Great Response to Americans who Down on Soccer

Soccer players in this country a forced to defend their game of choice more than they should be, because of the downers in the country who say that soccer is boring, there isn’t enough scoring, it takes too long,  or any number of negative statements towards the game.

In my Internet wanderings, I came across this post on Thatsoccerthing, a soccer related blog.  I’ll just let you read the post because it pretty much sums it up, but make sure you read the first comment made.  Some really intersting math about scoring in football and scoring in soccer that shows that the scoring per minute in soccer is actually comparable, if not higher in a lot of instances, to football.

I also want to give a nod to Endlines.  I found the Thatsoccerthing post through their site.

Flooding in Gulf Port, Illinois

I saw this article over at CNN.com the other day and I had to comment.

Let me say that I feel truly, truly sorry for everyone that is dealing with flooding in the Midwest right now.  I can’t even imagine what it would be like to lose everything you own in a flood.  The helplessness those people must be experiencing is unimaginable.

Gulf Port, Illinois sits right on the banks of the Mississippi.  Last week the town was completely decimated when two levees near the town failed and water rushed into the town.  According to CNN, only 28 of 200 residents had federal flood insurance.  Now, residents are mad at the federal government because they felt they were misled about not needing flood insurance, and they felt they were led to belief the levee would provide them needed protection from the river.  The levee was rated to withstand a 100 year flood, but not a flood the size of what we’ve seen over the last couple of weeks.

Just a couple of quick thoughts in response to this:

• If you live on the banks of one of the biggest, if not the biggest, rivers in North America, you should really have flood insurance.  The Mississippi is prone to flooding and unless you’re high up on a bluff, you should expect a flood no matter what.
• I feel like the faith put into FEMA is misplaced.  FEMA’s recent track record isn’t the greatest in the world when it comes to natural disasters and flooding.  Additionally, weather and nature isn’t the most predictable beast.  No one is ever 100% sure of what weather and nature are going to do.
• The flooding in New Orleans is a very clear reminder to expect the unexpected.  The levees were designed for a 100 year flood.  This isn’t a 100 year flood; its much, much worse than that.

I really hope that the families that have lost their homes and lives are able to find a way to recover from this catastrophe, and I hope that they never have to experience anything like this again.  It just doesn’t sit well with me that people are trying to blame someone else for repercussions of decisions they ultimately made themselves.  There are multiple points of failure that are being exposed here, and hopefully those points of failure will be remedied in the aftermath of the flood.  I just hope that everyone involved is willing to do a self-assessment to determine where they could have made a better decision to improve their situation.

Where ‘ThePresentTense’ Came From

One of the drawbacks to working in our office in LA is that I can’t listen to my iPod during the day at work.  Back in D.C.  I listen to my iPod for most of the day every day.  Some of my music that I’ve been missing the most has been Pearl Jam.  Goofing around on YouTube, I found a video of a performance of the song where I got the name for this site.

Present Tense was one of the tracks off of the band’s fourth album, No Code, which was released in 1996.  I didn’t really become familiar with the song until I downloaded the official bootleg from their 2006 D.C. show and listened to it a couple of times.  What I love about this song is that the message is so simple, and something we hear all the time, but some of the imagery that they use in the lyrics is great.  The image of the tree bending to capture as much sunlight and take in everything that it can is really cool.  We, as people, can be as rigid as trees appear to be, but like trees, if we want to get everything we can out of life must learn to flex.  I’m still working on the whole flexible thing, but this song is good inspiration.

As if you couldn’t figure it out, the basic idea is that you shouldn’t waste your time worrying about things that you could or should have done in the past, and concentrate on what is happening now.  Looking forward to where you want to be and trying to figure out how to get there is a much better use of your time.  Because this blog is about what’s going on in my life now and some of where I’m going, I thought the title was quit fitting.

