ND Alumni: Get ticket, will travel.

And they wonder why ND gets those invites to Bowl games..
the ExtraPoint (a swell little blog I just discovered this afternoon) makes a great point-- as highlighted by ESPN/ABC this morning..

It's simple-- ND/PSU tickets are going for more than #1OSU vs. #2Texas (both HUGE enrollment State schools) on the online-marketplaces..

ND/PSU: Notes from the first half

Okay.. like I said last year... I'm not a football expert.. I'm not going to try to be some kind of scout/pundit here.. but just a couple of notes and observations from my couch on the first half..

1. Nice new NBC intro.. FINALLY NBC incorporates some actual elements of the campus experience-- shots of campus, the band, etc. And they actually use the fight song! ND Nation has complained for years that NBC steadfastly refused to let you hear the band play the fight song as part of either the intro our outro of the game.

2. Brady still worries me with the way he's overthrowing some of these open receivers.

3. Got D? We do! You better look out!

Less than an hour to go...

JoePa

Okay, suspend the killer instinct for a second and read this.
The guys over at BlueGraySky got a really wonderful essay about Joe Paterno and the Nittany Lions from one of the Penn State bloggers. JoePa has always been one of the 'good guys' in college football-- humble and with a simple approach: go to class, get good grades, play good football. But this essay really puts the impression that he makes on that campus into perspective. Money paragraph:

Penn State University has played 1153 football games in its 120 year history. Joe Paterno has been an assistant coach or the head coach in 611 of them. That’s over half. Paterno owns 355 of the school’s 772 all time wins. Joe Paterno is the face of Penn State football and Penn State football is a reflection of Joe Paterno. Achieving longevity like that takes more than just winning games. It’s more than x’s and o’s. It’s about being part of the community. It’s about standing for principles and values that go beyond football. It’s about doing things the right way.

Remember the "Snow Bowl"

For the Record: After week 1

Since I usually have a hard time remembering how these things progressed after the season is over, I'm going to track ND's ranking (here's hoping they remain ranked all season!) week to week..

Going into Week 1, the Irish looked like this:

AP: #2
USA Today/Coaches: #3 (tied with Southern Cal)

with Ohio State the consensus #1.

Now, heading out of week 1, the Irish have, not unexpectedly, dropped:

AP: #4
Coaches: #5

A win followed by a drop in the polls is usually followed, itself, by a loud uproar from the fans of the descending team-- how can you drop a winning team, they howl.

No such uproar has been heard from the reputedly 'whiney', 'spoiled', 'unrealistic' (if you believe Mark May and others of his ilk on the sports page) Notre Dame Nation... I think we're all reasonably confident that, should ND win out the rest of the season, there will be no question where we should be placed in the polls.

So for now, we remain respectfully silent... and hopeful for next week's game against Penn State.

Enough of this nonsense..

The media is abuzz with chatter about the helmet-to-helmet call in the second half lastnight.

Ivan Maisel over at ESPN mentions "Even Charlie Weis thought it was a clean hit," and quotes Wheeler, the ferocious middle linebacker who put the lick on Quinn:

"I think the referee said it was an illegal hit but I didn't lead with my head," Wheeler said. "I do not think it should have been a penalty."

And in the Atlanta Constitution this morning, Yellow Jackets Head Coach Chan Gailey whined about sending a tape of the play to the conference office.. well, if this had been an ACC crew, that is:

The Jackets might have held Notre Dame to a single touchdown if not for a controversial personal-foul call against Wheeler for helmet-to-helmet contact. Gailey objected to the call during and after the game and stood by those objections on Sunday. If it were an ACC game, he could send a video of the play to coordinator of football officials Tommy Hunt, but it was a Big Ten crew so Gailey decided not to make any formal complaint.

"Because you know what's going to happen," he said. "It's going in the trash."

Chan Gailey, I have just three words for you: Send the tape!

Good flag.
Look, fellas.. this Big Ten officiating crew was hardly out to give the game to ND-- I'm still looking for this holding by Rhema McKnight that stalled ND's opening drive. And whether Wheeler meant to hit Quinn with his head or not, it was flagrant-- he put his helmet right on Brady's ear hole.. no doubt about it.

"It was a clean hit," Georgia Tech cornerback Kenny Scott said. "But that comes with the territory. These were Big 10 officials and we're playing Notre Dame."

Note to Kenny Scott: Notre Dame isn't in the Big Ten. In fact, the Big Ten kind of hates us.

So hey GT, go play your next game against, who? Samford? Then who is it? Troy State?
Best of luck with that Murderer's Row.

On to Penn State.
Go Irish!

Season 2, Game 1: Georgia Tech

Can't fully process what I saw last night, except to say that I'll be vacuuming up all the bitten fingernails off the floor today.

Quinn had Happy Feet the whole first half.. seemed to settle down in the second. He needs to be a lot more consistent throwing the ball if they're going to beat Penn State next week.
The Defense kept the Irish in the game-- how ironic considering all the negative publicity the Defense had been getting all off-season.
In the second half, the Offense finally seemed to get it's rhythm back, thanks entirely to Darius Walker.

Oh, and the hit of the night-- no it doesn't go to Zibby-- gotta give it to Ndukwe for this Td-saving (maybe game saving) hit on the very impressive Calvin Johnson in the first half:

Sure, Bo, sure...

Bo Schembechler says "ND needs Michigan more than Michigan needs ND."
And that's why he's been saying the Wolverines should stop playing the Irish.
Wouldnt' have anything to do with what we've done to the UM national championship hopes the last several years would it?

Weis prepared for Georgia Tech - Sports

Okay, look, I know it's early. I know they haven't played a down yet this season. And I know I may eat these words later...
but all I can say is I love everything I hear about Charlie Weis and his preparation.

Weis prepared for Georgia Tech

This article feeds the perception-- the man has a photographic memory, I believe. He can watch tape, catalog it, and recall it later. He's been filling his head with all the data, the nuance, the tendencies of his opponent. And I find myself thinking I'll be sorely surprised if I catch a glimpse of unease or uncertainty on Weis' face during the game. Even when things go badly for the Irish, I find that I trust Weis wholly to be in control and know what to do, how to adjust, to handle whatever contingency arises.

