Tag: ek Holiday

Sporting

Working

Terrier

Sigh, both the Men’s and Women’s Curling teams are 0 – 2.

When I get to it.

Hound

Toy

Non-Sporting

Herding

When I get to it.

I got to it. ek is busy with canines. 😉 TMC

TV SChedule for Monday evening 2/10 – Tuesday afternoon 2/11

8:00 PM NBC: Alpine Skiing, Freestyle Skiing, Short Track

12:05 AM NBC: Short Track, Luge

1:05 AM NBC: Alpine Skiing, Freestyle Skiing, Short Track (Repeat of Prime Time)

3:00 AM NBCSP:  Curling, women’s: USA vs. Russia.

5:00 AM USA:  Curling, men’s: USA vs. China.

5:00 AM NBCSP:  Cross-country skiing: men’s and women’s individual sprint competitions.

6:00 AM NBCSP:  Cross-country skiing: men’s and women’s individual sprint gold medal finals.

10:00 AM MSNBC:  Hockey, women’s: Russia vs. Japan.

10:00 AM NBCSP:  Figure skating: pairs’ short program.

1:30 PM: NBCSP:  Ski jumping: women’s individual K-95 gold medal final; speed skating: women’s 500m gold medal final.

3:00 PM: NBC: Cross-country skiing: men’s and women’s individual sprint gold medal finals; luge: women’s gold medal final runs; freestyle skiing: women’s slopestyle.

5:00 PM CNBC:  Curling, women’s: USA vs. Great Britain.

5:00 NBCSP:  Hockey: Game of the Day.

8:00 PM NBC:  Snowboarding: men’s halfpipe gold medal final; figure skating: pairs’ short program; freestyle skiing: women’s slopestyle gold medal final; ski jumping: women’s individual K-95 gold medal final.

Medal Events for Monday 2/10

Alpine Skiing: Women’s Super Combined Slalom

Official Results

Gold: GER Maria HOEFL-RIESCH 2:34.62

Silver: AUT Nicole HOSP 2:35.02

Bronze: USA Julia MANCUSO 2:35.15

Biathlon: Men’s 12.5 km Pursuit

Official Results

Gold: FRA Martin FOURCADE 33:48.6

Silver: CZE Ondrej MORAVEC 34:02.7

Bronze: FRA Jean Guillaume BEATRIX 34:12.8

Short Track: Men’s 1500 m Finals

Official Results

Gold: CAN Charles HAMELIN 2:14.985

Silver: CHN Tianyu HAN 2:15.055

Bronze: RUS Victor AN 2:15.062

Speed Skating: Men’s 500 m Race

Official Results

Gold: NED Michel MULDER 69.312

Silver: NED Jan SMEEKENS 69.324

Bronze: NED Ronald MULDER 69.46

A sweep by the Netherlands and two brothers TMC

So Team USA goes 2 for 2 in Phineas and Ferb edge-of-insanity, kiss-your-butt-goodbye, gravity’s-a-stone-cold-sucker nightmare rail skate track obstacle course of doom and Russia schools in Team Figure Skating.

There’s a message in there somewhere but I’m not quite sure what it is.

I suppose I should mention at this point that my listings come from Zap2It which has the great virtue of listing 3 hours at a time, though for this particular purpose I’m taking advantage of their days long by network presentation since there are only 4 channels I have to monitor- NBC, CNBC, MSNBC and Vs. (NBC Sports).

While Women’s Hockey and Curling are my sports of the Games, the ones I’m interested in over the next 24 hours are Slopestyle (aka Phineas and Ferb edge-of-insanity, kiss-your-butt-goodbye, gravity’s-a-stone-cold-sucker nightmare rail skate track obstacle course of doom), luge (let’s lie down on a Flexible Flyer and careen down an ice track at 80 miles an hour), and ski jumping (what can I say, my Dad did it and when he showed me the tree in the middle of the landing hill I asked if that was there when he was jumping and he said, “Oh yeah.  You just have to aim someplace else.”  Yoopers.)

Perhaps you’re looking for an alternative.  AMC has The Walking Dead, Bravo has Ocean’s Thirteen, tomorrow History has Ax Men.

Oh and tonight at 10 pm on CNBC we have Day 1 of the 138th Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show which we will be live blogging.

No rest for the wicked.

(Update: Phew, Monday.  I thought so.  Did I mention Zap2It is not always accurate?)

Short day unless you count the drunk who tried to hijack a plane.  Sigh.  Among the more embarrassing incidents in my life was flying to Tulsa for training with a notorious alcoholic.  Now I’m all for having a pop or a few before takeoff so I can sleep through an experience that at best is inferior to a Greyhound Bus ride but he was waaaay above Tranquility Base.  When our flight was called he got in a huge fight with the bar tender over a single drink (he was wrong and miscounted) and wouldn’t even accept it when I just plopped down the extra money (it only is you know) because ‘it was the principle of the thing’.

