Zathras

I thought you said not cheesy ones There's an unexpected reply.

I'm working on a list of love songs. Partially for my sister, but mostly for myself (to place on a CD for my wife.) I'm hoping to hit ones that aren't too cheesy if you know what I mean. Some of what I've got are: Stevie Wonder - Ribbon in the sky Eric Clapton - Wonderful Tonight Roy Orbison - You Got it Nat King Cole – Unforgettable Julio Iglesias – Can’t Help Falling in Love Bob Marley – Satisfy My Soul Ben Harper – By My Side Cat Stevens – How Can I Tell You? James Taylor – Your Smiling Face Mason Jennings – Butterfly The Drifters – Save The Last Dance Any suggestions?

Pistone! Am I a horrible person for wanting to hold onto all my old kits?

PS News on this side of the Atlantic is that Arena has said it's a totally inaccurately report. On the other hand, there's a new rumor that replaces "Scotland" with "Ireland."

Nah; he certainly didn't follow the suit's "marketing." He sat Johnson for the most part when he was supposed by the marketing people to be the big thing. He took Ching over Twellman when TT was the guy all the media and MLS pundits said was a sure thing for the roster and the best understudy to McBride. Donovan is the key to the US team; he may have been off-form in all of 2006, but where he goes, so too does that team. Sitting him at the World Cup would have been the worse decision. I think he was hamstrung by his belief that he needed an organizer at the back and that none of his veterans were up to that task; he wanted to play Pope and Onyewu in the middle for speed and size, but neither was the leader he needed. He had to either play Conrad there or slide Bocanegra into the middle, but he wanted everyone on the field, so he shoehorned Bocanegra to left back, Beasely to the right side of midfield and practically negated any chance Donovan had of regaining his form by playing through it by hiding him on the field. If you look at the Czech game, you can see that the overall organization of the team wasn't bad. There was a dreadful pair of mistakes that led to the early opening goal and then it was all over. If Reyna's shot goes in rather than hitting the post and we got into halftime at 1-1, I think it's a totally different game. By the end of the half, we looked back in it, but as soon as the second went in, it was over, and the third was just a breakaway. The Italy game showed even more how well he can plan if he's given adequate scouting--9 men against the champions? We actually had the better of the play I felt and deserved to win on Beasely's shot which was ruled offsides for a player who was not involved in the play (I don't totally disagree with the call, however.) The Ghana game was a shambles with poor refereeing on both sides and squandered chances, bonehead decisions by Reyna, Bocanegra and a couple of others that basically showed that they were desperate. It's that clutch situation where I might have concerns about his squad management. He's scapegoated a lot for Donovan's lack of form and not actually having a striker, which is unfortunate, but I do agree he made some baffling decisions during the world cup. Still, I feel like he'd do a decent job in Europe; he's used to getting every call against him on the road (If you don't believe me, watch the USA v. Panama qualifier from 2005--if those tackles happened to England, the press would be calling for outright war) and completely hostile crowds. He could do just fine with a team like Scotland.

To be fair, I'm surprised to hear this in the media, since he's notoriously unfriendly to the media in general. I can't imagine him ever getting the job either, just saying that it wouldn't be a bad move for the Scots.

Il Bruce would do well with the Scots. He's good at getting the best out of average players. Good organizer and motivator. Provided he leaves before he gets too attached to certain players and tries to shoehorn them into strange roles in order to keep them in the team.

Shots (On Goal) : Newcastle 18(9) Birmingham 7(4) Aye, sounds like they were right in it

Aye, but as a result psychiatrists commonly prescribe a different drug to counteract that side-effect. As a result of that, some pharmaceutical companies bundle the sex-drive enhancer into the anti-depressant pill.

Well that's that then. See you on the weekend.

Dylan's Oh Mercy charted #6 in the UK the same year as the Wilburys album came out. Harrison's Got My Mind Set on You charted at number one in the US the year before that, and When We Was Fab charted #7. Not exactly out of the mainstream at the time.... Granted Harrison didn't release anything after 1990, but he was still active in collaborative efforts through the 90's, working with Clapton and others.

QFT and the only reason they actually worked as a "super" group. At that point in their careers they'd run out of material and needed someone else to spark some life into each other. Imagine if someone tried to mix the working bits out of 5 or 6 1960s or 70s clapped out super cars??? It might be good for a mile but in the end it's still clapped out shit. You all believe that Harrison, Dylan and Orbison were tapped out??? I can buy Petty, but the others....

Afraid I can't give specific advice to this, but I'd be interested in hearing how you like Thunderbird. I've been using Outlook and the only reason I haven't switched is the lack of an integrated calendar. As I recall, it was a pain in the ass to get hotmail to transfer even into Outlook, so getting it to transfer into a non-Microsoft program is gonna be hellish.

As Meenzer suggested, tickets to a show are always good. lucky for me, her favorite show is in town over the festive season. $120 for two tickets to "The Sound of Music" and I'm gold.

Since the "greatest vocalist" thread got me thinking about it, I've been listening to the Traveling Wilburys a lot. Great supergroup. Most supergroups tend to suck because of the clash of egos and lack of real motivation. Some of these songs are spectacular. "end of the line" is currently one of my favorite tracks.

Hard to separate genres for this. Mercury is tough to beat. Roy Orbison's voice has a unique quality also. Ella Fitzgerald is another one along with Nat King Cole -- like I said, it's really hard to judge those first two against the second two; not enough common ground.

