Mmmmm, Beer....

Do you like beer? How would you like to have free beer for life? Well then, if you have any soccer skill whatsoever, I'd suggest you take a quick jaunt over to Austria and see if you can walk onto the national squad for their last 2 games.

You talk about motivation. I predict a 10 goal outburst from the Austrians during their remaining games. Acutally, the Austrian team isn't that good, but hell, now the players have absolutely NO excuse not to score in the next two games.

Euro 2008

I'm not sure how many people actually care about Euro 2008 here in the US (or even know what it is), but I'm lovin' it. For the first time ever, all the games are going to be broadcast on ESPN, in glorious high-def, so we here in the US can see it.

The Euro championship is basically a tournament just like the World Cup, except only national teams from Europe are eligible to participate. That covers just about every elite team in international soccer, save for Brazil & Argentina. It is basically the most prestigious tournament outside of the World Cup, and it only happens once every 4 years. Only 16 teams (4 groups of 4 teams) qualify for the group stage, which is what started on Saturday. I'm watching the Croatia-Austria match as I'm typing this, but I'm really looking forward to the next game involving the always powerful Germans vs. the team I'll be pulling for, the team of my motherland, Poland.

The favorites in this tournament are the usual suspects - Italy, Germany, France, Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands. I'm not gonna pretend to be an expert as to all of the teams in the tournament, though I've been following both club and international soccer pretty seriously for going on 4 years now. It's tough to follow it too closely here in the states, as none of the mainstream sports media really covers it, so you have to seek it out most of the time, through subscribing to Fox Soccer Channel, and GolTV, which show English and Spanish club soccer during the year. It's just nice to have all the games on ESPN this time around. Anyways, if you wanna read more about Euro 2008 itself, inlcuding an analysis of all the teams, I found a good summary here.

Unlike most of my friends and people I know, I love watching soccer. My dad loved playing and watching soccer, and always tried to get me interested in it. I would oblige and watch the World Cup here and there, but really, it didn't hold my interest. I first really started following it after I got a soccer game for my PS2 (Winning Eleven 7), and I got to know the names of all the teams and players. After that, I really liked watching the games on TV, because I was just more familiar with the game itself, and I knew the players and teams. Now I'm addicted to watching the English Premier League on Saturdays, and try to get in as much International soccer as I can. I do not watch the MLS. I guess it has gotten better over the years and I want it to succeed, but really the difference between watching the MLS and watching a class league like the EPL or Spain's La Liga, is like the difference between watching a high school football game and the NFL. No comparison.

Unlike most US soccer fans, I have no delusions of soccer becoming the "next big thing" here in the US. Sure the MLS has gotten bigger, but its still a 2nd or 3rd class sports league (yes, even with Beckham...). But I do think soccer is slowly and incrementally inching its way into America, and is slowly getting more and more exposure here. It will never be as big as the NFL, MLB, NBA, or even the NHL here in the US, but that's fine. It doesn't really make any difference to me if it does, b/c I'll enjoy watching it and following it either way. I'm also not trying to convert anybody into a soccer fan, but don't be surprised if you come over ot my house and I'm watching it, and then force you to watch a highlight of an awesome finish or an awesome goal from a game I have saved on my DVR....

Anyways, I hope you guys just give it a chance and watch some Euro 2008 on ESPN this month. It should be pretty good.

I will end this soccer-themed entry with a compilation of goals from my favorite player, Dimitar Berbatov, from my favorite club team, Tottenham Hotspur (located in North London). He's right below Berkman in my pecking order of man-crushes. The guy is just silky smooth on the field (the "pitch") and is just a cold-blooded finisher. Note: unless you really like techno dance music, just go ahead and mute it. I don't know why, but it seems like every goal compilation on YouTube is accompanied by some terrible techno music. I don't get it. Must be a European thing.

Karma and the Astros

It seemed like when I was posting about him, the Astros were doing well. When I went away, they cooled off. So, to not upset karma too much, here's my daily Lance Berkman photo+post. Notice the Puma-esque agility & quickness in the field.

