Where There's Love and Darkness and my Sidearm

Hurrah! 


Also, I started watching Firefly. I have this thing where I'll see an actor I love in something and immediately hunt down all their other stuff. It was like that with Richard Armitage - when I saw him in North and South I immediately got into Robin Hood because he was in it, and then fell in love with the series as a whole. I decided to check out Firefly because I love Jewel Staite, and Firefly is simply incredible. I've seen seven episodes so far, and they were all fantastic - no weak ones in the lot. The characters, the plot, the music, everything is amazing. I'm going to completely devour the rest, I can tell!

I'm really pumped for the return of SGA!! I had completely forgotton it was coming back in July - time flies! I was over on TV Squad and came across this mildly spoilery article that announced the premiere as July 11th.  Sweet!!

I had an excellent Canada Day. The beer was plentiful and the fireworks were pretty, though I have yet to see anything that compares with the show at the Butchart Gardens out West. It will ruin your appreciation for fireworks forever, because everything else pales in comparison! 

 In honor of Canada Day (I guess), they've created a list based off a survey done by CIC indicating the "101 things that most define Canada." Number one on the list was the maple leaf, which I guess I'm fine with - it's on our flag, it's neutral, it's not going to offend anyone by being ranked first. Rounding out the top 5 are Vimy Ridge, which is perceived in popular history as being one of our defining moments as a nation, hockey, which I can understand even if I'm not really a fan, Queen Elizabeth, which was kind of surprising given the amount of anti-monarchy sentiment floating around, and the Canadian flag, which is kind of a given.  The usual suspects like multiculturalism and bilingualism were also featured.

I don't know what I would pick as our top defining things. Pinpointing our national identity is hard enough, and then there's what we perceive ourselves to be versus the perceptions of the rest of the world. 

Anyway, tomorrow's the big day...I hope it doesn't rain. We want our fireworks!

Urgh...the Euro final was so frustrating to watch! The number of times we gave away the ball had me tearing my hair in frustration. It just wasn't a good night for us at all. Ballack was oozing a trail of blood across the pitch, Miro got a kicked in the balls...sigh.

But overall, I'm not as upset as I was when we got knocked out of the last World Cup. We weren't robbed of victory - the Spanish really deserved to win and I'm happy for them.

I'm still going to sulk for awhile, though. :P

We're through to the final!!! YESSSSSSS! Although it was so annoying how the feed kept going on the fritz...I only got to see one of the German goals. :(  And we didn't get to see all the happy hugging/piling/shirt swapping at the end. But at least there was a brief clip of the boys bouncing around and Poldi crowd surfing lol. Oh well. The important thing is that we're through. 

The best thing ever - there were some German fans wearing "free Jogi" t-shirts, wigs and swat team hats. :D I'm glad he was back on the field where he belongs today.

The song they play after a goal is scored at the Euros was driving me crazy, so I trolled the web until I found it: Samba de Janeiro. I ignored the warning of its incredibly addictive nature, and it's been stuck in my head all day! It's so catchy! Ahh!

I finally bought the new Coldplay album and it is AMAZING. The style is a bit different - more mature and melodic - and I've been humming the songs all day (when Samba de Janeiro isn't on constant loop in my brain lol). It was definitely worth the wait!!! My favorite tracks are Viva la Vida, of course, Cemetaries of London, and Death and All of his Friends. This is my favorite Coldplay album so far for sure. :D

So I started watching BBC's Robin Hood a couple of weeks ago, and I got completely addicted. Within the space of three weeks I devoured seasons one and two in their entirety, and I have to say that the season two finale absolutely WRECKED me. Never in my television viewing career have I been so devastated by a show. It seems ridiculous to become so emotionally involved in a fictional series, but I was so unbelievably upset! 


I wonder what season three will bring? I was kind of surprised when I heard they were making another one - the season two finale seemed pretty final to me! But I'll be tuning in for sure, because Robin Hood is awesome, even when it makes me cry.

