Sports, Games and Competitions – Page 14

A Fabulous Yule Bullet Pointy Chat

That is what I wish for you all. The gift of fabulousness. This season brings out the fabulousness in all of us and lets us witness the fabulousness in each other – in friends, family as well as strangers. Be fabulous to each other and to yourself. That is the true meaning of the season.

One way to be fabulous is to ensure you stuff double digit paper money into those Salvation Army kettles you run into in the malls and outside the liquor stores struggling to get the gin from shelve to punch bowl.
Gary is playing tunes from The Jam this week. Careful readers will know the tale of how that band and Paul Weller in particular got me through my late teens with a certain fabulous modish style. Where is my green German paratrooper parka anyway?
The Red Sox have had a run of signings for 2007, especially in the bullpen, that makes me proud of my six shirts: Coco, Tek, Nomar, a gold shirt, a Ted Williams rookie shirt and a long sleeve blue. I also have an umbrella and a beach towel. And books. And stuff, too. Oh, and a Many Louisville slugger. And caps. I think their plan to make money off of franchising the brand is working out.
Ian, who I never have met but who does seek out my advice in things fluid, summarizes the season’s particularities in his family. Best advice I have heard this year? You do not have to go and visit them, whoever the “they” are to you and yours.
Hey – I need a cut and paste from the main stream media. What is a blog without a certain measure of MSM copyright infringement? Besides, the courts know about it:

Providing Web links to copyright-protected music is enough to make a site legally liable, an Australian court ruled in a case that created legal uncertainty for search engines around the world. The full bench of the Federal Court, the country’s second-highest court, has upheld a lower court ruling that Stephen Cooper, the operator of the Web site in question, as well as Comcen, the Internet service provider that hosted it, were guilty under Australian copyright law.

A very Merry Christmas to all the digitally thieving buggers out there, too. Because the copyright infringing thief and their half-witted amateur and professional apologists in the new e-world (aka iWorld) are people we should remember at Christmas as well.

Must run. I am working on about 15 hours sleep so far this week due to reasons beyond my control and need to get where I need to get to so that I can think about napping later in the eleven days off to come. That is right. I am taking Yule off for the first time since 2002. Woot.

A Yuletide Friday Chat

Is this the ides of Yule? Hard to tell with mid-December temperatures in the 10C/50F range. 55F in Watertown, NY today. It is slowing down around town – the university emptying out, folks daydreaming of Christmas cake soon to come, people writing Christmas cards instead of clamouring in the streets. By the way, if you get anything from me this time of year it will be late. I seem to be always finding a reason to not open up that pack of cards. So it will be late.

Dear Mildred Dover, Attorney General of PEI: try that one again:

…Speaking to municipal officers, he accused Dover of displaying “underhandedness and sneakiness” in the way she prepared the amendments. “That language is totally inappropriate and unacceptable,” said Dover. “He operates under the Canadian Bar Association’s code of professional conduct. The code says, Mr. Speaker, and I do have it with me, and I quote, “he should take care not to weaken or destroy public confidence in legal institutions by broad irresponsible allegations of corruption or partiality ?.”

Does the highest…h’mph…law enforcement official in a province really think that the Code requires lawyers to not make unpleasant blunt comment about the acts of a legislature? The rules on legal institutions refers to the courts, the body of which we happy few are officers. We are not officers of the legislature. Further, we are otherwise directed to civility in relation to public authorities which generally includes the direction (at CBA Code, Chap XIII, Rule 3) “the lawyer should not hesitate to speak out against an injustice”. Further (At CBA Code, Chap XVIII, 9):

The lawyer is often called upon to comment publicly on the effectiveness of existing statutory or legal remedies, on the particular effect of particular cases, or to offer an opinion on causes that have been or are about to be instituted. It is permissible to do this in order to assist the public to understand the legal issues involved.

