Sport in Holland is dominated by soccer. The Dutch are a great sporting people and they always punch above their weight in the Olympics and stuff but in the end it all comes down to soccer. It's almost like having a lot of friends but one of them is really famous like say, Mick Jagger. If Mick calls you up to go to a party but you were supposed to play poker that night with your normal friends, what are you going to do? Of course, you party with Mick! To carry this analogy further, Mick Jagger is to rock and roll as Johan Cruyff is to soccer.
I got to Holland about 1991, but didn't start following soccer until about 1993 so I was a bit spoilt that the first team I ever followed was probably the best team I'll ever see. Learning to watch soccer from Ajax of the mid-90's was probably unfair. They were just so good. Van Der Sar, Reizeger, Davids, The De Boers, Rijkaard, Kluivert, Overmars and my favourite Jari Litmanen. They were all homegrown talent and probably should have won more in Europe than they did. I remember them absolutley dismantling Real Madrid in 1996. I think the score was 2-0 but a fair score would have 6-0. They were just so dominate. The Boswell decision(basically free agency) would come few years later and the team would be broken up and the players went to the bigger European clubs). Anyway, soccer peaked for me right here. One of the great sporting moments for me ever, right down to Jack Van Gelder going all Peter North on his call.
Like I said, there are other sports and there is a great club system for people who want to play. If you want to play a sport, join a club, it's that easy. I even got to play American Football for a couple of years while I was there. The same club also had a baseball team. It's a lot easier to play these sports in Holland than even in America! The only other sports that I really did was volleyball and skating. Skating is great and there is no better place in the world to skate than in Holland. Because of all the canals you can skate anywhere. From the middle of your city, out to the country and onto the lakes. If soccer is a religion than skating is like yoga. It's a release, if you like or an exatentennsial experience. Of course you don't race or compete in Yoga but the Dutch do and the Grandaddy of all skating races is the Elfstedentocht. It's a 200 km race through eleven cities that anyone can enter (as long as your pre-registered with the club). The only problem is that the race only happens if the ice allows which isn't very often. When I watched there had only been 11 races run in the last century. I got up at 0430 in the morning and watched until midnight when the last rider came in. In a cruel twist, if you were to skate the 200 kms and came in at 1 minute after midnight you weren't allowed to finish or get your stupid medal. I think the rules may have been written by a German.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
The Dichotomy of the New Zealand Parrot
While not as diverse as a lot of places in the world, the wildlife of New Zealand is usually unique in some shape or way. This is, of course, usually due to geographical isolation. I didn't even know that New Zealand had parrots before I came here. The Kea and the Kakapo represent this uniqueness in somewhat opposite fashion. The Kea is like the rambunctious teenager while the Kakapo is more like an older refined gentleman. I've never seen a Kakapo and I probably never will. They were thought to be extinct for many years until a population was found in the remote West Coast of the South Island and are now making a slow recovery on a remote island but remain one of the most endangered birds in the world. The Kea on the other hand use to be plentiful but they are headed towards endangerment but somehow this might actually have a lot to do with there own recklessness. I have had the chance to see a Kea and they are just wild!
We were camping in our van down in the South Island down by Fox Glacier when we were awoken by a bird on our roof. We weren't too concerned until were heard Keeeeeaaaaa!. When we opened the door we found one running off with a jandal. We chased him down until he reluctantly gave it up. I watched for the next 20 minutes as they tore into other parked cars. Wipers, rubber seal, external lights etc. They ripped into it! They then moved onto an out building, they started on the roof and worked their way down. They will tear into anything out of curiosity. I watched one on top of a Stop sign. I thought he had worked one of the bolts loose that held the sign in place. I didn't believe it so I walked over to check it out. He jumped off as I approached but stayed nearby. He hadn't actually worked it loose but as I grabbed the nut to check it he hopped over to right under my feet. I swear that he was telling me " Yeah man, go for it, let's fuck this shit up!" like he thought I was joining in. He was that enthusiastic! Here are videos of the Kakapo and that Kea that represents these opposites. You can watch the whole Kea video if you like it's actually quite good but the part I'm trying to show is in the fourth video about three minutes in. You can skip through the videos on the right hand side.