In other news, the tournament of the underdogs continues as Spain knocked out Italy in a penalty shootout. The game was pretty boring for the most part - not a single goal. The camera kept focusing on the hotness of Luca Toni for lack of anything more interesting lol.

 Well, this certainly has been a crazy week for footie!  I totally expected the Netherlands to wipe the floor with Russia, but it was quite the other way around!  It was a pretty exciting game, even though all the goals happened right at the end.  The fans were in fine form - I always wish they'd have more crowd noise on the broadcast and less annoying chit chat. It made me want to be there soooo bad. Going to the U-20 World Cup last year was one of the most exhilirating experiences of my life, and I can't wait for the day that I get to go to an actual World Cup or Euro. Being part of that crowd would be incredible. 

I'm not sure when I'll get to go to a World Cup, though. The next one is in South Africa, and it doesn't seem like the safest place to be. I think it has the second highest murder rate in the world and I just may have read something about a FIFA official getting killed there? Anyway, it's not on my list of top travel spots. The one after that is allotted to South America, and so far the only country that's put in a bid is Brazil. Now that would be an incredible experience if I was actually cheering for Brazil, but having been one of the few American fans in a stadium full of Brazil supporters at the U-20s has taught me a lesson. It might be dangerous to be cheering against a couple of thousand angry Brazilians on their home turf!

 

Ok, seriously, this was absolutely heartbreaking. Swiss captain Frei was injured early in the first half of today's Switzerland-Czech Republic game and might be out for the rest of the tournament. The look on his face - I'm pretty sure he was crying - as he hobbled off made me want to burst into tears. :( I hope he gets better!!!  The Czechs ended up winning despite many good chances for Switzerland. 

I saw the first half of the Turkey-Portugal game before I went out. Ronaldo was up to his usual tricks and delivered a wicked free kick that missed going in by a hair. I was kind of indifferent as to the outcome of this game, but my Ronaldo fangirling friends were happy that Portugal won. 

Germany plays tomorrow! Can't wait!

I watched a few more eps of Robin Hood, and it's really growing on me! I love how Marian kicks butt without it being overkill and how Robin is cute and bouncy. And the superficial side of me appreciates the smoking hotness that is Sir Guy...

 Ahhhh! Euro 2008 starts tomorrow!!!! I'm SO excited! Tomorrow's games are the Czech Republic vs Switzerland and Portugal vs Turkey.  All my friends are excited to see Ronaldo in action....he's the bait with which I lure my girlfriends into watching footie. I personally don't find him that attractive, but the girls look at him like a big dish of icecream, complete with drool and glazed over eyes. I miss Figo....sucks that he retired from international duty.

There's a cute article over at the Offside that has a list of all the national team nicknames. I've got to agree that Greece has the best one - "The Pirate Ship."  Also, someone over on the German National Team comm posted a giant collection of 74 German footie songs!!! Score!

I started watching the BBC's Robin Hood series...well, I watched the first episode so far. It has potential, though I find the pace a little slow. I need something to tide me over until my other shows start up again. The first half of BSG's season will finish up soon and who know when the rest will come back. SGA is returning sometime in late summer, I think, and all the rest come back in the fall.

Things I am excited about today:

1. Euro 2008! It starts in less than a week and I am off the wall with excitement. Because, well, it's Euro 2008! And I've been suffering from serious footie withdrawal ever since the domestic leagues finished. I ordered a spiffy new Germany jersey with some of my birthday money and it came in yesterday. Even though I'm an adult I fit into the kid's sizes, which are cheaper, so I splurged and customized mine with my favorite baller Miroslav Klose's name and number. Yay!

2. The new Coldplay album comes out on the 17th, I think, and I can't wait. I LOVE Viva la Vida, and I hope the rest of the album is just as awesome. 

And now some comments on this week's BSG.


