This is just too good to forget about, Part 7

Not that I would have forgotten about it already, as it only happened last night. And not that I ever will forget it, ever:

I'm not ashamed to say that watching it live, I went to shout something and all that came out was some unintelligible noise. This dude might very well be the second coming of Jesus.

True to my Word

Regular readers will know that one thing I dislike is bad sports journalism. They might also remember this blog post: http://theriseandriseoftimlovejoy.blogspot.com/2009/08/if-theres-one-thing-i-hate.html

If you can't be bothered to click on that - a quick summary. I was bored and fed up with tennis reporters/interviewers who kept on asking Ana Ivanovic a question along the lines of "How does it feel to be fit?" and I presented two examples. I also said this:

I'm going to make a vow, right here - if I ever see/hear/read a journalist asking Ana Ivanovic a question like that again, I'm going to find an address for them or their employer and write a letter of complaint. It is pathetic journalism, and if it makes me annoyed, God only knows what she must think.

The two people in question in that blog post were Marcus Tennis (he with the awesome surname) and Elie Seckback. Well guess what kids? Seckback just can't help himself...

I'll be fair, the rest of the video isn't too awful. But it's the first 40 seconds we're looking at here people. Because even though he dresses the question up a bit, and focuses on the "fashion" element that does exist in the female tennis world, I still wasn't too impressed, and I still think that a decent interviewer would perhaps ask pertinent questions about her tennis game, or at least tackle a subject that hasn't been widely acknowledged before.

SO....I e-mailed him. To be honest, I didn't complain, I just pointed out my feelings in a nice and professional manner. And I'm pleased to say Elie Seckback replied promptly:

hello patrick

thanks for the e-mail

last month i got over 2 millon hits 87% of them males 18-35

so sometimes some questions make it

interviews are for the most part longer that what you end up seeing

but i'll keep what you said in mind --

thanks again

elie

Well done Elie, and if my e-mail makes sure that you ask proper questions to female athletes, my life will be 0.00001% better off.

Now, another vow. If I see/read/hear anything else about The Beatles this week, I'm going to poke Richard Starkey in the eye.

The Sloppy Star

Shall we just take a look at the sports headline from yesterday's Shropshire Star? Yes, I think we shall!

Fantastic. The real question is though - how is the paper floating over my laptop like that?!

Ewar's HoF Inductee #1

Hello, good morning, and welcome, to a new feature here on TRAROTL - Ewarwoowar's Hall of Fame. Over the coming months I'll be selecting a group of people who deserve to belong in the hallowed kingdom of my Hall of Fame, and tell you a little about them and why I like them. Shall we have Inductee #1? Shall we?

STEP FORWARD MR CHARLES "Charlie" GIBSON!

Who else watches ABC World News on BBC 2 weekdays at about 1:30am?

Only me? Cool. I absolutely love the show, for one reason only - there is never any news on it from outside the US/doesn't impact the US. Now that wouldn't be a problem, but the fact the show is called 'World News' and then blatantly ignores the rest of the world just amuses me greatly. As Bill Bryson once said, "If you want to make the whole of Europe disappear, just open up an American newspaper."

Charles Gibson was born in Illinois in 1943, but moved to Washington DC when he was 12. Charles graduated from Princeton University in New Jersey, and then moved into a media career, starting on RKO Radio. He joined ABC News in 1975, and is perhaps best known in the States for presenting the morning news show from 1987-1998, then 1999-2006. He has anchored the World News show since 2006, but he will be retiring from that at the end of this year. Before long, the majesty of Charlie signing off with "I'm Charles Gibson - I hope you had a good day" will be gone forever, sadly.

In 2008 he was heavily involved in the race to be President - he was the co-moderator of the Democratic debate between Obama and Hilary Clinton, and he conducted the first interview with Sarah Palin after she became the Republican's vice-presidential candidate. Away from his job, he is married with two children, and in 2006 he donated $85,000 to a university in Virginia to establish a music scholarship fund named after his late brother.

Charles Gibson, we salute you!

Fantasy Football Leaderboard

Feels like ages ago this, doesn't it? In case you've forgotten, Gameweek 4 saw the Mighty Mancunians defeat Arsenal 2-1 at OT. Arsenal's misery was compounded by seeing their manager get sent off for kicking a water bottle.