We were camping in our van down in the South Island down by Fox Glacier when we were awoken by a bird on our roof. We weren't too concerned until were heard Keeeeeaaaaa!. When we opened the door we found one running off with a jandal. We chased him down until he reluctantly gave it up. I watched for the next 20 minutes as they tore into other parked cars. Wipers, rubber seal, external lights etc. They ripped into it! They then moved onto an out building, they started on the roof and worked their way down. They will tear into anything out of curiosity. I watched one on top of a Stop sign. I thought he had worked one of the bolts loose that held the sign in place. I didn't believe it so I walked over to check it out. He jumped off as I approached but stayed nearby. He hadn't actually worked it loose but as I grabbed the nut to check it he hopped over to right under my feet. I swear that he was telling me " Yeah man, go for it, let's fuck this shit up!" like he thought I was joining in. He was that enthusiastic! Here are videos of the Kakapo and that Kea that represents these opposites. You can watch the whole Kea video if you like it's actually quite good but the part I'm trying to show is in the fourth video about three minutes in. You can skip through the videos on the right hand side.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
My Happy Place
I've finished the Bill Bryson book "The Thunderbolt Kid" which is almost cause for a celebration in itself. The book itself is really good don't get me wrong. I like Bill Bryson and he's also the author of one of my favourite books of all time "A Short History of Nearly Everything" which if you didn't read it in 2006 when it was chic you should still read it anyways because it still has the ability to make you a little bit cooler than you are right now. No, I need to celebrate because I finished a book at all and it been a long time coming. I feel literaturely relevant again. I know I'm getting ahead of myself but it's a big deal to me. Bryson can be laugh out loud funny which is pretty hard to do. A mental snigger,ok, or a little audible giggle, maybe, but he really cracks me up which is really hard. "The Thunderbolt Kid" is about him growing up in the 50's and 60's in Des Moines, Iowa and he relates all these different stories to how it was and how idyllic it actually was. There is a part of the story where he talks about staying over at his grandparents tiny house and having to sleep on the "sleeping porch" which was freezing in the winter. I've picked out a bit that I really liked:
"The only heat that the sleeping porch contained was that of any human being who happened to be out there. It couldn't have been more than one or two degrees warmer than the world outside - and outside it was perishing. So to sleep on the sleeping porch required preparation. First, you put on long underwear,pyjamas,jeans, a sweatshirt, your grandfathers old cardigan and bathrobe,two pairs of woollen socks on your feet and another on your hands, and a hat with ear flaps tied beneath the chin. Then you climbed into bed and were immediately covered with a dozen bed blankets,three horse blankets, all the household overcoats, a canvas tarpaulin and a piece of old carpet. I'm not sure they didn't lay an old wardrobe on top of that just to hold everything down. It was like sleeping under a dead horse. For the first minute or so it was unimaginably cold,shockingly cold, but gradually your body heat seeped in and you became warm and happy in a way you would not have believed possible only a minute or two before. It was bliss".
I loved that little section because, I'm going to let you in on a little secret of mine because we're friends here, I love sleeping in the cold. Like freezing cold, albeit all wrapped up and snuggly. My mother says that when I was a baby I had colic and she used to lay me to bed next to an open window even during the winter to help my coughing. That may have had something to do with how it started. I can remember being about 10 or 12 in Worcester and having the bedroom window wide open ,which was just above my bed, and it started snowing during the night. The window had a screen on it, so the snow didn't get in but I can still remember being gloriously warm/cold under my blankets. My grandmother had a sleeping porch off the lounge of her house and when I stayed with her for a while I got to sleep in there where it was absolutely freezing. I loved it. I would love for it to be freezing cold and just have ten blankets on top of me. The only downside was, your body only warms the area where it has direct contact with. Once you've warmed a particular area, that's it. You can't move for the rest of the night without getting shocked by the cold that lies only inches from your body. Don't get me wrong here, I don't like the cold per se, I like being warm in the cold, if you know what I mean. Unfortunately, I don't get to feed that beast much anymore. Mrs Finndego is decidedly the opposite. I'm typing this post from my bed and I can see the heat waves rising from her side of the bed where she has her electric blanket on the "Chernobyl" setting. She's not even in bed yet and the heater is on and the house is a comfortable 18C. So, you know what I do now? When I go to bed and I start to nod off and I enter that half awake/half asleep subconsciousness I go to my happy place. Do you know where my happy place is? A snow cave. A fucking snow cave. Sometimes, I imagine that I'm on a sailboat in the middle of the Southern Ocean with 30ft waves and howling winds. A while back I saw this doco where a guy slept out in the middle of the Gobi desert in the middle of winter by burning wood to heat some stones and then covered the hot stones with dirt that was heated by the stones. That would be friggin cool. A human Hangi.
