Nice Weekend

I really enjoyed this past weekend.  It was jam packed full of things that I really enjoyed.  So much so, in fact, that it's almost hard to know where to start.  I suppose that chronologically is best, so here goes...

The weekend before last, while camping in Texas, I managed to bust a hole in the passenger tail light of Jodi's car.  I bumped it with the cooler's plastic wheel while trying to load the cooler back in the truck of the car.  The plastic of the tail light was the weaker of the two plastics, evidently.  It wasn't a hard bump but was more than sufficient to require a new tail light.  I say all this to say that the blinker also quit working and made me nervous because the bulb looked fine.  However, I bought some replacement bulbs after work on Friday and that was the problem after all.  So, that was a relief.  A good start to the weekend.

Goodbye, 84 body.  We hardly knew each other.

Saturday morning was a nice homemade breakfast with my family followed by the sale of the body to my 1984 Ford F150 at full asking price.  Woo hoo!  As mentioned in the last blog, I had it listed for sale on Craigslist and while I had talked to lots of people who claimed they wanted to buy it, I started to wonder if I would get it sold since no one had made any effort to actually see it in person yet.  I'm glad to make the space and liquidate the unnecessary asset.

I had time to mow and weed eat which is a huge chore, but one that I kind of enjoy doing.  While doing the weed eating, I listened to Leeland's new album, Invisible.  It was available to stream for free for the weekend only.  It's a great album!  We went ahead and pre-ordered it.  It is set to be available on July 22.  Afterwards, some family showed up to come with us to a church fireworks display to which our neighbors had invited us.  It was good to get to hang out with them and get to know them better.  They're a really nice family.  The children got to play on inflatables, the fireworks were fun to see, we had some good food, and got to spend some time with family and new friends.

Lyric successfully frog hopping his way across the balls.

Sunday afternoon was a small watch party at Qdoba to see the Euro 2016 final match between underdog Portugal and host country France battling it out on the pitch.  Portugal's star player, Cristiano Ronaldo, was injured shortly after the game began and despite making a valiant effort to continue on through the pain, he reluctantly and emotionally called to be taken off.  Without their captain, Portugal held off France well into extra time when a Portuguese substitute managed to blast in a goal from almost 25 yards out.  It was an unlikely goal from an unlikely source, but it was the only one of the match and it gave Portugal their first ever major tournament trophy while breaking a 41-year run of France defeating them.  It was certainly an amazing game to see as well as a satisfactory finish to a summer of international soccer watching.  With Copa America complete and now with Euro 2016 over, I go back to being a non sports-watcher.  Not that I'm complaining!  While I enjoy the tournaments, I'm equally looking forward to all the things I will have time to do now.

After the watch party and a stop at Lowe's for some trim, we headed down to Busiek State Park to hang out and let the kids play.  It was a nice finish to a nice weekend. :)

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Family, Fun, Food, and Futbal!

Last Saturday was my 37th birthday and we celebrated it how I wanted to celebrate it and then some.  For months, I've been looking forward to Copa America Centenario which, if you didn't know, is an international one-time tournament with countries from all of the Americas to celebrate CONMEBOL (South American Football Confederation) turning 100 years old.  The kick-off game was last Friday night between USA and Columbia.

USA may have lost that match 2-0, but I still really enjoyed the game particularly since for the first time ever I got to watch from home.  We signed up with Sling TV which is a really awesome app.  We get to try if for free for 7 days and then it's only $20 per month for the basic package (a trimmed-down version of a standard cable package).  For an additional $5 per month, I got the sports add-on package which included Univision Deportes Network.  All of the Copa America games will be aired on this channel.  The only caveat is that it's in Spanish, but that doesn't really matter since I don't care to listen to commentators anyway.

