E. Gary Gygax (1938~2008)

All my (A)D&D characters raise their tankards to you from their seats in Valhalla.

Rest in peace, Dungeon Master.

Time

You’re 6:49 a.m.

				You’re the time of day right around sunrise, when the sky is still a pale bluish gray. The streets are empty, and the grass and leaves are a little bit sparkly with dew. You are the sound of a few chirpy birds outside the window. You are quiet, peaceful, and contemplative. If you move slowly, it’s not because you’re lazy – it’s because you know there’s no reason to rush. You move like a relaxed cat, pausing for deep stretches that make your muscles feel alive. You are long sips of tea or coffee (out of a mug that’s held with both hands) that slowly warm your insides just as the sun is brightening the sky.

Thanks Tals. That was fun. I don’t know if this is me, but this IS my favorite time of day.

Superbowl XLII Aftermath: Eli’s not the MVP

Having mulled it over the day, I’m sure now. The MVP of the game was Strahan. They just felt compelled to give it to Eli because offensive skill players always get the spotlight. However, Eli’s two TDs would certainly not have been nearly enough without Strahan and company demolishing the New England offensive line and pounding Tom Brady’s good looks into the Arizona Astroturf.

So what exactly did Eli do? He made one great play (that escape from a near sack) followed by hitting that long pass to Tyree. That pass was ill-advised. It could have been picked off. Otherwise, he made a lot of fairly ordinary passes, albeit under pressure. Sure, his receivers dropped a lot of balls. What’s new? These are the 2007 New York Giants. Burress has always been a ball-dropper. Luckily, Shockey wasn’t around to add to the pain.

It was the defense that played way above expectations. They even beat Plaxico’s 17-point forecast, holding the Pats offense to two touchdowns. Two touchdowns! That’s way beyond anyone’s expectations. It would probably have been deemed impossible by prognosticators. Five sacks. Huge number of hurries. Kicked the living daylights out of Brady. The only big boo-boo was leaving Hobbs in single coverage in the red zone against Burress. They shut down the running game after Maroney ripped off five straight 100-yard games. The only guys they allowed to roam free were Welker and Faulk, giving up short yardage. None of the trickeration fooled them. They even took away the screen pass.

So give the game ball to defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo, who wasn’t afraid to blitz Brady and make him beat them. The Patriots kept getting beat on the edge rush, and when they tried to cover that, straight down the gut. Brady had to hurry his passes, because whenever he’d hold the ball for a long throw, a Giant would come up and nail him as he threw, usually spoiling the pass. The Golden Boy was short, wide, high and generally far less  accurate than the guy who went 26-of-28 a few weeks ago.

So sorry Eli, you shouldn’t have been the MVP of this Superbowl. The Giants defense are the ones that put that ring on your finger, so say thank you to them.

Live: Superbowl 42

I’m sitting in Sid’s Sports Bar on Jupiter Street in Makati. It’s 7am, and I just made it in time for the start of the broadcast. It’s not yet kickoff time.

I missed the Superbowl four straight years, usually due to work since the superbowl is on at early hours of the morning, differing a bit depending on what coast it’s being held. I was supposed to have other people with me, but I ended up doing this stag. Doesn’t really matter, I was planning to do this regardless. I thought I owed it to myself after missing it for work so many years. Especially since work for me these days starts late in the morning. Fun thing is I get to blog this, with no one else to keep entertained.

It’s also fun watching it on a big projection screen. I wish they had a big HD LCD, but this’ll do. Sure beats a small screen! And I’m saved the spectacle of seeing Tom Coughlin’s face in HD.

Okay, I hate this preproduction crap. I’ve got the Giants saying all kinds of silly things. This is ridiculous, I don’t know how the players aren’t embarrassed doing this. Resiliency my ass. And Eli looks… unsure.

I still remember how the Pats started this “come onto the field as a team” thing. It used to be that it was like the NBA, with each guy getting an intro. Better this way, I think.

It’s the Pats’ turn for the silly preprod. Brady looks every bit the movie star.

More preprod. No one’s mentioning that Strahan held out the whole offseason to avoid Coughlin’s training camp.

Jordin Sparks’s dad was an NFL player? Probably not a skill player or it would at least ring a bell.

Is Brady the greatest 6th-round draft pick ever?

Jeez, the guy interviewing Brady started several weeks for the 49ers. SF’s a mess.

You know what Jason Taylor wants right now? The Payton Award is nice, but he’d rather get a ticket out of Miami and get a chance to win a ring.

Toin coss. Ronnie Lott cosses, the Giants call tails and get the ball. I agree, they’d better batter Jacobs down the line and make the Pats defense stop him. Let Eli play the role of Trent Dilfer on the Bucs. 35 rushes. The first NTG series is gonna be crucial if they’re gonna pull the upset. They HAVE to score a TD to put pressure on the Golden Boy and his crew.