"The only heat that the sleeping porch contained was that of any human being who happened to be out there. It couldn't have been more than one or two degrees warmer than the world outside - and outside it was perishing. So to sleep on the sleeping porch required preparation. First, you put on long underwear,pyjamas,jeans, a sweatshirt, your grandfathers old cardigan and bathrobe,two pairs of woollen socks on your feet and another on your hands, and a hat with ear flaps tied beneath the chin. Then you climbed into bed and were immediately covered with a dozen bed blankets,three horse blankets, all the household overcoats, a canvas tarpaulin and a piece of old carpet. I'm not sure they didn't lay an old wardrobe on top of that just to hold everything down. It was like sleeping under a dead horse. For the first minute or so it was unimaginably cold,shockingly cold, but gradually your body heat seeped in and you became warm and happy in a way you would not have believed possible only a minute or two before. It was bliss".
I loved that little section because, I'm going to let you in on a little secret of mine because we're friends here, I love sleeping in the cold. Like freezing cold, albeit all wrapped up and snuggly. My mother says that when I was a baby I had colic and she used to lay me to bed next to an open window even during the winter to help my coughing. That may have had something to do with how it started. I can remember being about 10 or 12 in Worcester and having the bedroom window wide open ,which was just above my bed, and it started snowing during the night. The window had a screen on it, so the snow didn't get in but I can still remember being gloriously warm/cold under my blankets. My grandmother had a sleeping porch off the lounge of her house and when I stayed with her for a while I got to sleep in there where it was absolutely freezing. I loved it. I would love for it to be freezing cold and just have ten blankets on top of me. The only downside was, your body only warms the area where it has direct contact with. Once you've warmed a particular area, that's it. You can't move for the rest of the night without getting shocked by the cold that lies only inches from your body. Don't get me wrong here, I don't like the cold per se, I like being warm in the cold, if you know what I mean. Unfortunately, I don't get to feed that beast much anymore. Mrs Finndego is decidedly the opposite. I'm typing this post from my bed and I can see the heat waves rising from her side of the bed where she has her electric blanket on the "Chernobyl" setting. She's not even in bed yet and the heater is on and the house is a comfortable 18C. So, you know what I do now? When I go to bed and I start to nod off and I enter that half awake/half asleep subconsciousness I go to my happy place. Do you know where my happy place is? A snow cave. A fucking snow cave. Sometimes, I imagine that I'm on a sailboat in the middle of the Southern Ocean with 30ft waves and howling winds. A while back I saw this doco where a guy slept out in the middle of the Gobi desert in the middle of winter by burning wood to heat some stones and then covered the hot stones with dirt that was heated by the stones. That would be friggin cool. A human Hangi.