Fox has the broadcasting rights to Copa America and the only way that I could find to get the channel was to get cable or satellite.  Fox does have an app called Fox Soccer2Go for $20 per month which supposedly allows you to watch sports games broadcast by Fox on your phone or tablet.  However, I read a bunch of reviews and nobody likes it.  Complaints are everywhere that the app freezes or kicks you out almost all the time.  And, I didn't want to watch it on a small screen anyway, let alone if it is going to be so buggy that I'll miss parts of the games.

So, I'm really liking Sling TV.  Unlike, Fox Socer2Go, I can watch a game live or I can stream it later.  Plus, Jodi likes it too since it also has HGTV.  And, when we're done with it, we can cancel it.  This is how easy it's supposed to be, but never is, with cable or satellite.

Sorry for the infomercial, but clearly I have enjoyed this new concept of having affordable, no-nonsense "cable".

My birthday celebration was awesome from even the night before.  Friday night, we had brats and dogs on the grill and ate outside enjoying the beautiful weather we have been having.  Jodi worked her butt off making 20 lbs of fajitas that we had on Saturday and were amazingly good.  I will forever judge all other fajitas by this new standard.  Then, she surprised me with a mulberry cobbler that her and the children picked from our mulberry trees.  If you've never had it, you're missing out. We watched four more games between Saturday and Sunday and still had some time to piddle around with a few things that I wanted to do.

Overall, it was a very relaxing and delicious weekend enjoying some great international soccer from the comforts of my own home.  Even Cute (our cat) got in on the action.  Here she is getting extremely upset about a bad call the referee made.

Cute and I share a birthday.  I forgot to mention that she turned 2 on Saturday.

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Kingsmen

We just wrapped up our first indoor soccer session this week with a solid 11-3 win over the Headhunters.  It was a great game where we showed some impressive defensive skills and perhaps an even better offensive display of composed ball possession.  It was a game to be proud of, for sure.

What was more impressive than the game we played was the results of the season.  We went undefeated.  I've never been on a team that had an undefeated season before.  We came out the first game with a tie that was quite the battle to witness.  It was back and forth the whole game and ended 9-9.  That's a hefty goal count for a soccer game, even for indoor.

Every game after that was a win.  But, with the exception of one game that was a forfeit due to the opposing team only having two players show, none of the wins were handed to us or came easily.  Several of the games could have easily gone the other way.

I love soccer.  And, I forgot how much I missed playing competitively.  The next session starts up in a couple weeks and I'm looking forward to it.  The top three teams from this session's results will stay in this grouping and welcome three new teams to it, while the other three teams will drop down to the next level.

I fully intend to get a proper group photo at the start of the next session.  I'll have to add it to this blog once I get it.

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World Cup 2014 - Free Poster

The week after the draw, I created a poster using the open-source photo editing software GIMP.  I put it together for my own personal use but thought that some soccer fans such as myself might also like to have it.  So here it is in JPG format and PNG format.  Only 29 days left before the action begins!

This was designed to be printed at 24" x 36".  It can be printed smaller, but some of the text can become difficult to read at smaller sizes, particularly the dates of the games.

I printed mine at Staples for $3 plus tax at 24" x 36".  If you would like to do the same, you can upload the PNG format to the Staples website and have it printed as a black and white engineering print like I did.

I'll also have the links available long term in my downloads drop-down lists at the top of my blog.

Enjoy!

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World Cup Excitement - Free Download

ATTENTION! If you downloaded the World Cup spreadsheet before June 21, 2014 then you have a copy that has errors.  A fixed version is now available for download here with scores filled out up to June 21 or for a blank version download this one.

I apologize for the calculation error.  Technically, it's not my fault.  I originally built this spreadsheet in Microsoft Excel 2003.  Since the first round is a point system that breaks ties in points by goal difference and ties in goal difference by total goals scored, the formulas to determine the ranking for each group are surprisingly difficult to write.  I wrote formulas with multiple nested formulas within them.  Microsoft reduced the number of formulas for which you can nest within other formulas in Microsoft Excel 2010.  So, the formulas were logically correct but disallowed by the newer version of Excel that I am using.  As a result, the ranking of teams within Group play were not calculated and no teams were pulled over into Round 2.  Thanks, Microsoft, for that "improvement" (eye roll).

