Pile-Up

So even more football games to play now, thanks to the barely believable events of this afternoon/evening at Valley Parade. This post might well get edited into a longer one once all the thoughts stop swirling around. My thoughts on the game: they did very very well in the first half, were a threat when they attacked, they passed the ball well. It didn't look like a fourth division side against a top flight team. The two Arsenal centre-backs had a very shaky half and the front two of Hanson and Wells were brilliant at holding the ball up and giving the midfield and defence a rest.

The second half started much the same way, and it was only when Wells was replaced with the much slower Connell that the ball started to come back every thirty seconds. Even then, Arsenal didn't create that many goalscoring chances until the last ten minutes when the home side visibly tired. The goal was probably deserved from a territorial advantage point of view, but not from chances created. Extra time was just a case of holding on, which they did with a bit of help from the crossbar, which is probably still shaking now. The run in shootouts continued on its inexplicably merry way.

Thoughts on Arsenal. They're now a pale, pale shadow of the 'invincibles' team, and Wenger is now firmly in Liverpool-era Gerard Houllier territory: team full of dead-wood imports from France who aren't anywhere near the level of players they replaced. Gervinho played like he'd won a competition to play with the stars for a day. Podolski was utterly, utterly anonymous. Do Arsenal want to win things, or pay off the stadium? Looks like they're happy to do the latter.

Practice

Christmas has sort of snuck up on me this year. Though the plan has been for several months to go back home for a couple of weeks (and the tickets were booked in June), the fact that work's been a bit of a slog of late has meant that I've not paid it much attention till the weekend. So for another year, my sorry excuse for a tree is up, and there was a christmas house party at one of my labmates houses on Saturday night, complete with one of these. It was delicious, but the strength of the absurdly strong (75% by volume) rum was only partially diluted by the wine. Terrible headache yesterday.

The journal article that I've been working on is nearly done and I'll send that off to the boss man at the end of the week. It'll almost certainly be the last one ever. And to round off the week, it's the lab Christmas party at the boss man's house on Saturday evening, so as per usual it's a 'pot luck' style affair, that's to say you bring something with you. Only rule is you have to make it yourself, and not cheat and buy it from the supermarket and pass it off as your own. I decided that this year I'd do mince pies and so tonight was a trial run. Great success as it turned out. They are - if I say so myself - very very nice. Will make some more batches later on in the week. I've just got to make sure I don't eat them all...

Pile-up: The Revenge

So we don't have to worry about the Bantams adding to their number of games through further additional cup ties, given that they were, er, kicked out of the FA Cup today for fielding an apparently ineligible Curtis Good (on loan from Newcastle) in the game against Brentford last Friday. It's funny, because if this had happened in any other season, there would be all manner of abuse about being amateurish/incompetent being hurled at the club from the fanbase, but coming as it does four days before a glamour tie with Arsenal and amid a fixture backlog, nobody seems all that bothered.

Still unbeaten in Cup competition, though.

Austerity

I'm glad call-me-Dave and his never-worked-in-the-financial-industry-ever mate are treating their not meeting their austerity targets with the gravitas one would expect of people in their position.

Man who has no practical experience of economics is struggling to right the ship? Who knew?

Pile-up

Last night's home draw with Brentford in the FA Cup means that there'll be yet another game for the Bantams to schedule before Christmas. From mid September to New Year's Day, they'll have had exactly two midweeks free of games. This is a combination of a) the number of cup games they've been involved in; b) the season starting two weeks later than normal because of the Olympics, and ending a week sooner because Wembley is needed for the Champion's League final on the day the Fourth Division play-off final is usually played; and c) the fact midweek games have generally been moved from the winter to the autumn in light of the last few bad winters and mass postponements.

That four of the games have gone to extra time - and potentially a fifth - means that the game on December 29th against Rochdale will be the equivalent of a 38th game of the season. That's a whole Premier League season, in half the time available. It looks highly likely that if they're involved in the playoffs, they'll be into the realm of playing 60 games, before any potential further advance in cup matches is is considered. With a small squad, already robbed of three central defenders through very serious injuries, that's a big ask.

Odd thing is, I was looking back at the 1995-96 season on Soccerbase to check on something I put on twitter related to the sacking of the Micky Mellon below. That season, we played.......60 games. The normal 46 in the league, six in the league cup (in the days of two legged ties), three in the FA cup, two in whatever the Johnstone's Paint Trophy was called at the time*, and three in the playoffs. But I don't remember that season as overly fixture congested. Of course, the playoffs extended the season to the last weekend in May, which might have something to do with it.

We still have some way to go to match Stockport's season a year later. In the 1996-97, they played 67 (!) games: 46 in the league; 11 in the league cup where they reached the semi-final; 4 in the FA Cup, and 6 in the Auto Windscreen Shield where they lost the two-legged northern final.

* Wikipedia tells me they were eliminated by the drawing of lots - trust something as weird as that to happen to them - after a three team group between themselves, Carlisle and Doncaster resulted in three 1-1 draws and all sides having an equal record. Further advance would have added even more games to the total.

Expectations

Aldershot knocked Fleetwood Town out of the FA Cup this afternoon. On the face of it, a bit of a shock, given the former's 23rd place in the league, compared with the latter's budget and Blue Square Premier title not six months ago. The magic of the FA Cup, upsets and all that. The outcome? Fleetwood summarily fired manager Micky Mellon, for the heinous crime of losing three games in row and being seventh in the league.

I took a wander to the Fleetwood Town forum when I heard the news. I reckoned they'd be appalled at losing the manager who'd taken them from the Blue Square North - essentially the sixth tier of English football - to a level they'd never, ever played at. I was wrong. "Taken us as far as he can". "Thank f*ck for that". "Six games too late". Expectations are seemingly that with a wealthy backer, they should sweep all before them in vicarious, entertaining fashion. The great thing about sport in general is that it doesn't work like that. At least at lower levels. The Premier League long since stopped being competitive*

"Dream job for the right person", opined one poster**. Until it all falls apart, Gretna/Grays Athletic style as attendances don't rise to cover the cost of the vastly inflated wage bill.