No Comment
I've had some feedback about placing comments with the posts. I'm going to try and leave a comment after I post this and see how it goes. I've already responded to comments back when I first started last month and I can't remember it being a problem. I would like everyone who reads this in the next couple of days, if they could, to also have a go and leave feedback on how it went. I've had reports of people not being able to leave a comment or "being held up at customs". If you are unable to leave a comment please email me at coolbreezenl@hotmail.com and let me know what happened. I'm not sure if you need to follow the blog to leave a comment so that would be interesting to know, also. Mark
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Bob The Oligarch
I've banned Bob the Builder from the house. I've come to the realization that I have no wish for my children to espouse his peculiar trade practices. I have no doubt that Mr Builder is a capable tradesman who is committed to using green technologies. "Reduce,Reuse,Recycle" is his 2nd most used rallying cry. No, it is his use of unpaid labour and dodgy tender practices that most upset me. It is, to me, clearly evident that he uses his unique position in Bobsville to repress competition and has established a monopoly. He was clearly under qualified to enter a bid into Sunflower Valley development, but not only was his competition more qualified than he was, but he only decided to put a bid in the night before the deadline. A project of this scale would have run into the hundred of millions of dollars and he won!!!! I'm supposed to believe that one day he's fixing the drain over at Farmer Pickles barn and the next day he's overseeing a project of this size! That brings me to my next point. I can see that on everyday building jobs that his workforce would allow him underbid any rival bids. This unpaid workforce gives him an unfair advantage. Scoop, Muck,Dizzy,Lofty are basically slave labourers. I have seen Bob on several occasions work through the night to deliver a project on time. Is there anyone checking on the welfare of his helpers? Is there anyone making sure that they are properly maintained and not being overworked? I've never seen it. Clearly, he is using his unpaid workforce to allow him to maintain a unfair market share. When Scoop goes looking for another builder to run Bob's workshop while Bob is away on the Sunflower Valley project he consults the local phonebook down at the library and there is not another listed builder in the whole of Bobsville and surrounds! How do you think that this has come about! I wonder.
Also, can anyone tell me what the hell Bob is on about here? Maybe I'm not taking enough drugs when I'm watching this.
Lastly, don't get me started on these guys.
Friday, October 16, 2009
Don't believe the hype. Mayan edit
Apparently, the world isn't ending now on Dec. 21 2012. I wish these Mayans would make up there mind. My mortgage is coming up next month and I want to know if I should fix long term or just float. In other apocolypse news, God has taken to tickling unsuspecting pedestrians in an attempt to rebrand the Catholic church as the "Fun" church.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Some things I like to do in my spare time.
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While I can't describe my life as absolutly hectic, I do have some interests outside of work because, as they say "all work and no play makes something,something,something".... While my interests are varied I believe it all starts your health because as they say the body is a temple. Once the body is fit it good to exercise your soul. I've been busy working in India trying to help the pagans but that can be hard,as one would expect, but if that work helps my in my other love, music, well then so be it. Be sure to check out some of these products which would make great gift ideas with Christmas coming up. I give 0.01% of all proceeds to the needy so that you can feel good about yourself too! Passing my passion on to others also gives me great satisfaction. I love sports as you know now from my previous posts and I used to play a little American football but my greatest loves are golf and women so it's great that I get to combine these two. After giving the body and soul attention, I also like to exercise my mind and when I get the time I like to do this or this. If I can be honest with you though, if I still have any time left in my day nothing relaxes me like getting away from it all with just me and my camera but it's not just about me all the time. Some work that I do is in servitude of the people. I may not be your typical Republican (I am lower middle class,I don't own a gun, I can find Arizona on a map and I believe in evolution) but I serve all my constituents...as long as their white, of course. Did you know that Arizona was the only state to vote against making Martin Luther King's birthday a holiday? It was a long time ago but we're still proud of that. Just remember, it's not about me it's about us.
Monday, October 12, 2009
My Top 5 Places in New Zealand
We're pretty lucky to live in New Zealand. I can't really deny that nor can I find much to complain about. People I talk to who have never been here know how beautiful it is here. It has that reputation and it is well deserved. Here is a quick Top 5 list that I put together. I really could have done a Top 20 or a Top 100 and it wouldn't have been complete. It's really quite relative, so don't be jealous. Everyplace has it beauty spots and beauty is in the eye of the beholder as they say. That comment excludes Worcester, of course , that place is just a shithole really.