UPDATE:  For a free downloadable and printable poster of the brackets, go to my newest post and click on the link for the download.

FIFA World Cup 2014 is coming up and this guy is getting excited.  The weekend before last was the draw and so the official schedule has been filled and is ready to go.

So, without hesitation, I built my Microsoft Excel spreadsheet to keep up with all the games.  It's in the same user-friendly interface as it's been when I originally designed it for World Cup 2006.  I updated it a little bit, but I was afraid to get into the formulas too much because I keep getting a warning about too many arguments being nested within single cells.  Apparently, I was able to do more within a single cell in Microsoft Excel 2003 than in the 2010 version I have now.

Anyway, it works like a charm with no more interaction from the user than entering the final scores of each game.  In Round 1, it does all the math for you on the fly in regards to team points, total goals scored, total goals scored against, and total goal difference.  Basically, every scenario that might possibly be used to determine final ranking in Round 1 to see who makes it into Round 2 and who doesn't.

In Round 2, in the event of a tied game going into penalty shots for a tie breaker, a box pops up to allow the user to enter the penalty shots results.

It's a fun way to follow along with all the games.  Otherwise, with 64 games being played in roughly a month, it's easy to just miss a good portion of the action.

I considered marketing this sheet of mine, selling it online for download for something like a dollar.  But, after some investigation, I found out that FIFA holds exclusive rights for a lot more than I thought.  I would have been infringing on the intellectual property rights of FIFA had I done something like that.  Perhaps, on Microsoft, as well.

So, here it is for free.  Also, it will be available in the 'Downloads' drop-down menu at the top of this blog.  FIFA can't sue me for distributing it this way.   Well, they can, I guess, but they won't win since I am adhering to their legal requirements.

• I'm receiving no monetary benefits in the distribution of this file, nor any other form of compensation.
• I'm not using this distribution as a means to advertise any product or company.
• The file contains no copy-written or otherwise protected images belonging to FIFA or any of its affiliates.
• The file does not contain excessive words or phrases registered as intellectual property of FIFA or any of its affiliates.
• The purpose of distribution of this file is to excite a fan base and increase the number of individuals watching the World Cup in 2014, which is FIFA's own product.

P.S.  FIFA, if you are reading this, don't get mad.  You don't want to sue me.  You want to hire me.

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Mapping Out Your Travels

I got to talking with my wife last night about all the different states that we have been to over the course of our lives.  I've decided that there should be some universal rules in place to determine whether or not you've truly visited a state.  They are as follows:

1. You must have been old enough to have memories of the state you visited. (I was taken to California in 1979, when I was only a couple months old, but that doesn't count because, clearly, I have no memory of the trip nor the destination.)
2. A flight layover at an airport doesn't constitute visiting that state unless during the layover you left the airport and went somewhere.  (I have changed planes in Memphis, TN, Charleston, NC, and Atlanta, GA but since I never left those airports, I can't claim that I've been to those states.  I'd like to be able to check them off since that would complete the entire southeast U.S. for me, but I didn't really experience them just from walking through an airport there.)
3. Driving through a state does count for having visited that state.  (I feel that driving is a much more intimate way of travel than flying.  While it can be debated whether or not you actually "experienced" the state by zooming through it at 65 mph, I don't believe that an argument against having been there would be a valid one.  When driving or riding in a vehicle, you see the landscapes, the big cities, the small towns, the geography.  You experience the climate, see the local fauna, the habitats, etc.  It may not be as good as a guided walking tour and certainly isn't as equal to having lived in a state.  However, I maintain that driving through a state counts.)

The map at the top indicates all the states that I have visited.  The lower map is all the states that my wife has visited.  Ours are pretty close.  She's been to fourteen and I've been to seventeen.