* Of course, the coincidence that this should happen in the same week that Chelsea's sacking of their manager (six months removed from a European title) has spectacularly blown up in their face isn't lost on me.

** Someone wanted Peter Taylor. I laughed, hard.

Customer Service

A picture says a thousand words. Annoyed ones. Well done to my new TV company in getting yourself into my bad books quite a lot faster than my previous supplier did. Read up from the bottom.

 

 

Internet Dating: 2

So while we're in generally grumpy mood, let's carry on. 

I'm now three months into internet dating. I should have the next three months' charge deducted from my credit card in that time I think. As of right now, my profile has been viewed 1111 times by 309 different people. The number of people that that's manifested itself into dates: 6. Number of dates total: 8 (coffee 3, drinks 4, brunch 1 if you're that interested)l Now I haven't met any complete crazies yet, they've all been perfectly nice and civil and so on (they're Canadian, of course they're civil), but I don't really think I'm getting much of a return on my investment so far

Of the six people, only one (person number three) have I thought there and then "yes, she's really girlfriend material". And she liked me, I could tell. There was general flirting and backchat on a daily basis. And things went pretty well for three weeks but it's a long story to descibe the state of play right now (ex lurking in the distance is the short version).

There are a lot of things that I find odd, the fact that some people just disappear if you don't ask them out within two or three messages, there are people that don't put current photos of themselves up (three of the six people I've dated could be accused of this to some degree). That's not being honest with people straight off the bat. There are people who don't have any photos at all.

It's all just a bit...odd.

Impressions

The post below comes on the heels of the frankly ridiculous interview I had ten days ago at a company. To recap, they wanted a research team leader/lab manager. They wanted someone with a PhD (yay, that's me! They want a Ph.D!). I applied in early October, and got an email about three weeks ago asking me if I could come for an interview. I said I could, and then two weeks ago today the company's HR rang me up first thing in the morning, and asked me if I could chat for a bit whereupon I got a bit of a grilling on the phone. A bit sneaky to do that, but that was probably the point, to catch me off guard.

I go to the place ten days ago having done the usual research about the company, prepared answers for standard questions, hair cut, ironed shirt, clean shoes, etc etc etc. I spent $50 on a taxi to get there in good time rather than risk public transport. When I arrive there's noone there to greet me. Eventually, a harassed-looking woman comes out of the office whose name on the door is the same person that invited me for interview. She was still on the phone, and motions me to a room where I am parked at a desk and asked to fill out a variety of blank sheets of paper containing interview-type questions. Lots and lots and lots of them. Including most, if not all of the ones I answered on the phone. The spaces aren't big enough to write coherent answers. After an hour of this, sitting in a room talking to nobody, like I'm back in school writing my GCSEs or something, she comes back in to ask me a few questions about my resume and clarify a couple of points, that were - frankly - crystal clear to begin with. There was then a bit of talking at me in a heavy, stilted Romanian accent where I could barely understand her and she certainly couldn't understand my Yorkshire accent. At no time did she even look at the answers I wrote, or the transcript of the phone interview she brought in with here. Why even bother making me do them, then? There was then a two-and-a-quarter hour journey home on crowded, rush hour public transport.

First impressions work both ways. I might well have come across as bewildered and inarticulate on this particular occasion, but I think I had good reason to be. Because to be blunt, everything from beginning to end on that afternoon was amateurish and unprofessional on their part. Why spend the time and money to go there looking a million dollars and informed on their products, business and so on when I spend an hour sat in a room  not talking to anyone at all?

So from the post below, the Ph.D. got me in the door this time. But to a company that appeared, in footballing terminology, a fourth division outfit. If this is the best I'm going to get, interest wise, is it just better to pack this malarky in after however many years and do something else. Beginning to strongly suspect that's going to have to be the way. But to do what? That's the million dollar question.

Persistence

There's a scene in The Shawshank Redemption where the central character has been trying - and failing - to refurbish the prison library. He writes a letter a week to the state prison board, and eventually after a couple of years, a couple of lorry loads of books arrive. Persistence pays off. This came to mind today after I saw a sixth job advertised from a local chemical/drilling fluid company inside the calendar year that I could reasonably expect to apply for.

My cover letters to them have become ever more explicit that I'm perfectly willing and able to accept an entry level position to gain experience in the area. Coincidentally, today there was a talk given by a member of the chemical association of Alberta (or somesuch name) today, who also brought with him another person from said chemical company I've been banging my head against a wall with. I'd thought about going but got waylaid by something work wise. One of the students in the lab went to it and there was a bit of a chat about it afterwards. 

I joked "maybe I should have gone, asked him if there's any point me applying for a sixth time when they've seemingly ignored me five times already". Whereupon he remarked "yeah, he was saying that people with graduate degrees are viewed as something of a liability since they have to be retrained". So I think it fair to say I'm probably wasting my time again. Disheartening news.

Tuesdays

A long time ago, in a chemistry lab far, far away, Tuesday was regarded as something of an unlucky sort of a day. An "if it can go wrong, it will" sort of day. This was due in part to the lab next door having accidents and fires and things. It became folklore almost; "don't do that today, it's Tuesday".

So today was a nice for lots of potentially good things happening. First up, notification of a job interview I have next Wednesday afternoon. At last, after a ridiculous number of applications sent, something to demonstrate I am still apparently vaguely employable and my alterations to my resume and cover letters were actually useful.

Secondly, that the announcement that George Lucas had sold his LucasFilm company to the Disney Corporation would mean a Star Wars: Episode VII (and probably VIII and IX at least) and a chance to expunge the memory of two-and-a-half very bad films for half of a good one. Yoda vs the Emperor was worth it, but only just. It'll be interesting to see what they do to re-cast the principal roles of the original trilogy, being as the twins are in their sixties and Harrison Ford is now 70. It's also promising that Lucas will apparently only be 'creative consultant', rather than directly involved, since it hasn't gone without notice in the movie going world that the best film of all six (The Empire Strikes Back) was the one he was least involved in.

