Checkpoint

<{POST_SNAPBACK}> That's exactly how feel about C. Ronaldo et al. I get so tired of all those oversteps that are basically only fancy moves but rarely accomplish a whole lot. Look at the other Ronaldo, you know Mr. Fat Guy from Brazil, and his goal against Ghana. That's how you do it. Just a quick weave over the ball and the keeper is ordering hot dogs with extra ketchup. I get so tired of C. Ronaldo, Denilson and others who just do it too much instead of just looking up to see where his team mates are. Ronaldo took a shoot from a bad position yesterday instead of passing a free Pauleta in the area. Also I was happy to see Portugal go out because of how many of their players are falling over all the time. Take Maniche against England, for example. He gets an arm on his shoulder and up somewhere close to his neck. He sees the ball rolling out of his reach and falls over holding his head as if someone just hit him with a hammer and lies like that for a minute. It makes you wanna puke. All that said I'm rooting for Italy in the final. If anything I felt very sorry for them back in 2000 when they lost the Euro final to France following a late equaliser and an overtime winner. Very surprised to see France in the final, but a guy like Zidane wakes up in this type of games and he's been very valuable lately. I wouldn't be surprised to see the experienced Frenchies, who know what it takes to win, beat Italy in a final almost as boring as West Germany-Argentina in 1990. :D

Spacek ended up choosing between Edmonton and Buffalo, and chose the latter for reasons you'd better ask him. He seemed to enjoy Edmonton and Lowe wanted him back, but that's what you have to expect with UFAs every now and then.

It could get better. :ph34r:

Way to go Italy! I watched last night's game with the frame of mind that the final would be awesome whoever went through, so I put aside this Germany come-on I've had because I wanted them to be in for the sake of the tournament, and just sat back to enjoy. And I did enjoy! Italy came out with the mentality that they're a big football nation with a lot of pride, and they wanted to show the Germans that in front of their own fans. The Italians are obviously under heavy fire because of what's going on with Juventus et al, so they can take on an us-against-the-world mentality that's a perfect fit for an away game in the WC semi final. And they played well! Off-the-ball pressure well into the German half and early presence marked by Materazzi (who actually is a player I can't stand) and the ever-superb Fabio Cannavaro. About fifteen minutes into the game after the teams had exchanged a few half-chances the Italians took over. Pirlo was absolutely dominating and from time to time Totti came down to collect a few balls almost as if out of jealousy. The latter mixed the odd brilliant through-ball with some displays of arrogance (i.e. he was Totti), but Pirlo continued to shine. The Germans addressed this in the second half and we had to wait until about 70-75 minutes in, when the players started tiring, before it opened up and this case went from bad to worse in extra time. Again Italy! A post and a cross-bar. The Germans had their chances too, but Lippi showed courage in having all of Gilardino, Iaquinta, Totti, Del Piero and Pirlo on the pitch. It paid off, since when you have people like Cannavaro and a tireless midfielder like Gattuso on the field, the case of a guy like Grosso being out-run by Odonkor isn't as much of a worry. I think Odonkor isn't a whole lot more than pace, and when Grosso gets the help he needs they pretty much neutralise him. And the goals! Two beautiful Italian goals to spoil the party for Germany. Pirlo's pass to Grosso for the first one is superb and Grosso's finish is about as close to perfect as you get. Not to talk about Del Piero's goal on the counter-attack two minutes later. I've never been a huge fan of Del Piero as a player, but the guy is a class act and deserved to get that goal. With the actors from Portugal (sorry Soulseeker) up against the retirees from France I will definitely be rooting for Italy in the final. Although I must say I enjoy watching that Ribery guy on the French team a lot. Great player. And Zidane looked as though it was 1998 all over again in the quarter final. Anyway, longish post, but I haven't had a lot of opportunity to talk World Cup, so that's why this happens.

Samsonov will get his $4m+ and you can have him for all I care. Ineffective player made for the regular season. What's with all these teams out of cap room talking about more players? Don't you have enough woes scraping a roster together? Boston are talking about Shanahan and your man Samsonov, Toronto have locked up insane amounts of money on just-above-average-defensemen while looking for forwards, and New Jersey are almost at the cap with Gomez and Gionta unsigned. 'Tis madness I tell you! I like Kevin Lowe's approach better. Stay away from the McKees and the Whites and their humongous contracts, and sign cheap depth players like good old Marty Reasoner. Don't be surprised to see Lowe poach one of these teams for a steal.