Hxon doesn’t get much of a return. Rush, Jacobs. Let’s see them keep it up! They do, not much there. 4-receiver set, shotgun. They convert 3rd and 5 to Plax, great start for Eli. Play action to Boss. Back to Jacobs I expect. Yep, but not much there. 3rd and 6 again. They have to do better on 2nd down or they’ll get into trouble soon. Conversion to Smith. Harrison is down. Timeout. Giants look good, so far.

Looks like Randall Gay is out for now. You’ve got a rook ar CB out there, but they go back to Jacobs. Love it. The NY O-line is doing fine. Peyton’s here with the face. Another run! Bradshaw’s just as much a power guy as Jacobs. Boss drops it. Another Jacobs run. Eli avoids the rush and converts again! See what a good running game does?

Miss on the long TD play to Plax. Almost picked. Another miss on Eli’s throw, so out comes Tynes for the short FG. 3 points isn’t going to do it, but it’s better than nothing. Let’s see what The Hoodie has for us on offense.

My batteries aren’t gonna last, so I’ll blog the first Pats series, then sign off until halftime.

NYG allows a 43-yard return. You can’t let them have that.

Trickeration on the first play! Interesting. Maroney picks up 9 and then 1. That’s a great start for the Pats too. Brady misses everything on his first pass, then hits Stallworth on a shallow cross. 4-wide shotgun. Conversion to Welker, first down. Short run by Evans. Screen pass to Faulk to get a fresh set of downs. 4-wide shotgun again, pass to Moss is off. Pass goes right through the hands of Faulk. 3 & 10 into the endzone to Watson, pass interference on Pierce. And the Giants are dead here. 4 tries for Brady tog et 7. Maroney carries to the 1 to end the quarter. This has “7” written all over it.

Yup, TD. NYG had better have another logn drive in them, this time for a TD, or they’re quite dead. I’ll be back at halftime.

With Alicia Keys in the background, I’m back! What a sloppy, uneventful 2nd quarter dominated by the Giants defense. No scores, which is amazing. The Giants held the Pats to the lowest 1st half yardage output they’ve had all season. The Pats O-line is getting massacred, and Brady’s been roughed up a lot.

Let’s see, so it went – Maroney scores on a short run, Manning drives down the field and ends up getting picked on a Smith drop. Brady drives down the field but gets stopped by the G-Men. Punt. Giants take a delay of game penalty (Peyton disapproves) and have a botched handoff. Punt. Brady goes three and out with two sacks. Punt. Giants go three and out. Punt. Brady marches down the field and that ends with a turnover after Brady gets hit. Giants don’t convert a hail mary, and the half is over.

The good news: the Giants are playing well, especially with the running game, and their defense is dominant today. The bad news: they’re still down 3-7 and haven’t come close to sniffing a touchdown. At this point, while the Pats are no longer 12-point favorites, they’re still favorites. One big play will win this game, and the Pats are more likely to come up with something like that than the Giants are.

Despite the struggles of the NE O-Line, and the ball that Brady almost lost after getting hit on the pass, the Pats haven’t made mistakes. The Giants vets have made plays. The defense led by Strahan and Umenyiora has been very good. Toomer and Burress have made nice catches. But their kids, Smith and Boss and Bradshaw have put the ball on the ground several times. Eli’s made a couple of mental mistakes that Brady or his bro wouldn’t make.

And now The Hoodie and The Ernie get to make adjustments.

Regardless, I think Spagnuolo’s gonna get an interview with the Skins (and maybe the Raiders) after this is all over. He’s earned a big payday.

They’ve unearthed Tom Petty’s desiccated corpse to play halftime. I’ll be back in the 4th to wrap up what’s looking like a close game that the Pats are still going to win.

I don’t think the Giants change the game plan. They stay with the run game, but they have to stop making mistakes. They have to hope their defense can make good on the Plaxico prediction to keep the Pats to 17 points. If Brady gets 2 TDs, and that’s one good quarter for him, the Gs are in big trouble.

Belichick will fix Tom’s protection, possibly going max-protect or going to some more screens and maybe some trickeration. Let’s see.

Q3. Brady’s protection hasn’t gotten any better, and the Giants are still struggling to score. The question here is whether the Giants defense makes a mistake first or the Giants offense gives the ball away in bad position (or in the worst case, a pick-6). This is a low-scoring game, but it’s one of the best I’ve watched. Brady looks frustrated. The Giants are stil outgaining the Pats. Looks like the two weeks helped the Giants just as much as the Pats.

In a shocker, Belichick goes for it on 4th down and they don’t convert

It’s 11 minutes to go in the 4th and the Giants just scored on Manning’s pass to David Tyree. The Giants defense is looking even stronger, and the Pats defense is bending too far. If the Giants hold here, it looks very good for them.