And then the main event of the day, another cup win for BCFC. I am on record on one football forum today as to speculate "we might get tonked this evening", given we were without both centre backs injured, players cup-tied, suspended, and coming back from injury. And the team looked, politely, a bit cobbled together. But having listened to it all it sounds like they defended superbly, and their new-found invincibility in shootouts (seven wins in a row dating back to 2009-10) is as welcome as it is inexplicable. I just hope that tonight can serve as a tipping point to get the momentum going back the other way after twelve years of things getting ever worse.

Incoming...

So last week's dusting of snow, and Saturday's slight covering were both just the curtain raiser for tonight's first real blast of winter.

I hope this isn't a sign of things to come. The last time we had a heavy snowfall this early in the season (2009 I think it was), it went on like this until the end of April.

Better dig the winter boots out for tomorrow I suppose.

Dating Websites

So some of you out there know I've been doing interweb dating now for the last couple of months, thus making good on at least one of my New Year's Resolutions, 2009 (!) Better late than never, I suppose. It's an interesting escapade, that really warrants a longer post about the ins and outs, apparent rules of the game, my own 'rules' and so on, but what's really prompted this post is the fact that the first person that ever contacted me just appeared on my television set on the local evening news!

When I sent my profile live, I hadn't at that point stumped up any cash. Write your own Yorkshiremen jokes. Overnight, I had an email from someone which I couldn't read until I paid. I thought this a bit suspicious, especially since that when I did, that profile was 'hidden'. I replied and didn't hear anything for a few days, entrenching the opinion that it was a website-generated ploy to part me with my cash. Maybe four or five days later she emailed me back, we exchanged messages back and forth for a couple of days but then she disappeared into thin air again, never to contact me again (I had sent the last message, asking what she did, of all things).. She periodically reappeared on the site - you can see when people are online - but never reestablished contact. Tonight, she was there again, but had more than one photo. I just look at her profile again out of curiosity, we'll call her S. She'd initially replied to my jokes about my inability to skate, since she'd been a competitive figure skater as a child at the provincial level in BC. She mentioned she'd moved around the country a lot with work.

She'd uploaded some more photos. And as I'm looking at one, she appears on screen, sat in the newsroom of the local CBC station on the late night news, presenting a piece to camera. Her first name? 'S'. "Isn't that....?" A quick google of her name yields me her twitter, her facebook, her LinkedIn page (which confirmed pretty much everything she'd told me in her emails to me), her CBC biography page and two of the exact same photos she's using on her profile. I realise this could almost be construed as a bit stalker-ish, but what a bizarre coincidence. I suppose, in hindsight, that's why her profile was hidden.

I make that three members of the local TV news media on the same website I am. Lots and lots of teachers, and statistically significant portion of the female local news people under 35.

Progress

They're only working on the third (left) and second (right) floors out of sixteen, but I'm already on the brink of losing the view of Nose Hill I've had for the last four-and-a-half years.

Power

My English colleague at work is emigrating to Australia in two-and-a-bit weeks, joining up with his Aussie wife and anglo/canadian/aussie daughter who moved over there a couple of weeks ago. He's been slowly disposing of the unwanted/unneeded contents of their home for the last few weeks. Last night he delivered his vacuum cleaner to me to buy from him. I'd long since grown very tired of the one that I found in the lunch room at work, dumped by one of my predecessors because, to be honest, it wasn't very good. One of those ones that just has a long plastic pipe and the suction power provided by a hamster spinning in a wheel inside. Last night I had some sort of household chore epiphany; the new device you can see on the right is powerful beyond words, such that one lap of the Beige Towers carpet pretty much filled the bucket. It was almost enjoyable. Another lesson learnt. Sometimes, it's much better to buy a proper piece of equipment than try and cheap out on something far inferior.

Playoff Time

Wednesday night saw the last of our regular season games for the summer outdoor season. After the complete collapse in form that saw us finish seventh of eight in the Spring season, after a run of six defeats on the bounce culminating in Sunday afternoon practices* how would we do in the summer season? Answer, a lot lot better, as shown in the league table on the right.

This time, we were able to score a lot more goals than in the Spring, despite losing two or three players to fairly long term injuries. It also helped that we could keep our female contingent numerous, such that they didn't have to play whole games, with the exception of the nutty 6-5 win against KAM United where we played the whole game a player short. I kept the ridiculous goals against to a minimum (the first one against on Wednesday night a case in point. Dear oh dear), and achieved my aim of a goals per game against of less than two. Playoffs for the chance to have our photo taken with a plastic knock-off of the World Cup begin next week. No expense spared, that really would be the reward for twelve weeks battling the sun, high winds and ever shortening daylight.

*practice is really a euphemism for having four or five footballs shot at me very hard for two hours on a rock hard school playing field. It hurts

Locked Out

Tonight should have been the Calgary Flames first preseason games before the hockey season began on October 11th. As it stands, the season won't start on time due to the current lack of collective bargaining agreement required between the players union and the league/team owners. Deadspin has a useful article on the reasons for the dispute for those not familiar with the situation.

Hopefully, they get things sorted out such that the season starts at American thanksgiving, or Christmas or something, since otherwise it'll rob me of the chance of me taking all my colleagues' money in the work hockey pool....

Cup of Cheer

So to carry on from the post below, yet another win for the Bantams this afternoon (or evening, depending where you live). An eighth win from eleven games, and a fourth in a row. It's all very.....disorientating. It speaks volumes for the character they seem to have in the building that they can shrug off an apparently very harsh 2-0 deficit and come back in the closing stages. By my reckoning, that's still only the fourth or fifth time they've come from 2-0 down to win a game in more than 20 years. Winning breeds confidence which breeds more wins.

I have two wishes: firstly, that they are finally rewarded with a plum tie in the fourth round against a top team where they can get some exposure and make some money. And secondly, that they didn't put so much into tonight's game - they rested six players, but Hanson, Wells and Reid still ended up playing an hour - that they come out flat on Saturday in front of some of an expectant crowd. There have been too many games like that down the years. That game will, I think, tell us a lot more about the season to come.

Moan Free Zone

There's a long way to go in the new football season, for sure, but it's a promising beginning thus far for the (once) mighty Bantams. Four home wins on the bounce from the start of a season for the first time since 1957, two wins away from home against teams in higher divisions in cup competitions, merciless dispatch of sides we usually struggle terribly against at home. Fifth in the league and a very winnable home tie in the third round of the league cup next week with the chance of a big payday at a big name. It's all very........disorientating to not have things to moan about.