(Just going off tangent for a minute: if any other United fans ever read this - stop it with the whole "Wenger paedophile" chants. Was funny for about 15 minutes in 1997, but ridiculous now, and gives our club a bad name.)

Rant over! Also this Gameweek, Liverpool came from behind twice to beat Bolton, Chelsea crushed Burnley, and Hull managed to get a good point at Molineux. Right, the table!

1) Melchester Rovers (Daniel) 205 SAME

2) Clunge FC (Dylan) 202 DOWN 1

3) FATHEADZ BOYS FC (colby) 193 SAME

4) Boddy Dazzler FC (Darryl) 182 UP 2

5) Cynical Ben (Ben) 179 UP 1

6) Crem de la Prem (andy) 178 UP 2

7) Fantasy FC (Rob) 176 DOWN 2

8) Tommy Tank FC (Mitchell) 174 DOWN 4

9) Renford Rejects (Patrick) 163 SAME

=9) The Lamplight Tandem (Jon) 163 UP 3

11) Warrior's XI (arun) 154 UP 1

12) Miller-Urey XI (Don) 151 UP 2

=12) IsJohnCarewElectric? (formerly IsTonyDaleyElectric) (Shaun) 151 DOWN 2

=12) Dynamo Sawyer (Richard) 151 DOWN 4

Listless

You might have seen these before, but I saw this list on another blog and thought I'd steal it for my avid readers. It's very American, but still amusing. The ones in bold are those that I particularly enjoyed:

-I wish Google Maps had an "Avoid Ghetto" routing option.

-More often than not, when someone is telling me a story all I can think about is that I can't wait for them to finish so that I can tell my own story that's not only better, but also more directly involves me.

-Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you're wrong.

-Have you ever been walking down the street and realized that you're going in the complete opposite direction of where you are supposed to be going? But instead of just turning a 180 and walking back in the direction from which you came, you have to first do something like check your watch or phone or make a grand arm gesture and mutter to yourself to ensure that no one in the surrounding area thinks you're crazy by randomly switching directions on the sidewalk.

-That's enough, Nickelback.

-I totally take back all those times I didn't want to nap when I was younger.

-Is it just me, or are 80% of the people in the "people you may know" feature on Facebook people that I do know, but I deliberately choose not to be friends with?

-There is a great need for sarcasm font.

-I think everyone has a movie that they love so much, it actually becomes stressful to watch it with other people. I'll end up wasting 90 minutes shiftily glancing around to confirm that everyone's laughing at the right parts, then making sure I laugh just a little bit harder (and a millisecond earlier) to prove that I'm still the only one who really, really gets it.

-I would rather try to carry 10 plastic grocery bags in each hand than take 2 trips to bring my groceries in.

- I think part of a best friend's job should be to immediately clear your computer history if you die.

- LOL has gone from meaning, "laugh out loud" to "I have nothing else to say".

- I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.

- Whenever someone says "I'm not book smart, but I'm street smart", all I hear is "I'm not real smart, but I'm imaginary smart".

-How many times is it appropriate to say "What?" before you just nod and smile because you still didn't hear what they said?

- Every time I have to spell a word over the phone using 'as in' examples, I will undoubtedly draw a blank and sound like a complete idiot. Today I had to spell my boss's last name to an attorney and said "Yes that's G as in...(10 second lapse)..ummm...Goonies"

-What would happen if I hired two private investigators to follow each other?

- Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.

- I find it hard to believe there are actually people who get in the shower first and THEN turn on the water.

- I would like to officially coin the phrase 'catching the swine flu' to be used as a way to make fun of a friend for hooking up with an overweight woman. Example: "Dave caught the swine flu last night."

-I can't remember the last time I wasn't at least kind of tired.

- Bad decisions make good stories

- Is it just me or do high school girls get sluttier & sluttier every year?

-Why is it that during an ice-breaker, when the whole room has to go around and say their name and where they are from, I get so incredibly nervous? Like I know my name, I know where I'm from, this shouldn't be a problem....

-You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work when you've made up your mind that you just aren't doing anything productive for the rest of the day.