1. Wharariki Beach : At the top of the South Island west of Puponga lies my favourite spot. It isn't even close really as this spot is far and away my favourite. It ticks all the boxes for me. It is a wild west coast beach that is immense in scale and wild in weather. We were only here for three or so days but it's always stayed with me. When I go to a beach I often get bored. I like to beachcomb, climb rocks, explore rockpools and caves etc. Wharariki has all of that sort of stuff. It's at the end of a dead end road in an isolated part of the country off the tourist track so it's never going to get busy and it's a twenty minute walk to get to the beach anyway. You can only get there at low tide and you shouldn't swim in the ocean because of the rips. These are actually all plusses for me. You can see in the photo that at low tide you get these tidal pools for swimming anyways so that's not a problem. There is also a local seal colony and when I was there, I was sitting on a rock above a pool where two seal pups from the other side would swim past and check me out. Nevermind, that everytime I got in the water they would get out it was still great fun. To top it all off, there are massive beds of green lip mussels that you can even score yourself a feed! Really hard to beat that for me.
Kenepuru Sound/Portage : We actually spent more time here, about three months or so, because we had summer jobs at a resort. We pulled up for a beer at the bar because it was so beautiful and it was a nice day. We loved it right away and when we got talking to the staff and found out that there were jobs on offer well it didn't take us too long to decide, even though we had only really just arrived in the South Island.
Tairua : It's about 45 minutes up the coast from where we live now but, we've always gone here in the summer wherever we've lived. Mrs. Finndego's aunty has a bach here so it's always an easy choice. It's a small beach community that's just really easy going and I love it everytime I'm there. It has a nice inner harbour where the kiddies like to go and a great ocean beach where I like to go.
Sailor's Grave : Actually just over the hill from Tairua, it's a really nice beach that's a bit more secluded than Tairua. Whenever you go to the beach in New Zealand the biggest issue is the sun. It's just so harsh that the burn times can be as less as 10 minutes so you need cover. Sailor's Grave back's onto a cliff that has overhanging trees that provide good cover. We found a little path that leads down to a secret part of the beach that's cut off from the rest because of a rock outcropping and we've been able to spend the whole day there all by ourselves. We've had many a good day here. Yes, there really is a sailor buried there that drowned of the beach many years ago.
Abel Tasman National Park : There were so many places vying for the last spot but I don't really have any problem giving to Abel Tasman. Golden beaches , crystal clear water and some great bush make for a great spot. The weather wasn't great when we were there but it only enhanced the beauty of the forests that edge onto the beaches. We spent a whole day walking along a portion of the walking track that runs north to south through the whole park and every time you'd come around a corner it was a WOW! moment. Truly great spot.
1. Wharariki Beach : At the top of the South Island west of Puponga lies my favourite spot. It isn't even close really as this spot is far and away my favourite. It ticks all the boxes for me. It is a wild west coast beach that is immense in scale and wild in weather. We were only here for three or so days but it's always stayed with me. When I go to a beach I often get bored. I like to beachcomb, climb rocks, explore rockpools and caves etc. Wharariki has all of that sort of stuff. It's at the end of a dead end road in an isolated part of the country off the tourist track so it's never going to get busy and it's a twenty minute walk to get to the beach anyway. You can only get there at low tide and you shouldn't swim in the ocean because of the rips. These are actually all plusses for me. You can see in the photo that at low tide you get these tidal pools for swimming anyways so that's not a problem. There is also a local seal colony and when I was there, I was sitting on a rock above a pool where two seal pups from the other side would swim past and check me out. Nevermind, that everytime I got in the water they would get out it was still great fun. To top it all off, there are massive beds of green lip mussels that you can even score yourself a feed! Really hard to beat that for me.
Kenepuru Sound/Portage : We actually spent more time here, about three months or so, because we had summer jobs at a resort. We pulled up for a beer at the bar because it was so beautiful and it was a nice day. We loved it right away and when we got talking to the staff and found out that there were jobs on offer well it didn't take us too long to decide, even though we had only really just arrived in the South Island.