Moss catches a pass. The Giants kids got to make some plays in that last series and Boss and Smith came up with big catches. Brady’s not sharp today, which is a huge deal. Is the pressure getting to him? Is the beating getting to him? The Giants defense has been pounding on him all day. Another hurry, another miss. Another punt. Chris Hansen hasn’t been this busy all season!

Eli gets the ball back with a chance to make this a two-possession game. If he converts here, all bets are off.

Great scamper by Manning, but he just lofted that ball high for Plax. Another good Eli throw ends with Toomer short of the first down by a yard or two. Punt. In the punting game, Feagles is keeping pace with Hansen. Never thought that that would be a big deal in Superbowl 42 eh?

So Tom gets the ball back, and it’s still a one-possession game with time running out. Anyone’s game, but will this Pats offense really not get a score in the second half? Strahan’s looking like the Giants MVP so far.

Brady to Welker, then to Moss for the first down. Randy’s going down the middle, which means that they’re desperate. Moss hates contact. Maroney carries for 9. Look for a shot into the endzone here. Long enough, pass to Welker for a big gain. Wes has 10 catches. Pass to Faulk who smartly steps out to stop the clock. Welker catches #11, tying a Superbowl record. If they pull this out, he’s the MVP.

Moss ventures back into the middle to catch a pass for first down. This is amazing. Moss is giving up his body to win. Kevin Faulk catches another pass. They’re in full West Coast Offense mode, with Tom spreading the ball around. This is the first Pats drive of the day that looks anything like what they were during the season.

Red zone time. Again, this smells like a score. The Giants need a big stand or a pick here. Brady’s getting the ball out quick. Wide on a pass to Randy, which should have been a gimme. Brady’s feeling the heat. Incomplete to Welker. 3rd and goal now. Wow, great graphic. The Pats have won all three of their Bowls by 3 points, but never with a score this low. That’s ironic because this team broke the NFL single-season scoring record.

Brady to Moss, TD as Butler falls down on the goal line single coverage. Easy catch. Gostkowski nails the extra point.

So now Eli has to get a TD to win. Completion to Toomer down the middle. Incomplete to Plax. Incomplete to a double-teamed Plax. Two minute warning.

So. If Eli gets this done, he erases any remaining stigma of being Eli of old and becomes another Superbowl-winning clutch Manning. If he doesn’t, he’s Ol’ Eli again.

It was unrealistic to expect the Pats to lay an egg.

The Pats defense is fired up.

Complete to a diving Amani Toomer, spot looks short of the first down. 4th and 1. They have to go for it with 1:40 to go. Jacobs easily powers through for a couple of yards to move the chains.

Eli takes off and almost loses the ball. Timeout NYG. 2nd and 5. Manning throws it away and is almost picked by Asante Samuel.

Play of the game. Manning has three Pats grabbing him, and he escapes to throw a long pass that is barely caught by David Tyree at the peak of his leap, with two Pats draped all over him.

59 seconds on the Pats 25. Manning has nothing and tries to take off. Sack by Adaluis Thomas. Giants burn their last timeout. 2nd and 11 now. Almost picked off again! Tyree almost comes up with it, then drops it. Complete to Smith! First down! 39 ticks.

Manning to Buress TD! Hobbs blows the coverage in a one on one situation, and what the hell is Plax doing with single coverage anyway? He’s got 6 inches on Hobbs! Peyton approves.

So. Can Brady do anything with 29 seconds?

Four long shots down the field. First one misses.

Second one ends in an awesome sack on Brady. The Pats O-line got killed today.

Giants in a Cover 3. Moss almost gets it on a double teamed streak on the third.

Last gasp time. 4th and 20 but it doesn’t matter.

Giants win the Superbowl. This game belonged to the NYG defense. Eli was good, managing the game (ha), making important throws and not making any mistakes (that pick wasn’t his fault). The NE defense also did its job, holding the Giants to 17 points. So it was Brady and the NE offense that didn’t deliver.

Lots of money was made in Vegas by the hardy souls that bet on a NYG outright win. Money was also made on the spread, which was 12 at kickoff. And this cements the Superbowl as the most unpredictable culmination of any sport. The Pats have been on both ends now (see the 2001 SB vs the Rams).

For a 17-14 game, this was one of the best Superbowls ever.

Until next year.

RIP Heath Ledger

I was going to take a pass on all the Heath Ledger eulogizing. He died too young, another footnote on Hollywood’s long list of deaths-come-too-soon. However, he wasn’t a shining star, with his greatest performance to date being overshadowed by Jake Gyllenhaal. He was a solid-yet-unspectacular member of the Tinseltown Aussie Connection, far below the Hugh Jackman-Nicole Kidman-Mel Gibson-Hugo Weaving marquee. Just above Guy Pearce, maybe.

I mean, he couldn’t carry A Knight’s Tale.