Below I included two videos of PJ playing the song in concert.  The first I included b/c they let the crowd sing the same portion of the song as when I saw them in concert, and it was one of those great concert memories you remember for a long time.  The second is just so you can hear them sing the whole song.

Present Tense – written by Eddie Vedder and Mike McCready, Performed by Pearl Jam

Do you see the way that tree bends?
Does it inspire?
Leaning out to catch the sun’s rays
A lesson to be applied
Are you getting something out of this all-encompassing trip?

You can spend your time alone, re-digesting past regrets, oh
Or you can come to terms and realize
You’re the only one who can’t forgive yourself, oh
Makes much more sense, to live in the present tense

Have you ideas on how this life ends?
Checked your hands and studied the lines
Have you the belief that the road ahead, ascends off into the light?
Seems that needlessly it’s getting harder
To find an approach and a way to live
Are we getting something out of this all-encompassing trip?

You can spend your time alone re-digesting past regrets, oh
Or you can come to terms and realize
You’re the only one who cannot forgive yourself, oh
Makes much more sense, to live in the present tense

World Cup Qualifying: US vs. Barbados

We got the win today, but a generally disappointing showing by the US today.  We are clearly a better team than Barbados, but we only really displayed that superiority for parts of the game.  We came out very strong and possessed the ball well, but we definitely let the game get away from us for a good chunk of the middle portion of the match.  We definitely didn’t show the professionalism of putting away the match as we should have.

Because we won so handily in the first leg of the home and home series there was virtually no way that Barbados could have advanced over us.  They would have had to have beaten us 9-0, and if that had happened I would have never watched another US National Team game.  That advantage gave Bob Bradley the freedom to try out some younger, less experienced players.  He did just that, which I do agree with, but what I don’t understand is why he played DeMarcus Beasley, a winger usually lauded for his defensive work, as the lone striker.  I would think this would have been a great opportunity to try out more striker options that we haven’t seen much of in the past.  I believe that was a missed opportunity there.

I think we played a good deal of patience during the game, which is usually a good thing, but I think we took it a bit far.  I don’t think we had the needed urgency when an opportunity presented itself.  There were times when someone made a run that would have been very dangerous if we had gotten the ball to them, but we didn’t even try to play them through.  I also think we need more people willing to take players on, on the dribble.  Our possession gets too predictable when we’re trying to penetrate into the final third to try to get a chance on goal and the defending team knows exactly where to clog things up.

I was a little disappointed with Freddy Adu.  I’m not one of those expecting him to be some sort of savior of American soccer, but I’ve seen him play better.  Perhaps he was having a little bit of an off day, but he didn’t seem to be doing some of the small things that would have improved his performance.  I thought some of his positioning when receiving passes made it too easy for the defender to get to the ball.  I also would have liked to see him be the player that tried to take defenders on on the dribble.  Again, I’ve seen him do it in games before and I think that it adds a nice dimension to the attack that we don’t typically have.

We don’t play again until September and a lot will happen between now and then in terms of personnel that’s available to play and who is in form.  The Olympics will also likely have an impact on who will be available to the full men’s team for qualifying.  Many of the younger players we saw today will be involved in the Olympics and Bradley will no doubt call more of the seasoned players back in to the team for the qualifying matches this fall.  Let’s all hope that we start to find some better attacking options between now and then.  Our solid defensive work is only going to take us so far.

Roadtrip Rewind: The Grand Canyon

Okay, this has been a really long time coming. I had a bad feeling that if I didn’t post on this right away I would get busy and wouldn’t get to it and I was right. So here I am, finally getting to it.

The Grand Canyon is incredible. If there was another way I could describe it that I thought would do it justice, I would try, but I’m pretty sure words alone can’t really do it. I also don’t think pictures can really do it either. Basically what I’m trying to tell you is if you want to know what the Grand Canyon is all about you have to go there. Talking to someone about it and seeing their pictures isn’t going to sufficiently communicate to you what the Grand Canyon is.