New Toy

A couple of weeks ago, I changed TV/telephone/internet supplier, fed up as I was with the bill going up every three months since February 2011. After doing some due diligence, I changed from my old company to their major competitor, who could offer me exactly the same service, a free rental personal video recorder (like a Sky+ box), and a free rental tablet computer. 

I'd always wondered what the point of the latter were, and just why there'd be a need for something between laptop and smartphone. But it was free, It arrived in the post on Tuesday, and it's - to borrow a phrase - amazeballs. The quality of picture and sound coming from it is tremendous. It's a fraction of the weight of a laptop, and smaller. It's going to make the trip home at Christmas so much less of a pain, not having to carry a laptop bag, as well as a heavy laptop. 

It did make me laugh when I remembered what I was told on the phone when I rang up to cancel my old supplier. "If it seems too good to be true, it usually is", said the woman on the phone. Wrong!

Not This Year, I Didn't

Note to American gun nuts. When a person approaches you in Nose Hill Park, and asks you, during Stampede "have you been to the Stampede?", he is not trying to mug you, he's being pleasant. It's what Canadians do. Ridicule on the internet will ensue.

Better Late Than Never

And so here we are.

The very last Permanent Residence post. On the 647th day since I sent my application materials, the little bit of plastic that allows me back into the country unhindered has finally landed. Three weeks to the day since my new set of photographs arrived in Sydney (Nova Scotia*), I get another one of the jazzy holographic cards that seem to be so beloved of Canadian organs of state.

Yes, I should probably look a little more cheerful about the whole thing. But it's still a more cheerful pose than the sour-faced misery who landed me in the airport.

* for the avoidance of confusion of at least one of you out there

The Best Laid Plans

Today saw disgruntled, stagnating forward Rick Nash traded from the Columbus Blue Jackets (yes, that's really their name) to the New York Rangers. Arguably the best performer on the Canadian team in the gold medal game at the 2010 Winter Olympics, the perennial 30+ goalscorer finally grew fed up of an organisation seemingly incapable of building a team around him.

The trade wasn't really a surprise, it had been coming, but the amusement in Calgary today stems from one of the players sent to Columbus in exchange. Swedish defender Tim Erixon was the Flames' first round pick in the 2009 draft. He spent two whole years not signing a contract whilst starring in the Swedish league against men as a teenager. When the deadline for contract signing came, he proffered a list of really very flimsy excuses why he didn't want to sign. One of which was that he'd not get in the team in Calgary. He was actually born in upstate New York since his dad Jan played for the Rangers in the 1990s. How convenient it was when the Ranger$ came calling the day before the deadline, "we hear he hasn't signed yet. Do you want to trade his rights?". Very convenient. 

The Flames obtained young Czech forward Roman Horak and two second round draft picks in return. About the best that could be done in the circumstances. Fast forward a year. Erixon spent most of the season in the Rangers' minor league side (I thought he didn't want to play in the minor leagues?) and is now no-longer wanted by the team he seemingly connived to join, and parcelled off to arguably the worst team in the NHL, far from the bright lights of Manhattan and his dubiously-engineered dream. As someone remarked on twitter, "Tim Erixon learnt a hard lesson about the business today"

Canada Day

Card

I'm now well past the 600 day mark in the permanent residence escapade, and it's still not completely finished. I should have received my Permanent Resident Card about two months after I landed. The front page of the document on the left (the Confirmation of Permanent Residence I was sent in March) was surrendered in the airport when I landed in March, and was sent to Sydney, Nova Scotia to a processing centre; from that form, the card should have been produced. And so when the processing time came and went, and even allowing for public holidays and postal delays, I tried to get some information out of a call centre.

After being repeatedly cut off, I managed to get out of them that they hadn't even begun to process it yet, and to wait some more. Two more weeks passed and still nothing, so again, about thirty attempts to get into the queue for the call centre, before they told me the photos had been rejected as unsuitable. First question: why did Los Angeles accept them as OK, given I followed the instructions they sent. Second: why did the form sit in a pile in Sydney for three months before they decided they were unsuitable? Couldn't they be pre-screened on arrival? I was told there was a letter on the way and that would tell me what to do. That got here Wednesday, telling me to have new photos taken and send them back along with the enclosed form. Did that this morning, and they're now in the post. Hopefully, this time, they're acceptable, because my desk drawer will soon be overflowing with the spares if I have to have more taken.......

Canada Day: The Day Before

Today being June 30th, it's the final day of NHL players expiring contracts. The Flames had a lot of players out of contract this year and it was widely assumed that on the back of a third year in a row out of the playoffs, most of them would be on their way. Yesterday, though, they re-signed Cory Sarich, Lee Stempniak and Blake Comeau. I think this caught a few people a little off guard, especially in light of the acquisition via trade of Washington's Dennis Wideman on Thursday afternoon. Pictured on the right, with a little help from Capgeek is the 2012-13 Flames as they stand in my eyes. I've made Matt Stajan and Anton Babchuk, and their combined $6m salary disappear. If they could actually do that, they've roughly $11m to spend tomorrow on one player. That's a fairly hefty amount to go whale hunting for the big ticket forwards that are out of contract. They'd have to heftily overpay to get their man (see Wideman's new $5.2m per year salary) since Calgary is not at the top of free agents lists of places to come and play, which is stupid since it's a lovely (if a bit pricy) place to live. So far, the major casualty of the offseason appears to be Olli Jokinen. The first time they traded for him, it pretty much set the wheels in motion for the team of 2008-9 to completely run aground, and end up in the lack of postseason action we've noticed in the last three years. The trade to get rid of him landed them with the useless Ales Kotalik (banished to Buffalo), and then two years ago they shocked the world by signing Olli back again. His second stint was much more productive; his lower salary lowered expectations, but there was no middle ground among the support when he arose in conversation. Whereever he ends up, he is a boon for GIF makers.

Three Letters

I've written before about the TV programme, The Thick Of It, the BBC satire of  all things New Labour, and its central character Malcolm Tucker: a thinly-veiled caricature of former Blair press secretary Alastair Campbell. 

