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Kids, got'em. Books, read'em. Bacon, Om Nom Nom.
Kirsten and I made some pasta for dinner last night. We added some ground sausage and wine to some La Rossa's pasta sauce and set it to simmer while we boiled the water for pasta. For the wine, we opened a bottle of 2004 Valley of the Moon Zinfandel. Kirsten and I had toured this winery during a trip to Sonoma a couple years ago, and while we enjoyed the wine, we definitely enjoyed some other wines even more. This was the only bottle we purchased from this winery on that trip; and after the first couple sips the memories of mediocrity came flooding back. While certainly not a bad wine, it wasn't a great wine either. It was better than the Northern Vines, but not as good as the Doobie Red. In fact, the more time that goes by, the more I wish I had bought more of that particular wine.
Tragity struck the Walters house on Thursday when I ran out of coffee. So, a trip to may favorite new (and some would say inconveniently located) coffee shop, J & S Bean Factory. Don't let the silly name fool you, they are serious bean heads. They purchase the raw beans from co-ops, farmers, or ethical resellers and roast the beans on site. K stopped by on the way home, and picked up a pound of Tanzanian Peaberry. I brewed my first pot this morning, and let me tell you, those are some delicious beans. LIght, fruity and strongly caffeinated. Makes a great start to a saturday, or any morning really.
Big shout out to by UNI Panthers for knocking off number one seeded Kansas over the weekend. Since ESPN, CBS, NCAA.com and even David Letterman have all had their chance to praise the Panthers, I'll save my words for more interesting topics.
MLS 2010 season was saved from a stupid players strike. An agreement for a 5 year collective bargaining agreement was signed last week. I'm glad this got done sooner than later. ESPN has more details here.
Caribou Coffee has changed their look. For the most part, it's pretty much same-old, same-old. Caribou used to have a policy that would allow for $0.50 refills on a cup of coffee after you purchased your first one at full price. THis policy has been dropped, and instead you have to pay FULL price for any refill. Combine that with the fact that they raised the price of a large cup of coffee by $0.45 and it leaves me paying significantly more for my daily dose of caffeine. I like Caribou, but paying more than $2.00 is for a cup of their coffee, when I can go to Dunn Brothers or StarBucks for 7/8th the price, isn't worth my time.
Caribou, I used to love you. Now, you are dead to me. I cancelled the refill card I've had for the last 7 years. Breaking up is hard, but the Dunn Brothers are my new mistress(es).
I know it's the start of the NCAA Basketball tournament season, but something this stupid can't go unnoticed and written about by me, the 105th person in America that pays attention to these things.
It seems that the NFL isn't the only professional sports league that is having problems between 'Labor' and 'Management'. Major League Soccer seems headed for a work stoppage while the players re-negociate a collective bargaining agreement. The most recent publication I could find was from the Huffington Post.
First of all, if the Huffington Post is the only news outlet regularly following a potential labor strike for MLS, that says that no one really cares about your league anyway. Shouldn't soccer players in the US just be grateful they still have jobs without having move to Europe? The MLS is at least solvent and building stadiums for it's teams. It's growing and dare I say thriving in the face of other leagues that have failed before it. The quickest way to kill any fan base you may have earned is a strike or lockout. No one wins with these situations. Fans stop buying tickets, advertisers stop buying ads, people stop caring. Recovery in the eyes of fans takes years. Just ask the NHL, NFL and MLB. Hockey has never been the same since it's last work stoppage. Everyone remembers how bad the NFL was with scab players. And it took Cal Ripken, Mark McGuire* and Sammy Sosa* to resurrect that MLB after it cancelled the World Series.
Keep the MLS alive and kicking! No work stoppage in 2010.
* and a lot of steroids.
So with an anti-climactic World Series, the baseball season came to an end. After that, comes college football and NFL hysteria. College and Pro Basketball is just starting to get warmed up, and hockey....well, it's hockey. I'm completely underwhelmed by the NBA and NHL. NCAA basketball, and pretty much NCAA Football too, has just left a bad taste in my mouth. I'm happy to check the scoreboard on ESPN, but I'm increasing tired of hearing about suspension after suspension after brawl after DUI after theft after rape that seems to permeate the news cycle. I'll write more on that sometime soon.
So what is there left, but the Beautiful Game...Futbol. Or as they say in America, Soccer. And what's not to get excited about. Just missed the MLS Cup Final (Real Salt Lake beat LA Galaxy), World Cup draw is complete (England, US, Algeria, Slovenia). English Premier league season is 1/2 way finished (Tottenham Hotspurs are 4th).
You may be asking yourself "Tottenham what?" Yes, Tottenham Hotspurs. A north London Futbol club founded in 1882, and have been a part of the English Premier league since it's inception, and they are my adopted team. The Spurs play other Premier league teams such as Manchester United, Arsenal and Chelsea. However, where Manchester United are the Yankees (usually good, usually rich, usual entitled) of the Premier league, the Spurs are more like the Cincinnati Reds (sometimes good, always exciting, rarely dead-last). This makes them the ideal team for me to sign my allegiance too.
Premier League, and European futbol in general is an ideal for the disenfranchised winter sports fan in America. As the World Series is just finishing up, the Premier leagues are just getting started. The seasons are nearly mutually exclusive. It's also nice, because most matches (the English call them 'Fixtures') are timed for evening kick-offs. Evening in England is roughly noon in America. So if you do want to watch an American Football game, you'll still have time.
With the World Cup kick off in 185 days, it may seem like it's premature to get excited about it just yet. But the pools were drawn on Friday, and discussion is just getting started. After 3 years, it's hard not to get a little itchy for some futbol. The US had an impressive run through the qualifier matches and a good showing at the Confederations Cup on the World Cup fields last month. World Cup is a big deal, and it's going to be thrilling for sure.
Okay, enough futbol. Must actually get some work done. Go Spurs!
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- April 2010 [2]
- March 2010 [12]
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- January 2010 [6]
- December 2009 [12]
- November 2009 [3]
- October 2009 [7]