It was pretty cold when Cris and I were there so we didn’t feel the need to rush out there early in the morning. For anyone that’s never been there, let me provide a brief explanation of how the park is set up. You drive into the park and there are a handful of parking lots where you can put your car, and then right the Park Service shuttle service to a variety of point of interest. There are campgrounds in the park, a village with hotels, restaurants, and shops, and a series of scenic viewing points scattered along the shuttle route.

I’m really happy with how we approached our visit, and I would recommend others doing the same thing. It was pretty cold when we were there so we didn’t go out to the Canyon until late morning. We parked our car near the main ranger station and hoped the shuttle out to one of the point on the east end of the shuttle route. After spending some time there, we rode back in and went to the village and got some lunch in the mid afternoon, after the lunch rush. After getting some lunch and visiting some of the shops, we took the Hermits Road shuttle out to the scenic viewing points on the West end of the park. I remember the name of that route because I think its the best one. If you only have time to go down one route, its the one to take.

A couple of things that really struck me about the Canyon. Everyone knows the Canyon is big, but you have no concept of how damn big it is until you’re standing on the rim. Even though you’re standing there looking at it and experiencing it, it doesn’t seem real. Its a bit hard to maintain some kind of perspective about its size b/c of how expansive it is. One of the best ways to get a little perspective is to watch hikers go down one of the trails that goes down into the Canyon from the Village and see how small they look down at the bottom.

Another thing that was quite striking about it was how quiet and still it was. When you get out away from the crowd at the village, and if you can make it to one of the viewing points without alot of other people, it almost seems like the world stops. The only you can really see moving are the clouds, and if you can catch a glimpse of the river its moving, but its so far away that you can even really sense the movement and you definitely can’t hear it. You have to remember that you’re out in a desert plateau and there are very few living things. We saw a handful of birds and two or three elk near the village, but I honestly don’t remember seeing any other living creatures besides people while we there.

The weather was really crazy while we were there and I’d kind of like to go back when the weather is nicer. I never thought that it would rain, snow, sleet, and hail on us all in one day at the Grand Canyon. I sort of feel robbed, because I’ve always heard how amazing sunsets and starry skies in the southwest can be and I didn’t get either, so I might have to try to go back one day.

I’ve included a sampling of the pictures that Cris and I took while at the Canyon so you can see what we saw.

Euro 2008: Netherlands vs. Russia

I finally got to see some the Euro 2008 championships today.  Normally, I would record the games on the DVR and watch them when I got home, but we weren’t able to hook up the DVR here in LA and all of the games are played well before I get home from work.

Great match-up between the Netherlands and Russia.  The Netherlands has a greater tradition in the Euro 2008’s, getting the quarter finals a number of times in recent years, whereas Russia has only made the quarters on one previous occasion.  Despite their respective histories, Russia looked the better team today through most of the game.  Recognizing the strength of the Netherlands, they set out to look for counterattacks, but looked dangerous in build-up throughout the match.  Russia had less to lose in this match, and they played like it.  They created many more solid chances during the run of play, hitting the post and testing Edwin Van der Sar from start to finish.

Russia scored first ten minutes after the half on a nice ball crossed from the left side that was finished by Roman Pavluchenko making a textbook run to the front post.  The Netherlands looked most dangerous on set pieces and it was almost Russia’s downfall giving up the equalizing goal to Ruud Van Nistelrooy five minutes from the end of regulation.

The first overtime period was fairly even, but Russia dominated the second overtime, pinning the Netherlands back into their defensive third for the majority of the 15 minutes.  The Netherlands defense looked a bit sluggish, and their midfield couldn’t hold the ball to build an attack.  The Russians got a lovely, deserved goal on a service across the box to a wide open Torbinsky, when the Dutch defense looked like they decided to take a smoke break.  The final Russian goal was the perfect display of the Netherland’s lack of sharpness when a throw-in was allowed to run all the way into the box for a one touch finish by Andrei Arshavin.

