R.I.P. The Man Who Helped Create British Punk

Well, we've lost Malcolm McLaren, and at the young age of 64. I think it is safe to say that, for a guy who founded a band simply as a means of drumming up publicity for his clothing store and then had that band manage to hang around long enough to record exactly one studio album, he had a fairly thunderous impact on popular music.

And here is that band:

A Return, And A Departure

* Blows dust off blog, again *

I'm back! And where have I been for the last month? Well, toiling in the University Bookstore through the September textbook rush, for the most part. The scene below is a reasonable facsimile of the sort of job it was:

Trust me, there will be anecotes, oh my yes!

However, it is not the goings-on at the University Bookstore that concerns us today, but rather a somewhat odd news story that cropped up last week. Here it is:

Thousands of hyphens perish as English marches on
Fri Sep 21, 2007 4:54pm EDT By Simon Rabinovitch

LONDON (Reuters) - About 16,000 words have succumbed to pressures of the Internet age and lost their hyphens in a new edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary.

Bumble-bee is now bumblebee, ice-cream is ice cream and pot-belly is pot belly.

And so, farewell, noble hyphen! Well, not entirely "farewell," as the article goes on to point out that hyphens will be hanging around in situations where confusion would result otherwise (the word "twenty-odd" is cited as an example). Furðermore, one must recall ðat ðere are æt least a handful of letters which have been þrown out of þe English language, so perhaps þe partial removal of a piece of punctuation is not such a big deal (For the record, the three obsolete letters used in that sentence are, in order, eth, ash, and thorn. We've also lost yogh and wynn). Still and all, I think I'm going to miss the ice-cream.

Soccer Notes

A couple of wee tidbits:

• England lost a one of the good ones today. A genuinly classy individual, as well as a very fine manager. He also was known to employ an interesting turn of phrase, every once in awhile...
  
  
• The Canadian men's national team just returned from the CONCACAF Gold Cup, and I actually think it went pretty well. Canada faced as tough a group as they did during the WC qualifiers, but the boys defeated Jamaica and El Salvador, and managed to tie Costa Rica, thus in fact winning the group. The Canadians then bowed out at the quarter-final stage, losing to Honduras on a very debatable penalty call (aren't they all!). Most impressive of all, in the games that I saw, there was actually evidence of forward-thinking tactics, something that was too often lacking during the Dale Mitchell era. Oh, and Ali Gerba's goal against Jamaica was truly a thing of beauty:
  
  
  
  
• The new manager of the Canadian men's team, Stephen Hart, has enjoyed a fairly bright beginning (well, it's not really a beginning, since he was interim manager before Mitchell got the permanent job). Under Hart this time around, the team's record is: Played 6, Won 4, Drawn 1, Lost 1, 8 Goals Scored, 3 Conceded. Pretty good, I'd say.

April 15, 1989

Very strange to think that it's been 20 years... My most vivid memory of watching the coverage of that thing on television was seeing the fans (of both teams) ripping down the pitchside advertising hoardings to make stretchers.

R.I.P. the 96.

More Sadness In The Gaming Community

One of the very early posts on this blog dealt with the death of D&D co-creator Gary Gygax. Well, the other half of the creation team, Dave Arneson, has passed away at the age of 61. Arneson was not nearly as famous as Gygax, but deserves much of the credit for transforming table-top wargaming into role-playing as she is practised today. Various appropriate tributes to him are appearing on the 'net, including here and here.

Sadness!

The intertubes are a little less funny today...

All the best to Constable Enns in his new posting, and thanks for all the laughs!

Slingin' Sammy Baugh

A sad sports note. Sammy Baugh was the man who made the forward pass an integral part of football. In 1943, he led the NFL in passing (as a quarterback), interceptions (as a defensive back), and punting (as, well, a punter). That is probably not something we will see again.

Musical Interlude

I was lucky enough, when I was much younger, to get to see Odetta in concert here. Mostly what I remember about it is the fact that she had an incense stick on the end of her guitar - I recall thinking that it smelled very interesting. Anyway, she passed away last week, about a month before she was scheduled to perform at Barack Obama's inauguration. Here she is performing "Midnight Special."

Oh, I've Seen This Before!

more animals

Shades of the departed Claudia cat, who used to enjoy very much lying on the hot-air vents!

Fabellae De Fele Taffeta

Well, as CR has already reported, we lost a friend this week. And so I thought I would take this opportunity to share with you a couple of the many, many, anecdotes generated over the years by a most sociable and excellent cat.