I found this cool little map maker at Big Huge Labs.  It lets you check off all the states that you've visited and it turns them blue.  It gives you the html code for the map you create so that you can insert it into your blog, website, whatever.  It's fun to see what yours looks like.  It also lets you change it to the globe to check off countries you've been to.  But, I stuck with the U.S.A. only since Haiti is the only other country I've been to.  Go check it out and make yours now.  How many states have you been to?

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Brazil Wins Again

Brazil has won their fourth FIFA Confederations Cup.  This one makes three in a row for them.  Couple that with their five World Cup championships, and no one can doubt that they are not the leading country when it comes to competitive international soccer.  So, why don't I like them?

I say I don't like Brazil because they're not the underdog.  They're the overdog, if there were such a thing.  I say it's nothing personal.  It's just they always seem to be winning.

But, the truth is that my disdain for Brazil goes deeper than that.  Let us travel back in time to the year 1994.  [Insert funky time traveling sound effect]  I am 15 years old.  This is the first World Cup to which I would be paying attention.  And, this is the first World Cup ever to be hosted in the United States.  For most of my life I had received scorn for being a soccer player.  It was not a favored sport in this country and in my particular home town of Ozark, Missouri it was disrespected at some times and all but ignored most of the time.  But with the World Cup games being played in every major city throughout the U.S., soccer was finally getting its due attention.

Their were three major soccer giants in the tournament.  All three countries had each won three past World Cups.  They were Brazil, Germany, and Italy.  Two other countries sported two World Cup wins.  They were Argentina and Uruguay.

My favorite team is Germany.  I had seen one of their games and fell in love with their mathematically controlled playing style.  I love Italy because I always felt that the little bit of Italian blood coursing through my veins bonded me to the country somehow.  Of course, I hope the U.S. will do well, but we all know with the lack of public support for the sport, we are way behind every other country in developing a program.  I respect Brazil for their obvious talent, but have no ties to them otherwise.

Through the month of June, the 64 games get played with the final between Brazil and Italy.  Of course, I'm rooting for Italy.  The referee's stopwatch runs out with the two teams tied.  They go into the first overtime period.  Tied.  The second overtime.  Tied.  Then come the dreaded penalty kicks.  What a way to end a tournament.  The greatest tournament on earth.  Yet, that's how it ends with Brazil defeating my team and walking away with their fourth World Cup.  The only country to win four.

Fast forward to 2002.  Similar story, but this time Brazil beats Germany, my favorite team, in the final.  Now they've won five World Cups.  Fast forward to 2013, a couple weeks ago.  I somehow didn't know about the Confederations Cup, but when I found out, it didn't take me long to discover that the last Confederations Cup in 2009 the U.S managed to make it all the way to the final.  But they lost to ... you guessed it...  Brazil.

So, when you hear me say that I don't have anything against Brazil, please call me out on my blatant lie.  I may have to work on my unforgiveness.

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FIFA Confederations Cup 2013 - Free Download

After church, last Sunday, we went out for lunch to the new downtown Qdoba.  It was great food as usual and being summer with all the college kids away from the area, it's considerably less busy than the other ones in town.

They had ESPN going on a couple televisions and I spotted what appeared to be the opening of a World Cup soccer game between Italy and Mexico.  But, the World Cup isn't for another year.  I should know.  I've been looking forward to it since the last one ended in 2010.  So, what was this?!

It turns out that it's the FIFA Confederations Cup 2013.  What is that?!  How is it that I've never heard of this before?  Granted, I don't have cable, the only television I watch is Netflix, and the only radio I listen to is Christian radio.  But, surely someone would have told me about this, right?

Well, no one did.  Evidently, it's sort of used as a rehearsal for the host nation of the upcoming World Cup to take place the following year.  Thus, this year it is in Brazil preceding FIFA World Cup 2014 Brazil.

Those of you who know me well know that, of course, I will be following along.  And, yes, I'll be following along with my Microsoft Excel Spreadsheet that I customized just for this newly discovered tournament.  If you would like to follow along with the spreadsheet, as well, I have conveniently included it in the Downloads section of the drop-down list found at the top of this blog.  Or, since you're here anyway, feel free to just click this link.