Thinking in these terms reminds me of the Michigan State game last year. I remember watching Weis on the side-line and wondering what was going through his head as the Irish fell behind 38-17 in the 3rd quarter. Even then, he seemed to be in control. He got the Irish into a position to win, got them back into the game.. only to lose it on a defensive breakdown in overtime.

Likewise the famous end to last year's USC game..
Weis leaves little to chance.. but chance still is a factor.

Nevertheless... I trust him to keep us in the game.

Weis: We're not deferring.

In his news conference today, Charlie was asked if he had the men ready to handle the coin toss on Saturday. In reply, he said "If we win the toss, there's no question what we'll be doing. We won't be deferring."

So what did you ever do after college, Joe?

The boys at BGS reminded me of this commercial from a few years back featuring Joe Montana and Father Riehle , shortly after ND signed on with Adidas.

Shark Attack

Rack him!

Hey Romey,

just wanted to give you this little blast from the past-- a piece of transcript from your ESPN show back in January 6, 2005.

Regardless of the spin coming out of South Bend, there is no way they would have broken off Ty Willingham if they knew they were going to have to settle for Charlie Weis. They fired Willingham because they thought they had Urban Meyer. And if youre going to whack a solid guy like Willingham you better end up with Meyer or Steve Mariucci or Jeff Ted ford. You dont fire Willingham to hire a guy with no head coaching experience. Notre Dame is not the place to go to learn on the job. You cant hire a guy just because he went to school there. What, Rudy Reuttiger didnt want the job?

Still, I guess that didn't stop you from pimping him on your show a few weeks ago.

War Irish.
Beat SoCal and the Wonder Poodle.
I'm out.

Hey Ramblin' Wreck.. you're on Notice!

Found this graphic on Classic Ground, a blog about "Art, Cultural Literacy, and Notre Dame Football."

The Hype Machine

Oh yes, the Hype Machine is in full Swing!

And while it does my heart good to see the Irish featured in all this national media, I can't help but worry about it... the SI cover jinx or whatever, I'm not sure.
I just think I liked it better when the Irish were under everyone's radar.
The Irish have big targets on their backs this year.... and that may not be a good thing.
Then again, I trust that Coach Weis will have them prepared and ready to handle everything that comes with the spotlight.

@#$%&*!!

Give me Quicktime or give me death!!
NDNation.com today has a link titled "Changes to Irish All-Access".

A few weeks ago, ND made their pay 'All Access' online video service totally free. From the looks of it, they run the Coach's weekly show, interviews with players, and other general fluffy reports on comings and goings around (primarily) the football team.

The other day, I went over there to try out the newly-gratis service and found that the videos streaming playback was choppy at best and most often just cut-out after 30 seconds or so..

So when I read that there were changes released, I thought surely this meant that they had addressed some of this bugginess in the playback or beefed up the bandwidth or something..

But instead, all I get is a message saying the following:
I run Firefox on a Mac. I'm about as Microsoft independent (without being a zealot) as you're likely to find..
But this is really starting to piss me off!
So there's a link at the bottom of the message that says 'Click here if you're a Mac user.'
So I clicked it... I mean, hey, maybe they have some kind of support for non-IE, non-Windows users..


But instead, I got this:
and that's when I really got pissed.
CSTV.com, a CBS company, supposedly #1 in College sports is telling me that if I'm not running Windows with IE 6, I'm SOL.

So I'm wondering-- from a product delivery standpoint... how are these changes for the better? I am a patron of this site who previously could watch these videos-- granted they did appear to be stop-motion animation at times, but nonetheless, it was a start.

Now CSTV, which has apparently gotten UND.com to sign a partnership agreement, has decided that the non-Windows community can take a walk.

I suspect there'll be some kind of mass feedback sent to the University on this.. I won't be surprised if this changes in the next few weeks..

But then, there's that voice in my head that says Here goes Microsoft again.. using that market leverage to force inferior products on us all once again. If you want to see this ND content, you've got to be a user of our crappy software..

Worse yet, they basically say "Hey, don't worry-- with the next release of OS X, Apple is going to bundle BootCamp which will allow you to install the ENTIRE WINDOWS OPERATING SYSTEM on your Macintosh, all just so you can watch some of our cheesey videos.

No, I mean it.. they really say that:

Once you have installed Boot Camp and Windows XP, Service Pack 2 you will be able to view All Access content on a Macintosh if you are booted up using the Windows XP platform.

What on earth would I want to do that for??

Have these people not heard of Quicktime?

So now, all I'm looking for is an email address to which I can vent my anger over this stupidity..

Wonder Poodle

Run over to publicity-shy USC's website real quick and behold the wonder that is Pete Carroll jumping around like a jack-ass in a Wonderbread jumpsuit...

Apparently, Carroll brought in Will Ferrell for an inspirational break with the team-- they went to see Talladega Nights as a team.

Just makes me appreciate Charlie Weis all the more for bringing in guys like Joe Montana and Jerome Bettis (you know, alumni, football players-- see the pattern?) to visit camp.

Get out your Chainsaws, Sox Fans..

Oh what a weekend it'll be for baseball!
The Yanks and Red Sox play five games between now and Monday, kicking off with a double-header today. The Yanks took the first game of the set this afternoon in a 12-4 Wang-gem..
but the nightcap was looking grim. Top of the 7th and the Yanks were down 10-7. Giambi walks and Bernie gets a single, so we've got two men on.. so the get a little something going with one out.. Posada singles to load 'em up, and that's when the bottom fell out.

I can hear them now in Boston-- get out your chainsaws, Sox fans, because there can be no retribution severe enough for what Mike Timlin did tonight. May as well call him the new Bob Stanley.