I cut it off though. Actually I prefer calling it rock'n'roll hair. :D

Warning Disclaimer - Video in Swedish Extremely hilarious and could even be funny for speakers of English. Yes, that's actually "nice" the southern Swedish motor enthusiast keeps saying. He also throws in words like "power" and "joystick". Don't know if anyone would hear it, but I'd strongly recommend a guy like Kaftan to have a look and a laugh. De e najs.

That was... original.

This is teh Schmarthie.

I take it you didn't watch the playoffs.

The second one looks like Demogorgon in BG2, but I don't know what he's supposed to look like from any fiction or whatnot. I for one don't care for an uber demon with a couple of baboon heads, however.

I'm going to enjoy my six weeks of work as best I can.

Yesterday I was really ambitious buying breakfast to keep me from starving at work today. There was milk, cereals, eggs, tropical juice, bread, butter, cheese, ham, cucumber, you name it. So what does poor imbecile me do? I stay up until 4 a.m. and oversleep, miss breakfast and have to eat an expensive shrimp-and-mayonnaise roll for breakfast instead. (this is where everyone gets to call me names)

Two things get birthday threads: Pixies and America.

I seriously can't remember a pic of Kirottu without some form of intoxicating beverage in it. It's okay, we love you anyway, rrrowrr.

...insulting a city that had come to love him in the process.

Yeah, that one caught him off guard. He basically blamed his wife if you "read between the lines" on that one. Right now I'm just happy to know he's out of Edmonton and I expect him to get boos like you've never heard 'em at Rexall this fall. Still, although I like Lupul a lot, I can't help but feel we could have gotten something better for the immediate future. Sure, a promising D-man and a few picks, but how do we know Smid will be a stud? We don't, so we'll have to wait and see on this one. I sure hope Anaheim fail miserably and our prospects come up big in the future, but at the same time that conditional pick might be gone if Anaheim mess up. Oh, and I hate Chris Pronger.

Djurg

About five years ago I went to the dentist for the first time in several years. They found a few cavities and I also needed to do a deep cleaning and pull a wisdom tooth. Two appointments later you're not exactly going "hey, here's my SEK4000 now that you just hurt me so bad" with a whole lot of enthusiasm. It's too expensive going to the dentist, and last time I got a cavity fixed the tooth actually started paining afterwards.

I often find myself trying to cry, but it's almost as though someone were watching and I can't go. Ironically you easily start to cry when you're talking about what's bothering you with someone close, but that's also when you try to hold your tears back. When my grandmother died last summer I didn't cry, because it was so expected due to her illness. I did, however, cry at the funeral which felt really good afterwards since I felt that I wanted to cry but didn't think I'd actually do it.

Has anyone read this sci-fi book Chasm City by what's-his-name-anyway? It's a book I've been persuaded to pick up, but I'd like a verdict if anyone's read it (preferably without spoiling half the plot, of course). I'm having trouble regarding my concentration these days, so it's a bit hard getting started, but if someone besides my friend could put in a good word for this book I might try harder.

The Olympics were great! For some of us. :D

Agreed. Like everybody else I couldn't believe it when poor Dvo shot the puck straight into Ward's glove in the last game. At that point the Oilers were also only up 2-0, so it could have had catastrophic consequences too. I actually supported the decision to wave it, but nonetheless I felt very sorry for Radek. There's no other player I'd rather see score a GW for us tonight. He's definitely earned it with his efforts.

A good effort by Spain. For a team that was losing for 70 minutes they sure looked a very solid side. I was very impressed with how they refused to panic and kept the tempo up and passed the ball around without too many touches in between. They're a tactically very well drilled team and their constant off-the-ball movement paid off big time. Tunisia played well but suffered the common underdog fate of tiring around 70 min, which was just around the time of Raul's equaliser. This Spanish team has impressed me greatly today and maybe, just maybe they can finally challenge for honours this year.

Since I'm lazy I only took the comedy test. Social liberal (71% permissive) Economic liberal (28% permissive) I'm a Democrat. I exhibit a very well-developed sense of Right and Wrong and believe in economic fairness. So there. I also laughed at "It should be legal for two consenting adults to challenge each other to a duel and fight a Death Match." For the record I went with Strongly Disagree for a somewhat accurate outcome of the test, but I was slightly tempted to answer Strongly Agree just for the heck of it.