Tucker's creator, Armando Iannucci was awarded an OBE yesterday in the Queen's birthday honours list. Campbell, perhaps unwisely, decided to poke the metaphorical bear on twitter and got made something of a fool of.

As put downs go, concise, and straight to the point.

Hangovers

The rehabilitation of my duffed ankle/leg has continued over the last few weeks with the recommencement of outdoor football. This year, we're playing in an 8-a-side league with proper referees and nets and all that jazz. I'd felt reasonably good about playing indoors by the end of the season, but knew that outdoors would be a whole different kettle of fish. There's so much more ground to cover, and a bigger target to defend. And it would involve jumping in the air, which is how I did myself in in the first place. 

And it'd be fair to say the first two or three weeks were a bit of a struggle, mobility wise, culminating in probably the worst 20-30 minutes of football I think I've ever played in the third game. Which was odd since I'd done OK in the first 15-20 minutes, but then I completely lost all bearing of where the net was behind me, and let four goals in in rapid fire before half-time. And then, into the second half, the straw that broke the camel's back: a fifth where I let a shot roll wide - or so I thought - when it actually ended up in the net again. I'm more embarrassed about the shirt and glove throwing fit that followed, storming out of the game at 5-0 down than my actual play. It was the anniversary of the accident, and I don't think in hindsight my head was in the right place. The pitch was rock hard, I was bothered about diving, but they're flimsy excuses. Like a lot of things with me, it's mostly between the ears and sometimes I need a bit of a kick in the rear to get things going. I actually threatened on twitter to pack playing in goal in.

I talked myself out of packing it in, and in the last three games I've felt much better. I didn't play in week five due to a work-related conference dinner, but I'm now able to move more freely. I run in slow motion now, but at least I can run. I'm wearing even more body armour than I was before, which perhaps gives me a bit more peace of mind. I know where the net is again; or at least I know a bit better where it is. I don't slide in to gather the ball or kick it away from the on-rushing forward thinking "don't get hurt" but much more "be assertive, be aggressive, get there first"*. Thinking "don't get hurt" affects the performance too much. We only play for fun, but it's still not a fun feeling when you perceive yourself to be letting the others down through being too passive or cautious. So, in a funny sort of way, I'm looking forward to game ten, when I try and set the record straight against the side I made myself look repeatedly stupid.

* I realise at least one of you out there will not approve of such a statement.

Sarcasm

I think this is now the third full week in the lab since the move was done and dusted. Just about everything now has a place, and most problems have been solved. An inevitability about working in a large group is that equipment breaks fairly quickly. So we've now found a spot in the lab for the broken equipment. And it looks like someone's been feeling a bit sarcastic about their life in academic research....

Windows

I like having windows at work again. It's so much more......agreeable.

Tornado

That purple and red splodge towards the bottom right of the map is a tornado that touched down just south of Taber, AB (about 120 miles away) and is still moving northwestwards. The city of Calgary just got put under severe thunderstorm watch; tornados this far north are a rare thing, but just another demonstration of the weather we get out here.

Advertising

This is probably one of the least consequential things I've ever written about on here, but there are no more immigration worries to write about and work is nicely moving in the right direction. A chain restaurant, Boston Pizza, is heavily promoting its new "all meat wings", and has been for some weeks now.

Chicken wings are a popular snack in pubs, particularly on a Wednesday night when you can get them for 25 cents each in just about any pub in continental North America. Eating wings is dirty, messy work, grease and oil and sauce all over your hands and face and so on. There was a fun evening two weeks ago after football in a pub on wing night.

 All meat wings are supposed to be some advance on this front, you don't have to gnaw away on bones and so on. Except, they admit on the bottom of the screen "made with chicken breast meat", i.e. they're actually really chicken nuggets. Yet we get the irritating man in the sharp suit telling us every ten minutes (because that's how often adverts are on), WE INVENTED ALL MEAT WINGS. HOW CLEVER ARE WE?! But they're not wings. Do Boston Pizza think we're all stupid?

"Football? Bloody hell!"

[3:09 pm I've edited the post to remove a paragraph that's probably a separate entry entirely]

The quote in the title is from Sir Alex Ferguson, Manchester United manager, in the immediate aftermath of the 1999 Champions League final against Bayern Munich. I've included the footage especially for L***s U****d fans that might have missed it. United, second best throughout the game to a technically superior opponent, and having had two shots against their woodwork in the last five minutes, scored twice in injury time to win 2-1 and complete the treble. Complete smash-and-grab. It's a well worn cliche, but what goes around, comes around. A long time later, in this case, but in what dramatic fashion.

Manchester United and Manchester City were both tied on points going into today's final games of the Premier League season. The rest of the field have been also rans for some months now. Manchester City had a better goal difference, largely down to a 6-1 win at Old Trafford in September, and so led the table. Manchester City - unbeaten at home in 17 months, 17 wins and 1 draw at home this season - had, on paper, a cakewalk of a game against relegation-threatened QPR. Manchester United had a tricky away game at Sunderland. Yet there was always the chance that Manchester City would revert to type; that loveable loser who had turned the freakish tragi-comic pratfall into an art form down the years. United went ahead fairly early on and weren't in serious danger of losing their game. City had almost all of the ball as QPR "parked the bus", but contrived to do very little with it until a shot from full-back Pablo Zabaleta went through both hands of Paddy Kenny and into the net. Imagine, a blunder from a former Bradford Park Avenue player deciding the league title. 

With the news that Bolton took a lead at Stoke early in the second half, QPR had to come out and try and salvage something from the game since they were now in the drop zone themselves. A terrible defensive lapse from (a probably bored) Joleon Lescott let in Djibril Cisse for an equaliser. They had half an hour to hang on. Whereupon almost immediately Joey Barton swung an elbow - evidently in retaliation - at Carlos Tevez and was sent off, and could have had himself a couple more red cards as he left the field. His career in English football should be finished after today; no amount of philospher-king pronouncements on twitter can hide the fact that he's a sandwich short of a picnic. He could have cost his side his league place. Inconceivably, five minutes later QPR were ahead when a one man break down the left saw a hopeful cross thrown high to the second post, where Lescott was again completely asleep. A beautiful arrive behind him from Jamie Mackie buried it and gave a 2-1 lead to the ten-man visitors. This would be one of the biggest sporting chokes I think I can ever remember. Cue lots of noise from the United supporters in the Ship. People watching in the Ship on days like today is brilliant.