So as I said, Posada singles to load the bases.. and in comes Timlin, for Mmm-Bop Hansen. Melkey Cabrera steps up and works 8 pitches, taking a couple of strikes, fouling a few away, really working the at bat..
And then he hits the most beautiful little single to right, scoring Giambi.
Bases still loaded-- Damon flies out-- but Jeter smacks a double to deep right, clearing the bases, scoring Williams, Posada, and Cabrera all the way from first..

Open up the flood-gates, the Yankee bats seem to come in streaks, like everything else in baseball.. but it's those little moments like those first several pitches that Cabrera worked through to find the pitch he wanted... that was the opening they needed...

Now, of course, as I write this, it's 14-10 Yanks, still in the bottom of the 7th..

Charlie being Loud and Proud on Fox..

As noted by the guys over at Blue-Gray Sky, Fox Sports is running an interview with Charlie Weis. Here's a quick taste :

Chris Myers: I think it was a few months into the job, you got this ten-year contract. I ask this because no matter what the contract says, you'll hear rumors that this [NFL] team might be looking at him, or that team might be looking at him.

Charlie Weis: Well, that's what we were trying to do. We were trying to end that...because by doing it the way we did it, it showed a commitment by both parties. It showed a commitment from ND to Charlie Weis, but it also showed a commitment from the Weis family to ND, saying, "We're not looking to jump ship the first time a better offer comes along."

Myers: There won't be that burning desire after all those years in the NFL, with the Giants, and--

Weis: I'm at Notre Dame...the head coach at Notre Dame. I mean, why would you have a burning desire to go anywhere else?

Myers: Well, there's the college versus the pro grame--

Weis: (sounding it out) No-tre-Dame...the University of No-tre-Dame...

Myers: (laughing) I feel like I'm being recruited here. Where do I sign, coach?

Weis: Well, I mean...it is something different.

I just love that we have a coach who's proud of the University again, and who's not afraid to give that pride voice. No-tre Dame. It is something different.

Here come the Irish..

.. is it September 2 yet?

New Rule

From Pat Forde's column this morning:

New Rule: Yes, Notre Dame is different. Get over it. If your school were important enough to get its own NBC contract and thumb its nose at conference affiliation, do you really think it would decline?

Oh, now that's gonna leave a mark..

Well, as if the Titans didn't have enough problems.... now it'll look to the rest of the league like they're enlisting their mascot to do the dirty work outside the sidelines..

At the start of the third quarter of tonight's pre-season game agains the Saints, the Titans mascot actually hit the Saints' QB with a golf cart.

I'm just shaking my head.

Taking me back

Took the boys to get haircuts this morning and have spent most of the rest of this Saturday afternoon watching the new (well, it's new to me) Pink Floyd DVD, "Pulse".
And it's just beautiful..

Oh, and Aidan likes it-- not sure if that's the seal of approval that David Gilmore was looking for, but...

Also catching up on my buddy Manundso's podcast.. and if he's reading this-- not that I have any idea why he would be-- I just gotta say, I'm actually liking the post-T-Diddy direction he's going. It's got a surreal, Samuel Beckett kind of feel to it with the layered voice tracks.. and the Bono Interview is just outstanding. I need to barge back in and make a contribution, if I can muster one... but if nothing else, I just wanted to give my vote of confidence to the guy at Happy for Apathy.

Hezbollah's Crude Propaganda machine

I've been hard on CNN's Anderson Cooper before, here and elsewhere, for his on-camera 'righteous indignation' persona... but I've got to give it to him for his take on Hezbollah and it's overt manipulation of the western media..

12:50 p.m.: Anderson is doing a few more stand-ups about our story that's quickly become less about Hezbollah and more about their crude propaganda machine when the "family" emerges from the bunker behind us and joins their friends in the street. They're laughing, talking loudly, and gesturing with their hands, mocking anger. I really should learn Arabic. Anderson does another stand-up about the group now standing behind us.

For a little partisan commentary comparing this piece from Cooper with Nic Robertson's earlier, and less candid profiles on Hezbollah, go here.

Landis looks to be done

Reading Mark Kreidler's article on ESPN.com just now-- this morning, Floyd Landis' "B" sample came back positive for inflated testosterone levels, so it looks like our latest American hero is about to get stripped of his Tour title.

That's interesting and sad in a way, but not nearly as interesting as something Kriedler reminds us of as he argues that Americans have been getting all too accustomed to the excuses athletes come up with when they test positive. In the article, he recalls us to the incident at the 2000 Sydney Olympics when World Champion shot-putter (and Mr. Marion Jones) C. J. Hunter tested positive for steroids-- four times-- and he cried on camera at his press conference, saying he couldn't explain how this stuff had gotten into his system.. he just had no earthly idea.

Hunter's nutritionist was at the press conference and he had some ideas, however. He argued that.. well, let me just refer you to the original article back in 2000:

Hunter's nutritionist flatly denied that he took the anabolic steroid nandrolone, which showed up in massive amounts in urine samples taken four separate times, and suggested the positive tests were caused by iron supplements Hunter used.

The nutritionist, Victor Conte, said Jamaican runner Merlene Ottey and retired British runner Linford Christie, who both tested positive, took the same supplement.

Who was that again? Victor Conte.. That's right.. Conte, Balco, oh my.

Barry Bonds can get indignant with the fans, the media, whomever he wants... the picture is just becoming all too clear now.. and history will not look kindly on Barry, or virtually any of the big hitters from this era in baseball.. to say nothing of the shot-putters, sprinters, or Tour de France Champions.

Haden

Also.. listening to the announcers on this clip reminds me, all over again, of just how much Pat Haden irritates me..

That is all.

The last ND-USC game I attended..

Memories of the last USC-ND game I attended.. the 1995 game when SC, with Keyshawn Johnson, came into the cold and rain of South Bend ranked #5 in the country, and got handed a 38-10 whooping..

This hit by Kinnon Tatum was decisive..
He literally flies over the fullback and delivers such a blow to the running back... amazing..
Not that we could see much of it in person from our little seats back in the student section on the other end of the stadium...



Oh, November 25 is going to be some fun this year.. I hope.

"A fastball, a change, and a pretty lousy curveball."

