tennis, life and a few things in between

Someone’s just asked Woodie if he had mentors when he’s novice trader.  My novice moment came when I was learning to ski. Maybe the second or third time out, to a new resort. At the base, I saw the signs for different trails: Novice, intermediate and advance or something like that. At that time I didn’t understand the word but common sense told me I should go with novice.  It’s a busy time, long queues behind me. I had to make life or death decision as to ski Novice or not.
“Is this for beginners?” I pointed toward the sign.
The loader looked at my ill fitted costume, said, “oh sweetie, it’s right for you.”  and one push plus shovel I was out of his hair.
Hey, so cool that I was learning English even on a ski trip, :)). 
Btw, Woodie said he didn’t. The reason was simple: no one was willing to provide free advise like he does.

Budweiser – one of my favored beers – makes great commercial, consistently.  I haven’t seen a bad one so far.  The first autumn in the US, in a bar, I was in the mood for Federweisser – the German fresh young wine – so kind of jokingly asked if they have it.  “Federweisser?  No, but we have Budweiser.”  Without asking what it’s, I said “OK”.  Guess my English wasn’t good enough to distinguish F from B, :), so I had my first Bud.  It wasn’t bad at all .. and their commercial is even better; fits in well with my sense of humor anyway.  I’m not a big beer drinker, so a case of Bud can last pretty long, cause Golfer drinks those fancy brands.  So Bud is for the masses, :).  In Austria they have Storm – the red young maiden, the answer to Germany’s white Federweisser.  I miss them all.  Oh, the Apfelwine too.

I see empty seats at Wembley Stadium!  Do I need my glasses?  … OMG, baby face Eli just scored his first TD, wtg. ….  Lousy weather, bad grass – who said the grass is greener next door?  Grass is greener right here at home, :).  It’s sort of annoying to see Giants in white color.  Bring the blue back!  What is NFL thinking by picking fall in London?!?!

Dream Theater just had their concert at Wembley, don’t know if they sold out there.  They have much larger following in Europe than at home, the fans in Romania gone wild for them. Dolphins’ uniform is pretty cool – so was Dan Marino, 🙂 – so is Cowboys’, the hue, I mean.   Have few neighbors over here, got to tend to them.  Enjoy the game.

The NY Giants will play Dolphins in London this coming Sunday.  Shishe, why did it take so long for the NFL to play on the European soil?  The last time I was in Frankfurt, NFL stuff was all you see in their sporting goods stores, nothing else – blot out the sky and cover up the earth, that was 1991.  LT had since retired, but there is no shortage of giant men with thick necks (as wide as their face .. I was amused), pot bellies (seemingly so unalthletic), poppy arms (as strong as my legs) ..  They said there are 700,000 fans trying to buy a ticket to see the football, American style.  I’m anxious to see a photo op with the Queen at high tea, 300 pounders holding her Majesties’ delicate china.

33:9 in the 4th, 49er needs Joe.  They’re getting killed.  My kids told me to be quiet – jk, it’s hard, but I’ll try.  So I blog instead, 🙂  Sugar why Giants’ tickets are so difficult to get??  Pls let the guy do little thing on his own after a TD!  Nothing goes right for the 49er’s, but the coach is pretty good looking, check him out, :).

Wie’s Parents at the Center of Controversy.  Road map to ruin your kids’ career, :).  Give the girl some breathing room, will they?  I heard story about Michael Chang, the tennis one slam wonder who won French Open at a very tender age of 17.  His mom was always around.  During practice, she’d just walked onto the court and spoke to him in Chinese.  One of a very respected coach was willing to coach Michael, but only on one condition: his mom to stay away.  Apparently the Chang camp found that too hard to accept.

Giants had 3 TDs in the first half, yeeees  Go Giants.  Their defense is super aggressive.  Falcon’s QB got sacked so many times, I lost count.  Poor thing.

Next week the indoor bubble will go up.  It’s been little more than a decade that I’ve been playing with this weekend morning group.  It gradually draw on me that we’re getting older and older by the day, and just couldn’t get up early enough to show up at work as we used to.  When I first met them, every weekend, there’ll plenty players at the courts, 6:30am.  Now it’s almost 8am, the 5 courts are almost empty.

Did the light bulb just flash in my head?  Seeing Fan’s lethal handsome backhand did something for my backhand – it’s improved a lot, suddenly, 🙂 – badminton that is.  We played few very exciting sets tonight.  In the beginning, there were only Yong and I, for good 20 minutes, we sweat to death.  He asked me if tennis is more intensive, I said, no way.  Badminton is more exhaustive, 短兵相接 IMHO anyway.  Then came Fan and John.  Fan and I played against them, won relative large margin, 15:9.  Then John and I played against Michael and Yong, it’s a tough set.  We stagnated at 2 for few change overs, till 2:9 did we catch up with them, but eventually we lost 13:15.  The last set was with Fan, and we lost.  Throughout the night, as if Simon was still there, they all hit to me, the weakest link, :).  When there is too many players, we don’t get to play as much, but when few show up, we wear out early.  By 10 we all wanted to leave, except Michael, who came late.  Fan was nice, agreed to stay bit long.  The points were long and we all played very hard. … ok, I’m out .. good night.