Needless to say, we were shocked. I was about to confront the perv, but it turns out he wasn’t coveting thy neighbor’s wife — he was cheering for something called “soccer.” Specifically, the Chelsea Football Club, from a far off land called “England.”

Now, I had heard of this “soccer” before. It was what those floppy haired, flip-flop wearing, Spin Doctors-loving high school classmates of mine played when I went home and rocked Tecmo Bowl on Nintendo.

Soccer seemed like such a strange game, aloof and confusing. It wasn’t until I spent a summer in Munich last year that any of it made sense. No doubt seeing European fandom firsthand had something to do with it. That experience, coupled with the stellar performance by Team USA in this year’s World Cup, has baptized me into a new fanaticism: European Football. My team? FC Bayern-Munich, naturally.

I’ve always been a fan of sports. I can’t rattle off stats, but I hold my own in most conversations involving a ball, a net, fence, goal, basket, field and overpaid athletes. Yet my soccer didn’t fandom didn’t come naturally. Sure, certain elements of the game were immediately appealing: cutthroat sub rules; the way that the clubs move up and down in leagues depending on how their season finished; the “get up or get off the pitch” approach to injuries. Brilliance! But it was hardly love at first free kick. I think I know why: my American sports brain is simply ill-equipped to handle certain aspects of soccer.

The World Cup is definitely raising the game’s Stateside profile, but there’s still a huge swath of the country that doesn’t get it. Maybe we can meet soccer halfway? With that in mind, here is my list of things that need to be changed if FIFA wants win over Americans:

10.  Make the Clock Count Backwards: What the hell is up with the clock starting at 00:00 and going up!?! Clocks don’t go up in sports, they go down! This is what tells people how much time there is before the game ends. Without a backwards countdown, the viewer is forced to do their own calculations. That’s MATH! Americans want no part of it! Mathematics and athletics only have one thing in common — the suffix. Beyond that, they shouldn’t be mixed!

9. Get Rid of “Bonus Time”: So, the clock hits 45:00 or 90:00 and the refs suddenly pick a random number out of their ass. These are extra minutes to be played. The number is supposed to account for all the game time lost during the match. The officials say, “Oh!  I see that we are technically done, but I am going to make you run around for a little while longer — until I feel like it’s done. Until it seems right.” How about this: the game ends when you blow the friggin’ whistle!

8. Mascots: The New Zealand team was called the “All Whites.” Many non-Tea Party Americans suffer from tremendous white guilt and this kind of thing offends our delicate sensibilities. There’s no way in Hell I’m gonna stroll through an American metropolis cheerleading for “All Whites.” It simply would not end well. So how about we change that to the New Zealand Whale Riders? Or maybe the New Zealand Sort-of Aussies? Has a nice ring to it.

7. Time Outs: I don’t know about you, but during sports matches, I tend to be drinking. I also tend to be drinking before the broadcast. Soccer’s lack of time outs makes it tough to pick when to go potty (this is what I call it in front of my boys). It doesn’t help that the scoring system (or lack thereof) makes me want to see every minute. I’m often heard bellowing “what happened! what happened!” over the sound of tiny tinkling (what I call “peeing” in front of my boys). So how ’bout giving me a break once in a while?

6.  More Goals!: Dedicating 90 minutes (plus 30 minutes of overtime) to nonstop viewing means we deserve better than a 0-0 tie or 1-0 match. Make each goal count for 3 points, and create “mini-goals” by putting a midget in a bright orange/yellow jersey on the field. Hit this wee moving target with the ball and you get a point. That’s a freebie, FIFA. You’re welcome.

5. American Sports Announcers: “Such decent shots from long distance. Fabulous game play this half with astute awareness on the pitch.” What the hell is that!?!  What does it even mean!?! European sports commentators could use some lessons from us Yanks. I mean, we can make bowling sound exciting. Yell some stuff! Scream and cry! And please, don’t ever use the word “fabulous.”