Tairua : It's about 45 minutes up the coast from where we live now but, we've always gone here in the summer wherever we've lived. Mrs. Finndego's aunty has a bach here so it's always an easy choice. It's a small beach community that's just really easy going and I love it everytime I'm there. It has a nice inner harbour where the kiddies like to go and a great ocean beach where I like to go.
Sailor's Grave : Actually just over the hill from Tairua, it's a really nice beach that's a bit more secluded than Tairua. Whenever you go to the beach in New Zealand the biggest issue is the sun. It's just so harsh that the burn times can be as less as 10 minutes so you need cover. Sailor's Grave back's onto a cliff that has overhanging trees that provide good cover. We found a little path that leads down to a secret part of the beach that's cut off from the rest because of a rock outcropping and we've been able to spend the whole day there all by ourselves. We've had many a good day here. Yes, there really is a sailor buried there that drowned of the beach many years ago.
Abel Tasman National Park : There were so many places vying for the last spot but I don't really have any problem giving to Abel Tasman. Golden beaches , crystal clear water and some great bush make for a great spot. The weather wasn't great when we were there but it only enhanced the beauty of the forests that edge onto the beaches. We spent a whole day walking along a portion of the walking track that runs north to south through the whole park and every time you'd come around a corner it was a WOW! moment. Truly great spot.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
The Sporting Life
It's hard to explain what sports mean to me. Mrs Finndego certainly doesn't understand it after 11 years. I've been a sports fan for as long as I can remember and a lot of my earliest memories have something to do with a sporting event. Whether it's going to Fenway Park with the old man and sitting in a different seat every inning while he had a few beers up in the Standing Room Only stand or watching softball with my grandfather at Kendrick Park. He died in 1976 when I was seven but these are things that can be connected by something. In his case, I can tie that memory of him with the help of a trigger. Sports. I've probably had way more meaningful moments with him but they don't have an "event" that triggers that memory for me. Sports does that. I think it's perfectly normal for kids from 8 to 18 to become obsessed with sports. Sports can be everything for a kid and it was for me. As we get older, we put sports in it's place, wherever that may be. Women, work, kids, mortgages all become more important but usually, if sports had a place in a kids life, they keep a place within it when they get older. Of course, the wife , the kids the job and the mortgage are all more important to me right now but sports are and always will be important to me. The Sporting Life will be a series of posts that will try to explain how this came about and in some regards how sports have shaped some of what I am.
It all starts with the Red Sox - For me, everything starts and ends with the Boston Red Sox. They have managed to define how I live with sports and all the emotions that go with it. I'm not going to try and explain what it means to have been a Red Sox fan pre-2004. Nick Hornby does a much better job of explaining this obsession in his book "Fever Pitch". The analogy from Arsenal to the Red Sox works very well. Unfortunately, Hollywood executives thought the same thing and adapted the book into the totally forgettable movie "Perfect Match".
For me, it all starts right here. I certainly wasn't actually awake at the time it actually happened, but I was already drinking the Red Sox Kool-Aid during this series. My dad(he'd been drinking the Kool-Aid back since 1967) has recapped the game itself for me a hundred times. He always reminds me that Fisk never would have got the chance if it wasn't for Bernie Carbo and that everyone forgets that. It was the greatest moment in Red Sox history from 1918 to 2004. Robin Williams and Matt Damon do a much better job explaining the emotion around this game than I could. Unfortunately, I'm Damon in this scene. Damn you Robin Williams, damn you!!!!!!!!
I actually miss the pre-2004 Red Sox fanness. Suddenly, everything hasn't become life or death and when the Red Sox have the bases loaded with no outs I'm not busy thinking how we can screw it up. Strike out, double play was always the obvious one. Now, I know we'll do something and that we'll be alright. Subconsciously, 2004 creeps in and negates the negativity. The problem with that is that I've already been hard wired to expect the worse to happen and I need to channel that somehow. For example, the Red Sox played today against the Anaheim Angels in the playoffs and lost to go down 2-0 in the series. I'm bummed out, but any fan would be but it's not the end of the world. Actually, it was almost expected but you know we could come back and win the series. We've done it before in 2004 and 2007 and that gives us hope. The problem is that I don't know how to deal with hope. That's not how I was brought up. This is how I learned about the game. As great as the Red Sox winning the World Series was in 2004 they have changed things irrevocably and this was the moment it happened. This is the moment that that karma changed forever. The really fucked up thing about the whole thing is that the Red Sox ran out of ways to break my heart by losing that they had to go and do it by winning! Damn you Red Sox damn you!!!!!
