Winding down

It's coming to the end of term, and things are winding down. My First Certificate class seem to have done their exam and fucked off without even having the courtesy to tell me how it was. The only student still coming didn't do the exam, and I pity the poor guy as he clearly did not expect to be on his own last week. He's not coming this week, so I've got a nice mid-morning break Tuesday and Thursday. Today, however, I spent it polishing up my "I have a dream" class, which took about forever. Class went well, though, and sparked some good conversation.

- - - - - - - -

The third matches of the group stage have started, and run over the next three days. The two matches for each group are played simultaneously, I believe to make any fiddling on the part of players to throw a match (so as not to have to face a scary rival in the round of 16, for example).

Group A: Germany beat Ecuador, and they go through as winner and runner-up, respectively.

Group B: England and Sweden drew, 2 all. They also go through as winner and runner-up, respectively.

So Germany faces Sweden and Ecuador England in the round of 16.

On the softball front, Johnbai played enough for all 32 countries in the World Cup. I lurve baseball more than anything, so glad to know someone's getting to have some.

CXVII

August 2004
Capt. Yuriy Ivanov [Ukraine]
Pfc. Fernando B. Hannon 19
2nd Lt. James Michael Goins 23
Sgt. David M. Heath 30
Spc. Brandon T. Titus 20
Lance Cpl. Paul David Trevor Thomas 29 [British]
Lance Cpl. Caleb J. Powers 21 [Mansfield, WA]
Pfc. Henry C. Risner 26
Sgt. Harvey E. Parkerson III 27
Spc. Jacob D. Martir-Gutierrez 21

Source: CNN.com

More talking about football

Got up, went to class, talked about football. Talked a bit about the ethnic origin of Americans, carrying on from last class. (Did you know that on the last census, 15% of people put themselves down as having German ancestry? I believe this is not exclusive, however.) Got talked into making a bet with my student, predicting who would go through to the round of 16, quarter finals, semi finals, final. He worked out a whole points system and everything. I fear I'm like to lose.

Went for breakfast, nice café con leche and roll with tomato and salt-cured ham. Read paper, some of it about football.

Went to get some new sunglasses, as my other ones got sat on by someone last Friday while watching football. Sunglasses are expensive!

Got to the school and almost immediately went down for a coffee with Faye. Talked about football, among other things.

Work, interspersed with talk about football.

Walked home, did a grocery shop, soaked my feet and watched an episode of Friends. No football mentioned.

Made dinner, watched Spain totally dominate Tunisia. Very nerve-wracking game. (OK, football officially not relaxing. I think I'd forgotten the last World Cup when I made that comment.) Although Spain clearly dominated (ball possession 64%-36%), Tunisia scored in the 7th minute, and it wasn't until minute 72 that Raúl, who used to annoy the shit out of me, but who I've lately come to like a lot (plays for Real Madrid), finally scored. Two more goals, one a penalty kick, guaranteed our place in the octavos. Yay Spain!

Football making it very hard to get any studying done, so I'm going to try to get in a half hour before bed.

CXVI

August 2004
Capt. Michael Yury Tarlavsky 30
Pvt. Marc Ferns 21 [British]
1st Lt. Neil Anthony Santoriello 24
Lance Cpl. Nicholas B. Morrison 23
Lance Cpl. Kane M. Funke 20 [Vancouver, WA]
1st Sgt. Jeroen Severs 29 [Dutch]
Spc. Mark Anthony Zapata 27
Sgt. Daniel Michael Shepherd 23
Pfc. Brandon R. Sapp 21
Pfc. Geoffrey Perez 24

Source: CNN.com

Civilians reported killed by military intervention in Iraq

Minimum: 38475

Maximum: 42889

Source: iraqbodycount.net

Obstacles

This makes me think about how easily we sometimes allow ourselves to be stymied in doing what we want to do. The rules may be imposed upon us, or come from within. As I'm in the process of trying to figure out ust what the next step is to be, I've spent a lot of time thinking about what I "can" and "cannot" do, and how these limitations come into being.

On a football note, I think I must take back what I said to a student last week: that I find watching football relaxing. He looked at me as if I were crazy. I said that I just didn't usually care that much, and so while I could get a bit excited at times, it didn't really stress me out. Last night's Italy-U.S.A. game put the lie to that. I really wanted Italy to win, and the States was playing very well. On top of that Italy scored very early, but followed it up not much later with an own goal. As Ghana's beat the Czech Republic, a draw would make things a bit tricky for Italy. Then before you knew it, one of the Italy players got a red card and was sent off. At the end of the first half one of the Americans was sent off, and another early in the second half. On the edge of my seat, I was. In the end, the 1-1 draw held, so we'll have to see what happens in the next matches. The States could even go through, and Italy not, depending on how they do next time around. Yikes! Can't believe I've just written a whole long paragraph about this!

