Observations on the 2012 Election 8.31

You may or may not have seen Clint Eastwood's train wreck of a speech, and I use that word loosely, at the RNC last night. Short version is that Eastwood spent 30 minutes at the heart of prime time talking to an empty chair which represented the 'invisible' President Obama. There are plenty of places to read or watch the wreck, and it is entertaining in its own way, so I wont get into it here. I did want to share the President's short and to the point response which was posted on both Twitter and Facebook earlier today.

"This seat's taken."

Obsevations 8.30

With Saturday's game a new era of Penn State football begins, I'm talking about the post Paterno era not the WiFi at Beaver Stadium one. With other things going on, and in an attempt to put the scandal behind me somewhat, I haven't mentioned it much lately. What I am sharing here seemed a good reason to break that silence. Two days ago a group of past Chairs of the Penn State Faculty Senate released a statement concerning the NCAA and its "sweeping assertion that a culture permeating every level of the Penn State community places the football program "in higher esteem than the values of the NCAA, the values of higher education, and most disturbingly the values of human decency."

For what it's worth some highlights and a link to the complete statement with its 28 signatories.

".... as a document in which evidence, facts, and logical argument are marshaled to support conclusions and recommendations, the Freeh Report fails badly. On a foundation of scant evidence, the report adds layers of conjecture and supposition to create a portrait of fault, complicity, and malfeasance that could well be at odds with the truth. We make no judgment of the culpability of those individuals directly surrounding the Sandusky crimes. We lack sufficient knowledge to do so, and we are content to wait until guilt or innocence is adjudicated by the courts. But as scientists and scholars, we can say with conviction that the Freeh Report fails on its own merits as the indictment of the University that some have taken it to be. Evidence that would compel such an indictment is simply not there.

More central to our concerns are the recent sanctions levied against Penn State by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and, more importantly, the rationale for those actions and their negative impact on the academic well-being of the University. The NCAA did not conduct its own investigation of the Penn State situation, but rather drew its conclusions from the findings of the Freeh Report. The NCAA Consent Decree, which substantially embellishes the initial Freeh findings in both tone and substance, claimed no standard of proof for its conclusions but nonetheless required Penn State to accept the Freeh Group’s assertions as fact. The NCAA actions were not predicated on any rulebook violations by members of the football team, the crimes committed by a former assistant coach, or even the alleged concealment of those crimes by University officials. Rather, the NCAA based its actions on the  sweeping assertion that a culture permeating every level of the Penn State community places  the football program “in higher esteem than the values of the institution, the values of the NCAA, the values of higher education, and most disturbingly the values of human decency.” The NCAA further alleges that “the culture exhibited at Penn State is an extraordinary affront to the values all members of the Association have pledged to uphold and calls for extraordinary action,” and it states that the sanctions are intended to change this culture.

As faculty members with a cumulative tenure at Penn State in the hundreds of years, and as former Faculty Senate chairs with intimate knowledge of the University stretching back for decades, these assertions do not describe the culture with which we are so very familiar. None of us has ever been pressured or even asked to change a grade for an athlete, nor have we heard of any cases where that has occurred. We know that there are no phantom courses or bogus majors for athletes at Penn State. Some of us have privately witnessed swift and unyielding administrative actions against small transgressions, actions taken expressly to preserve academic and institutional integrity. We have performed our duties secure in the knowledge that academic funds do not subsidize the athletic program. We have been proud of the excellent academic record of our student-athletes, and of the fact that Penn State has never before had a major NCAA sanction. And we have taken pride in an institutional culture that values honesty, decency, integrity, and fairness.

It is disturbing in the extreme to have that culture’s very existence denied by the NCAA. The NCAA has used its assertion of collective guilt to justify its collective punishment of the entire University community, almost all of whom had absolutely no involvement in or knowledge of the underlying crimes or the administration’s allegedly insufficient response."

Complete statement.

Also this is a good column by Walter Uhler who graduated from Penn State in 1976 with an MPA in Russian Studies. It's a little eye opening about being both a scholar and a football fan.

Observations on the 2012 Election 8.30

I don't even know how to begin to describe the final hour of last night's Republican convention. It began with a speech by Condoleezza Rice who honestly did a very good job of speaking to all Americans whether or not they agree with her. She was followed by New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez who seemed to channel both Steve Martin and Clint Eastwood with her 'I was born a poor girl with a .357 magnum in my hand' speech. The night ended with an admittedly very good but totally scary performance by vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan.

Condoleezza Rice gave a brilliant speech and what a friend said later is very true, to bad she isn't one of ours. After the speech one of the commentators said that if Pete Wilson had appointed Rice to the Senate seat from California, which he vacated to become Governor of the state, Rice and not Willard might be accepting the nomination for President tonight. Instead Wilson appointed John Seymour who was defeated by Diane Feinstein two years later. Her best; "On a personal note, a little girl grows up in Jim Crow Birmingham. The segregated city of the south where her parents cannot take her to a movie theater or to restaurants, but they have convinced that even if she cannot have it hamburger at Woolworths, she can be the president of the United States if she wanted to be, and she becomes the secretary of state."

