Author: Matthew Groff

  • Super League Falling Apart

    The New York Times is now reporting that the Super League is coming apart. Looks like fans and politicians in the UK aren’t having it. Story link below…

    www.nytimes.com/2021/04/20/sports/soccer/super-league-collapse.html

  • Europe’s Super League is a Mistake

    I have been following the Premier League for the past couple of years, and specifically supporting Tottenham Hotspur for the past three. I have watched them change mangers twice, get to the finals of the Champions League, got really annoyed when they didn’t re-sign Eriksen, got totally confused as to why Dele isn’t playing, and got really happy with the Kane/Son duo on the pitch. I even paid for Peacock so I could watch matches, and have tried to read up on the history of the team, so I at least have a bit of a knowledge to build off of.

    So, when the Super League was announced on Sunday, I had a resigned disappointment. Here is an explainer from the New York Times. Long story short, 12 of the biggest football clubs in Europe are forming a new league, and outside of these 12 teams making a whole lot of money, there really isn’t much benefit for anyone else. The Super League will kill off smaller clubs, actually eliminates competition, and just reeks of greed.

    And as an American, I just want to say, “Your welcome, European football fans!” Yup, we are great at greed and capitalism when it comes to ruining sports. I love baseball, but there is no mystery to that sport; whoever spends the most wins. Why don’t baseball clubs just announce how much they are planning on spending, and then the top 16 teams just play each other for the championship? It would cut out the pesky middle man, which is that boring summer season. There is no real competition during the baseball season, the playoffs is where all the action is, and money determines it.

    Which is what the Super League is. They have decided that their home leagues are meaningless, and having to deal with competition from smaller clubs is just getting in the way. The difference is in America, we still perpetrate the lie, while Europe is coming around to the truth; this isn’t about sports, it’s about making money.

    Again, you’re welcome Europe!

  • Personal Review: The Real World, Season 1, 1992

    The wife and I have been looking for a TV show to watch at night. Something to wash the pallet clean at the end of the day, but not too serious, but also not totally dumbed down. After searching around all the streaming services, we landed on The Real World from MTV on Paramount+.

    When we started season 1, which took place in 1992 New York City, it was a fun reminder of what early 90’s life was like, as we were in high school when the show premiered, and it was a neat snap shot of what pre-Giuliani New York was like. Also, this was the show that birthed the “reality” genre, so to go back to the source, so to speak, was enlightening; not only for the way things were, but how they are now.

    I was 15 when I watched the show originally, and my memory of the show had holes, but it was rather intact. Now, 44-year-old me watched it with a more cynical eye, and found the show slanted to a very specific perspective.

    Of the seven cast members, six of them were currently living in New York at the start of the show, while one member, Julie, was from out of town, Alabama, but she has aspirations to be in New York as a dancer. Thus, the fish out of water storyline that followed through the whole season. The other six members were all in the arts, at the start of their careers; one writer, three musicians, one painter, and one model. A very liberal arts group.

    15-year-old me remembered that this was my first experience with seeing people of my generation pursing the arts, and struggling. Before this show, if I wanted to see young people in the arts, it was either the Lost Generation of the 20’s, the Beats of the 50’s or the Hippies in the 60’s. What the 44-year-old me saw was that some of the people were working much harder than others. My memory of the show was that it had a very voyeuristic quality, but remained true to the proposition that it was showing people being “real.” Older me, having experienced other “reality” shows, could see the manipulation of the cast and certain situations.

    As I finished the first season, it was much tamer than I remembered. Knowing what is coming down the pipe with the reality television genre, you can see the start of how things will be edited and presented to have a desired effect. It was like a quarter of the way through the season, the producers realized that this wasn’t a documentary, but a story that needed to be compelling, so the audience would tune in next week.

  • Trouble Sleeping, Some Anxiety

    I have been having trouble sleeping of late. The other night was pretty bad. It took a while for me to get tired, and then when I did go to bed, I couldn’t stay asleep. It felt like I was waking up every thirty minutes or so. The thought that kept replaying in my head was that I wouldn’t be able to get a job when everything gets better, because I will need to get a job. We can get by on one income, but we can’t get ahead unless I bring in some money.

    I keep thinking that I am not going to get a job because I’m too old. And I kept thinking that I am not going to get a job, because I don’t have any useful skills. And I kept feeling worse and worse about myself. It created a downward spiral of negative thought, that I just couldn’t shake.

    And then I went to a very dark place. It wasn’t so much a specific memory, but more of recalling a deep emotional feeling. I started to relive the emotions of the time period when my mother was dying, and the complete lack of sympathy I received from my co-workers. (To make this quick, the place that I worked wanted me to quit to save money, so two co-workers took it upon themselves to bully and harass me so that I would leave. And yes, I did go to HR and they said there was nothing they could do.) It was difficult to deal with the emotions of losing my mother, while also having to survive eight hours of isolation and intimidation. It was a one-two punch that was miserable, and depressingly lonely. I am very fortunate that I have my wife, family, and friends, as without them, I don’t think I would have survived that period.

    I like to think of myself as a mentally well-adjusted and fit person. That was an awful period of time, but I did come out on the other side with a better relationship with my wife, and father, and family, and friends. And all of that was due to talking about it, and sharing, and making ourselves vulnerable which allowed healing. It’s still a work in progress, as there are bad days, like the other night. But… I know it will get better.

  • Ants

    It’s spring, and it seems like the world is slowly coming back to life. Flowers are blooming, trees are budding, and grass is greening. And bugs are back. In our tiny apartment, that means the ants are back.

    We get ants in the Spring. And I hate ants. These are stupid, little black ants, which are called Little Black Ant, annoy the shit out of me, especially their stupid, unoriginal name. They are easy to kill, and stop, but man, it’s like two weeks of those little bastards just showing up along the edge of the wall. The kid hates them, and also thinks the ants are out to get her. So, we have to have a calming down moment before she goes to bed to make sure she understands the ants aren’t after her.

    Stupid ants.

    Growing up in Texas, the fear was fire ants, as those assholes are awful. For every kid, there was always a moment when they accidently stood on, or fell on, or kicked a fire ant mound, and those evil guys swarmed, biting the hell out of you.

    I remember my dad buying fire ant killer at the local hardware store in the Spring to deal with them. The stuff he bought was a poison in the form of little yellow pellets that he would spread around the mound. The ants would think its food and bring it into the nest. Slowly, over the course of a week or two, the mound would die off, and a little pile dirt was left in the yard, like the ancient ruins of a civilization. I would dig up the dead mounds carefully, to see the tunnels that they had created. It was fascinating that little things could build such complexity.