-Can we all just agree to ignore whatever comes after DVDs? I don't want to have to restart my collection.

-There's no worse feeling than that millisecond you're sure you are going to die after leaning your chair back a little too far.

-I'm always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my ten page research paper that I swear I did not make any changes to.

-I hate being the one with the remote in a room full of people watching TV. There's so much pressure. 'I love this show, but will they judge me if I keep it on? I bet everyone is wishing we weren't watching this. It's only a matter of time before they all get up and leave the room. Will we still be friends after this?'

-I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello? Hello? Dammit!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and goes to voicemail. What'd you do after I didn't answer? Drop the phone and run away?

- I hate leaving my house confident and looking good and then not seeing anyone of importance the entire day. What a waste.

-When I meet a new girl, I'm terrified of mentioning something she hasn't already told me but that I have learned from some light internet stalking.

-I like all of the music in my iTunes, except when it's on shuffle, then I like about one in every fifteen songs in my iTunes.

-Sometimes I'll look down at my watch 3 consecutive times and still not know what time it is.

-It should probably be called Unplanned Parenthood.

-Even if I knew your social security number, I wouldn't know what do to with it.

-Even under ideal conditions people have trouble locating their car keys in a pocket and Pinning the Tail on the Donkey - but I’d bet my ass everyone can find and push the Snooze button from 3 feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time every time...

-My 4-year old son asked me in the car the other day "Dad what would happen if you ran over a ninja?" How the hell do I respond to that?

-I wonder if cops ever get pissed off at the fact that everyone they drive behind obeys the speed limit.

-The other night I ordered takeout, and when I looked in the bag, saw they had included four sets of plastic silverware. In other words, someone at the restaurant packed my order, took a second to think about it, and then estimated that there must be at least four people eating to require such a large amount of food. Too bad I'm eating alone. Thanks for making me feel fat before dinner.

http://thefosterfollowing.blogspot.com/ is where I got this from, many thanks to them.

Where'd you go?

I stayed up till 3am last night/this morning, watching Ana Ivanovic painfully slump to a 1st round defeat in the US Open against unseeded Katernya Bondarenko. This morning, I'm left wondering just what on earth has happened to my dear old Ana. First up, I'll give you a quick biography, because her story, particularly in the early days, is quite interesting.

Ana is now classified as Serbian, but back in her youth Belgrade, her place of birth, was part of Yugoslavia. Inspired by the great Yugoslav player Monica Seles (y'know, the one that was stabbed), Ana memorised the phone number of a local tennis centre, and a star was born. It wasn't easy however - growing up, Belgrade was being bombed constantly, forcing her to train in the mornings only. In the cold winters, there were no facilities, so Ana used to train in an abandoned swimming pool. So, in a way it's a miracle that she got where she has.

She rose up and up the rankings, winning tournaments, battling top 5 players, getting to latter stages of Grand Slam events and making a name for herself, before last year, at the age of 20, she won the French Open and clinched the Number 1 ranking in the world. Great player, nice person, attractive - she was tipped to be the new tennis superstar.

Since then....freefall.

• Wimbledon 08, 3rd round.
• US Open 08, 2nd round.
• Australian Open 09, 3rd round.
• French Open 09, 4th round.
• Wimbledon 09, 4th round.
• US Open 09, 1st round.

It's been her worst year since she turned pro. She hasn't defeated a Top 10 player this year. She's only won back-to-back matches on six different occasions in the whole year. Just what the fuck has happened?

I don't think she has been "found out", necessarily. She's too talented for that. I don't think she's lost her drive or her motivation - she's only won 1 Grand Slam title after all, not 10. Injuries have been a problem, and I wonder about her knee, which was strapped up for a long, long time. My feelings are that she's become a bit confused in where she's going - and becoming World Number 1 at such a young age and after such a rapid rise perhaps hindered her long-term career rather than helped it. Coaches have come and gone, as have fitness instructors. This excellent article sums it all up better than I could. For once, an article about Ana that doesn't just go down the "ZOMG shes so fit" route, once you get past the title.

Whatever the problem, let's hope Ana gets it sorted. There's no Grand Slams left for her this year now, until the Australian Open she's pretty much done. Let's see what a rest does for her.