I'll leave you with one of my favorite Berkman quotes of all time:

"In Baltimore last year I forgot how many outs there were and ran off the field. I got to the line, and I was like, Oh, my gosh, nobody's running off (the field). I immediately went to the fake knee injury. The trainer came running out and was like, 'Are you O.K.?' And I said, 'Yeah, I just forgot how many outs there were.' That was right after I came back from my knee surgery so I had a built in excuse." -- Sports Illustrated, April 2006

Attn: Nintendo DS owners

(NOTE: This headline was not just a gratuitous excuse to post a pic of Carrie Underwood - She actually is a DS Owner...)

Ok, so I know these 3 posts in rapid succession don't really make up for not posting in like 3 weeks, but hey, its my lunch hour and I'm bored.

Anyways, if you own a Nintendo DS, you really should own a R4 card (or similar type card) for it. It is truly a great invention, and for the uninformed, I'll show you guys how to get one, how to utilize it, and what it does for ya. I've done this via email for a few friends in the past, so I figured I'd just do a blog entry here so I can refer people to it in the future.

Alright, I'll try to explain this as simply as possible: Do you like playing games on your DS? Would you like to have more games to play, but don't want to pay that pesky $19.99-$39.99 for each game that Nintendo is currently charging? Would you like to have access to almost the entire library of Nintendo DS titles (plus some old school NES games) and spend a total of about 60 bucks? OK, then you will love the R4 card.


Esentially, the R4 card is an SD card that goes into the game slot of your DS. It looks just like any other game cartridge, and fits in there like any other game. You can buy one on the cheap from here. You will also need a microSD card to store the games on. You can get cheap ones from here (I got a 2GB one).


Alright, now all you have to do is decide what games you wanna put on that bad boy. You can look at this site for a list of compatible games. About 98% of all DS games are compatible (the ones highlighted in green), and they are listed in that site by release date. The ones with the (U) are the US version of the games, (J) are the Japanese games, and (E) are the European games - all 3 will work with the card, but unless you are fluent in japanese, you may want to pick the US versions.


So how do you find the games? Go to this site, and search for the game you want. You will note that they are organized and ordered on that site in the same way they are listed on the wiki compatibility list I linked to above, so they are easy to find. Once you find the game or "ROM" (the name for the file you will be downloading), then click on it, download it, and unzip the file onto your computer. Search for the file that has an ".nds" extension, as that is the only file you actually need to put on your R4 card (for example: Newsupermariobros(U).nds). You can delete all the other junk that's included in the .zip file.

Now its just a matter of putting those downloaded ROMs (the files with the .nds extension) onto your R4 card. You do that by copying them onto your microSD card. Just plug the microSD card into the USB adapter that came with your R4, plug it into the USB port of your computer (it should appear as just another "storage device" on your My Computer screen), create a folder to put your games (i.e. "NDS games"), then copy your ROMs into that folder. That's it.

Then slide the microSD card into the little slot on top of your R4, put the R4 into your Nintendo DS, turn it on (it should boot up to a different screen than usual), select the game you want to play, and voila!!!!!! Enjoy!!!

You can also put mp3 music files on the R4 card that will play on your DS, and you can download a Nintendo "emulator" that will play old school Nintendo games. More instructions on how to do that in a later post, or you can email me.

Congrats, you're now an R4 user!!!

C V C II

CVC II - June 14, 2008.

If you don't know, you betta' acks somebody!!!

Astros Update

So, I haven't posted for awhile, because I've been to busy/lazy/apathetic/pick an excuse.

However, to update on the Astros, they continued to do pretty well for a few games after my last post, then the hitting went away. After a great Game 1 vs. the Cardinals to start a long road trip 2 weeks back, they pretty much went in the tank and lost 8 of the next 9 games. Berkman's still doing well, but the offense is anemic overall. Scored more than 3 runs exactly ZERO times in the last 8 games.

It's been maddeningly frustrating, and I've had to utilize the handy Stress Reducer pictured above far too much recently.

Start a series vs. the Cards in Houston tonight. I'm expecting the Cards to win the series 2-1 (again....). Prove me wrong, fellas!!

More updates to come....