Paul Ryan is something different entirely. He also harkens back to a dark time of the American soul. He is good, very good, but also a classic demagogue in the style of Huey Long or George Wallace. I'm in no way comparing Ryan to Hitler but looking at the faces in the audience during his speech I was reminded of the films of Hitler's early speeches at Nuremberg. Ryan is that scary good. When he said "sometimes, even presidents need reminding, that our rights come from nature and God, not from government," my remote literally hit the wall yet I couldn't stop watching.

After two nights of very little actual ideas I come away with two predominate thoughts about the Republican Party. Noblesse oblige, a French term which implies that people of noble birth, or wealthy in our case, are obligated by that birth to be honorable and generous. The Repubes think they are being just that but all one most do is look at the smug face of Paul Ryan to realize they are actually being the polar opposite. That fact plays along with my second term which is manifest destiny. For the most part the speakers and their audience honestly believe all the rhetoric. They believe the country is in ruins, that Obama is the devil incarnate, and most of all they believe they are right and destined to save this country from itself while leading it into a second American 'century of greatness.'

As I said, scary good. More later.

Observations on the 2012 Election 8.29

This would be all too funny if it wasn't such a serious subject, still one must always laugh. I found it on of all places the Le Monde website, via Talking Points Memo, and even though it's originally from an American site it gives you a good idea what the Euros think of our political conventions. If I had only known such a video was going to exist I wouldn't have bothered watching last night but alas I did. Sadly in the end this may the only good thing to come out of the first night of the Republican convention.

La première journée de la convention en 100 secondes ....

link

Observations from the Window 8.28

After a day or two of much needed decompression I'm finally getting back to normal. Yes, what passes for normal in my world. I was totally wiped due to the flight back, my inability to sleep when I fly, and the fact that I didn't sleep at all my last night in Paris. Why? Better question is why the hell would I?

While I was catching up with laundry and such today I was watching the Weather Channel, keeping up with news about hurricane Isaac, as a more entertaining alternative to the GOP convention. In my new capacity as style maven, more on that at some later date, I have to say there was something very wrong in the network's coverage. Picture two women in the studio, one wearing a red dress and the other an orange one, both sitting in front of a wall size screening of the Isaac radar. If the dresses didn't clash enough on their own sitting in front of the radar, which is predominately red and orange, did the trick. I just wanted to scream every time the network switched back to the studio.

In all seriousness before I move on I should mention that Isaac,
currently a Category 1 hurricane, is due to make landfall just south of New Orleans as early as tonight. Keep your fingers crossed and say a little prayer to whatever god/gods you pray to for the people down there as Isaac is probably going to track directly over the city itself and twenty inches of rain is predicted.

Finally, there seems to be some kind of political event going on in the wake of Isaac. Yes that would be the convention I mentioned earlier. Morning Joe is live from Tampa all week and yesterday Chris Matthews and GOP Chairman Reince Priebus got into a bit of a shouting match. About 3 minutes in Tom Brokaw says it all explaining why Americans are about fed up with politics, except for us political junkies. Just after that Priebus again accuses President Obama of looking to Europe for ideas, principally he is talking healthcare reforms. So if the President based his health reforms on Willard's in Massachusetts doesn't it just follow that Willard also looked to Europe? Again I'll remind you where Willard spent the Vietnam War years.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

video link

late update - After some thought I'd like to add this. If Willard really thinks his birther joke was just that, a joke, and didn't realize how it would be taken, well I don't want to think about what that says about his judgement.

Observations from le Voyage 8.26.1, mobile update

I may have mentioned last week how stunning it was flying into the sunrise. A week later chasing the endless sunset isn't quite the same thing. When your body thinks it is about 1AM and the sun refuses to set you start to feel like some human version of the British Empire. Than to taught you the sun finally sets just an hour out of JFK. To make matters worse we were delayed in the air over JFK for 20 minutes because of TS Issac related delays and airport closings to the south.

I'm not a big fan of baggage claim so when my bags were the last out all I could think was that my best two leather jackets had been lost over the Atlantic. It was not the case however and all my leather arrived safe and sound.

So I'm back, a bit sad maybe, most assuredly exhausted,
but back just the same.

Observations from le Voyage 8.26

Sitting outside at a cafe across from my one time hotel, sipping iced coffee, while my bags are all packed and stacked in the hotel lobby waiting to go home. Sadly I don't think I'm as ready for that trip as they seem to be. The inside of the cafe was decorated by Catherine Deneuve and though it looks good I'm not at all sure what she was after. It has the feel of a large living room but I mean seriously, a glass coffee table? It has a nice terrace to sit outside and ponder life so I wont complain about it. Actually I haven't found anything to complain about since I'm here other than the fact that I wont be here much longer. One thing I do miss is my Sunday New York Times, the IHT is basically the same thing but yet it isn't, something about it just seems off. It makes no matter as my cab is here to take me to Charles de Gaul, meh ....

When I was still at the cafe my brother called to ask when my flight landed at JFK and he got a bit confused when I answered. He wasn't the first to be confused by my schedule as it wasn't all that easy explaining to Ash that she should be at the airport just two hours after I left. It goes like this, my flight leaves CDG at 7PM Paris time and arrives at JFK at 9PM New York time which is six hours behind Paris. All this means is that my eight hour flight only takes two hours off the clock and my mind, not to mention my comps, will think it's 3AM which it will be in Paris. Got it? Well Sean came up with something more, in its day the Concorde made the same Paris/New York flight in three hours so in a way you would arrive in New York before you ever left Paris. Just try and figure that one out.