QPR parked the bus again. And it looked like it was going to work; City didn't once put a good ball into the penalty area in the remaining 25 minutes, ignoring that they didn't have anyone capable of winning it in the air. City's desperation was such that they threw Balotelli on, about three weeks after it was widely pronounced he'd never play for them again. And then in the second minute of five minutes of injury time, sub Dzeko headed in a corner from almost on the goalline, from the first cross of any quality. There were still three minutes left, and almost straight from the kickoff, City scored again: broken play on the edge of the area, Aguero took posession and drove towards goal. The QPR left-back dived in, opened the way for Aguero to get a clear shot at goal, and he buried it. Cue bedlam from the blue-clad half of the Ship. Haven't seen many of them in there before. To be clear: I have no real interest in who wins the Premier League. Unless it's BCFC, but the chances of that are, er, slim, unless one of George Galloway's mystery Arabian businessmen friends take over. All I want from my weekend mornings in the Ship are a cooked breakfast, and to be entertained, whether it's the game, the people, or both. And you couldn't argue it wasn't entertaining.

On the day, was justice done? Hard to say. QPR were so lacking in ambition in the first half, I'd be mighty annoyed if that was my side on a do-or-die sort of day. But their defensive performance in the second half for 35 minutes with a man down was superb. They gave City the wide areas of the pitch and took away the middle; City had no striker capable of winning the ball in the air till Dzeko came on, and no midfielder capable of crossing the ball. But over the course of the season, they probably deserved it; they were the best side in the league up until the New Year. City will be accused of "buying the league", but since the dawn of the Premier League era, that's pretty much the case every year; United's team today cost about the same as City's did. United won the league almost by default last year with no worthy challenger. This year looked different for about a month, culminating in that 8-2 demolition of Arsenal in September, but that looks to have been something of a false dawn. This is the weakest Manchester United squad in a generation. Think of their treble winning team of 1999: Schmeichel; G Neville, Stam, Johnsen/Berg, Irwin; Beckham, Keane, Scholes, Giggs; Yorke, Cole with P Neville, Butt, Sheringham, Solskjaer and others on the bench. How many of the 2012 vintage gets in the 1999 side? Or the 1994 side? Rooney alone, probably. It bodes ill for the competition at large that while City have so much money to spend, United are at best, in transition, Chelsea are now way past their prime and this year's Liverpool are possibly the worst they've been since the late 1950s. 

Twitter was full of "that's why it's the best league in the world". Depends what you mean by "best". Spectacle? Almost certainly. Technical ability? Patently not. All five goals today stemmed from some sort of defensive error, some of the level that our Wednesday team might mock if we committed them. Today was, though, an illustration about just what's so good about the beautiful game; wild swings in momentum, sides turning the game on its head out of nothing, and moments of high drama. Almost certainly, this was the latest in the season that a title has ever been decided. Even later than the famous Liverpool-Arsenal game in 1989. The "oh, soccer [rolls eyes], 0-0 draws all the time, booooring" meme is as inaccurate as it is lazy.

In the end, a team so well known for its ability to conjure wins out of added time at the end of the game was denied by the team across town doing the same thing. But don't be disheartened United fans; you've still some way to go to get to BCFC levels of losing games in the last minute. Somewhere, though, Oliver Kahn, Carsten Jancker, Sami Kuffour and the rest of the Bayern players denied in 1999 are probably having a quiet grin to themselves about what happened today.

Ooh, Shiny

My chemicals that I've been waiting for at work finally got to me on Tuesday, a mere 18 days after I ordered them thanks to the idiots in the university central purchasing office. The last three days have been lots of running around trying to get things going, which is going to end almost as soon as it begins as we start the move to the shiny new building on Monday. It was fun today to isolate a brand new compound, the third step of eight on the road to the molecules my boss wants me to make. Even though it's still a relatively unremarkable thing, it's still never been made before. It's still fun to make and discover things.

Today was essentially the last day we could work in the lab, and there's been lots of disposing of unwanted samples and junk. Despite the fact I've walked past the building site that became the new building twice a day for four years, I only got to see inside on Monday afternoon when six of us had to go and move the new lab freezer off the pallet it was delivered on. It makes a nice change to have to go upstairs into a workspace with windows. 

The building is only half-finished inside (which puzzles me since the building has been topped out for almost two years now), and there are lots of issues that we'll have to work through. Currently there's no office, and nowhere to eat our lunch. Until today there weren't even locks on the doors. There's a picture of the new lab above left. I think we're all a bit nervous about being the first one to drop something or make a really brightly coloured mess. It's nice and large, has a nice high ceiling and a view of most of the northwest of the city, and the mountains beyond. Windows! Here's a view out of the window. When I first moved into Beige Towers, I didn't think it possible to live any closer to work. Now, of course, it's about half as far. As someone remarked to me on Monday, "you could zip-line home". 

Just how long I get to work in this shiny new lab remains to be seen; on Tuesday afternoon I was invited to a job interview for a research position at a company that services the oil and gas drilling industry two weeks today. It looks - from a brief bit of resarch on the internet - to be very, very different work, but I think that's a good thing. I'm happiest when I'm learning about things, and I think that while there's always new chemistry to learn in the job I've done for the last 13 years, there hasn't been anything new in the way of techniques or processes learnt for a very long time. A change is as good as a rest, or something. And better paid as well.

We Can Rebuild Him

Today is nine months since the cast came off the bionic ankle. The ankle itself seems fine, and stands up to playing football again, although there's intermittent soreness down my shin some days.

