Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Blanco Bounce

An old video from back in April on Comcast, but at the 1:35 mark, look for the "Blanco Bounce."


Watch out Fire fans!

Cuauhtemoc Blanco scored just 30 minutes into his debut match against Celtic FC on Sunday and almost single handledly earned the Chicago Fire a 1-1 draw against one of the top club teams in Europe.

And NOW, we'll be announcing the signing of Paulo Wanchope sometime tomorrow. Allegedly there is one more piece to the puzzle arriving by Friday. Let's keep our fingers crossed for Zidane. Okay, wishful thinking, I know. How about a damned Polish player? Please?

Either way, it was exciting to watch the Fire again on Sunday. Probably for the first time since I've been here, we played really attractive soccer. And now we'll have someone that can finish the beautiful chances that Blanco creates. So excited.

Here's a taste:

Saturday, July 21, 2007

David who?

I don't really have much to update, but its been a couple weeks so I figured I'd say hello. Since I posted last, I have given my liver a breather, and it has thanked me.

Last Sunday my soccer team, Sting SC, won our match against Arrigo, bringing our season record to 3-5-1. We have really looked good when we're at full strength, although I looked pretty awful for the first time this season last week. I think it was probably all the cheeseburgers I've been eating and the extremely small amount of exercise I've been getting. I have had two consecutive stretchs where I've not played for two straight weeks, with just one game in between. Not good for the legs and lungs.

I'll be back in action tomorrow morning, despite the Chicago Fire's 3:00 PM match against Celtic FC from Glasgow, Scotland. Normally I'd have to be at the stadium too early on a game day, but lately I've been having less and less to do. That will all change as Polish Night, the Corporate Cup and Armed Forces Appreciation Day arrive, but in the mean time, I'll take it.

Some of you may have heard that David Beckham finally arrived in Los Angeles this week, but you probably don't know that the Chicago Fire's big superstar just got here as well. Cuauhtemoc Blanco, the start forward for Club America and the Mexican National Team got to the Windy City and put on a Fire kit for the first time in an evening practice session at TOYOTA PARK. his first match will be the Celtic game tomorrow, and I'm really looking forward to seeing what this guy can do in person.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Catching up

I know it's been almost two weeks since I've posted, and I know that two weeks doesn't seem long relative to the nearly seven months it was previously, but nonetheless, I apologize. It's been a tough couple of weeks with birthday parties, soccer games, the Dave Matthews Band show, out of town guests, the extreme heat in Chicago, me catching a cold, relationship issues, the potential sale of the company I work for, and so on.

I'll be perfectly honest, the best thing that's happened in the past two weeks was seeing my old friend, Nick Berry, two straight weekends. Nick and I were roommates for three years, four if you include sophomore year living in the fraternity house with 27 other guys. The kid kinda disappeared off the face of the earth after college though. Previous to this spring I had only seen him once, a weekend trip he took to Chicago back in 2003. I was able to catch up with him in Oxford a couple of months ago when I went down to speak in front of the Sports Studies majors at Miami and ended up convincing him to make the trip for the "Cap of July" party on June 30.

It was great seeing him for the weekend, and when he took off on Monday afternoon, he told me that he was going to head up to Minneapolis to see another friend for the week, but would be back the following weekend before going home to Cincinnati. He ended up doing just that, and I probably wouldn't have survived the weekend without his help Saturday and Sunday. I swear, if I could talk Nick into moving to Chicago and Hacksaw (yeah, you heard me Duggan) into moving back to his hometown, my life would be much better. As amazing as this city is, and no matter how many new friends I make, it still sucks that the two guys I care about the most are the same two guys I see the least.

The worst part of the past two weeks was getting sick in the middle of it all. I came down with a cold (a COLD, in the middle of SUMMER) a couple days after the big party, which was awesome by the way, and I haven't been able to shake it since. Granted, I have been going non-stop and drinking heavily a couple of nights and a day, so that won't help shake it. Still, I slept ALOT last night and even that didn't help with my tiredness. Perhaps I will go for a run tonight, I'm a little worried about the fatigue catching up with me for my game on Sunday morning.