I realized I hadn't posted on Prince Caspian, which was AMAZING. But that will have to wait until later...:)

 Norton Antivirus ate my computer! One little upgrade and my whole Windows was kaputt! I haven't had my computer for a week. The repair guys were able to fix it, thankfully, and install a new antivirus program called Avast, which I highly recommend. But still, you'd think that something meant to help your computer wouldn't be so prone to causing it harm!

For some reason I really want to see Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanemo Bay. I'm not usually that into stoner comedies, but just the fact that it has 'escape from Guantanemo Bay' in the title kind of makes me want to go. We'll see. 

There was so much I wanted to post about but now I don't remember. Oh yeah.  
ETA: I finally posted my pimp post for Swallows and Amazons over at smallfandomfest! Yay!

We beat Dortmund 2-1 to win the DFB-Pokal! Yeah!

 

Seriously - can Poldi and Schweini be any more adorable? :)

 
In other news, summer is officially here, as my skanky neighbors have started tanning on the roof of their building wearing pretty much nothing. What a lovely view from my bedroom window. x_x  I went to play some pickup football in the park, which was great, except for the park where I fell in the mud and got attacked by ants. 

I really hope the snow is gone for good! 

 

 
The weather was sooooo beautiful today. Spring is definitely here. Today was 20 degrees and tomorrow it's going to be 22! Although knowing Canadian weather, it'll probably swing back to sub-arctic temperatures within the week...

One of my friends recently discovered she has to start a gluten-free diet and she was showing me some of the gluten-free stuff she's going to be eating. It looked (and smelled) like bird seed. And it is super expensive. I feel so bad for her! Everything seems to have gluten in it - even licorice and lollipops! I can't imagine having to deal with that. :(

Tomorrow is Friday! Hurrah! New BSG and lots of sleep is in the cards.

I had waaaaaaay too much sugar today.  At work we took a morning break to go to Timmy's where I indulged in the "Iced Capp Supreme", which is a mint/chocolate flavored iced cappuchino with a giant glob of whipped cream and powdered chocolate on top. Guh. And then at lunch one of my buddies got a bunch of free chocolate pecan pie from the cafe he used to work at and that was also delicious. So I was on a sugar high for a good chunk of they day, but then I crashed around 2:30 pm and was useless for the rest of the afternoon. 

I wrote another section of my Swallows and Amazons fic, which I am hoping to post in the next couple of days. I'm getting to the end, slowly but surely.

There's a big to-do going on about the RCMP seizing a Dutch ship in international waters, which is kind of an act of war...oops! And there's all sorts of craziness going down at the Hill - we've got the anti-seal hunt protesters, the anti-anti-seal hunt protesters protesters, and the protesters protesting about the coast guard's involvement in the sinking of a sealing ship. And they apparently all started fighting each other. Yikes!

 

 

 

The expressions on their faces pretty much sums up how I feel about today's Champions League games. On the bright side, though, Barcelona will have a better chance of squashing Chelsea in the semis than Schalke would.

 I was rewatching some episodes from Farscape season 2 and came across one of my favorite funny scenes. It's in the episode "Crackers" and John is talking to the Scorpius in his head:

Scorpius: Go on. Kill her. Then we'll have pizza and margarita shooters.
John: Nobody...has margaritas with pizza.

Just the whole image of Scorpius talking about margarita shooters had me rolling on the floor laughing.  I love Farscape. :D

Scientific American has a really cool article on "The Color of Plants on Other Worlds", complete with digitally constructed images. Another interesting read was "Why does my cell phone make screechy noises when I place it near my computer?", a question I've wondered more than once. My cell also causes my TV reception to go all wonky...

The nefarious Chelsea managed to weasel their way into the Champions League semis despite having to play their third string keeper. They're like a wily insect that won't die no matter how many times you try and squash it. I don't hold much hope for Schalke to beat Barca tomorrow, but as the Proline commercials bleat, "anything can happen, anyone can win."