• Did I mention that she was sociable? I recall receiving a phone call from the local elementary school, requesting that I come over and pick her up. She had gone over to play with the kiddies during recess, and had simply gone into the school with them afterwards. Tired out from her exertions, she had then decided it was naptime, and so, when I arrived, she was curled up fast asleep. On the Principal's desk, of course.
  
• She once joined a pair of Jehovah's Witnesses who had come to our door, and set off accompany them on their rounds. We could here them attempting to dissuade her as they headed off up the block ("Go home, Kitty! Go home!"). Eventually they succeeded, and she returned.
  
• She did, once, nearly meet her end as the result of a chance encounter with a wandering coyote. I had just come around the back of our house into our driveway when Taffeta went past me at about Mach 7, leaving me face-to-face with the oncoming coyote. It stopped oncoming, and we stared at each other for a moment before it turned and ran off. As near as I can figure, the coyote had trapped Taffeta under our neighbour's low-rider van, where it couldn't quite get at her, and my appearance on the scene prompted her to make a break for it.
  
• Ah, but the truly epic Taffeta story involves the ash tree in the front yard, which she liked to climb up and perch in. She was, in fact, perching in it one fine autumn day, when a young woman jogged by beneath her (I mention that it was autumn because the tree was bare, and in no way up to camouflaging the presence of a 14-lb cat). As the jogger passed by, Taffeta went into full National-Geographic-Special-on-jungle-panthers mode, and actually leapt from the branch on which she was perching at the oblivious jogger. However, and fortunately, she came up well short, and had to content herself with running at the jogger's ankles, causing the young woman to skip in startlement. It was truly a fine performance.

She was an excellent companion for many years, and is very much missed.

RIP Paul Newman

Obituary here. I'm going to have to go and watch Slapshot again, I think.

Heu! De Avi Morte

My grandfather (maternal) passed away this morning far off to the East at the age of 91. He was the last surviving grandparent of mine. There is not too much to be said about it that hasn't already been said, and well, by Crimson Rambler and Chorus here, here, and here.

So, much sadness around here today. Ave atque vale, Grandad.

Another Ending

Dungeons & Dragons Co-Creator Dies at 69
By EMILY FREDRIX – 7 hours ago

MILWAUKEE (AP) — Gary Gygax, who co-created the fantasy game Dungeons & Dragons and helped start the role-playing phenomenon, died Tuesday morning at his home in Lake Geneva. He was 69.

I shudder to think how much time and money I've spent, since the early 1980s, on that particular hobby. Actually, I don't shudder at all; it's been worth it, and still is. I suspect, if I thought about it, I could probably still remember the names of most of my characters through the years, and I certainly still have most of my original dice (I believe that a ten-sider may have been lost somewhere along the line, but that's about it)!

Am I a geek? Naaaaaaah...

Requiescat Mr. Gygax in pace; the millions of people who have drawn immense and even life-changing enjoyment from the fruits of his labours will miss him, and mourn him. Fortunately, those fruits will remain, providing pleasure, good company, and, it must be said, an inducement to avoid more important things to all who wish to partake of them!

Terminal Point of an Epoch

... yessiree, no cliches here (we give 110% and really come to play when it comes to avoiding cliches)

Anyway, getting back on topic:



Packers QB Favre to retire
Three-time MVP calling it quits following 17 seasons
Posted: Tuesday March 4, 2008 9:52AM; Updated: Tuesday March 4, 2008 1:16PM

GREEN BAY, Wis. (AP) -- After flirting with retirement for years, Brett Favre means it this time. The Green Bay Packers quarterback quit after a 17-season career in which he dazzled fans with his grit, heart and rocket of an arm.

Sad, but inevitable. At least he got to retire after what can only be described as a stunningly successful season.

And so now, the inevitable question - who's going to be the next Brett Favre? Who, next, is going to show that combination of ability and ebullient on-field running-around-like-a-kid personality. Tom Brady and Peyton Manning, while fine quarterbacks both, are disqualified on account of being robots. Donovan McNabb's been injured too much. Phil Rivers and Brady Quinn are apparently creeps (also Carson Palmer, by some accounts). So, who does that leave? JaMarcus Russell (Yes, I know he plays for Oakland, but still)? Drew Brees? Big Ben, in Pittsburgh (I did just wimp out of trying to spell his name, thank you for asking!)? Eli Manning (and it's no accident, methings, that young Elisha played the best football of his career after Jeremy Shockey was removed from the equation, speaking of creeps)? Maybe, but for now, Packers fans can but hope that the answer to that question is "Aaron Rodgers."*

*Edit: I somehow managed to leave Tony Romo off that list. He may, in fact, be the best candidate for "next Brett Favre."