Pretty good article in the NY Times on Jeff Samardzija's summer "vacation" pitching in the bus leagues...

The Irish have arrived..

When the video game commercials feature your team, you know you've arrived... or something..

Goodnight, Olivia

Well, after days and days of slinging boxes and bags full of stuff we probably ought to have thrown out weeks ago, I think we've finally done it. The last touches were put on cleaning the old house out, scrubbing it down and getting it ready for the buyers to take over after closing tomorrow.

We're trying not to be too sad about it. But it's the house we brought both our boys home to, it's where we started this little family of ours-- it's where Grandma Irene stood in the backyard, holding a hatchet high above her head preparing to take another whack at a tenacious shrub we had spent most of the afternoon trying to removed from the yard (what eventually became the round flowerbed)-- and we've spent a lot of good years there. We'll always have those to look back on, the pictures and memories of the times we spent there.

The boys, of course, are not so sentimental. Mama took the boys by there this afternoon during the cleaning process. They each ran from room to room and exclaimed about how clean and nice everything looked. Then, as they drove away, Aidan and Bryce both waved and said "Bye bye, House." And now they've moved on, thoroughly.

For us, though-- and maybe we're just being sappy-- we're spending a little time reflecting on the last 8 years and the family, the life we started building within the sheltering embrace of that house.

G'night, Olivia.

Should we be surprised?

From the headlines at espn.com :

Miami safety Cooper shot, teammate returns fire

After Cooper was shot, teammate and roommate Brandon Meriweather pulled a pistol from his pants pocket and fired three times at the person, who jumped a fence and fled with another person in a car, police said. It was unclear if the assailant was hit.

Sometimes you just can't make this stuff up..

Just FYI..

The Results are in!

Notre Dame ticket lottery results are available online here
And we'll be California dreaming in late November!
Lost out on the tickets to the Penn State game, but we will be able to go out to SoCal and watch the Irish take on the Trojans in the last game of the season.... hopefully the crowning end to a successful season... regardless, it's sure to be a good game.

Secret Italian Training video

Hey Manundso.. this is for you..
In honor of the Italians winning the World Cup, we present this from Youtube.

It's on!

I've got my pointy geek ears back on this afternoon!
Season two of the new Doctor Who wraps up tonight.. just aired in the UK..
I'm, ahem, retrieving it now and hope to be watching it tonight..
and from what I'm reading, it's going to be great!

Geek out!

Don't put the ice in the Arena!

Um, yeah..

Happy 4th of July

Can't get enough..

... of watching this..
the closing seconds of the 1988 'Catholics vs the Convicts'.



And thank you, Jimmy Johnson, for giving us the prototypical 'Face of the Sore Loser'.

in the Clutch

Okay...I've been saying for a year or more that A-Rod just isn't clutch.
Nice stat sheet. Good numbers at the end of the year. But even I had to wonder if he could really be called MVP last year.

That position has only been amplified in recent weeks as Big Papi in Boston looks to be getting the game-winning walk-off hit in every game the Sox play..

So mark it down: tonight, A-Rod hit in the clutch. A two-run walk-off dinger in the bottom of the 12th inning to beat the lowly Atlanta Braves 4-3.

So for today, at least, A-Rod is clutch.

There, I said it.
Let's see about tomorrow.

The Whole Tommy Z Fight

Done in 49 seconds

Well, I'm surely no boxing fan. And I'll be even less of one if, after last night, Tommy Zbikowski decides to leave football behind. But it's still nice to see him do so well in his pro debut, dispatching Robert Bell-- a guy who adopted Ohio State colors for the fight, apparently thinking that flashing buckeye colors in the ring would intimidate Zibby..

I don't know about you-- and maybe this is just the sleep deprivation talking-- but I can't imagine a worse tactical error. Poor guy had no idea what was coming. That much is clear.

Okay, so is it football season yet??

You are a Social Liberal (61% permissive) and an... Economic Conservative (66% permissive) You are best described as a: Libertarian Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

Working tonight.
You know how they say to never talk about work in your blog.
Well, I won't either.

But suffice it to say, I'll be here a while-- til about 2am tonight-- then back again in the morning.

Spending a little time reading manundso's blog here

Downtown Nashville is pretty at night.. but looking out my window, there are some strange (and scary) characters roaming around down there.

Mark May..

Oh, and I've got to shake Nevin O'Donnell's hand for the way he goes back and finds all these snide, ridiculous things that Mark May said about ND over the course of last season...

Can't wait for the Irish!

My friends down here in Tennessee will hate to see this, but, much like all these other little highlight films Nevin O'Donnell has put together, this one still just plain give me chills.

Just another 32 Foot Glass Cube on 5th Ave!

Steve Jobs interviewed on CNBC:

The buying experience and ownership experience of owning a Mac are about the best of any product I know.

Snogging

"I'm the Doctor. And I just snogged Madame de Pompadour!"

Geeking out again on Doctor Who.. second season, with David Tennant, this time.. and he is just having too much fun .. good show!

Samardzija!

Must see this..

I've been watching this over and over..

The View from the Chopper

In case you're wondering, from looking at this picture, if we just bought an empty lot.. you can rest easy, friends.. obviously this satellite image was taken before the new house was even built. The sellers built the place in April 2004, so it's truly just a couple of years old...
And despite my best intentions, as you can see I am, in fact, buying another house with a drainage ditch running across the back of the property.. but this one is much more scenic than our current one.

House news!

We've got some big news this morning..

We put an offer on a new house yesterday evening and this morning, it was accepted! So, if all goes well, we'll be moving into the new house in mid-July (the seller's are building a new house, hence the lenthy wait before closing-- but that's fine with us.. gives us plenty of time to work on selling our current house.

Pros-- about 700 more square feet, a great floor-plan, and an awesome yard just a short walk away from the neighborhood pool-- and best of all-- neighbors with TONS of kids Aidan's and Bryce's ages!

Cons-- Aidan had his heart set on a house with "two garages" (i.e. two garage doors).. this house has a garage built for two, but alas only one door. This afternoon, when we were showing him pictures of the house, he saw the door and said "But I told you that I wanted two garages!"