CXV

August 2004
Lance Cpl. Larry L. Wells 22
Spc. Joshua I. Bunch 23
Cpl. Roberto Abad 22
Pfc. David L. Potter 22
Rick A. Ulbright 49 [Dept of the Air Force civilian]
Lance Cpl. Jonathan W. Collins 19
Pvt. Lee Martin O'Callaghan 20 [British]
Capt. Andrew R. Houghton 25
Lance Cpl. Tavon L. Hubbard 24
Staff Sgt. John R. Howard 26

Source: CNN.com

Ring-ding-a-ling

Here's a good I'm-a-ding-dong moment. Just got my art history assignment back. Got a 48 out of 100. Thought to myself, 'Self, I know it wasn't perfect, but a 48?!' Started to read the tutor comments, confusion mounts, as she starts off with, 'This is an absolutely excellent assessment of the two paintings, for which you have got virtually full marks.' Again, I say to myself, 'Self, is she on drugs? Or mayhaps the assignment was only worth 50 points? Whazzup?' It is then that I look below, and see the note about how the rubric requires me to compare TWO PAIRS of pieces at 1000 words each, not ONE PAIR with a 2000-word field to romp around in.

Oh.

I get out the assignment booklet, wondering where on earth I went wrong. There it is, plain as the nose on my face: TWO PAIRS of pieces, 1000 WORDS EACH. What a numbskull. It is little consolation that I did as well on the one I did do, as of course, I had 1000 EXTRA WORDS to spout out my words of wisdom in. Surely I won't have missed anything important out.

Just goes to show you, all the clear instructions in the world can't stop people from not reading them. I will, in the future (ie, until this memory of my stupidity fades) have far more patience with instruction-impaired students of mine.

CXIV

August 2004
Sgt. Juan Calderon Jr. 26
Capt. Gregory A. Ratzlaff 36 [Olympia, WA]
Sgt. Tommy L. Gray 34
Pvt. Christopher Gordon Rayment 22 [British]
Lance Cpl. Joseph L. Nice 19
Gunnery Sgt. Elia P. Fontecchio 30
Sgt. Moses D. Rocha 33
Sgt. Yadir G. Reynoso 27 [Wapato, WA]
Spc. Donald R. McCune 20 [Washington Army Nat'l Guard]
Pfc. Raymond J. Faulstich Jr. 24

Source: CNN.com

Very tired

Was going to try to get some studying in tonight, but am just plain tired. Work and school stress get to me more than I realize, I think. I run around like a crazed chicken, and then when I get a bit of a breather (which I don't actually have at this point, but next assignment, due in two weeks, still seems a long way off yet), I just crumble.

My knee's stopped acting up, so I walked home for the first time in a long while. I'd started watching the England-Trinidad and Tobago match in the bar with folks from work. They all had to go off and teach (the very idea!) after the first half, so I took advantage of the crazy TV time difference and walked home in time to catch the last 25 minutes or so.

Now you might be excused for thinking that there is an actual time zone change between work and my house, but it's just that Spanish television is mad. The free channel (la sexta) that bought the rights to the games, sold about half of them to a cable channel (Canal+). In addition, la sexta is new, and not every building's antennae has been tuned to it yet, so a lot of people can't watch the matches at home, unless they have cable, as you can get la sexta through that, too. This means that if you don't have cable, which I don't, or la sexta, which I do, you've got to find a friend that does or go to a bar for the matches. Now the topper is that la sexta shows some/most/all of the matches that are on Canal+ what they have been calling "live", but which is not actually live. It is 45 minutes later. This results in strange goings-on like hearing the Italy-Ghana match's shouts of "Gooooolllll!!!!!!" twice as two different groups in my building were watching the game at the same/different time on two different channels. You'd hear the shout and the television commentator's excitement, and then 45 minutes later, the same thing repeated. Got very confused as to how many goals Italy were actually scoring, and kept having to check the Internets.

Anyway, in this case, the time difference worked out for me, as I was able to walk home, which takes about an hour, and only miss 15 minutes or so of the match.

Now to beddy bye.

CXIII

July 2004
Gunnery Sgt. Shawn A. Lane 33
Lt. Col. David S. Greene 39
Cpl. Marcin Rutkowski 24 [Polish]
Spc. Ken W. Leisten 20 [Oregon Army National Guard]
Spc. Joseph F. Herndon II 21

August 2004

Spc. Armando Hernandez 22
Spc. Anthony J. Dixon 20
Pfc. Harry N. Shondee Jr. 19
Cpl. Dean P. Pratt 22
Spc. Justin B. Onwordi 28

Source: CNN.com

Journalists and Media Assistants, August 2004

Journalists Killed, August 2004

Hossam Ali, freelance
Mahmoud Hamid Abbas, ZDF
Enzo Baldoni, Diario della settimana

Media Assistants Killed, August 2004
Jamal Tawfiz Salmane, Gazeta Wyborcza

Source: reporters without borders

Contractors, August 2004

Contractors Killed August 2004
Federico Samson, Filipino engineer
Mike Dawes, American international police liaison officer
Carl Carroll, American military contractor
Solomone Cabelutu, Fijian security guard

Source: icasualties.org

Spain vs. Ukraine

¡¡¡¡¡Gooooooooollllllllllllssssssss!!!!!