When we got to the gate we found out our flight was delayed an extra 2 hours so he parked our butts on the still warm stools and demanded another round.

“I’m not serving you.”

So the moral of the story is, don’t piss off the bar tender at the only bar on the plane side of the security checkpoint.

I’ll slink away now.

Olympics–

I think I’ll be watching Gold Rush.

Oh, where to begin.  Perhaps with the fact that Sochi is a sub-tropical beach resort and all the snow is manufactured.  In it’s own way that’s the perfect metaphor for the Potempkin Village that is the XXII Winter Olympiad.

It’s long been known that the International Olympic Committee is the most corrupt governing body in sports, eclipsing Bernie Ecclestone, FIFA, the NFL, Major League Baseball, and the World Wrestling Federation aggregated in a package.  Indeed this 18 day spectacle will cost more than all the previous Games put together, $51 BILLION, most of which is going into the pockets of Putin’s toadies, sycophants, and cronies because it sure isn’t going into the half finished hotels and venues or the stinky yellow water or the two toilet ‘lover’s stall’ bathrooms.

Then of course there’s the Phineas and Ferb edge-of-insanity, kiss-your-butt-goodbye, gravity’s-a-stone-cold-sucker nightmare rail skate track obstacle course of doom athletic safety issues that have competitors standing at the top of the hill debating whether a shot at what is basically just another Gold Medal that will gather dust in your trophy case until you blow it off to show your Grandkids (assuming you live that long) is worth a career and endorsement ending injury, and some are already saying- no.

There is the threat of terrorism delivered by the #1 sponsor of State terrorism, Saudi Arabia’s Prince Bandar “Bush”, who’s pissed off that because John Kerry’s an idiot who should never have been let near the State Department stupidly told the truth instead of lying the way the House of Saud instructed him and his boss Barack to and has made it impossible (so far) for Saudi backed Al-Queda elements to take over the Syrian government and maintain Saudi (and Wahabi Sunni) dominance in the oil trade under increasing pressure from Shia Iran to be the “swing” producer who can cover shortfalls in periods of high demand and dial back production to jack up the prices when necessary.  That’s why it’s soooo important we bomb, bomb, bomb Iran too.

Oh, and for the record I think Mohammed’s nephew had at least as good a claim to be his spiritual heir as any of the regional warlords they called Caliphs, not that as an atheist I believe in anything except the historical (but non-Western) record of 600 or so C.E.

Anyway, this threat has led Budwieser (Budwieser!) to scale back it’s sponsorship (though they’re contractually obligated for some things) and keep it’s executives away from Sochi where they had expected to do the usual round of boozing and schmoozing favored and potential clients.  Coca Cola on the other hand has no problem with private security guards prominently sporting the ‘Coke’ logo while they beat up protesters for LGBT rights and turn them over to the real cops for a nice Siberian vacation in the Gulag.

And let me state once again for the record that I think Mr. “Perky Nipples” Putin has some issues with his own fantasies.  Big game hunting?  Treasure diving?  Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it’s damn hypocritical which is I suppose the best you can say about a Lt. Colonel in the KGB who spent 16 years torturing and murdering people as a profession.

They are also killing dogs.

You may ask yourself, and I have, why I’ll be covering this at all.  My only answer does me no credit, which is that at the Olympics, every 4 years, you get to see some sports that you never see anyplace else.  For me it’s Curling and Women’s Hockey, you might be into Figure Skating or Biathalon.  Women’s Ski Jumping is making its debut and I’m looking forward to that, there are several technical reasons Women might (in time) come to dominate Ski Jumping just as they dominate long distance swimming today.

Here’s how it will work- every day at about 6 pm I’ll put up the schedule for the next 24 hours.  This will be at some disconnect with actual events because NBC is broadcasting most things on an at least 11 hour time delayed basis so if you have an ignorant friend you want to sucker into a bet you can play the ‘Wire’ scam from The Sting.  

I’ll try to include some suggested alternatives if you are boycotting.  I respect your convictions.

Events of interest that deserve live blogging will be live blogged.  If you’re following something and don’t wish to diary yourself, well, that’s what the comments section is for.

Tonight is fairly simple, Opening Ceremony (broadcast) is scheduled for tomorrow.  This evening we have footage of some sports that start early because of the short schedule of the Games.

8 pm NBC Figure Skating, Snowboarding, Freestyle Skiing

From Sochi, Russia. Figure skating team events: men’s short program, pairs’ short program; snowboarding: men’s and women’s slopestyle; freestyle skiing: women’s moguls.

(Slopestyle == Phineas and Ferb edge-of-insanity, kiss-your-butt-goodbye, gravity’s-a-stone-cold-sucker nightmare rail skate track obstacle course of doom)

Repeats at 1:30 am and 3 am.

