intellectual in the oval office would be a nice change of pace. Speaking of Palins, check out the Michael Palin for President site!

I didn't actually log in to talk about the presidential race though. I've been DVRing old Maverick episodes on Encore Western. What an awesome show! It has everything my love for Rockford has but 15 years earlier, w/ 19th century gamblers & in B/W. If you've never seen the show, you should definitely check it out. The writing is fantastic, the sarcasm is great, & the plots are just plain weird.

I didn't actually log in to talk about that either though. What I really want to discuss is Pete Michell, Top Gun's Maverick. We watched the end of the film the other night, & while his ability to go supersonic & be there in 30 seconds is pretty sweet, I noticed something I've never thought about before. It's possible this issue goes back to the basic claims of homoeroticism in the film, but I think it's quite possible that Maverick is simply an ass-hat. Goose's death isn't directly related to Mav's hot-shot flying, but it's claimed over & over again that everything he does in the air is in relation to the chip on his shoulder so @ least indirectly Maverick is responsible for Goose's death. That said, @ some point, he's going to have to talk to Goose's wife & kid about everything, & the conversation will go like this.
Mav: Because I'm a hotshot & left my wing man in order to win a stupid contest & prove a point, your father is dead.
Goose's kid: Could you have avoided this & spared my father's life?
Mav: Of course.
GK: Maybe the Lord will be able to forgive you, but I never will (this is the same thing Tom Cruise's character is told in Born on the Fourth of July when he has to explain how he is responsible for an American death.)
Mav: I'm really, really, really sorry... w/ sugar on top.
GK: Were they able to recover his dog tags?
Mav: Yep, I held his body in the water until the rescue helicopter got there.
GK: Could you give them to me so I have something to remember my father who died in the service to our fair country?
Mav: Nah, I took it upon myself to throw them into the Indian Ocean. I'm sure the Defense Department will be happy to make you a replica set though. They're pretty cheap & easy to make.

We're going to skip the obligatory "thumbs up" soccer reference & go w/ the more obvious though less common "just prior ot anal insertion" reference

The Blogging of the Planet of the Apes

You may recall that we watched Soylent Green a few months ago because our recording of Planet of the Apes didn't play properly; well, I recorded Planet of the Apes again & we just finished watching the 5th of the 5 films. That's right, we've watched all 5 in chronological order so I guess I need to discuss them for a few minutes. To begin w/, they kinda suck. I don't think I'd ever actually seen 1 of them all the way through before, but the 1st is by far the best. Like the Star Trek films though, they don't get progressively worse, but rather have a sort of up & down thing happening. The 2nd 1, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, is shit. The humans send another astronaut into the future to find Heston & he & Heston's hot girlfriend find an underground group of mutated humans who worship an atomic bomb. In the end, the bomb explodes destroying the planet. The 3rd, Escape from the Planet of the Apes, follows 2 of the apes, Cornelius & Zira, as they leave the planet just before it explodes, going back in time to 1970s New York (or LA... it's kind of unclear). They become celebrities & even get montages of them getting fitted for fancy clothes in fancy boutiques. It is soooo bad it's got a campy goodness. The 4th 1, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, picks up w/ the story of Cornelius' & Zira's child, Caesar, as he leads the ape/slaves into rebellion about 20 years after the previous film. It's a bit darker than the other films & has some nice commentary on race & power. The final film, Battle for the Planet of the Apes is a piece of shit beyond anything that the 2nd or 3rd film could ever attempt. Caesar has a power struggle w/ another ape who wants war w/ another set of mutants who live in the ruins of the city (maybe the ancestors of the mutants in Beneath the Planet of the Apes). Over all, I'm glad I finally saw them, but I wish they were a bit better. Oh, & I did see the Tim Burton remake a few years ago too, & that is also a piece of shit. I know some of you have a love for everything Burton, but other than Batman & Ed Wood & to a lesser extent Mars Attacks & Beetle Juice, his films are way way way over-rated. As a side-note, I'm blogging from my car as I'm waiting for a parking spot on campus. Why didn't I just bike, you ask? I had too much to carry today, but I can assure you'll I'll be sure to bring stuff to my office @ other times of the day so I never have to park @ 11:30 ever again. Anyway, had I seen the films as a kid, perhaps I would have more tolerance for them, but as it stands, here are my rankings:
5) Battle for the Planet of the Apes
4) Escape from the Planet of the Apes
3) Beneath the Planet of the Apes
2) Conquest of the Planet of the Apes
1) The Planet of the Apes

Raymond Domenech is a Doucehbag!