4. Put Some Stats on the Screen: I bought a widescreen television for a reason: so more stuff can go on it. Soccer’s lack of onscreen stat updates means that my kickass TV displays a buncha grass with a few white or red dots running around. Golf has more visual flair! Not to mention cable news, which has a ticker at the bottom, a story timeline on the left and weather to the right — it’s enough to make you dizzy. We have the technology: let’s make it happen.

3. It’s Called a “Field”: To us Americans, a “pitch” is something that Nolan Ryan, Sandy Koufax, and Roger Clemens are really good at it. Now, I know that the term “pitch” goes back centuries for you and rest of the world agrees, but stick with us on this one. We call them fields. That’s what it is. Let’s just clear up any confusion.

2. Show Me The History: Stop telling me about the goals and games of yesteryear and how defining they were to world history — show them! I don’t know what you’re talking about when you discuss Baron Von Vechten-Walshup’s dazzling goal in the 1982 Apple Bottom Cup Finals. Hell, I don’t even know who Georgie Best is, and I couldn’t pick Pele out of a crowd in full jersey and cleats! Video! Video! Video! And if doesn’t exist, get the fine folks at EA Sports to render it in video game format — we Americans can barely tell the difference.

1. Let Them Use Their Hands: OK, bear with me now. Players can pick up and run with the ball only for five seconds. They can throw the ball into the net at this time. While they have the ball in their hands, the other players can tackle and check him. If someone gets tackled or checked, the ball changes possession. Each tackle results in what we’ll call a “Wobble Nob” against the player with the ball. Three Wobble Nobs and you are out. And that is where the midget comes back to play. The little fella then takes the place of the Wobble Nobbed player and gets to carry the ball around for the remainder of the game. Of course, the opposing players are allowed to openly tackle, check, or pick up and throw the midget as they please without penalties.

What!?!? Would that be sacrilegious or something?

As tempting as it is to want to block out the antics of the FOX cult nation, it’s terribly important that we all continue to keep an eye on them. Remember: tea baggers are like rabid chihuahuas. They may look too ridiculous to be dangerous with foam dripping from their tiny, yapping jaws, but don’t let appearances lull you into complacency. No matter how silly they may appear, large numbers of any kind of irrational, blood thirsty, dim witted animals are dangerous.

With this in mind I created Logical Fallacy Bingo! Monitoring coverage of our delusional and/or propaganda poisoned fellow ‘Mericans is scary and sad, to say the least. Logical Fallacy Bingo makes it into a lively game the whole delinquent intellectual family can enjoy. Now you can “know thy enemy,” brush up on your debate skillz and have fun all at the same time!

This link goes to the Google doc, but you should feel free to make your own cards so the entire gang can participate. I picked some of the most common fallacies for my example card, but there are plenty more to choose from. LogicalFallacies.info has a good list with clear examples, or a book that I really enjoy and reference regularly* is How to Win Every Argument: The Use and Abuse of Logic by logician and philosopher Dr. Madsen Pirie.

For prizes you could give out Aristotle t-shirts, mini busts,ball caps, etc..

* The only problem I have with this book is that many of the author is British and many of the examples are drawn from real incidents in England’s recent political history. Unless you’re a politically obsessed Anglophile you’ll have to look some things up.

That said, I do tend to stay abreast of developments in gaming. Basically, I’ve just been waiting for the day when the video game medium realizes its promise and becomes a truly interactive cinematic experience. We’re almost there. Games like Fallout III, Uncharted II, Grand Theft Auto IV and Assassin’s Creed II have considerably advanced the ball for visual detail and storytelling. And the problem of the “uncanny valley” — where human facsimiles closely resemble their real-life counterparts but are just off enough to be revolting — is certainly receding. These days, it’s more like an “uncanny pothole.”

I should mention that I own all of the aforementioned games, even if I play them very rarely. It’s not because they aren’t incredible. I just have other hobbies, like recording music, watching movies with my wife and feeding my social media addictions.