One thing I learned this week is that I truly do love this city and I really do want it to be mine one day. I also learned that I've changed drastically in the past few years. Thing is I may have changed just as much in the past week but than I suppose dreams will do that to you.

It's about time to board so I want to get this posted quick. It's not going to be my last post about this trip or my last about Paris but it will be my last post from Paris, for now anyway. I plan on being back soon one way or another.

Before I go, my sis moved yesterday and starts classes tomorrow morning. There is a little known secret that says she may even play field hockey but I didn't tell. No, no, not me. Good luck gurl!

Observations from le Voyage 8.25

One exciting thing about my trip is how many times I have been wandering and found a spot where I could just sit and paint which is something tat never happens in New York. There are even some spots in Paris that I wouldn't mind painting, this is something I never do, I just don't paint scenes, landscapes. There really are some exciting possibilities in my mind at the moment, I just hope it doesn't overheat.

Yesterday I mentioned the Sennelier store but I didn't really explain what it was. Sennelier is one of my favorite paint or 'color' merchants. Their paints are thick, almost buttery, but easy to mix on the canvas. Sennilier produces 145 colors and over 100 oil pastels, the later have the consistency of lipstick and were first produced for Picasso in 1949. Below is some background on Sennilier from their website.

"1887, Gustave Sennelier, a devoted chemist and exceptional colorist, established himself as a purveyor of fine-Artists' paints Quia Voltaire in Paris. Surrounded by artists, he developed the first range of colours : Sennelier Artist oil. These quality oil paints have been used for paintings nowdays exhibited in the world's greatest museums. In fact, Sennelier offers a wide range of quality colors that have attracted great painters such as Cezanne, Picasso, Bonnard, Soutine. The Sennelier shop is a meeting place for artists, they maintain creative exchanges that leads to the development of new techniques and unique colours.

Colours that have forged Sennelier's reputation have been retained, such as Madder Lake Deep and Genuine Cobalt Blue, the industry benchmark. Signature transparent colours, such as Chinese Orange and Cinnabar Green, invented by Gustave Sennelier in conjunction with the Impressionists, have contributed significantly to the evolution of art styles through the Fauves, Cubists, and beyond. From Bonnard's blues to Mogdigliani's favorite flesh tones, Sennelier colours have been inspired by the masters and have been an inspiration to them.

2012, the Sennelier products' range has expanded : soft pastel "à l'Ecu", oil pastel and oilstick, watercolor, acrylic, tempera, gouache, ink, with an unchanged regard for quality that allows Sennelier to stay a brand recognized and appreciated by painters. For its 125^th aniversary, Sennelier goes on with increasing fervor to combine the traditions of the Old Masters with the innovations of modern chemistry, to please today and tomorow's Artists asking for vibrant and eternal colours."

Observations from le Voyage 8.24.1

This short has a lot of good shots in it but what makes it totally special is the fact that it was made entirely with an iPhone. I really can't see myself doing anything like this with a phone.

Gabriela Mudado is a Comunication and Arts graduate of PUC Minas, Brazil who wrote her final paper on the films of Tim Burton. A music fanatic she has been working as a DJ for the last 8 years and also has two websites dedicated to French music in Portuguese and in English.


PARIS LA FETE from Gabriela Mudado on Vimeo.
"Many thanks to: Henrique Fares, Kyle Balda, Jackie Jirka, Mariana Berutto, Mateus Berutto, Camila Cortielha, Maíra Fares, Fernanda Fonseca, Lina Hauteville, Brice Michelini and Carla Mudado.
Made entirely with the iPhone 4S."

Observations from le Voyage 8.24

I'm sitting in a cafe just off the Luxembourg Gardens, eating breakfast, pondering what to do with my last 48 hours in Paris. Funny how fast a week can go by. I've been to the Louvre, Montmartre where Christopher Moore's novel Sacre Bleu takes place, walked till my feet are sore, worked some, met some fun people, and did enough shopping to fill that empty bag I brought along. I went to the Père Lachaise Cemetery yesterday and unlike most I didn't visit Jim Morrison's grave but stopped by Oscar Wilde's which was a strange, surreal, moment. It was one of those times where you feel like you had been there before even though you know you hadn't.

Still its been just been a taste, a taste that makes me want to be here even more. I thought I would write much more while I was here but haven't taken the time. I have tons of notes so I'm sure more will follow and I've taken hundreds of photos but looked at so few, posted some I liked on flickr. I'm sure once I'm back in the Village I'll be posting more both here and there unless politics gets in the way.

But for now it's time to keep moving.

Just keep moving.

afternoon update - So I guess I was getting just a little sad about the week nearing its end but something snapped me out of it quick. I decided to take a walk because shouldn't a girl visiting Paris be able to say she took a walk on the Left Bank and saw the Eiffel Tower? But that sight isn't what did it. About halfway to the Eiffel I looked up and saw something that all but bought tears to my eyes, the Sennelier store, which just happens to be celebrating its 125^th anniversary. About $200 in paints and shipping later I was in an awesome mood. 