"Take the Train, Rock!"

75 years ago today...

More Firefly

For the bookmark file: pretty good run-down of a few themes in the Firefly series..

YouTube

Discovered YouTube a while back.. but didn't really give much thought to the idea that we could post and share our own little home videos..
Haven't had much time to clip any recent video together, but this is a little montage I put together early last year...

Bettis & the Sugar Bowl

Just watched (again, thanks to ESPN Classic and TIVO) the 92 Sugar Bowl.. Mirer, Brooks, Culver, and of course, Bettis.. love to see them "Gator Chomp" all over Florida (and a much younger-- and more goofily dressed-- Steve Spurrier)... just right to get me back in the mood for next football season.. oh, it's going to be a long summer...

TV Geek

When did we all become such pop culture nerds?
It all started when DVDs started rolling out season after season of all the great TV shows.. Star Trek, The Sopranos, the X-Files. Now it's Knight Rider, The A-Team, Millenium, and Battlestar Galactica (the original 1979 edition)...
I wasn't into buying those boxed sets, but I did think it was a pretty great thing that any time I wanted, I could run out to Best Buy and pick up a copy of Season 2 of the Dukes of Hazzard, whenever the impulse struck.
Then BitTorrent and TIVO entered my life.. and lately, it seems like my entire social and intellectual existence revolves around which TV series I'm thoroughly immersing myself in.. well, immersion is always a relative notion with me. It can sometimes be several days or more than a week between times when I can sit down and really watch something.

So what have I been watching lately?
Well, I downloaded the whole first season of Doctor Who a few months ago.. the new edition with Christopher Eccleston. It aired in England last summer.. I downloaded it this winter.. and now Sci-Fi Channel is re-airing the first season here in America. David Tenet takes over the role this spring... and they're off to a pretty good re-start.. although I do have to take issue with a few moments throughout the show where you can hear the editorial voice of the BBC speaking through the characters voices (making one or another off-handed quip about the American President... and when did the Doctor become such a big environmentalist?)

Also watching 24 and Battlestar Galactica week to week...
Battlestar had a few down weeks this past season, but otherwise, it remains, I think, the best show on television right now.

Went out and got the Firefly series on DVD a month or two ago and spent about three weeks working my way through that.. what a great show! How did I miss it when it was originally airing?

Now I'm on into the first Season of Arrested Development-- a brilliantly written comedy.. and another show that I'm discovering only after it's been killed...

And I downloaded the first season of The Shield the other night.. thanks to TIVO, I've been sucked into a couple of the recent episodes.. and since it's like the 6th or 7th season, I figure I ought to go back and get a little of the back story...

TIVO.. what a marvelous invention... and perfect for those late-night bouts of sleeplessness when I'm up with one of the boys.. or just for those scraps of 30 or 40 minutes in the in-between times when the kids aren't in high-need mode..

CSPAN Combine

Watching the NFL Combine on the NFL network this afternoon and something occured to me...
this is like C-Span..
More commentary, perhaps.. but basically , what I realized is that, like C-Span, watching the Combine has that same kind of empty, lonely feeling.. the feeling where you realize that you're watching this with only a handful of other people in the country watching with me...

"Ah, here comes the 'Off-Tackle Reaction' drill. This is a fun one."

Fascinating stuff.

H4A!

Did another stint on the HappyforApathy.com Podcast with my good friend, Manundso.
It's such a good time getting to hang out with those guys.. a nice break from the every-day grind... it was a low-key evening for me, so I don't feel like I really added that much this time around, but it was a great time anyway... and a good drink. Thanks, Manundso! See you next time.

Anderson Cooper, my hero

All I've got to say is: I'm looking at CNN.com and stumble across Anderson Cooper's so-called 'Blog'... emblazoned with his narrow, earnest ("I'm so J. Peterman") mug and these sage words across the masthead:

"Be honest about what you see, get out of the way and let the story reveal
itself." Anderson Cooper

He's so humble, that Anderson. He even quotes himself.

More Battlestar Commentary

Again... more from my ongoing email conversation about Battlestar Galactica with a buddy from grad school..

Finally watched the latest Battlestar on TIVO last night... "The Captain's Hand"...
And egads! Are we rushing Lee's character along at this point, or what??

I HATED that opening scene with Dualla.. with all it's "while you were away" exposition thrown in there..
I realized during that scene that my problem here is that I have NO idea what the trajectories of these characters are...
I feel like they did a pretty good job milking some of Starbucks development earlier in the season... but now it feels like we're just rushing the characters along. Starbuck is drinking herself to death infront of projector screens full of young pilots getting waxed (remember a few eps ago) while Lee sleeps with (quite literally) every woman he encounters (except the president and the terrorist leader) and jumps from CAG to Pegasus Commander in a matter of weeks...

That said, it felt like this episode kind of found itself somewhere about 2/3's of the way through... around the time when I was REALLY ready to give up (as I was thinking to myself "is there even one single competent officer ANYWHERE on Pegasus?")... as what's-his-name Pegasus idiot took himself down to the engine room and the battle ensued with the Cylons, it's like they were able to capture some of the original tension and pacing of the early episodes.

And just when I was ready to feel better about the show.. then Baltar announces himself for President...
And I realized that so much of what's been missing these last few episodes has been Baltar. He really has been terribly underused recently.
But to use him this way, was really more like abuse than anything. I didn't care for it... this all just feels really very ham-handed.
Did I come to expect too much from the first season and the first half of this second? What the hell is going on here?

All the same, this ep does give me a small glimmer of hope.
They are going to have to figure out how to write a subtle Pegasus character, though... and having Lee running the ship over there gives them some opportunity to do that, I suppose...

Preview makes it look like the next episode will be another character-sketch... this time on the Cylon side... could be interesting.. but I just feel like these previous character-excursion episodes they sent us on somehow caused them to lose the thread on the larger story... so I'm concerned about how or if they'll ever get back on track...