We are asked to be particularly careful in our discussion of the courts as we also recognize that they cannot speak back…as opposed to an Attorney-General who can and who is in an opposing and adversarial position to the interests of the lawyer’s client. Remember – this is a politician hitting the big red button in their brain for being called underhanded and sneaky. The inhumanity of it all. Sneaky. And at Christmas, too.
Have I mentioned recently…ummm…Matsuzaka! The Red Sox will clearly control the universe next year with the best pitching line-up in the history of all human endevor. All are doomed. I have been wearing my Red Sox t-shirts all week in celebration. In oneness with those who know me not but care for me. That is the miracle of sports fandom. They care. They really care.
By comparison, I guess I am not that big of a fan of hockey. Maybe it’s that thing I have about anything called a stick:

Billed as “the single most important piece of hockey memorabilia in existence,” the world’s oldest hockey is now up for grabs on eBay. As of Thursday morning, 26 bids had sent the price of the coveted piece of Canadiana soaring to $2.2-million (U.S.). Gord Sharpe has owned the hand-carved, one-piece hickory stick since the age of 9. It was given to him by his great-uncle, whose grandfather Alexander Rutherford Sr. fashioned the stick on his farm near Lindsay, Ont. for play on a nearby pond. The stick is believed to have been carved between 1852 and 1856.
You people really need to deal with the fact that in winter I sleep in a bit:

Gary Rith to me: 7:34 am (11 minutes ago)

c’mon, dammit, POST!

Alan McLeod to Gary: 7:38 am (7 minutes ago)
I woke up at 7:22

Gary Rith to me 7:38 am (7 minutes ago)
who cares! just got a message from cm and the race is ON!

Go!
I am listening to a discussion of “presenteeism” which is the opposite apparently of “absenteeism”. It means encouraging people to not show up at work when they are sick. The pendulum just started its way back. Next, the virtues of a cluttered desk.
Speaking of a trend coming to an end:

After analyzing thousands of credit and debit card transactions over a two-year period, Mr. Bernoff found that Apple has historically been able to sell only 20 songs on average for each iPod device sold. “If iPod owners continued to purchase music tracks throughout the lifetime of their ownership, one would expect to see iTunes sales growing at a faster rate than iPods,” he concluded in a new report. Years ago when CD players were introduced, consumers rushed out to buy new music libraries. Clearly, the iPod is not having the same effect on content, he said.

This is the problem with the digital world – no stuff. We are creatures of stuff more than we are of money. If things are not acquirable without payment and come with no stuff, why would there be any economic inertia behind that change? It wouldn’t. The transactional event is hollowed out. Soon people will clamour in the streets for the return of stuff.

Update: my pal Dan noted another issue with the 2.0 world.
How does the governmental administrative process of “giving up” actually occur? Is there a protocol? A guide?

In a major blow to the Bush administration’s efforts to secure borders, domestic security officials have for now given up on plans to develop a facial or fingerprint recognition system to determine whether a vast majority of foreign visitors leave the country, officials say. Domestic security officials had described the system, known as U.S. Visit, as critical to security and important in efforts to curb illegal immigration. Similarly, one-third of the overall total of illegal immigrants are believed to have overstayed their visas, a Congressional report says.

Tracking visitors took on particular urgency after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, when it became clear that some of the hijackers had remained in the country after their visas had expired. But in recent days, officials at the Homeland Security Department have conceded that they lack the financing and technology to meet their deadline to have exit-monitoring systems at the 50 busiest land border crossings by next December. A vast majority of foreign visitors enter and exit by land from Mexico and Canada, and the policy shift means that officials will remain unable to track the departures.

That is nutty. Aside from the security issue, who gets to decide that they have “given up on plans”. Is this some sort of infiltration of libertarians?

Yes, sort of boring this week. But I am late. I am all ready behind. Next week? Last workday before Christmas. No problem. Week after that? I will be a week into a holiday week. Expect big things. Today? M’yyeh, you know.