Observations from le Voyage 8.22

The Palais du Louvre, Musée du Louvre, Musée Napoléon, the Louvre Museum or the Louvre, it has gone by many names over the years. Its history goes back to a 12^th century fortress still visible in the basement and the Lower Hall where the vaulted ceiling is all that remains of the complex's origins. On August 10, 1793, in the midst of the French Revolution and by decree of the revolutionary National Assembly the Louvre first opened as a museum. The Holy Grail of art historians was born.

Currently the Louvre is home to almost 400,000 works of art of which it shows 35,000 at any given time in its 750,000 square feet of public displays. The museum is divided into eight curatorial departments; Egyptian antiquities, Near Eastern antiquities, Greek, Etruscan, and Roman antiquities, Islamic art, Sculpture, Decorative arts, Prints and drawings, and Painting. The Painting department alone has twelve curators and 7,500 works.

I could spend weeks in the Louvre and never leave but I have probably have one or two visits so I have a must see list. In no particular order it includes The Aphrodite of Milos (Venus de Milo), Antonio Canova's Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss, Michelangelo's Dying Slave, Jacques-Louis David's The Death of Marat (Marat Assassiné), Raphael's Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, and as much of the Italian Renaissance collection as I can possibly see. Yes the Italian collection would include Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa.

Today I visit my Holy Grail.

A little bit of mind boggling trivia before I finish. Admittedly it is from a mind easily boggled by art and history trivia. As large as the museum complex is it could be so much larger. The Tuileries Palace once closed the west end of the Louvre courtyard which now is open to the Tuileries Gardens. Eventually a wing of the Louvre connected the two and both the Tuileries and the Louvre were to be included in the museum. The Tuileries Palace was destroyed in 1871 by a fire set by anarchists during the rise of the Paris Commune after France's loss in the Franco-Prussian War. The fire also destroyed the Louvre Library. Recently there has actually been talk of rebuilding the Tuileries at an estimated cost of $380 million.

Observations from le Voyage 8.21

It may say just a little too much about the sad state of American education but I have actually met a person who thought Paris was named for Paris Hilton. It fact it is in all likelihood named for the Gaulic Parisii tribe who inhabited the area when it was conquered by Julius Caesar. Another version has Caesar naming it after the Trojan Prince who fell in love with Helen precipitating the Trojan War. Caesar was fond of thinking he was Paris reincarnated, presumably after too much wine. Than there is Paris' nickname, The City of Lights. This has nothing to do with real lights but to Paris being the main center of learning during the Age of Enlightenment.

One of my favorite times of day is early morning starting just before dawn. It makes no difference if I was up or night or not. It may be the only time of day that I love color, the play between the last ebbs of the night and the first rays of the sunrise making a seamless transition. On the flight over I tried to get some sleep because I had been up all day, driving, and knew once I arrived there would be no sleeping. I did manage to doze off but about four hours into the flight (about 2AM New York time) I opened my eyes to one of the most stunning sunrises I have ever seen, including on Kauai. The same play of light and color I just mentioned with the added effect of being 30,000 feet above the Atlantic. It was gorgeous but I totally should have closed the blind because that was about it for sleeping, time for those free drinks the Air France stewardesses were kind enough to supply.

I'm staying in a small hotel on the Rue Cujas in the Latin Quarter, between the Sorbonne and the the Luxembourg Gardens.  Being used to New York I find it so cute that because the hotel is small they lock the door at night and you have to wait for the concierge to unlock the door, something he than apologizes for twenty times. Two other sweet things about the hotel are that the bed has lots of pillows and the wireless internet surprisingly is fast as hell.

When I got into my room one of the first things I did, after I connected my comp, was turn on the TV because it's just what I always do. Thing is I flew over 3,000 and the first thing I see on said TV was effing Paul Ryan and his mom. I could rationalize seeing Willard here because he hid from the Vietnam War in his family's chateau in France but Petey Ryan? The Repubes' head gym rat? To purge that from my mind I watched the first episode of Weeds in French. I always wanted to watch Weeds and I own the first and second season DVDs but somehow southern California women selling weed in French doesn't cut it. I'm going to have to watch episode one in English as soon as I get back.

And why the hell is it 90° here? I packed leather jackets!

Observations from the Window 8.17

This is going to be a pretty messy post because I'm going to throw together a few I have started in an effort to clean up a little before my trip which begins in about 24 hours.

I had some things I wanted to write about before my trip if I had time. As always my mind wanders constantly and has been totally into the Olympics of late. Politics seems to be on the back burner for now more because I'm so tired of the endless fighting that leads nowhere than any other reason. If the Democratic Party is smart it will call the GOP bluff and let them take the country over that proverbial cliff at the end of the year. But there is plenty of time to talk about that when the November election gets closer.

Before I get into anything else I have a major announcement to make. Truth be told I forget what the hell I wrote that for or what the announcement was so it couldn't have been all that major and was probably a wonderfully sarcastic remark. The only announcement I have tonight is that I still don't have my passport. I'm going to have to get up early and drive to my dad's than drive right back to the Village which makes my Saturday itinerary New York, Pennsylvania, New York, Paris. Sweet jesus.