Spain has just achieved a spectacular win over the Ukraine: 4-0. Yup! That's four-nil, four-zilch, four-zip, four-nada! It wasn't just that they were taking on a markedly inferior team, they played really really well. The fourth goal was especially lovely. Check out the video highlights. It's nice to see them do well in the World Cup for a change. If they go through to the round of 16 first in their group, they'll probably meet Brazil in the quarter finals. Normally, this would not be such a good thing, but if Spain play the way they did today, and Brazil play the way they did last night ...

CXII

July 2004
Cpl. Todd J. Godwin 21
Spc. Danny B. Daniels II 23
Staff Sgt. Michael J. Clark 29
Lance Cpl. Mark E. Engel 21
Spc. Nicholas H. Blodgett 21
Sgt. Tatjana Reed 34
Pvt. 1st Class Torey J. Dantzler 22
Lance Cpl. Vincent M. Sullivan 23
Spc. Nicholas J. Zangara 21
Sgt. DeForest L. Talbert 24 [Virginia Army National Guard]

Source: CNN.com

In for the long haul

This university business has been a long, hard slog. I'm in my last year of one degree, with a fairly easy year next to finish off the second. When I get really stressed, even more behind, a bit depressed because I simply do not have the time to do myself credit in terms of grades, I try to remember the feeling of excitement and anticipation I had when I first started, and indeed still get sometimes. It's what the Spanish call ilusión, which I think is a nice word for it.

When I have to, like today, decide to not do an assignment, and take a substitution (average of the others plus a 0 for the undone one) score, I get really down and down on myself. I wish I could do better, but I either don't have enough sticktoitiveness and self-control, or am far too ambitious in terms of time commitments to do more than I am.

Still, I have learned a lot, and despite the hard work and stress, I've enjoyed it. I fully plan to be proud of myself when I've finished!

CXI

July 2004
Pfc. Torry D. Harris 21
Cpl. Demetrius L. Rice 24
Pfc. Jesse J. Martinez 20
Staff Sgt. Paul C. Mardis Jr. 25
Lance Cpl. Bryan P. Kelly 21
Sgt. 1st Class David A. Hartman 41 [Army Reserve]
Spc. Craig S. Frank 24 [Michigan Army Nat'l Guard]
Pfc. Charles C. Persing 20
Sgt. Dale T. Lloyd 22
Flight Lt. Kristian Michel Alexander Gover 30 [British]

[Today's one of those days when this just makes me so mad at George F-ing W Bush and his heartless, moronic cronies I could scream.]

Source: CNN.com

One up, one down

At the school, we've got a World Cup pool going. As there are only eight of us participating this time, and there are 32 teams, each person drew four teams each. I've got Mexico (my best bet and entirely fitting given my ancestry), Serbia & Montenegro, Australia and South Korea. The latter two haven't played yet, but today Mexico beat Iran quite convincingly, 3-1, but S & M lost to them orange Nederlanders. Poo! It's a tough group they're in, and basically S & M have to beat Argentina to get through the group matches stage to the round of 16. Not bloody likely. Australia and S. Korea have slightly better chances, but we'll see how they perform Monday and Tuesday, respetively.

It's been a football/study weekend. Shouldn't have, but yesterday went out to the pub to watch the Ingerlund-Paraguay match, which England won on an own-goal. Not a terribly convincing for my disappointed partners in spectatorship. Then there was a bit of terraza-tion (sitting outside and eating and/or drinking, in this case homemade dark beer), which is the bestest thing about living in Spain, and something I find it almost impossible to resist. So not so much studying got done. Today I resisted the temptation to go out again, and planned lunch around the S & M-Netherlands game so that I could watch some of it, then kept an ear out for shouts of "GOOOOOOOOOOOLLLLLL!" during the second half, while studying in the other room.

Anyway, dinner break and short gander at Portugal-Angola's over, back to studying before bed.

CX

July 2004
Pfc. Collier E. Barcus 21
Staff Sgt. Trevor Spink 36
Pfc. Christopher J. Reed 20
Sgt. Krisna Nachampassak 27
Cpl. Terry Holmes 22
Spc. Dana N. Wilson 26
Sgt. James G. West 34
Master Sgt. Linda Ann Tarango- Griess 33 [Nebraska Army Nat'l Guard]
Staff Sgt. Dustin W. Peters 25
Staff Sgt. Jeremy J. Fischer 26 [Nebraska Army Nat'l Guard]

[&@#!+ car accidents, car bombs and roadside bombs taking out convoy vehicles.]

Source: CNN.com

Civilians reported killed by military intervention in Iraq

Minimum: 38355
Maximum: 42747

[I know it's been a bit since I posted a count, but the leap here since the last time is truly heartbreaking, about 3,000.]

Source: iraqbodycount.net

Busy bee

No posting for a long time. Have been very busy studying lots, writing papers and working bunches. Lots of little bitty translations that seemed to take forever. Two Open University events in three days and the prep for them. Two assignments due within three days. Appointment to get my knees x-rayed. (Hopefully good news to come on Tuesday.) Start of Italian conversation course. You get the idea.

Have also been working on getting the British Language Centre blog up and running. We'll see if it flies. I was never sure if the student newsletter I used to do got any readers. At least this way I'll be able to track it with site manager.