Sacrifice

A little Battlestar Galactica commentary after watching this week's episode:
Okay... after watching the latest BG over the weekend.. I'm honestly now starting to feel like I'm watching these episodes out of sequence.

What's the deal with Billy? you know, an episode or two ago, I remember wondering where he'd gotten off to.. even thought he might have been killed and I'd just not noticed it... and is it just me or did this little romance between Apollo and Dualla just spring up virtually out of nowhere? I do recall them setting it up a bit a few weeks ago, but even then I was wondering: What the hell happened to Billy? And my but isn't Apollo having a go of it lately-- that hooker on Cloud 9 he was keeping under wraps, a near tussle with Starbuck, and now Dualla.... geez-louise!

Makes it hard to believe Rosalyn when she's getting all weepy over Billy-- I mean, I'm talking to the TV: Geez, lady, you haven't seen the kid in like 2 months.. comes back on the scene, he's about 2 inches taller, got a new haircut, and he's clearly been working out at the gym... anyone care to wonder where he's been. Did his re-appearance not have "I'm back for one day's worth of shooting so they can kill my character and I can move on and work on my new pilot" written all over it??

Other questions: where's the good Doctor and Ms Tricia Helfer? Are they on vacation??
Has anyone seen the Chief since he and Helo were released?? (They were released, right? See, I can't even remember)..

All this adding to the ongoing drama of "What the hell happened to Pegasus?" I know, I know, they've made a couple of mentions of the ship, but who's at the helm of the freaking boat??

This ep was generally better than the last one, I thought, and loads better than 'Black Market'. More tension, a few good lines (Adama: "Cut the line."). But I'm starting to feel like Moore and the gang are either a) starting to feel a little too bullet-proof with their writing; or b) these were just filler episodes they figured they could shoot in any sequence and drop into the lineup when they needed some time to work on some larger story-arcs. I wonder.. from the preview, it looks like we're finally getting back to the Pegasus...

Let's hope so. After the last three or four episodes, this show is gradually starting to lose its grip...

Congratulations, Jerome!

Steelers win Super Bowl 40 tonight, 21-10.... and Jerome Bettis gets his first (and only) Ring.
Well done. Well deserved.
He announced, in the post-game, "the bus has made its last stop in Detroit!"

Happy Retirement, Jerome!

The best coach...

Tom Brady says Charlie Weis i the best coach he's ever been around:

On Sirius radio, Brady acknowledged this was a trying season, especially after losing offensive coordinator Charlie Weis to Notre Dame and defensive coordinator Romeo Crennel to Cleveland.
“From the start of the year, the word coach (Bill) Belichick used was truth,” Brady said. “He was going to tell us the truth where we were at every single week as a team. We weren’t looking at the past. We had quite a bit of changes. We lost Charlie, who’s the best coach I’ve ever been around. We lost our defensive coordinator, who’s a head coach in the NFL. We lost some key players, had some tough injuries, and even through all that, were very competitive at the end of the year and had a shot to host the AFC Championship.”

Scar! and Serenity

Clip from an email I sent a friend regarding BattleStar and Firefly:

Just watched this week's BSG on TIVo--
Scar"-- and I've got to say.. I think it may be the most uneven episode I've seen (in a while at least)...
Since when did Cat become such a hot-shot? Maybe I haven't been paying proper attention...
Also seems like they introduced a lot of new pilot characters.. or at least the camera gave them special emphasis we haven't seen before..

This plus the overwhelming emphasis on Starbuck's drinking... and I've also lost track of who's CAG on which boat.... is Starbuck no longer attached to Pegasus..

Just weird.
I still loved the episode, but I just found myself scratching my head when it was over....

Also finished watching Firefly and Serenity this week.. and I'm totally IN LOVE!
Read a rumor somewhere along the line that the DVD sales of the show and movie are good enough that Joss may try to make the case for a return to TV for the show... that would, I think, be best... as good as the film was, I just think the pace of the writing and the style of the show lends itself best to the weekly TV format...

Random things you notice when you're kids are watching Toy Story non-stop for a week-- Joss Whedon got top writing credit for the first Toy Story screenplay.. not sure I realized he worked at Disney or Pixar... wild.

The view from my office

Just wish I weren't in my office quite so early in the morning..
but the view is pretty.. (not sure how well it comes through in these pictures..)

Blackberry'd

So they gave me a Blackberry at work this week..
I never figured I'd be one of those guys with the multiple devices clipped to his belt (well, I'm still not, for the record)... I mean, who really needs constant access to their email anyway?

But I must say, now that I've got this little thing in my hands, I'm totally geeking out.. I can't put the damn thing down.. it's ridiculous!

Embarrassing...

Well, that may be too strong a way to describe my feelings in the aftermath of ND's loss to Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl.
Do I feel like the Irish deserved to be there? No question.
At the same time, I do feel a bit that the Irish were being ranked as much for their potential as for their accomplishments.
And, as a friend pointed out, I think Ohio State could, at this moment, give Texas or USC a run for their money if a playoff were part of the deal.

So all in all, I don't feel too badly. Disappointed..
But in years past, as in the Fiesta loss to Oregon State, or the Gator (?) Bowl loss to NC State-- I felt a sense of the lost opportunity, as though another season like this might not come along for a long time to come..

But this year, it seems terribly easy to say "Yeah, well wait til next year."
Here come the Irish.

Yanks get Damon-ized...

News today that Johnny Damon has signed with the 'hated' Yankees...
and the Red Sox 'Nation' (which stretches as far as 495, last I heard) weeps with the 'defection.'
As though Damon were born a Red Sox...

God Bless Joe Paterno...

Gotta love this note from the Dayton Daily News coverage of ESPN's College Football Awards show:

The zinger of the night came from Penn State's Joe Paterno, the Home Depot coach of the year. After he gabbed on the air with Herbstreit, a former Buckeye and Centerville High School quarterback, Paterno cracked, "It sure is great to be interviewed by a guy from Ohio State who can speak English."

Sleepy SleepyDad!

Well, it may be bowl season-- odd that that means that there are actually NO college football games for weeks and week...