Let’s start at the top.  This is not the ‘Reefer Bowl’.  As poblano said Monday this is a pick ’em.  It’s actually incredibly rare that the two top teams in each Conference face each other, rarer still that the top offense (Broncos) faces the top defense (Seahawks).

Now poblano when pressed picks the Seahawks but I suspect that’s mostly based on sentiment and not statistics.  The Seahawks are the only team to have won Championships in both Conferences, but they’ve never really been very good and the rest of the teams in Seattle suck.

The Broncos have yet to recover from the Tebow incident and the Rockies, Avalanche, and Nuggets are legit (as long as they play at home).

Now me?  I agree with bmaz that this game will be decided not by how good the Seahawks defense is- Payton Manning, as much as you may hate him, will score some points.  It will be decided by how good the Bronco defense is and whether Russell Wilson can score more (he was an incredibly excellent draft pick, 75th in the 3rd round and has already performed well above that).  Now good Defense has won Superb Owls before, but the Seahawks is not that much better than the Broncos.  Broncos are 2 point favorites and will need to shut down the Seahawks ground game.

Weather will not be a factor though it might rain a little.

Now I know some of you are not at all interested in the Superb Owl and are looking to avoid it at all costs.  Here are some suggestions-

Alternative TV

• Anti-Super Bowl Sunday: TV alternatives include puppies, kittens, zombies, Star-Ledger

And I know some of you watch it just for the ads ($4 Million for 30 seconds last I looked)-

Ads

• Watch 22 Leaked Super Bowl XLVIII Commercials Before Sunday’s Game, Rolling Stone
• 2014 Super Bowl Ads, Boston Globe
• Rejected Super Bowl commercials, Boston Globe
• Unforgettable Super Bowl commercials, Boston Globe

You can always count on The Guardian to provide an offbeat take on American Throwball-

Funny

• Super Bowl XLVIII: a quick and mostly true guide to … the game
• Super Bowl XLVIII: a quick and mostly true guide to … everything else

And serious ones too-

Why the NFL is a Billionaire Scam

• The NFL Gameplan
• The Stadium Swindle
• The Great Pinkwash
• The Concussion Defense

The New York Times coverage is by comparison thin (WaPo non-existent, they’re too concerned about their imploding franchise).

This piece is an interesting comparison to the Wall Street Casino=

Big Time Betting

• The Super Bowl of Sports Gambling

They also have a couple of interesting analysis pieces-

Matchups

• Super Bowl XLVIII Matchup: Seahawks vs. Broncos
• Denver’s Offense (Unstoppable) vs. Seattle’s Defense (Unmovable)

The Superb Owl below.

If you’ve been a faithful reader you’ll know this site was an early adopter of the animal excitement and pageantry that is the Puppy Bowl experience.  Starting at 3 pm Zap2It is listing 3 two hour installments on Animal Planet as “New”- First and Goal, Going for 2, and Third & Long to be repeated at 9 pm with an additional repeat of First and Goal at 3 am.  I think it’s highly likely this is just a marketing ploy and it’s the same 2 hours on continuous repeat as it’s been in previous years.

Meep the Cockatiel will be back as ‘tweeter'(@MeepTheBird) but the Hedgehog Cheerleaders have been replaced by Penguins.  The National Anthem will be accompanied by a Police Dog Escort.  ‘Lil Bub’ the “‘perma-kitten’ dwarf cat” is added as a commentator and there is a new Puppy Bowl Fantasy League on the official Puppy Bowl web site.

Bissell Kitty Halftime

The featured performer this year is ‘Keyboard Cat’ who will be covering Bruno Mars’ Locked Out of Heaven about which Rolling Stone Magazine had this to say-

On the other halftime show with Bruno Mars – or the other Bruno Mars – they added Red Hot Chili Peppers just last week, because they were feeling the heat when we announced that Keyboard Cat was going to be on.

Keyboard Cat is the second of that nick, the original ‘Fatso’ Keyboard Cat having sadly passed over the Rainbow Bridge in 1987.

The show will open with a kitty parachuting into the Stadium, include over 30 kitties, feature a domino cascade, and the big finish is a pyramid of 30 cats (and you know how hard they are to herd).

Over 66 puppies will be competing this year, 13 of whom had the chance to participate in a special training camp with Michelle, Bo, and Sunny Obama (also in Politico).

This year the Puppy Bowl faces two new rivals– the Kitten Bowl on Hallmark and the Fish Bowl on National Geographic WILD, but at 12.4 Million viewers the Puppy Bowl is the clear leader.

• Washington Post’s 22 Puppies to watch
• Bleacher Report Best Videos from Last 9 Years (note: I couldn’t get this to work right in my browser)