But after reading reviews of the new Sony title, Heavy Rain, I knew another purchase was imminent. Could this be the game that matches the plot and pacing of motion pictures with the dynamic interplay of video games? I had to find out.

Turns out Heavy Rain is really good, but not quite the game-changer (pun intended) that people have heralded it to be. That said, the storyline is highly engaging on an emotional level, which is something you can’t say for most titles. Not to sound sexist, but this is a product that could get more women into slick gaming platforms like the PS3. And it’s not just interesting to play, it’s entertaining to watch, too: just ask my wife, who was pulled in as if it were an A-list suspense thriller. Which in many ways, it is. When I announced my intention to fire it up again after a several-hour break, she said, “Oh good, I was hoping you’d play it again tonight.” I don’t get that with Resistance: Fall of Man. (Shit, I own more games than I thought!)

Heavy Rain is also the most depressing video game I’ve ever played. Just about all the characters are suffering a loss-induced trauma, and the ever-present rain of the title gives the entire proceedings a crestfallen quality. With a plot centered on the search for a serial child murderer, one doesn’t expect a lot of laughs. But it’s not the grim subject matter that sticks with you — it’s the punishing banalities that the characters go through in getting through the day. The simple act of opening the refrigerator becomes a study in self-reproach, as the principals wrestle with feelings of guilt and inadequacy in the face of a predatory terror they can neither contain nor cover up.

It’s also the first video game in which I’ve had to change a diaper.

The only real failing of Heavy Rain is that it sometimes feels less like a game and more like a Choose Your Own Adventure by a tortured existentialist writer. You don’t so much as “play” it as you do nudge it further down the road to despair. Yet it remains interesting because all of the choices you make affect the direction of the plot, and conceivably, the final outcome.

I say conceivably, because I have yet to make it all the way through. This isn’t for lack of addictiveness, but rather because during last evening’s session, the entire PS3 platform fell victim to a global glitch that rendered Heavy Rain unplayable. Not only does that mean no more gaming for the time being, but also no more Netflix streaming on-demand to my TV or movies downloaded from the Playstation store. For those who made fun of the many problems with Microsoft’s Xbox 360, here is your comeuppance. This is nothing short of an EPIC FAIL for rival Sony.

The glitch is a bit like that great-cataclysm-that-wasn’t, the Y2K bug. Except that this one actually happened and no one saw it coming. Apparently, the problem is with the PS3′s internal clock, which for some reason has reverted to 1999 — back when the Playstation 3 was but a twinkle in some Sony developer’s eye. Somehow, the system zapped itself to before it was born! No wonder it’s suffering an identity crisis.

It is an odd coincidence that this happened the day after I bought a new game. I can’t help but feel like maybe it was my fault. Did the PS3 sense my n00b-dom and commit digital suicide? It’s like when your parents think they broke the internet, but really the ethernet cable just came unplugged.

The powers-that-be say they’re working on a fix, and in the meantime have advised PS3 owners not to turn on their machines, lest they suffer some kind of permanent memory loss. Spooky-scary! Of course, I’m not sure exactly how we’re supposed to download a patch if we can’t take the thing online. I guess that’s up to the geniuses at Sony to figure out.

Until then, I guess it’s just Twitter and all the music in the universe to keep me entertained. Sigh.

UPDATE: looks like the worst is behind us. That was fast.

But as adults, we naturally want to reinvent our childhoods as a primary colors affair and shove all the old weird feelings (and inconvenient visions and fears and introspectiveness) back down into shadows.

Then we encounter, in say, the Daddy’s Junky Music on Mass Ave this afternoon, a picture that somehow brings it all back:

Dig little brother on the left: first off, I doubt his parents were even born before Simon & Garfunkel‘s Bookends album came out, so how the fuck he is channeling parsley, sage, rosemary & thyme from across the generations? That’s the first obvious clue that this kid is not of this dimension.