The physio said that this may happen because everything that's happened may alter the gait of how I walk, and I should concentrate on my gait while walking. Self-diagnosis on the internet is a dangerous thing, but there's lots of information out there about shin soreness due to the overwork of the muscles that move the foot after serious injuries such as this. Being back at work and back on my feet all day tires it a bit, but it should hopefully condition my leg to being used to being up and about all day in the long run. If I walk pretty slowly, there's no discomfort at all. Which is ironic after all those years of people complaining I walk too fast. Oddly, the best it feels is the couple of days after I play football on a Wednesday. Maybe that's because I stretch properly before games, and I don't do my long list of stretching exercises anymore. But look at those before and after shots. It looks like a normal ankle again (albeit slightly more pointy).

But my pre-Christmas efforts to get my medical records and the printouts of my x-rays of the added bits seem to have been largely wasted. In all three airports (Calgary, Heathrow and Manchester) I went through on my whirlwind trip home, those two plates and thirteen screws didn't once set off the metal detector. Consider me a bit surprised (and very slightly disappointed) on that front.

 

The Basement

So here I am, eight days into being back at work. And in some ways, it's like the last ten months never happened. In the same lab, with the same people, working for the same boss. In the same office, at the same desk, on the same project. About the only different thing is the fact that I have a different workspace (pictured). 

Fortunately, the group is moving to a shiny new building in the next couple of weeks, which means that after more than four years, the working on an open bench will soon be a thing of the past. We'll actually have a view as well, since we'll be on the fifth floor. But it's been very frustrating today; the chemicals I ordered last week still haven't arrived, and I have pretty much exhausted my various 'to do' lists. There was a fair amount of sitting about this afternoon, but at least unlike the last ten months' sitting about, at least I'm being paid for it again. Every cloud and all that.

Done: Redux

It's nice to see they keep up with things.

Done

So here we are. Done and dusted. Less than 24 hours back in the country and I now have my new social insurance number, a renewed Alberta Healthcare number and a firm date on which to start back at work. I am officially an actual person again, at least in the eyes of the powers that be. So as of next Monday I'm back in the basement for a couple of weeks before we then have to move into the new building across campus. The move will cut my daily commute from an onerous ten minutes on foot to a much more agreeable five minutes.

After spending two hours on Monday afternoon carefully cataloguing and valuing my possessions accompanying me, the man at customs didn't want them. The woman who processed me and welcomed me to Canada came across as generally surly and miserable which was a bit of a shame. Still, she didn't give me the going over the two poor souls before me got. Five minutes and I was done! All I have to show for the last 17 months and one week is one bit of flimsy paper, and a shiny card which will arrive in the post in six weeks or so.

Ready

Finished

So the day has come that I sometimes wondered would ever happen; my tracker entry (left) is now coloured green. My passport is back north of the 49th; I got it back at about half past one this afternoon, which was good going since it was still in Los Angeles at this time yesterday. Accompanying it was my Confirmation of Permanent Residence document which I have to hand over when I return to the country and land. There was one last scary moment to deal with when the package wasn't delivered to my flat; the tracking said "left at front desk", but there was nothing downstairs! Cue complete terror for ten minutes, till I got onto their call-centre and found out it was sent to the UPS shop I'd bought the shipping envelopes at. Nobody had bothered to tell me this was company policy for important documents. Panic over.

 All that needed to be done after that was to do my landing trip, and I'm now booked on a plane on Monday night. By Tuesday evening I'll be in sunny Bradford. Not a long stay this time; I'll be back on the plane the following Tuesday since I'd like to a) get back to work and b) not let the football team down by them having no goalie for their first playoff game. We're now only four days away from being able to answer the question that's been pondered here for almost ten months: am I going to set off the airport metal detector?

Returns

Wednesday night is football night. To continue the happy mood round here of late, there was a crushing 6-2 win for Hangover 96, in which I neither managed to get almost decapitated (as tonight's opponents did about five weeks ago), nor further injure my left hand (which I had done the two previous times I've played at tonight's venue). All three episodes occurred in the dying seconds of games, so it was nice to hear the final whistle blow and not be left in an undignified heap on the floor. There were even some more searching through-balls as well.

By the time I got home it was nearly 11pm (that's 9:30 starts for you), so before retiring to bed for a bit of a read, I just checked my tracking number for the return envelope for my passport. I hadn't had an email to indicate that it had gone into the system, but it showed that it's on its way back. Hopefully, I have it in my hand by Friday at the latest, and I can then get on with a quick trip home before I start work again. I hadn't mentioned in on here because most people who read this know one way or another, but for those of you out there that don't I am going back to work in the lab I worked in at the university for a a period of some months (to be precisely determined, but the job ad said ten months). Hopefully, while I'm there, something more permanent comes along, now that my applications won't be binned before they were read because of my status. Everything has just about turned out right. Eventually.

Decision

So we've almost made it to the end. I checked my online status tool this morning and here's what it says. It seems odd to me that "decision made" should come after the passport request, but who am I to question the, er, wisdom of CIC? I did have to read the "medical results have been received"  with a slightly arched eyebrow. You received them in October!!

It put to bed one last bit of paranoia; in the UPS shop when I sent my passport over three weeks ago, as the assistants had printed the shipping labels and so on, one of them pointed to the plastic envelope that contained my passport, cover letter, photos and so on and asked "I guess this has to go in there?" to which I replied in the affirmative. I saw her put it in the shipping envelope. For whatever reason, in the last couple of weeks I have occasionally thought "are you sure she did?", despite the evidence of my own eyes seeing it. Not even telling myself "well, the cover letter had your address, two phone numbers and an email address on there, so they could contact you and the passport wouldn't be lost" managed to get the silly notion out of my head.

"Decision made" wouldn't have appeared if they didn't have my passport and other documents in front of them. So I should hopefully get an email from UPS in the next couple of days when my return envelope gets scanned into the system. And then there'll just be the landing trip to go.

Anniversary

Today is the fourth anniversary of my landing in Canada. The Calgary weather, in typical style, has decided it'll celebrate by potentially dumping up to 30cm of snow. I have also decided that I'm going to brave the elements and try and get to IKEA. At least if I get snowed in, there's plenty of stuff to sleep on.