I know most of you faithful readers are tired of the soccer posts, & a few of you are expecting a Landon "Ladycakes" Donovan post, but after the way France played in Austria the other day, I decided to take it upon myself & bore you all again. First off, the coach needs to be sacked... like NOW! His shit ass selection bought Les Bleu a 1-way ticket home from Euro 08 @ the bottom of their group & now they dropped 3 points in World Cup qualifying to Austria?!?!?! WTF!?!? Maybe I'm going to far here, but I think I could do a better job... & I'd do it on the cheap. I'm not asking for millions of Francs, just airfare, expenses & a small stipend to pay my bills. And maybe a new replica kit. After Mexes' horrible performance in central defense (& considering the fact that Thuram is 36 years old), here's what I'd do. A 3-5-2 is the only way to go since they're having a rough time fielding 2 useful central defenders (actually, they're having a rough time fielding 1 useful CD but Gallas will be alright). W/ that in mind, Mexes should exiled on Saint Helena... his crimes are much worse than anything Napoleon ever did. He scored an own goal, lost his marker for the 2nd goal & pulled down an attacker to give up a penalty kick for the 3rd goal. Maybe exile is too nice... a bullet to the back of the head might be more fitting. Anyway, here's the line-up I'd go w/:
Frey
Sagna----Gallas--------Evra

Flamini----Diara
Govou-----Ribery------Nasri

--------------Ben Arfa
----Benzema
Yet Flamini & Ben Arfa aren't even in the squad while Thuram, Henry, Anelka, Makelele, Vieira, & Toulalan are & they are all ancient. Toulalan might not be as old as he looks, but he plays like he is. even if they do turn it around & qualify, these fossils won't be going to S. Africa. (Maybe Henry will, but not as a starter.) I said it after the Euros & I'll say it again: they need to focus on their youth! I imagine Domenech is claiming that the youth will evolve over the next 2 years & slowly overtake the older players, but unless some changes are made now, it won't matter because they won't be playing a competitive match until the Euro 2012 qualifiers begin in the fall of 2010.

In other news, we won our 1st match the other day as the other team only had 4 people & had to forfeit. We gave them some people & played 8 v 8 & Dan (my brother in law & right winger) got his 1st goal ever, finally overcoming the anguish of being stopped by a legless goalie as a kid. Along w/ "getting his duck," he also published a story on Word Riot... you should all check it out.

The Well Organized Vast Coalition of Leftist Bloggers

Cleta Mitchell was on the Diane Rhem Show today & suggested that this coalition has joined together in an organized front to smear Palin (the Governor of Alaska, not the Monty Python cast member). Having missed the organizing meetings, I'm perhaps a couple days behind on this one (I had to let Landon have his say). That said, I'm not certain that it really takes a "vast coalition" to find fault w/ her. Mitchell's claims were about the attention on Bristol (the 17 year old daughter, not the city in England) & Palin's alleged attempts to get books banned from the Wasilla, Alaska Public Library. First off, I absolutely agree w/ Obama's stance that the families should be off limits & therefore we shouldn't attack her because of her daughter. However, when she & the GOP put her eldest son on a pedestal for joining the military & attempt to win our sympathies based on her youngest child, it seems like she's trying to have it both ways (which I'm also sure she's done before... not that there's anything wrong w/ that either). If we are all supposed to look @ 2 of her kids, all should be fair game. As far as the book banning goes, the only "proof" so far that this happened has come from a 1996 article in The Frontiersman, the Wasilla newspaper, where she discussed it a little bit. Of course, it's not completely out of the question; the mid-nineties were full of library book-banning movements. Remember the dude in Ohio who shat in a children's' book about gay parents? Those were the good ol' days of book-banning (well, not as good as Nazi Germany, but pretty good none-the-less). Mitchell's response to the book-burning question was "I'm not commenting on that. She is the target of a smear campaign and I don't know if that even ever really happened, but remember, many parents have been upset by the books their children are forced to read." This is fantastic: what she means here is this: "I'm not talking about it, it might not have happened, if it did it's justified anyway." In her defense, she is right that parents are often upset by what their children are forced to read... Huck Finn, Harry Potter, Slaughter House 5... but that is an issue to be settled between the parent, the student, & the teacher. No one in the public library system is "forcing" people to read books. I don't know though, maybe in Alaska, librarians carry guns... Librarianators... Biblio-enforcers... pistol packin' Athenaeumians... they get archival on our asses... perhaps these are the brain police Frank Zappa warned us about. Maybe I spent too long discussing the book-banning issue, but I'm not in the camp that says this is a personal issue. Her support of censorship may actually be an important thing to know about before we cast our votes.