I was just thinking the same thing--this can't really be a discussion on a message board can it? We're civil and finding common ground! Then again the discussions I've had with you have historically been civil and worthwhile Homo.

Fair enough that they don't need the money, but I still feel that the playoff will give equal incentive to play. The winner of that playoff gets that opportunity to play with the "big boys." Perhaps it's a disincentive to the really, really low rated teams, but just as Estonia had previously good years and now is in a down-turn, such teams have ebb and flow of power which makes those games interesting. In fact, in my mind, it makes those play-off games mean that much more because it's actually *for* that 'privilege' of playing the big teams. What really 'meaningful' games do the minnows actually have in the current set up? Is there really a great incentive for Lichtenstein to try to sneak a point in Azerbaijan? Wouldn't it be a similar badge of honour to make it into the group stage? I agree that there might be a difference in the mindset about the minnows, but I live for the giant-killing stories in football. Even in NCAA American Football this year there have been a number of HUGE upsets and I love it (even though I don't follow the sport at all.) Upsets are why you play the game; if we played it on paper, the Brazilians would win just about every cup. However, I think the World Cup is diminished by groups like Group H where a cup-worthy team is going to miss out on the playoffs. I guess it's a balance between the romance of giving Slovakia a better chance in a playoff against Spain and the romance of having the possibility of a Netherlands v. Turkey (or v Belgium) or an England v. Ireland match at the World Cup. Where do you place the balance? On the Cinderella story to the cup or on the best teams battling it out on the biggest stage. I suppose I agree that it's a value judgment.

Kind of... there are 9 groups, so 8 of the 9 second-placed teams go into the play-offs, while the worst is immediately eliminated. Typical FIFA - never a simple solution when you can have a complicated one. You want complicated, you should look at the CONCACAF system. That said, I think it would benefit Europe to adopt portions of that system. I dunno, I know you've got the "get rid of the dross" aspect there, but the European system is precisely what the European countries have grown up being used to. What other benefits do you see in what CONCACAF have to deal with? To me it seems really prohibitive on teams like Lichtenstein and San Marino to have to play five away games, when you could have a home and away series against each other so the loser plays only one away match and the winners go on to the group. It reduces the size of the groups, so presumably the winners end up playing the same number of games (approximately.) I remember from 2002 qualifying (?) the Lichtenstein team captain missed a crucial qualifier because he had to harvest his crops; his priorities were on his livelihood, not his country's football team (and rightly so.) By reducing the burden on those teams and players, I think it benefits those F.A.s because they don't have to spend as much on travel etc, and can then reinvest that money in development, perhaps improving their overall teams in the long-run. If you have seeded knock-outs between the bottom two seeded pots, you have 17 teams, reduced to 9. Instead of 53 teams in 8 groups, you have 45 teams. Then you can do 11 groups of 4 (one of five) and then a further group stage for the top several 2nd place teams (or other method to get the final two qualifiers) If you have a group of four teams, you can have those matches take place pretty quickly and then leave the remaining 8 top 2nd place teams in the group play two more four-team group phases to get the last two qualifiers. Even those teams stuck in the second group phase end up playing only two more games in this system than they would in the current system, and that's not including the playoffs. I think having more groups creates a higher probability of the 'better' teams qualifying. Alternatively, nine groups of five makes for four spots remaining for the nine second-place teams, so you can keep your play-offs or have further group games. If you want to keep the 8 groups, you've maintained the same basic system with fewer matches to tax the smaller countries. Maybe I'm overestimating the strains on the smaller countries, but it just strikes me as a system that gets the best teams into the World Cup without compromising the fair chance of the smaller nations. You don't actually need to have preliminary rounds to make the groups smaller, but I think that the benefits listed at the top to the smaller nations is worthwhile in itself.

Kind of... there are 9 groups, so 8 of the 9 second-placed teams go into the play-offs, while the worst is immediately eliminated. Typical FIFA - never a simple solution when you can have a complicated one. You want complicated, you should look at the CONCACAF system. That said, I think it would benefit Europe to adopt portions of that system.

England have every chance to qualify; even if they have to go through the playoffs (again.) Happy to see the Scots having a decent shot, and the Irish aren't too far long-shots if they get their act together too. Group 5 in Asia should be interesting, even if people are gaga for group 1. Iran, Kuwait and the UAE should be fun. Mexico got hosed in CONCACAF, but the US got a relatively simple draw and Costa Rica has a cakewalk to the final round. In Africa, the group with Nigeria and South Africa should be interesting to watch, just to see how those two shake out. Group two will be good to see if Zimbabwe can upset Guinea and advance. I'm also rooting for Liberia, but they're unlikely to overtake Algeria and are gonna get smoked by Senegal.

Right. Now I'm confused. Probably shouldn't have tried to switch gears from International Contract Law.

Moved to Croatia at age 15, received dual citizenship in 2002, after playing in the Croatian leagues for four years (spent some time on loan back in Brazil.) Played for their U-21 squads and eventually the senior squad. Good enough for me. Especially since his nickname is 'Dudu'. Too bad he doesn't play for Brazil, though; to have Kaka and Dudu in the same squad would be terrific.

The best part is Alexi Lalas saying he wanted someone to get the Galaxy to play "sexy football." Nothing changes, I guess. As much as Gullit is a moron, there will be no success in LA until Lalas is gone. Yallop was undercut by Lalas trading away half his squad mid-season.

Rumors over here that he's on his way to coach the LA Galaxy. Didn't think they could get much lower, but they're sure trying. http://sports.yahoo.com/mls/news?slug=txga...t&type=lgns