However, it was all going to change when he took the role that is now one of the greatest in Jack Nicholson’s bio. Playing a terminally psychopathic madman well tends to get you noticed.

Good ol’ Jack stoked the fire when he claimed to have said “I warned him” without saying what about. Maybe playing the likes of The Joker can be hazardous, especially for thespians who like to get into their character’s skin?

While we don’t believe that Jack went wacko, we also don’t really know what Anthony Hopkins has with his Chianti these days.

It will be vaguely discomfiting to watch The Dark Knight now, though. While people flocking to the theaters to see a dead man play a homicidal clown isn’t unprecedented, the rumored tour-de-force performance of a lifetime that Ledger gave as the Clown Prince of Crime stands to go down as one of the most eerie in recent film history.

I know that I’ll be watching.

Francis Lawrence’s I Am Legend (2/4 stars)

They had to turn it into Resident Evil.

Matheson’s novel is a meditation on what a man would become if he were all alone. This was captured very nicely by director Francis Lawrence and The Fresh Prince through the first half of the film. The eerie, empty sprawl of a deserted New York City. The struggle with mannequins as the only “people” you “know”. The appreciation of having a dog to keep you company.

It actually put the brilliance of Tom Hanks’s performance in Cast Away in a whole new light. Will Smith had it far easier - NYC and a big dog. Hanks had a deserted island and a vollyball.

Anyway, they had to turn the vampires (Dark Seekers my ass) into your run of the mill ravenous mindless ghouls. Thinking that the audience wouldn’t see the film if it stayed true to the novel?

The whole thing REALLY jumped the shark when it turns out that he really wasn’t the last person on earth, and the title of the film somehow came from Bob Marley’s masterpiece recording.

Sorry. Ricockulous. I checked out right there and was a disinterested spectator when the film got to its insipid climax and thoroughly awful denouement. That was truly BAD. Think of The Village BAD. Yup.

Bottom Line: So, 4 stars for the first half, until the tragic death. Zero stars after that. That leaves us with a thoroughly disappointing two-star forgettable film. Pass.

Where Imagination Saves the Day

These photographs by renowned photographer Annie Liebovitz are absolutely gorgeous. They were shot as part of the new campaign of Disney, and getting various celebrities to pose as the Mouse House’s iconic characters was an inspired idea. I’m sort of surprised that they haven’t done this kind of thing before.

While I’m not usually a fan of ham-handed Photoshop jobs, a couple of these strike home. I love the Scarlett/Cinderella and Rachel/Snow pics, with the Jess/Pocahontas one not far behind. Gotta admit that the Becks/Prince and Federer/Arthur pics are also decent. (Interesting choice to go with athletes over more Hollywood types, though one could argue that Becks is more celeb than athlete these days.) Not a fan of the Platt & Co./Wonderland and the Giselle/Pan tableaus. (I did catch the Tina Fey/Tinkerbell joke.)

Anyway, some good pics to rotate into the screensaver/wallpaper collections.

Taylor Swift (3/4 stars)

I’m a country-pop fan, with country-pop being defined as ranging from Garth Brooks and Tim McGraw to the Dixie Chicks, Martina McBride, Trisha Yearwood, Faith Hill and yes, Shania Twain. I tend to prefer the female country vocals harmonizing with ringing strings, whether stummed, plucked or bowed. I chanced upon Taylor Swift performing on the Ellen Degeneres show, and loved the performance (reminded me of LeeAnn Rimes with a higher voice). Was lucky enough to find the Deluxe Edition CD/DVD 2007 rerelease and that’s what’s playing right now.

Taylor’s 16-year old voice is smoky beyond its years, and her songs have your classic country-lovelorn lyrics that seem to be far beyond her teenage ken. I like the album a lot, and it’s now in my iPod, shuffling along.

Validating my faith in moving over here, WordPress.com is going the way of GMail by increasing free internal media storage to 3MB. Still can’t use activex plugins, but at least I can reduce reliance on Photobucket for storing images and start putting them on here directly. That way I don’t break any more links when reorganizing.

Death Checkmates Fischer

One of the greatest and most troubled minds in gaming history has lost his battle with Death herself. Bobby Fischer is dead. Known equally for his erratic behavior and brilliant mind, Fischer was an icon of the Cold War, when the 64 squares of the chessboard proxied for the world as the battleground of the United States and Soviet Union.

Fischer’s battle with Russian Grandmaster Boris Spassky was as strange as it was titanic, and it was one of the first great stories about a boardgame that I can ever remember. Chess still sucks as a game, but so many people took (and still take) it as a serious intellectual pursuit that it became the vanguard of insinuating games as a mainstream intellectual pursuit.

Fischer will also be remembered for dodging Garry Kasparov. Whether that was due to his mental state or fear of being defeated, the world will now never know.

Checkmate, Bobby.