Remember: Do Not Be Nutty Today

Sometimes life does mirror really bad 1980s movies of the week:

Myriam Bédard, a one-time Canadian Olympic hero, is now a fugitive wanted by police for parental abduction. Quebec City police have issued an arrest warrant for Ms. Bédard, who left for the United States this fall with her spouse and her daughter from a first marriage. Ms. Bédard’s former husband, Jean Paquet, had filed a complaint with police last month, saying her sudden departure violated the terms of their shared custody of their 11-year-old daughter. A couple who have made headlines for their increasingly odd behaviour, Ms. Bédard and her current partner, Nima Mazhari, were believed to be at one point in the Washington, D.C., area. Mr. Mazhari is scheduled to stand trial next spring in Montreal on charges that he allegedly stole paintings from a Montreal artist.

I will never look at my cross-country skis in the same way again.

Hall of Fame Game Announced

Mets!!! I got the news in my Baseball Hall of Fame newsletter by email today. Excellent but this may make for a more difficult ticket to compared to last year. Gary may have to do a service to the good of GX40:

The 2007 Baseball Hall of Fame Game will feature a flashback to the 1969 World Series as the New York Mets and the Baltimore Orioles will play on Monday, May 21 at historic Doubleday Field in Cooperstown, N.Y. The game traces its roots back to 1940, and is the only in-season exhibition game on the Major League Baseball schedule.

Only so many tickets are available, the first goting to those present at Cooperstown on Saturday, February 17. We may have to organize something here…

You will recall that Gary and I went last year.

Red Sox: Infield

Let’s consider the infield, outfield, pitching and batting over the next wee while. First the infield.

So we now have Lugo.

The question is this: is Lowell, Lugo, Pedroia and Youkilis better than Lowell, Loretta, Gonzalez, Youkilis. I am not pleased that Mark Loretta was not taken up for another year. I saw nothing in Pedrioa that told me he was ready at the end of last year. Last year, Youk looked good because so many of the throws to first base were right on the money. And they hold on to Cora , too, as the utility man for short and second which means if Pedrioa doesn’t pan out he is the main man at second. I don’t know. I liked Gonzalez and Loretta.

Tangent: This is weird:

The Blue Jays say the decision to remove the face of Vernon Wells from the team’s holiday greeting card wasn’t guided by business considerations. Their soon-to-be free agent star disagrees, but thinks the team was right to cut him out in any case. The card features sluggers Lyle Overbay and Troy Glaus, as wells as pitchers Roy Halladay, A.J. Burnett and B.J. Ryan. After being pictured last year, Wells is missing from the card currently landing in mailboxes around Toronto. Two weeks ago, Wells was also notable by his absence from a new series of print ads aimed at season ticket buyers.

The Final First Friday Of A Month Of 2006 Chat

I remember like it was yesterday that it was recently not now but that was a lot longer ago than I recall.

What is going on? It is a moving day for someone I know and I am lending a hand so a half day. It is also a double party evening. It’s been so long since one of them came a long I can’t recall how they work. Sweater vest and red tie for the first, ball cap and mandolin for the latter. Have we discussed “mand-o-lin”: violin for the hands, no?

Old logo good, new logo swooptastic!!!
This is neat if you have a British last name as illustrated by “Campbell” here.
This is just weird:

When Christopher Fleming-Brown, a banker living in the exclusive area of Kensington, London, kicked a ball about with his five year-old son in a large private garden communally owned by the houses in his crescent, little did he know he would later face a two year court battle for inadvertently turning the garden into “a public recreation ground,” contrary to the Town Gardens Protection Act 1863…[because]…[l]ast November, a magistrate court held that this game did not constitute football, as there were no ‘teams’ involved. According to the present law, they concluded, teams means football…

What!!! I am not one to just on the “Europe is dying” bandwagon but this is just…what…they appealed?

This week, on her appeal, the High Court decided that Mr Fleming-Brown’s game had amounted to football, with Mr Lord Justice Waller saying that “By any common-sensical, natural interpretation the respondent and his son were playing football or a similar game.”