It's a strange feeling when you have a dream and that dream is about to come true, even if it is only partly coming true. In my dream I only have a one way ticket to Paris. Still the first time I stand by I. M. Pei's
Pyramide du Louvre and look at the museum itself, well,
all bets are off.

To me Paris has always been as much about Hemingway as about art. You might wonder why I of all people  have an obsession with Hemingway, well it's time you knew. When I was little, yes I was little once, my parents read to me every night but I didn't get Dr. Seuss like most children. My mom would read everything from Shakespeare to Dumas but my dad would always pull out his favorite author, Hemingway. Like many things I blame on my dad Hemingway became my favorite author too but somehow I just seem to relate to Hemingway. I'll finish with one of my favorite stories because in the same situation I would probably think the same thing he did.

In 1846 a monster hurricane assaulted Key West and pushed so much sand ashore it seemed to move the Key West Lighthouse inland. Many years later Hemingway bought a house in the shadow of the lighthouse and direct sight of Sloppy Joe's which was his favorite drinking establishment. "As long as I can see that beacon," Hemingway once said, "I'll always be able to find my way home."

Like I said, I can relate.

Observations from the Window 8.16

At times I may mentioned horoscopes because I have a fondness for them, not that I live my life by them, I just like horoscopes. Seriously, they are often dead on so shoot me if you must. This isn't about my horoscope though but about dreams. Some people actually believe you can predict your life by interpreting your dreams. Thankfully I was never one of them because that's just crazy. My lack of belief in dreams may be a result of my lack of dreams which  may be because of my lack of sleep, or maybe my non-lack of alcohol and caffeine. I'm not a doctor so I wont get into why I don't dream.

The thing is with my big trip coming up Saturday I don't want to take any chances so when I actually had a dream last night I was forced to act on it. It was a simple dream of which I remember little but I do remember I had a pink pillowcase on my bed. I have so many pillows on my bed you could drown in them but they all have black pillowcases so I was forced to buy a pink one today and to be safer I bought another pillow too. This means I have a virgin pillow with pink pillowcase on my bed as I write this. That is too weird, but than so am I.

My flight to Paris leaves JFK at 10 PM Saturday night and today I made a discovery that has far reaching implications for my time until than. JFK is in New York which is good because I am in New York along with my tickets and semi-packed luggage. This is all good. What i discovered today is that my passport is NOT in New York it is in central Pennsylvania. This is not good, this is bad. As a matter of fact it is very very bad. At this point I can't even trust FedEx so I'm going to have to take Foxy on a road trip sometime before Saturday night. Maybe I should have bought pink sheets too.

Less than 48 hours now, stay tuned.

Observations from the Couch 8.15

The Olympics ended a few days ago so I suppose it's time I stop writing about them, they are over and i have a late Saturday date with Air France that is taking over more and more of my brain power. What I had been trying to do for my last Olympic post was jot down my favorite moments and just do a look back over the games. The problem was I constantly returned to one thing, the American women. Again I don't want to sound like some kind of American zealot but I can't say enough about them.

A lot was made of the fact that for the first time there were more women on the U.S. team than men. In all honesty that fact is just a bit overdone because it was a majority of one. If American men actually knew how to play soccer, or for that matter field hockey, there would have been no female majority. What impresses me is that 63% of the medals won by Americans went to women athletes, that is historic.

Soccer, swimming, basketball, track, and gymnastics were the big headline grabbers, and deservedly so, but there was barely a sport where the women didn't have an impact. From a rich tennis star to a poor boxer from Detroit American women dominated the London games to the point that if they were a country they would have been fourth in total medals and only China and Great Britain won more golds than them. What is even more fun is that the women won more total medals (58 to 45) and more gold medals (29 to 17) than the American men.

Twenty years ago at the Barcelona games only 25% of the total athletes were women and 34 teams had no women at all. In London 44% of the athletes were women and every one of the 204 teams included women. In fact women were a majority on three of the five largest teams, the United States, Russia, and China. Remember the London games for what you will but history is going to remember them as the games where women first showed what they could do given an equal Olympic sized playing field.

Watching the games I cruised through a range of emotions but it wasn't till near the end that I realized more than anything else I was just proud.

______


Before i say goodbye to the Olympics a few more odds and ends. Here is a look at what Penn State athletes did in London. Megan Hodge and Christa Harmotto won silver medals with the U.S. women's volleyball team, Erin McLeod and Carmelina Moscato won bronze medals with the Canadian women's soccer team, and Natalie Dell won a bronze medal in the women’s quadruple sculls for the United States. I have no idea what a scull is but Dell was the first Penn Stater to ever row in the Olympics. However I do know what a goalie is and McCleod was Canada's awesome goalie who shutout France in the bronze medal game.

Finally, after complaining the Japanese silver medal winning women's soccer team had their flight upgraded to business class for the trip home. For the trip to London they had flown economy class while the men's team flew business. The Japanese women are the reigning world champions of women's soccer and were favorite to challenge the U.S. team for the gold medal. The Japanese men weren't expected to do crap London and didn't disappoint.

So its been fun, now I'm just going to kick back and wait for that call from ESPN. See you all in Rio.