P.S. For those who know, you may have noticed that I didn't even mention this. For those who don't, just nevermind. It's still too painful.
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Saturday, October 3, 2009
Look out! Links
I've been telling people that I was going to put up some sporting links but I haven't had the time. Instead, I've been watching the most disappointing "Fight of the Century" (note: link has already been pulled from You Tube. That's how bad the Tua-Cameron fight was!) thatI have seen, well ,so far this century really. So I thought I'd put some links on that you might like.
Here, quite frankly, is a buskers wet dream. Do you think this guy was shitting himself or not? I'm not a big Bruce fan but he seems like a cool guy. It was his 60th birthday this week so here's to him.
There was a doco made a few years back about people who jump off the Golden Gate Bridge. They put camera's at both sides of the bridge and watched the people walking across. It's a sort of indictment of the San Francisco City Council who are not taking any action to prevent jumpers. The bridge to them, is a Mecca where they come from far and wide to jump. While beautifully and respectfully done it could be disturbing so please don't watch if it's not your cup of tea.
Ted Williams was one of my hero's. Weirdly, his death has taken on a life of it's own. There are so many other levels to this story but this is really rock bottom. Only in America.
Speaking of America, here is another reason for more gun control! Way to go Jethro!
If you have either this or this at your next party ,well, quite frankly I'm not coming.
Greg Easterbrook writes a column about American Football and will mix other things in that I find interesting (science, technology,current affairs etc.). I don't always agree with what he says even though he is more intelligent than most people I know of. He often writes about ignorance in America ,which is ironic, because he often holds a point of view that is out of touch with the rest of the world too. His TMQ column is quite interesting,
but maybe only to me.
I threw a link in my last post to Liam Finn. Here is his dad and uncle from around the time he was born.
If you have any links you'd like to be seen, feel free to share. Meanwhile, I'm watching the beginning of New Zealand and Pakistan match while I'm doing this and they have a midget singing the Pakistani National Anthem in a deep Barry White voice while the women who sang the New Zealand National anthem just made a hash of the whole thing. Welcome to my world!
Here, quite frankly, is a buskers wet dream. Do you think this guy was shitting himself or not? I'm not a big Bruce fan but he seems like a cool guy. It was his 60th birthday this week so here's to him.
There was a doco made a few years back about people who jump off the Golden Gate Bridge. They put camera's at both sides of the bridge and watched the people walking across. It's a sort of indictment of the San Francisco City Council who are not taking any action to prevent jumpers. The bridge to them, is a Mecca where they come from far and wide to jump. While beautifully and respectfully done it could be disturbing so please don't watch if it's not your cup of tea.
Ted Williams was one of my hero's. Weirdly, his death has taken on a life of it's own. There are so many other levels to this story but this is really rock bottom. Only in America.
Speaking of America, here is another reason for more gun control! Way to go Jethro!
If you have either this or this at your next party ,well, quite frankly I'm not coming.
Greg Easterbrook writes a column about American Football and will mix other things in that I find interesting (science, technology,current affairs etc.). I don't always agree with what he says even though he is more intelligent than most people I know of. He often writes about ignorance in America ,which is ironic, because he often holds a point of view that is out of touch with the rest of the world too. His TMQ column is quite interesting,
but maybe only to me.
I threw a link in my last post to Liam Finn. Here is his dad and uncle from around the time he was born.
If you have any links you'd like to be seen, feel free to share. Meanwhile, I'm watching the beginning of New Zealand and Pakistan match while I'm doing this and they have a midget singing the Pakistani National Anthem in a deep Barry White voice while the women who sang the New Zealand National anthem just made a hash of the whole thing. Welcome to my world!
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