Well that’s alright then.
Well, I suppose I better make my call on the Liberal Leadership Campaign:
- Iggy – The Grit Stockwell Day. Day was elected, Iggy might be too. It will be weirder for a while and then it will be over.
- Rae – the nicest guy in Canadian politics. If he wins I might vote for him as I have usually voted for some version of a soft socialist with a faint hope of winning power. Experience and I expect him to give a great speech. My hometown Senator Hugh made the point that few of the candidates have ever spoken to a crowd of 5,000. Rae has.
- Dion – I don’t know that he has done anything to attract the attention of anyone who isn’t supporting him. Is he a Grit policy wonk?
- Kennedy – less a no-chancer than three weeks ago but corduroy jackets are so 1974 and also 1994. He would probably make a good leader but he can make a good leader next time. They have to vote for someone who can win in six months.
- Dryden – he played hockey, right?
- The others – there are others?
Big brother has been watching…no, really – he’s my big brother…has been watching events and implications of the great “Wuzza nation?” debate and considers how nations have hockey teams so Quebec may now need one, too.
A freaky weather event may happen down our way later today:

NORTHEAST WINDS AHEAD OF THE LOW PRESSURE AREA WILL DRAW DOWN THE WATER LEVELS ON EASTERN LAKE ERIE…BY ABOUT 2 FEET. THE SUDDEN SHIFT IN WINDS ALONG THE LENGTH OF LAKE ERIE AS THE COLD FRONT PASSES BY WILL LIKELY SET UP PRONOUNCED SEICH AND FORECAST PRODUCTS ARE SHOWING A RISE OF 8 FEET FROM THE LOWERED WATER LEVEL TO THE HIGHER WATER AS THE LAKE SHLOSHES BACK. A LAKESHORE FLOOD WARNING WILL BE IN EFFECT FOR LAKE ERIE FOR THIS EVENING. LAKE RISES ARE POSSIBLE ON LAKE ONTARIO AS WELL…AS THIS STORM PATTERN IS SIMILAR TO AN EVENT IN FEBRUARY 2006. WATER LEVELS ALONG THE EASTERN SHORE OF LAKE ONTARIO AND THE UPPER SAINT LAWRENCE RIVER ROSE A COUPLE OF FEET FROM OSWEGO TO CAPE VINCENT AND DOWNSTREAM TO ALEXANDRIA BAY ON THE RIVER.

Freaky. I wish there were some sort of over the counter product to deal with “PRONOUNCED SEICH”. On the upside, this is a rare boogie boarding opportunity.
I will go to the Dinosaur BBQ again. I do not care. I ♥ it.

That is it. Gotta go. That must be enough. Can’t you stop emailing me? Someone is at the door. What? WHAT??? Argghhhhhh!!!….

[Exeunt. Ovation. Bows. Exeunt. Fin.]

Ski Gliding

Dan has a little link to a really freaky vertigo-laced bit of YouTubery:

Yikes.

Big East Basketball

In my never ending drive to mix insipid views of world affairs with solid reporting of what I get to see on my TV set, it is a particularly big day – even if the sun is not up yet as I am likely late for work – when there is a report in the NYT on Big East basketball. I do not follow the NBA. I do not care a whit for it. But I really like NCAA college b’ball, which is not to be unexpected from someone who was 6 foot 2 at 12. I knew the ways of the orange ball once, let me tell you. Then I stopped but that is another matter. The other, more specific Orange, is ranked third going in:

Coming in third in the coaches’ poll, Syracuse may need a big season from the freshman Paul Harris, who was named preseason rookie of the year. He will be called upon to provide some of the offense lost with the graduation of Gerry McNamara.

I don’t know if the games will be on the local northern NY radio but I will check that out soon. There…I just did. It states we should tune to 103.1 but I am thinking that 100.7 FM actually has the SU broadcast deal for Watertown.

Friday Left Margin Blob Talk Time

Well, that is another week in the books. My halfth birthday is past history now, the Mets are out and there is a bed sheet ghost hanging in the tree out front. What a game that was last night – tied from the first to the ninth 1-1, then the Cards pull ahead in their last at bats and the Mets lose with the bases loaded after a kid…ok, a guy with a beard…smokes one past a multi-millionaire who was fooled and frozed where he stood, only able to watch the curving ball enter the strike zone and then the catcher’s glove. The game featured the greatest double play last night with the Met’s Chavez (a former Expo, portland pointed out) robbing a guy out in left by snabbing the ball way over the wall then having the presence of mind to drill it back in to the relay man who got it to first. WHAMMO!