What I appreciated most about the match was the speed and openness of play.  Both teams were interested in attacking, and the creativity displayed by both teams was a treat for everyone that watched.  Russia was easily the better team on the day and deserved the win.  They will go on to play the winner of the Italy/Spain match in the final quarter-final game.

Delta’s In-Flight Entertainment System

I mentioned in a previous post that I loved flying Delta Airlines.  Our trip this past weekend to Atlanta did a little to strengthen that love, though it wasn’t all pluses.  Another nice plane, flight left on time, and the in-flight entertainment system was pretty sweet.

We were on a 767, I believe, and there was a small monitor in the back of each headrest that was controlled through a touch screen. The system allowed you to watch about 15 channels of satellite TV, listen to the typical set of in-air radio stations that airlines usually offer, listen to a pretty decent selection of CDs covering all genres of music, or play a trivia game against other passenger on the plane all for free.  Additionally, you could pay a relatively small fee to watch HBO TV shows, movies, or play games.  The movies were $6, the TV shows $2, and $2 for games if I remember correctly.  Before anyone balks at those prices, keep in mind that a movie in the theater will cost you $10 in a lot of theaters these days.  One nice feature of watching the movies is that you could pause and rewind them as much as you want.

So the bad part of the flight was when we got to Atlanta.  Now I have to admit that I’ve had really good luck when it comes to flights and having my luggage meet me at the airport every time.  I didn’t have that luck this time.  I understand there are going to be issues sometimes, but coming off a red-eye with very little sleep had my patience way down, and the policy the airline had in place didn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense to me.

My bag didn’t make it on to our plane and had to be sent on the one after us.  The problem I had with the whole process was they couldn’t tell me where it was for at least an hour.  They kept trying to convince me that mine was the only bag of over 200 passengers that hadn’t made it into the baggage claim from the plane at the gate yet.  After a half an hour, when all the other passengers were gone and I went to ask them about my bag, their only response was to wait another half an hour b/c they could see that it had been loaded.  What they either couldn’t see or didn’t tell me, was that it wasn’t loaded on to our plane.  Somewhere in the whole process was a breakdown in communication that I could have dealt without.

All that being said, Delta is still my favorite airline to fly and I’ll fly them every chance I get.

My Best Friend’s Wedding

This past weekend, Carissa and I took a quick trip back across the country to Atlanta for my best friend’s wedding. Overall it was a really great weekend, but we’re both pretty beat now that we’re back in LA.

The trip started with a red-eye flight out of LA on Thursday night. This was the second red-eye I’ve taken, and it really put a hurtin on me. Our flight took off just after midnight LA time, landed in Atlanta just after 6:00, and I think I got about 2 hours of sleep on the plane. Unfortunately, there was no time to take a nap when we got to Atlanta because I had to help my friend, Steven, set up for the wedding on Saturday. We picked up our rental, (crappy, thank you very much Thrifty) we went to Carissa’s brother’s house, I grabbed a quick shower and then took off.

Setting up for the wedding was no problem. For the most part, its easier to work with people who don’t get overly worked up about stuff, but it isn’t always helpful when you need someone to make a decision and your questions are responded to with a shared shrug and a “whatever” or “I don’t know.” After getting everything set for the wedding, we went and picked up Steven’s fiancee’s daughters and met Cris for dinner. (she spent the day hanging out with her brother) Good meal, good company, and fortunately for Cris and I, we got home early enough to get about eleven hours of sleep on Friday night.

Waking much more rested on Saturday, Steven came by to pick me up and we headed out to the church again. The wedding was a pretty small, intimate affair with mostly family and close friends attending. Now that I think about it, the whole deal is sort of odd in my head, in that it wasn’t odd. Let me try to explain. I always mentally put the people I know into a sort of a box, and when they do something that doesn’t fit in that box its really sort of weird for me. Normally, seeing my best friend at standing in front of a minister getting married totally wouldn’t fit in that box, but it seemed totally normal, which was sort of weird. In addition to seeing them together and interacting, it supports my belief that the marriage is a really awesome thing. To say the least, I’m really excited and happy for both of them.