But this morning, I am, as my pseudonym implies, very very sleepy.
The younger of our two boys, 19 months old now, is still battling the last of this latest round of winter-time sniffles.. and last night seemed to be the worst of it-- he just could not get himself to sleep.

Add to that the stress of settling into a new job-- not to mention getting up at 4:30 this morning so I could be in the office by 5:30 (don't ask).. and it just was not a good night all the way around..

Coffee, coffee, coffee...

Sickboys

The boys have both come down sick this weekend-- stuffy, runny noses, little coughing, sneezing, and not a lot of sleeping... and I've started having to go into work at 5am.. why do these coincidences always happen to me like this?

Video iPod

Conan O'Brien's got a pretty funny little parody of a video iPod commercial... it's worth a look.... (courtesty of MacTV)

Congress gets into the BCS-bashing act...

Okay... now I KNOW that Congress, and politicians in general, are an easy target for this kind of thing.. but I just couldn't believe my eyes when I read this headline on ESPN.com:

"Congress to look into 'deeply flawed' BCS system"

HOUSTON -- Calling the Bowl Championship Series "deeply flawed," the chairman of a congressional committee has called a hearing on the controversial system used to determine college football's national champion.

A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee, charged with regulating America's sports industry, announced Friday it will conduct a hearing on the BCS next week, after this season's bowl matchups are determined.

[soapbox]Not that anyone asked, but the real problem with college football isn't the BCS.. the BCS is just the symptom. The real disease here is the Conference system. If the BCS just took the 8 top-ranked teams, who would be complaining? (Oh, well, I guess #9 would.)

But instead, the major conferences only agreed to the BCS because they each get an automatic bid.. meaning a Florida State team with 4 losses could go to a BCS bowl this year...

So while ESPN will have you believe that Notre Dame is really the best example of why the BCS is flawed, I'd argue the Conference system is really at the heart of the problem.

Playoff system? Maybe... but I think a playoff system would become unnecessary if Top 25 teams would play MORE Top 25 opponents...

Get rid of the BCS, get rid of the Conference system (in College football, at least).. and create a super-conference of the top football programs.. and require teams to play a certain percentage of each year's schedule against opponents from that pool of teams. Don't play at least 7 games against top-tier programs? No BCS consideration for you.

Oh.. and no more games against I-AA teams.. not that count, anyway...

[/soapbox]

Apologies and thanks for indulging me in that rant.
Have a happy rest of your Saturday.

BCS-bound

Had to listen to the ND game last night via WLS radio, over the internet... local ABC affiliate here decided to show us Georgia-GA Tech.. can't say as I blame them, given the pre-game no-hype over ND-Stanford...

But man, did they miss out on a nail-biter!
And so did I... almost.
With a couple of minutes left in the 4th quarter and ND leading by only 6 points (30-24), the WLS internet radio broadcast was interrupted by a message indicating that they had to end their copyrighted broadcast over the internet or something like that... it was Heidi-like timing...

So I watched the herky-jerky play-by-play scroll on the ESPN gamecast for a few minutes-- long enough to 'see' ND miss a 29 yard field goal and then Stanford scores after a 79 yard completion and goes up by 1.

What's that sucking sound you're hearing?

Geez-Louise I HATE games like this (no kidding).

And just as I was cursing the gods of Internet radio (okay, well, that's a bit melodramatic)... over my shoulder, I hear ESPN News switching over for 'bonus coverage' of the closing minutes of the ND game... and man, am I glad they did!

I have to say-- in that closing two minutes, once again, the Irish showed the kind of poise I can't recall seeing for many years before this season. Starting from their own 20, ND moved swiftly down the field (with two long pass plays to Samardzija) and scored on a powerful run from Darius Walker, reaching out and holding the ball over the goal line for the win... so tough! (capped by a two-point conversion made on a direct-snap to Walker who went in untouched)

So today, both the AP and Coaches Polls have dropped the Irish from #6 to 7... not that I can say I'm crazy with the way the Irish won.. but how may times before, in reference to USC's many close calls this season, have we heard "Just win"...

Ah well.. I'll still be munching some tortilla chips for the New Year... and for the first time in a decade, I feel like the Irish have a legitimate shot at winning the thing!

$399

Outrage of the week from the NY Times
For just $399, you too can get yourself a high school diploma...
Just another reason I'm glad I'm an ND fan.. (feel free to flame me for being an obnoxious ND fan on that one; I remain unrepentant after reading crap like this)...

Out of Pocket...

Heading out with the family tomorrow for a bit of an excursion.. So I'll be out of pocket for the next week or so. Not sure if there'll be internet access or not-- and there's no laptop coming on this trip.. so the blog will go silent for the duration.

But I'll take notes and come back with lots to say, I'm sure.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Happy for Apathy

Got home a little while ago from my friend Manundso's house, doing a little stint on his Podcast.
He's the proprietor of Happy for Apathy.com. He's a former co-worker, a stand-up comic, virtuoso composer.. and all around good guy.

Check out the website..
Check out the podcast..
Try not to be too disappointed in me..

Doctor Who!

Excuse me while I geek out on the new Doctor Who for the next few weeks...
watching the first episode right now. But as little time as I get to spend watching shows like this, it could be weeks before I'm through.

Christopher Eccleston is the new Doctor.. well, he's the first season doctor.. the 9th Doctor, whatever.

David Tennant is the newest Doctor. In the UK, they're preparing for the unveiling of the second season... but me? I'm just trying to make my way through this first new season..

Eccleston looks great. Too bad he decided to leave after just a single season.

Silence is Golden...

This was a news item a week or two back-- there was some rumor about Charlie Weis possibly scoring 1600 on the SAT and turning down a scholarship to Harvard in order to go to ND...
When questioned about that in one of his press conferences, he responded this way:

“That’s a misnomer,” Weis said. “Let’s look at it this way. If I said yes, I’m either smart or a liar, OK? If I said no, what do I gain from saying that? Let’s leave it ambiguous.”