Observations from the Couch 8.12.1

This probably isn't the last post of Katie2012, I have a couple started that I want to finish, but it's kind of important if you want to understand how this suddenly became a sports blog. I said at the beginning how much I love the Olympics because of the sports but it is always at the end that remember other reasons. One of my least favorite traits is that I can be terribly emotional and along with that I can be terribly sentimental. As long as I can remember I watched the Olympics, it was just what we did as a family, and whenever they end I'm just a little sad because it's four years to the next and who knows what will happen in those years. I can tear up watching the damn highlight show as I wait to watch the closing ceremonies I already watched live online.

Maybe deep down I'm just a big, well tall, kid again.

Of course there are other less emotional reasons too. For two weeks the news in it's many forms is dominated but sports and smiling faces making it easy to get lost in the games and barely notice that Willard picked wingnut Ryan as his running mate. It sounds corny but the nations of the world compete and no blood is shed, unless you happened to watch the field hockey gold medal game. Athletes from around the globe laugh, cry, and share their dreams as we at home argue, clap, yell, stomp our feet, and throw an occasional remote at the wall. The world just seems a much better place when medal counts are more important than body counts.

Than the flame is extinguished, the spirit fades, and the realization comes that the world really hasn't changed at all. Or has it?

In London ten openly gay athletes won medals, including seven gold, so if gay were a country it would have come in 31^st in the final medal standings. They included Seimone Augustus of the U.S. women's basketball team, Megan Rapinoe of the U.S. women's soccer team, whose coach Pia Sundhage is also gay, and English rider Carl Hester with gold medals. Judith Arndt, a German cyclist, won a silver medal while Edward Gal of the Netherlands and Lisa raymond of the U.S. won bronze medals. I'm especially prould of Marilyn Agliotti, Carlien Dirkse van den Heuvel, Kim Lammers, and Maartje Paumen of the gold medal winning field hockey team from the Netherlands.

Maybe the world did change if ever so slightly. Still, it is changing.

Observations from the Couch 8.12

Three hundred and eighty-nine days, 389 days after the U.S. women's soccer team lost to Japan in the World Cup they found redemption at the Olympics by defeating the same Japan team 2-1 and winning the gold medal. The American team had played six games in sixteen days in three different cities and won the gold in front of 80,203 spectators in Wembley Stadium, home of the English national 'football' team. It was the largest crowd ever to watch a women's soccer game in Great Britain or at any Olympics games. The win even earned them a tweet from President Barack Obama who signs his personal tweets bo.

My MVP of the team has to be goalkeeper Hope Solo and it has nothing to do with her cute butt. At one point in the tournament Solo, arguably the best keeper the team has ever had, strung together 368 minutes of shutout soccer in the net. Solo was also one of only three women at the Olympics to play every minute of every game for her country and allowed only six goals doing it. She came through for the team when the only options available were gold medal or failure. She now has two Olympic gold medals and a Golden Glove award as the best goalie at last years World Cup.

The team will play a series of exhibition games this fall but what comes after that is anybody's guess because both the player's association's and coach Pia Sundhage's contracts run out at the end of this year. With no major international competition until the 2015 World Cup and no major women's professional league in the U.S. it will be hard to keep the team together in its current form. Seven of the eleven starters are currently listed on the roster as having no club affiliation, none of Japan's were listed that way, so you can't blame any of them for going overseas to play at a high level.

Defender Heather Mitts, who is 34 and has three Olympic gold medals, announced her retirement after the game Friday. Captain Christie Rampone, who is 37, a mother of two, and the only American to have played in four Olympics and four World Cups, has mentioned the possibility as well. Hope Solo, Amy LePeilbet, Carli Lloyd, Shannon Boxx and Abby Wambach are also all over the age of thirty. Still it's a deep team with Alex Morgan, Sydney Leroux, Lauren Cheney, Tobin Heath and Kelley O’Hara are all under the age of 25 and the NCAA brimming with prospects.

Last year's World Cup and this Olympics showed how the rest of the world has caught the U.S. in women's soccer, a sport the team has owned from its birth. Japan, France, and Canada all had awesome tournaments but in the end London also proved something else. Once again the Americans are at the pinnacle and the team to beat in women's soccer.

"We filled Wembley Stadium, and you're telling me there is no league to play in?" Solo said after the game. Seems what Forbes Magazine called "the most compelling team in American sports" deserves at least that.

Observations from the Couch 8.9

I finished writing this in the heady time after the American gold medal win in women's soccer. After some thought I later added a postscript.

As the London Olympics enter their final days I'm amazed at just how much it has become a showcase for American women. I know I'm far from impartial but it just seems so many American women are doing so well in every sport. A 17 year old girl from Flint, Michigan became the first American woman to win a boxing gold medal. In swimming American women won 14 medals, including 8 golds, and seem to have a bright future led by Missy Franklin who won 4 gold medals in her first Olympics. As of yesterday the women have won twice as many gold medals as the American men and there are just too many highlights to mention but here are some of my favorites so far.

Monday Jenn Suhr (photo) of the U.S. won the gold medal in the women's pole vault and ended Russian Yelena Isinbayeva's bid for a third straight Olympic gold medal. Isinbayeva, who has broken the world record 28 times, had been hoping to be the first woman in track and field to win the same individual event in three straight Olympics.