I know someone will bring it up so I’ll get it out of the way by saying, a six year old having a crush on you is funny and cute for a little bit, but only for so long. I do think its pretty funny that she was giving Carissa the “I got my eye on you” hand gesture at the reception.

After the reception Cris, her brother, my sister’s family, and my parents all got together for dinner. Its sometimes hard on quick trips like this one to see everyone you want to see, so I’m really glad that we had the chance to get together. Everyone seemed to be doing well and we had a really enjoyable dinner, even if we did make my sister and brother-in-law go to a chain restaurant, which they prefer not to do. After dinner, I had the great opportunity to try to explain all of the underlying reasons for high gas prices to a 7 year old, who, surprisingly, liked my answers better when they were longer. She seemed to understand all the fundamentals, and I fear my explanation was going to fall short before her ability to understand ran out.

Sunday, we were fortunate enough to be able meet my parents for breakfast for Father’s Day. Because we live in D.C. and my parents live in South Carolina, I don’t get to see them that often, and I see them most often on the major holiday’s like Christmas and Thanksgiving. Seeing my pops on Father’s day was a nice treat.

The flight back was insignificant, which is what you always want in a flight. All in all a great weekend. Great to see Steven, great to see him get married, and awesome to see my family and visit with Cris’ brother a bit.

McCain and Obama Tax Policies Still Missing the Point

After reading this article on cnnmoney I’m kind of annoyed about the tax plans that Obama and McCain are putting forth.  At their basic level, the two plans aren’t all that different from stuff we’ve seen from the two major parties before, but its still nice to see the exact differences and how each one will effect you.  You can read all of the specifics in the article, but I’ve including the key portions below.

Under McCain’s plan

The net result: compared with their tax bill today, taxpayers on average would see their tax bill cut by nearly $1,200. That means their after-tax income would rise by 2%.

But those in the lowest income groups would only see their after-tax income rise by less than 1% (or between $19 and $319). By contrast, the highest-income households – those with incomes of at least $603,000 – would see a boost in after-tax income of 3.4%, or more than $40,000.

Under Obama’s plan

The net result: compared with their tax bill today, taxpayers on average would see their tax bill cut by nearly $160 under Obama’s plan. That means their after-tax income would rise by 0.3%.

But those in the lowest-income groups would enjoy the biggest after-tax income rise as a percentage of income – between 2.4% and 5.5% (worth between $567 and $1,042). By contrast, the highest-income households – those with at least $603,000 in income – would see a dramatic decline in their after-tax income – a drop of 8.7%, or $116,000.

For what its worth, I’m favoring Obama’s plan.  I have to support making it easier for people that don’t make as much to buy things they need like food and clothing, than giving the super rich people in this country more money to buy another boat or a second or third house.  I like capitalism, but I’m not a fan of the ridiculous excess that ends up coming with it.

That part of the whole article that just fries me is the portion below.

Under both plans, all American taxpayers could pay a price for their tax cuts: a bigger deficit. The Tax Policy Center estimates that over 10 years, McCain’s tax proposals could increase the national debt by as much as $4.5 trillion with interest, while Obama’s could add as much as $3.3 trillion.

The reason: neither plan would raise the amount of revenue expected under current tax policy – which assumes all the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts expire by 2011. And neither plan would raise enough to cover expected government costs during those 10 years.

We always hear politicians talking about fiscal responsibility, but none of them seem to get the concept that paying off your debts is a fiscally prudent thing to do.  I recognize that the economy isn’t as simple as I’d like it to be, but at least an effort needs to be made to pay down the debt.  I find it ironic that more than a few members of Congress and political appointees in government were successful businessmen prior to entering government and politics, yet they continue to run the government in a manner that would bankrupt their companies in a second by spending more money than you take in.