Anyway, it seems to me that these aren't even the issues people are really talking about. The only times I hear about them is when the GOP think-tank people don't want to discuss the real issues they keep saying we need to discuss. In fact, McCain's appearance on Larry King was canceled after one of these alleged "personal attacks" by the media when Campbell Brown asked Tucker Bounds to discuss Palin's Foreign Policy qualifications. She pressed him to answer the question he tried to deflect in the way any good journalist is expected to & they say she was "attacking" Palin's personal life. Before you watch the interview, I want to say that I keep hearing people say their Republican friends are scared by this VP pick... 1 heart beat away from being the PILF... the hottest VP since Mondale... yet all I see is GOP support. I don't really know any Republicans though, so I'd love to hear from some & get a reaction to these issues. Now, enjoy the CNN clip (& then a little Daily Show fun w/ soundbites), & don't forget, the next meeting for the Well Organized Vast Coalition of Leftist Bloggers will take place in my living room next week... bring beer:

Landon's Post #3: Transfer Deadline Day

I waited until today to recap the weekend so I could also discuss the transfer that took place. The squads are set in Europe now until January 7, alas, I'm still in LA because I suck & my 1st 2 attempts in Europe found me coming home a complete & utter failure. When I say I suck, I want you to understand how badly I suck... really badly. That said, I did get 2 sweet goals this past weekend, but in the MLS shouldn't really count.
Here is how the final day of transfers went:
Chelsea: lost out in their bid for Brasilian star Robinho
Liverpool: Scored a much needed winger by signing Espanyol's Albert Riera
Man City: Swooped in and grabbed Robinho right from under Abramovich's nose... pissing off Chelsea fans everywhere
Arsenal: Wenger never ended up buying the much needed defensive midfielder pissing off Arsenal fans everywhere.
Other than the clubs in the top 4 right now, Man U finally signed Berbatov from Tottenham, & then sent strikers Louis Saha & Fraizer Campbell to Everton & Tottenham respectively. Tottenham also grabbed the celebrated Russian striker, Pavlyuchenko, after missing out on his compatriot, Arshavin. As for me, Landon Donovan, I'm still taking a piss in the MLS.Now for my Premiership wrap up... 2 days late. Arsenal redeemed themselves nicely by spanking Newcastle 3-0 @ the Emirates. Liverpool & Chelsea drew in their matches w/ Villa & Tottenham & Man U had the weekend off after losing 2-1 to Zenit St. Petersburg in the UEFA Supercup on Friday afternoon @ Old Trattford. The Landon Donovan Douchey Player of the Game Award goes to Paul Scholes who hilariously palmed the ball into the back of the net from about 15 feet out like Maradona or some volleyball player. I was impressed by John O'Shea's attempt to cover it up by celebrating the goal & hugging him. Scholes will miss their 1st 2 Champions League matches, but I'll miss them all because I suck & am stuck on that sinking ship that is the LA Galaxy. Watch the hand ball here:

Wrap Up & Tape Up

The Big Ass Summer Party went well Saturday night. Live music under the stars by Jim, Warren & Gerry while we enjoyed a fire & the fancy party lights. Everyone seemed to have a good time (& I beat Jean @ horse shoes... always a good day when I beat Jean @ something). We even classed things up a bit w/ the inclusion of caviar & escargots. Although the snails were only enjoyed by myself & a few kids... most people were afraid to try them. I've been loving them since I 1st tried them in middle school though. What could be better than a small, tasteless ball of muscle drenched in butter & garlic. I know they aren't vegetarian, but they're not much different than bugs & I kill those all the time. I suppose it's time to remind y'all what Ben Franklin said when he briefly gave up vegetarianism, "So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do." The caviar was pretty nasty though. It tasted like how a bait shop smells. As far as the turn out went, it was no Burns' Night blow out, but a smaller crowd was nice (& calm for a change). Work people, soccer people, neighborhood people & old friends. Geo even skipped the Jazz fest. I was going to list the names of people who RSVPed that they were coming but didn't show up, but they know who they are & the shame they must feel is greater than any shame a mention here could ever cause.In other news, Jim informed me that he may miss a few games this fall because he hurt/possible broke a toe while falling off of his kid's scooter. I told him to man up & quit being a douchebag so Karma got me yesterday while I was playing soccer in the yard w/ Jean, Aiden & Dan. I stubbed my toes into the ground & may have broken my 2nd Metatarsal. I can bend it & it's not swollen, so I'm not sure what the situation is, but if I'm able to play on Saturday, I think it will require a bunch of tape, but then again, I still have to tape up my thumb so what's 1 more appendage?