[from the Fort Wayne News Sentinel]

Respect...

The Rock notes a detail today from the end of the Navy game that should not be overlooked: the moment of respect paid by ND Players, standing together with the Midshipmen, for the Navy Alma Mater.

This note from gomidshipmen.com:

From greyknight:

My heart is just too, too full.

It's been a long, long road since my son played youth football, to watching him play in the state 4A finals to a heartbreaking loss, to being at his side throughout the whole recruiting process, to supporting him in his decision to playing for Navy after being offered by "bigtime" programs...to seeing him run out on the field this afternoon at ND Stadium to such a warm, warm reception from the ND fans, both before, during and after the game. The class showed by both ND staff and players alike all contributed to an experience that he'll remember for the rest of his life. I spoke to him by phone immediately after the game, and again just a few minutes ago after the team arrived back at the Yard, and he said that it was truly an experience that he'll always remember. The sincere good wishes from the ND fans, their standing Os for Navy, the support shown for them after the game as they left...so, so very overwhelming. It was the largest crowd he has ever played for. 80,000 fans cheering for something much. much bigger than just a football game...cheering for and giving support to players, some of who will, in just a short few months, be putting their very lives on the line for all that our nation stands for.

Beeeeeaaaat Middies!

Irish 42
Navy 21

Okay, I don't really have a lot to say about this game.
In case you're concerned.. no, you're not really reading a Notre Dame sports blog.. but for my own purposes, owing to my really terrible memory, I've decided to keep a little personal log here about each Notre Dame game and my impressions of it-- key players, moments, thoughts, that kind of thing.

Not exactly the best kind of breathtaking Blog-reading, I realize.
So if you don't care about Notre Dame football.. or you just don't care about what I think about it.. feel free to ignore these posts.. I do actually intend to write about other things.. but at this time of year, there's little else of note on my mind.. so please oblige me.

So I really don't have much to say about this game... we were attending a little party for my sister's birthday, and my Dad and I got to catch a few minutes of the game here and there, kept track of the score, that kind of thing...

The Midshipmen had their usual, old-fashioned (and uniquely frustrating) option offense on display.. and it seemed to trip up the Notre Dame defense for a good while (most of the first half).. but the D did seem to adjust.. and their size and skill eventually just overwhelmed the Navy O-line.. so by the fourth quarter, the game was out of reach...

Quinn continues to impress.. and both Travis Thomas and Darius Walker had good games at Running back... and Stovall stole the show with three Touchdown grabs that, I'm sure by now, are making NFL scouts' mouths water.. just a little bit maybe.

And I think Samardzija was held without a TD for the first time all year... oweing in part to the double and triple-coverage the Middies had on him most of the game..

So what do you think? Next year, for the Heismann: Quinn, Walker, and Samardzija??
I know, I know. I'm a nut.

Sorry I missed you...

My good friend, Manundso, proprietor of the ever popular Happy for Apathy website, forum, podcast, and-- let's face it-- lifestyle, called last night to have me do a segment on his podcast... and it surely would have been a treat to do if I'd been able to catch the phone.

Can't remember exactly what we were doing or where we were. Short term memory again... but hopefully, there wouldn't have been any screaming Cloonan boys in the background.. that's a big hopefully. In all likelihood, it would have been pandelirium...

I am going to have to make it over there some Thursday night for a Podcast, though.
Check out his site here, take a listen to the Podcast.
He's the original good peoples.

Denny Crane

Denny Crane to Alan Shore on last night's Boston Legal:

It's fun being me. Is it fun being you?

Drink your beer!

The boys and I ate some pizza earlier this evening.
After taking his first bite, Aidan noted that the sauce was spicey.
"Spicey" has been a big thing with him lately. He says tomato sauce is spicey.
Green peppers are spicey. Grapes... well, no.. okay, he's never tried to say that grapes are spicey.

So after noticing that the pizza was spicey, Aidan looked at me and said, "Daddy, you should drink your beer. This pizza's spicey!"

Horizontal

..truly.

Rocky Topped....

.. but still rocky.
We had our friends John and Christie and their kids over for dinner and to watch the game. The kids frolic'd downstairs as we cheered through the first half... and as we shouted Zibby to the end-zone in the second half...

Irish 41
Vols 21


So what are we to make of this victory over Tennessee?
The Irish looked great in the first quarter, uncharacteristically slow in the second quarter, and after half-time, the Tennessee defense was positively slicing through the Offensive line to get to Quinn.

Now, as I've said before, I'm no kind of football expert. All I'm putting here are my simple reflections of my experience of the game... my experience from the couch...

But it was clear that the Tennessee defense had worn down the Irish by the second-half.

So by the time the Vols tied it up at 21, I can safely say I was biting my fingernails and worrying a bit about what I'd have to say at work on Monday...

But God Bless Jeff Samardzija. He's the reason I don't have to worry about that tonight.

And my goodness, did anyone else see the way he gripped the baseball and football that Lewis Johnson handed him during his post-game interview.. gripped them in ONE HAND. I mean, he held that baseball in his hand.. and then, while Johnson was making some kidding remark about how Jeff was going to have to make a decision in his future about holding one of these [the baseball] or one of these [the football]-- and he went to put the football in Jeff's other hand.. but instead, Jeff just extended three fingers and gripped the ball so he was holding both in the same hand. No wonder he makes such amazing catches.

A couple of notes:

• Great catch, Maurice. Too bad, I don't think you caught a ball all game after that. But you did put on some outstanding blocks (like the one that sprung Samardzija for 73).
• Pat Haden said of Samardzija: "You know, it's surprising when he doesn't catch them."
• It was wonderful to see Fasano rumble toward the end-zone and then get horizontal.. and with just enough momentum to tag the pylon with the ball... beautiful.
  

Dear Tennessee...

Dear Tennessee.. Brandon Hoyte and the Irish welcome you...

A Knoxville TV station reported Thursday night that three busloads of fans totaling ''close to 130 people'' had left the UT campus headed for South Bend. That will leave only 80,665 in attendance presumably cheering for the Irish.