Epilogue. I made it there and back. There's a lot to be said for going at lunchtime on a Monday, and on a snow day to boot, rather than on a weekend; there was barely anyone there. The danger with trips to IKEA is that you always have you eye taken by things you didn't set out for. "Oh, that's good, I could do with one of those".  Still, I managed to leave those things for another day and only leave with what I went for, which is essential when you don't have a car and you can only buy what you can carry home on public transport*. So all the various boxes and so on have found their new home on the desk by the window. I think that it shows either a) my inner scientist neatly classifying and filing things into groups, or b) I'm bordering on OCD territory here.......

* A previous trip illustrated that coffee tables are very hard work in this regard

Movie Of The Week

Now that Beige Towers has been dragged kicking and screaming into the modern era of film watching with the arrival of the Blu-ray player, coupled to the fact that I still have to sit here all day and do nothing, for a few weeks more (see upcoming post), there's been a lot of watching films of late. So began a task to watch the DVDs in the stack that I hadn't watched, those I wouldn't necessarily want but had to buy to make up the numbers in a 'buy-five-for-£20' sort of thing, plus a couple of online orders now I am able to relax the purse-strings a little, plus a couple of Blu-rays. Here are some reviews of a few of them. More to come over the coming weeks.

The Departed (2006). IMDB score 8.6/10.

Martin Scorsese's return to some fertile ground in the crime/gangster genre. Matt Damon is a corrupt, newly-minted Massachusetts state trooper, working his way up the ladder, aiding and abetting underworld overlord Jack Nicholson from the inside. Leonardo DiCaprio is a similarly aged new recruit, hiding undercover as a mole, trying to feed the police tips from within. The central conceit is a good one, two double agents working for either side against each other. Problem is, it's nothing outstanding, just another film that's better than some, not as good as others, but not really worthy of the audience praise and awards showered on it (see also Gangs of New York). I can't help but think that even twenty years later, people still feel obliged to overpraise Scorsese movies as penance for not awarding Goodfellas the 1990 Best Picture Oscar, going for Dances With Wolves instead. 6.5/10.

Public Enemies (2009). IMDB score 7.0/10.

On a similar line, Michael Mann knows lots about the crime/thriller genre (Manhunter, Heat, The Insider, Collateral). So with a cast including Christian Bale, Johnny Depp and Marian Cotillard, and a director more than capable you'd think you were onto a winner. Amirite? Sad to report, this is a plodding rehash of Heat, in which policeman (Bale, instead of Al Pacino) pursues gangster (Depp, in place of Robert DeNiro), except that instead of being set in 1990s LA, we're in 1930s Chicago. There's even a set-piece gunfight running down the middle street that looked almost exactly the same. If you don't care what happens to the central characters, what's the point in watching on? I was bored after about 40 minutes, but stuck it out in the hope that it might get better. It didn't. Watch Heat instead. 4/10.

Slumdog Millionaire (2008). IMDB score 8.2/10.

Danny Boyle's career to this point has been all over the map; heroin addicts in Trainspotting, discordant housemates Shallow Grave, zombies in 28 Days Later, and slightly off-beat Sci-Fi in Sunshine. This 2008 film swept the board at the Oscars. It's the sort of thing the Academy voters like, the feelgood story of the downtrodden orphan underdog from the slums who succeeds in the face of almost unbeatable odds, then walks into the sunset. The plot device is simple enough; a tea-boy from an Indian call-centre gets on the local version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? His life is told in a series of flashbacks to various hardships pertaining to how he knows the answer to the questions, which of course, he gets right and wins the show. It stretches the plot concept right to breaking point, but it's enjoyable stuff, looks great in HD, and a nice Bollywood tribute over the end credits. I look forward to the sequel, where he ends up on the Indian equivalent of Eggheads. 8/10.

Contagion (2011). IMDB score 6.8/10.

The first Blu-ray at Beige Towers. It looks amazing compared to DVD. Gwyneth Paltrow returns from a business trip in China with some sort of lurgy shrugged off as a bit of winter cold. She passes it on to her colleague, her lover, and her son. All drop dead within hours from a brain haemorrhage. Her husband (Matt Damon) and step-daughter don't; the rest of the story is mostly told from their point of view as society collapses in the absence of critical services. In the meantime, the Centres for Disease Control (led by Larry Fishburne and Kate Winslet) work on a vaccine to the virus, along the way examining the issues related to scientific ethics and homeopathic remedies as advanced by bloggers (Jude Law, never more annoying). The first hour is very good, the second hour tails off a little, but it's certainly way better than Outbreak was. 7/10.

In The Loop (2009). IMDB score 7.5/10.

This is the cinematic spin-off of the BBC4 comedy series The Thick Of It, a spoof behind-the-scenes documentary about a fictional government department and the spin doctors that surround the minister. Think Yes Minister meets The Office. The show's most notorious character is Malcolm Tucker, a very thinly-veiled Scottish version of Alastair Campbell. The show is famous for its use of a swearing consultant. Now rude language is not big, and not clever, but most of Tucker's lines (Peter Capaldi) are rude enough to get you giggling at just how rude he is. Nothing is off limits, and the inspiration for the rudeness comes from some unlikely places; the subversion of the infamous Ferrero Rocher adverts to name but one. The plot involves a bumbling minister (Tom Hollander) and his off-message remarks on an imminent (unnamed) war, and the mess he and his aide get into when trying to backtrack. He ends up sent to Washington and the United Nations in New York, where the predictable fun happens between two very different political cultures. The US military are also no help in the form of James "The Sopranos" Gandolfini. Biting - and very profane - political satire. 8/10.

Wit

If you haven't been paying attention, there's a link to my five latest tweets on the bottom right hand side of the page. Very occasionally* I am sarcastic. Word play and so on appeals to my sense of humour, so when a topic appears on a funny hashtag, I try and join in. Sometimes, the stream goes so quickly that my finely-tuned humour disappears off the bottom of the page in seconds, like a couple of months ago in the #chemistrythemovie theme:

Ignoring for a second that maybe two (or three) people who read this thing will understand them and the other two or three of you are going 'eh?', they got two retweets between them. So imagine my surprise yesterday when I managed to get SIX retweets of this, thus declaring me funny by my twitter peers for about five minutes:

That's easily the most heavily retweeted thing of mine in three years and 5900 tweets. A successful day, I suppose.

* like, 90% of the time