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Soccer Thursdays

I've started playing soccer once a week with some guys I work with.  It's been a lot of fun and certainly good for me.  A lot of people my age are starting to give the "I'm too old" excuse when I ask them if they want to play.  But, I can't help but think of all the 50-year-old men that I have played with or against over the years.  And a lot of them are still really good.  They're not the fastest on the field, but speed isn't everything.  Smart team ball control makes the game.

It's a pick-up game that's open to whomever, but it's $5 to play.  All the money goes to charity.  This way, not only are we having fun and bettering ourselves physically but we're also improving our community by financing local good works.

By the ever so slight chance that someone comes across this blog and wants to play and lives in or near Springfield, MO, we play every Thursday at 5:30 pm at the turf field at Glendale High School.  That's on Ingram Mill Road a few hundred yards north of Battlefield Road.

In the event that we change the location, time, take a break, or just stop getting together to play, I will amend this blog accordingly.  Otherwise, see you there!

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5 Years & 300 Blogs

I actually started blogging on MySpace back when MySpace was all the rage. But, in August of 2006, I decided to go pro and get an actual blog site rather than continue to use the blogging option on my social networking page. Not long after that I decided to scrap my MySpace page altogether. I was growing increasingly bored with it.

So, now it's been five years since I moved to Blogger. And, this is the 300th Blogger blog that I've written. I feel like maybe I should celebrate in some way, but I'm not sure what to do. I could give away "the words" T-Shirts to the first 50 people that comment on this blog, but I don't have any "the words" T-Shirts to give away. They don't even exist. I just GIMPed this together.

I'd like to play a blog game of some sort. I did that for my birthday last year. It was a Celebrity Guessing Game full of celebrities who were all my age. You had to name them all just from their head shots. It was sort of fun to make. My brother-in-law, Chris Steward, won that one. I did another just like it a couple years before that when I was turning 29. I used a different set of celebrities that time. My beautiful wife won that game.

So, what game can we play? I've done celebrities twice so it's time for something new. How about the first person to decode some Mad Gab phrases?! That should be fun. If you don't know how to play Mad Gab, don't worry. It's easy. Just read the phrase and decide what phrase it really sounds like. For example: "Sit Jerk Lock" is really "Set Your Clock" and "Shack Each Anne" is really "Jackie Chan." Get it? Let the games begin!

The first person to type all the answers into a comment wins the opportunity to choose my next blog topic. But, don't play unless you will actually pick a blog topic for me. :)

1. Dawned Hutch Debt Aisle
2. Arrow Man Tick Calm Eddy
3. Pen Silly Raise Her
4. Thug Yet His Burger Dress
5. Bah Kin These Addle Ache Ken
6. Shake Key Low Kneel
7. Lie Fizz Booty Fell
8. Wheel Fair El
9. Sent Tom Hanukah
10. Mike Lion Tis Inner Scent

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1979 Celeb Guessing Game

I did this a couple years ago for my 29th birthday. I thought that it was kind of fun to see who all in the celebrity world is about my age. At 29, most of the celebrities still looked like they could pass as teenagers. Maybe not so much at 31?

This year, I only found 6 celebrities. One, of which, isn't even alive anymore. I wanted to get all new famous people without repeating any from the last game. The problem with that was that after these six they started becoming very obscure. I didn't recognize anyone else, in fact, with the exception of the young blonde girl from the movie Jurassic Park. Although, I doubt anyone else would have recognized her. I didn't until after I saw what all she had been in on IMDB.com.

So, good luck. Oh, by the way. The name of the game is easy. Name all the celebrities. Be the first to do so and leave them all in a blog comment and you'll receive honorable mention in an upcoming blog, bragging rights for a whole year, and you get to choose my next blog topic! Exciting, isn't it? And, as always, click on the picture to make it larger (in case my audience is getting older like me and needs it bigger to see anything).

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