The women's basketball team remains undefeated in London and now hasn't lost a game in the Olympics since they won the bronze medal in Barcelona twenty years ago, the men should be so lucky. The last time they lost in the Olympics was 1992 to a now nonexistent CIS team that represented the defunct Soviet Union. Saturday they will play for their fifth consecutive gold medal. Also Saturday the U.S. women's volleyball team, including its four Penn State members, will play Brazil in the gold medal game. A win will bring the first gold medal in the volleyball team's history.

Women's beach volleyball had a final that was an all American affair with the team of Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh Jennings, who have played together since 2001, defeating the team of Jennifer Kessy and April Ross. It was their third straight gold medal and the last, May-Treanor plans on retiring after the games. Walsh, who hopes to play in yet another Olympics, said afterword; "The journey in the past two years that we shared together changed my life; I know it sounds really dramatic, and cheesy, but it has. Our competitive journey together is done, and that’s a big deal. It crushes me a little bit. It makes it really hard, really bittersweet, but I’m really proud that we went out the way we went out."

Finally there is the newly crowned Olympic Champions of the women's soccer team, I'll have more to say about them later.

postscript - My original thought here was how well American women performed when compared to the American men but I'm not sure I made that point clear. I didn't mean for what I wrote to in any way take away from what women in general have accomplished in London. There are so many truly inspiring stories to be told.

There was Saudi judo player Wojdan Ali Seraj Abdulrahim Shahrkhani who faught her match even as Islamic clerics back home said she had dishonored herself and country for fighting in front of men. There was also Tahmina Kohistani of Afghanistan who ran for a country where good women walk behind their men and where a woman was executed for adultery last month.

Than, for totally non-political reasons, there was the Canadian women's soccer team. Last year they quietly exited the World Cup after 3 losses including a 4-0 loss to France. A 1-0 win over that same French team earned them the bronze medal and Canada's first team medal in the summer games since 1936. Over the past week they put in a performance in every way worthy of a gold medal.

Agony and Ecstasy

A small visual postscript to my last post on yesterday's soccer game. I can't even begin to imagine what it feels like to compete at their level. I never even played in championship games of any kind like my sis has. But over the years I did play in enough close games to totally understand either extreme of emotion you feel when the game is over and you find yourself on one side of the abyss, or the other.

Sophie Schmidt, Canada, Doug Mills/The New York Times

Abby Wambach, United States, Doug Mills/The New York Times

Observations from the Couch 8.7

When I turned on the women's match game between the U.S. and Canadian soccer teams I expected a good game but there wasn't much doubt in my mind that the American girls would win. What I didn't expect was a game won in the 123^rd minute of what will go down as one of the great soccer matches ever played. You can use any word or cliche that comes to mind. Epic, classic, one for the history books, the ages, in this rare case none of them would be wrong. Alex scored the winning goal almost three minutes into injury time after 30 minutes of extra time while most, no all, of those watching were getting themselves ready for the first ever women's soccer penalty shootout in the Olympics. It was the latest goal ever scored in an Olympic soccer game, men or women. From beginning to end this game was simply that good.

What made the way the game played out all the more unlikely was, among other things, the history of these teams. Canada scored first and took the lead three times only to have the Americans answer each time. Also, the score was 1-0 Canada at the half and the U.S. hadn't won a game it trailed at the half in its last dozen tries. Since 2001 the U.S. has gone 22-0-4 against Canada so how is it that the two teams could play one of the greatest games ever? Totally amazing.

My brother, a bigger soccer fan than I, said the game was just meant to be. After all the game was played at Old Trafford Stadium, built in 1910 and home of the Manchester United since that same year. To put it in perspective for an American it would be like playing a women's baseball Olympic elimination game in Chicago's Wrigley Field.

The American win setup a rematch of last years Women's World Cup final against Japan which Japan won in a shootout. It would be the third straight Olympic gold medal for the U.S. team but after the game against Canada Thursday's gold medal game has a lot to live up to.

After the game U.S. Coach Pia Sundhage found Alex Morgan and told her to “remember one thing, promise yourself one thing:
remember this moment.”

How could anyone who saw that goal ever forget?
This is why I love sports.

Observations from the Couch 8.6

The U.S. field hockey team played South Africa in its final opening round game this morning. When I started writing this South Africa had scored four goals in the first half while going into the game they had only scored a total of four goals in the entire tournament. SA won by a final of 7-0, in it's opening game South Africa lost to Argentina 7-1, Argentina being the only team the U.S. defeated. The Americans, a team that started the Olympics with medal hopes, will play Wednesday in the 11^th place consolation game.

Only four teams make the medal round in Olympic field hockey. The likely first round games should be the defending gold medalists from the Netherlands playing New Zealand while Australia plays China in the second game but both could change as today progresses. As the last games are played only the Netherlands has clinched a medal round berth. But looking farther ahead the Netherlands and Australia, the two perennial field hockey powers, have never played for the Olympic gold medal.

The first week of the London games is past and one of my lasting memories will be of South African sprinter Oscar Pistorius who made history by being the first double amputee to ever compete in the Olympics. After he won the 400m semi-final Sunday night Kirani James of Grenada immediately sought out Pistorius to shake his hand and trade name cards in one of those moments I watch the games for. Whether you believe he has some sort of unfair advantage or not, I don't,  it was one of those moments that change everything. The day is fast approaching when the sports world is going to have to come to grips with equipment that does enhance an athlete's performance. Not like light weight running shoes or graphite hockey sticks do but in a more basic biomechanical way.