Update: having a good argument here with good folks who think we need a dutiful or responsible press. I think they are being nutty but I side with the rabble in most things.
In the impending gap in life called the baseball off season, you should be brushing up on the knowledge you need. The Baseball Hall of Fame has an email newsletter that you can sign up for.
Go read Gary’s blog. He is starting to describe the work of potters he admires. It is knowledge sharing time and it is very interesting.
The Tories have a green plan. Let me be the first to dub it the Tom Green Plan – hey, I didn’t know he was born in Pembroke. I have to wait longer than I have lived, until 2050, for this policy goal to be achieved. Nothing like an ambitious plan. They wait for a decade to start. Andrew Coyne, looking alarmingly like a man who know he was being an embarassing party lapdog, was on the CBC national last night saying how waiting ten years is just like starting soon and a plan that waits longer than my lifetime to date (and I am an old fart) to kick in is pretty much like one diligently pursued and aggressively implemented. They think we are dopes. They are starting to look like one-termers, history blips, modern-day John Abbotts.
Did you know you are wicked and bad? Almost everything is bad:

While he did not specifically mention gay marriage, thousands of listeners at the fairgrounds in Verona’s outskirts strongly applauded the two parts of his speech about the family and “other forms of unions”. He urged them to fight “with determination … the risk of political and legislative decisions that contradict fundamental values and anthropological and ethical principles rooted in human nature”. The Pope said they had to defend “the family based on matrimony, opposing the introduction of laws on other forms of unions which would only destabilise it and obscure its special character and its social role, which has no substitute”.

Each and every one of you are going to hell. Especially you!
Today is my answering the phone day at NCPR. I even got a confirmation card in the mail. So pledge between 3 to 5 and you will get to talk to me. I am taking the camera so as to have a scrapbook tomorrow, a photo montage as it were, maybe a even a three dimensional mobile of events. Interesting when someone asked how long it would take to go that far south, I got to reply that I am heading north-east to Canton, New York.

Gotta run. I have to remember the border papers. I think I will do the entire border crossing with a Flemish or Maltese accent just to see it that messes them up. Or maybe just answer every question put to me with “how the hell do I know?!?!” in a slightly loud voice. Whaddya think? Maybe include a five dollar bill when I pass over my papers. Just to smooth things out. You know.

Week Seven With Brendan Carney

It was going so well at about nine minutes into the game. I had just secured a source of Unibroue’s Maudite that I can keep to myself and, like many of you, was heading into Loblaws with the hope of finding a morsel of whisky cheddar when I heard on the radio that Syracuse was up 7-0. Later they were only down 17-14.

But soon that was pretty much that. Soon the Orange had lost on the road to West Virginia 41-17. I search for meaning in these times. Apparently Carney is “suffering through his worst statistical season and there hasn’t been anything out of kickoff or punt returns – except no turnovers.” There was maybe a wobbled hold on a field goal, too. Being on the wrong side of your QB getting sacked five times is not going to help either. Yet it was a big game for Carney in the bigger picture:

Senior Brendan Carney became SU’s career punting yardage leader against the Mountaineers. He kicked seven times for 275 yards at West Virginia and now has 10,256 career punting yards, breaking the old mark of 10,073 held by Mike Shafer.

Here are this week’s stats:

Kickoffs	No.	Yds	TB	OB	Avg
CARNEY,Brendan	4	255	1	0	63.8

Punting	No.	Yds	Ave	Long	In 20	TB
CARNEY,Brendan	7	275	39.3	45	1	2

I hadn’t realized when I picked this way of following Syracuse football that Carney was such a BMOC. Actually I had figured the lot of a punter who does not get to kick field goals would be one in the shadows. Interesting to note that we may (theoretically) see the Orange for the first Bowl in 70 years outside of the USA as the Big East is tagged to send a representative to the first International Bowl. But that would mean winning some more games. And the next two at least against Louisville and Cincinnati do not look like likely candidates. Actually all five remaining games look tough.

More on the game here. More Carney here.