I wasn’t sure of all of the negatives of a huge national debt so I went to my Wikipedia crutch.  It turns out there is an argument for carrying a national debt, but given the example of Japan in the Wikipegia article, it doesn’t sound like the best idea.

I’m still in favor of paying down the debt, and at the very least not pursuing policies that are going to make it bigger.  Can anyone say Balanced Budget Amendment?  The CNNMoney article notes that the candidates’ plans will likely be adjusted some as time goes on, and as more information is available the analysis will change.  Let’s hope the changes that are made are positive, but I’m not going to hold  my breath that paying down the debt is going to be a part of that.

How Much Will American Life Change as a Result of High Gas Prices?

I don’t think its a secret to anyone that gas prices are painfully high for us Americans these days. Yes, I know, we pay nothing in comparison to much of Europe, but I’m not addressing that difference in this post. Sitting in my car in LA traffic, wasting lots of that really expensive gas, I began to wonder just how much high gas prices are going to force us to change how we live in this country. I also wonder if maybe the high cost of gas could have a silver lining to it.

The high prices have already started to force people to adjust how they live their typical lives. There’s been a great deal of anecdotal evidence that people are starting to drive less to try to conserve gas and save money. People are trying to find alternative modes of transportation like carpooling or riding their bikes to work. Sales of SUVs and trucks are down, while demand for smaller, more gas efficient vehicles has increased. The problem that I see is that these changes will take us only so far. Despite what many people may assume, the US isn’t completely to blame for the prices of oil, and in turn gas. There is a perfect storm of conditions that have brought the prices to where they are. I’m far from an economist, but my understanding is that 1) spiking demand from developing economies such as India has a large part, 2) low interest rates drive investors to put their money in commodities like oil as opposed to investing in the financial markets to seek better returns driving up demand and prices, and 3) our invasion of Iraq, in addition to other conflicts or threats of conflict in the region raise concerns about continued supplies.

Now some of these conditions can, and probably will improve, but I’m pretty skeptical that those conditions are going to improve to the point where gas prices are going to drop significantly. I’m pretty sure the growing economies that are largely driving demand are going to continue to grow, thus demand will continue to increase. So the question is, what can we change about how we do things America to improve our relationship with oil? Also, is it actually going to hurt us enough to really institute some significant change?

Things that I would like to see change:

True commitment to alternative fuel technologies. I don’t know which one should or will come out on top, but the only way that we’re going to be able to divorce ourselves from oil, is to find something to replace it. The world population is going to continue to grow, world demand for oil will continue to increase, and there isn’t really anything we can do about it, but find an alternative to using so much oil.

I’d love to see a change in the car purchasing behaviors of the country. I just can’t understand the mindset that brings people to drive Hummers. The only people that truly need Hummers carry assault rifles and wear camouflage for a living. If everyone drove smaller cars that were more gas efficient, the roads would be safer as well.

Increased use of mass transit in urban centers. One of the big things that many European cities have over many US cities is a well-developed mass transit system that uses a subway system as a primary component. Even in Washington, D.C. where they have a good transit system, its pretty inconvenient in large parts of the city. One of the most popular portions of the city, Georgetown, is still unreachable by the subway. Atlanta, one of the biggest cities in the south, has a terrible mass transit system.

The last thing that could improve our situation with oil, is something that I’m not so sure is a good thing, but I’ll throw it out anyway. Increased urbanization, would decrease commute times. We are the kings of urban sprawl in this country. People really like their suburbs and lots of land around them. I doubt that a movement back to the cities would ever actually occur, but it could help improve the oil dependence situation.

One basic thing we have to realize is that there isn’t an easy quick fix to the high gas price problem. I’m of the opinion that they’re never going to drop back to where they were. The way to getting out from oil’s thumb is probably going to be a long and painful one, but I’m pretty sure we don’t have much choice in the matter.