Here is the link to a good video bio of Pistorius by Mary Carillo, NBC doesn't have an embed option for its videos.

Later today the women's soccer medal round begins with the possibility of it ending with a U.S. versus France rematch in the gold medal game Thursday afternoon EST.

Observations from the Couch 8.4

I know this is just one of a series of ads for Olympic sponsor Visa but some of them are rather well done. Also it doesn't hurt that it's a bio of Russian pole vaulter Yelena Isinbaeva. But really she has nothing to do with posting this. Just my way of celebrating the end of swimming and the beginning of track & field in London.

She looks much taller than 5' 8" ....


link

I should also mention that if Visa would like to sponsor me in any way, well, I would have no problem with that.

Observations from the Couch 8.2

I crawled out of bed on three hours sleep today to watch the U.S.A. vs Australia field hockey game only to have high school flashbacks. I played hockey for six years and one of the worst places to play was a private school in Lancaster County, PA, Lancaster Mennonite. I never really understood where the Mennonite part came in because it is a very expensive school to attend. It was the worst place to play because it had a blue turf field that was so much faster and harder than the grass I always played on. I was always sore when we played there. So I turn on the game this morning and there it was, blue turf surrounded by pink like some sort of garish sporting nightmare.

I was wondering why nobody around here seems to be as excited about Olympic hockey as I am. Having played for so long I sometimes forget how limited in scope the sport is in this country, nowhere near as popular as soccer, and men's field hockey is nearly non-existent. Field hockey has grown at the college level because of Title IX which in 1972 mandated colleges fund comparable men's and women's sports programs. But even in the NCAA field hockey is dominated by a select few schools basically in the Big10 and ACC conferences. In the last ten years only three teams have won the NCAA Div I title, Maryland (5), Wake Forrest (3), and North Carolina (2). All three are ACC schools and half the members of the U.S. Olympic team went to one of these schools.

But for this post I'm going to narrow it down even farther. Of the sixteen members of U.S. national team nine are from Pennsylvania and seven of those nine are from eastern Pennsylvania. Eastern Pennsylvania just seems to be the heartland of field hockey in the United States but that may be about to change and not for the better. This year the PIAA. the body that governs high school sports in PA, will no longer sponsor a spring girl's soccer season in the eastern part of the state. This means girls will no longer be able to play both field hockey and soccer. The only reason given for the move is to unify the sport as it's the only sport in the state without a state champion or full state playoff.

Now that I answered my field hockey question I have a new one. Why don't they play lacrosse in the Olympics? Lacrosse, that sport invented by the Iroquois, played mainly in the eastern United States.

Never mind.

Observations from the Window 8.1

I love to fly and I always have but its been a long time since I flew anywhere let alone a flight the length of JFK to Paris. I thought this would set some kind of record for me but the close to 8 hour flight time to Paris is still an hour short of the 9 hours from Chicago to Honolulu. When I think back that trip seems like an entirely different life but it did land me on Kee Beach on Kauai, still what I think is the closest this planet gets to perfect. Getting back to this life, due to the crazed world of time zones this flight is still going to be something totally new to me. As of now I'll be leaving JFK around 10PM and arriving at Charles de Gaulle around 10AM the next day. According to the Air France website "hot and cold drinks, with or without alcohol, are served."
Without alcohol? Seriously? Why?

I'll be staying in the Montparnasse area of Paris close to where Ernst Hemingway rented an apartment on the Rue du Cardinal Lemoine and about a thirty minute walk to The Louvre. I'm going to load A Movable Feast on my netbook and maybe see if I can find some of the spots. I don't expect to run into Hemingway's ghost but if I should I have plenty of questions to ask him about his years in Paris but also about his third wife the journalist Martha Gellhorn. Still if I don't see him I'd be perfectly happy to run into his very much living great-granddaughter Dree, that would work for me too.

At the turn and early part of the 20^th century the Montparnasse was the heart and soul of artistic Paris. A list of its more famous inhabitants includes not only Hemingway but Pablo Picasso, Marc Chagall, Jacques Lipchitz, Ezra Pound, Salvador Dalí, Henri Matisse, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. The Montparnasse and its cafes was also the social center of the large American expatriate community in Paris of which Hemingway wrote so much. Marc Chagall said he had gone to Montparnasse because at the time "The sun of Art then shone only on Paris." Living in the Village it may seem strange but at times I think the same thing.

For now beyond that I haven't made any major plans. Work, walk, shop, walk to the Louvre, and try not to look too out of my element doing it. The shopping may be a major plan because I'm not quite sure how I'm going to get anything. I toyed with the idea of taking an empty bag but with the Paris weather all over the place, 60° one day and 75° the next, I have no idea what to pack.

Finally, a friend sent me this video, totally gets me in the mood ....

Paris In Motion (Part I) from Mayeul Akpovi on Vimeo.

Soundtrack: Angel - Massive Attack, Mezzanine (awesome tune)
Mayeul Akpovi Photographies - facebook
© July 2012