Second, just feel for a moment my little man’s approach to the whole photo session. On the one hand, Little Sally Hollywood over on the right is just jazzed to have another photo job to keep Mommy stocked with enough Ritalin to keep her child actor career on an upwardly-mobile track. She’s got that ‘curious’ look down pat; she’s already thinking down the road to her 2pm ‘glee’ gig. But on the other hand, young Malkovitch over there is going all Lee Strasberg on this shit, as if to say “Sure man, we all live in this superficial ‘Shake n’ Play’ world, but truly, what does it mean to listen?” Isn’t that what’s at the heart of all this? Isn’t that the gripping existential question that wakes us up in the middle of the night in our sweat-soaked Spongebob jammies? What are we listening for? Some elusive confirmation that yes, we do the hokey pokey and that is indeed what it’s all about? To look into his eyes is to peer into the inky bottomlessness of our own longing.

Then, shocked and shamed by his unanswerable look, we turn the box over to find this:

Holy shit: who the fuck is this kid, anyway?? And why does his Hitchcockian stare bore holes into my soul? His laser-beam eyes are blazing straight through the falsehoods of my adult life. Now his pensiveness has morphed into an indictment, his insatiable questioning has trained its focus on you. Can you truly meet his gaze, brave and unashamed?

Goddamn, I need a juice box.

Oh, hi! I hope all you sun-worshipping humans are happy. Summer is here in all its blinding, blistery, blazing glory. I think perhaps I was meant to live deep underground. I thrive in cool, dark environments. Dark… safe… yes… precious….

• Why is it okay for law enforcement and the media to make public allegations such as these against Satanists? Defamation/slander laws only apply to “normal” religions?
• Another odd mention of Satanism in the world news.
• The Devil’s Paintbrush — new fiction featuring Aleister Crowley and other Golden Dawn luminaries as characters.
• I guess I don’t understand why fortunetelling would be regulated any differently than other businesses.
• Whatcha gonna play?
• Dark, angsty, Hot Topic-y plagiarism.
• A “mass experiment into the paranormal” using Twitter
• But Facebook can be paranormal, too!

That’s all my baby bunnies. Now get off this computer and go outside to play!

I love you. Please be good to each other.

Molly

I don’t much like re-posting stuff found at Boing Boing, but I figured this was a decent compliment to Alec’s post about the giant Gundam statue. This piece was recently installed at Blizzard Entertainment’s Irvine, California headquarters and was designed by Peter Jackson‘s Weta Workshop nerds. Dig.

Some readers will likely be familiar with Hermann Hesse‘s masterwork, the Nobel Prize-winning novel The Glass Bead Game (also translated as Magister Ludi). Hesse’s novel, published in Switzerland in 1943, set forth the idea of an ongoing game played by making intellectual connections between seemingly disparate artistic or natural forms. The game takes the premise that things we perceive, such as musical chord changes, a color fade in a painting or the curve of a beautiful woman’s breast are all symbols, conveying a language that must be discovered in order to fully understand the world we perceive. Perhaps someone is able to see that the Mona Lisa‘s half-smile is speaking the same language as a serpentine melody that winds itself around an Am to Dm chord change. They have just made a play in the Glass Bead Game.

I came across an interesting article on Reality Sandwich last night, discussing the different ways in which we can see the shape of a tree in our world. The article mentions veins, computer programs, the neurological system and many other examples of natural or man-made systems or items that take the shape of a tree. It also discusses the occult meaning of trees, the history of the tree in religious belief and practice, and what we can learn from this shape.

Living alone in the woods, I know well the secrets trees can tell us. Given my choice between a party with beautiful people and a forest with beautiful trees, I will almost always choose the latter. My affection for trees aside, however, this article is interesting both for the view of the symbolism of a tree and for the fact that, in making these connections, the author, Howard Rheingold, is playing the Glass Bead Game. Give it a read, friends, and keep making those connections. One of these days one of us might just discover the secrets behind it all. . .