Jennifer

I don't believe it! Just not too long ago I checked multiple times to see when my favorite German band would be playing some dates in the US and every time nothing, but on June 28 they decide to announce a month long tour they'll be doing in August, and I just now found out. Tickets for Chicago went on sale eight days ago and they're already sold out. :-( They have three on ebay, currently $41 each, but they still have six days left. 

I should have moved to Chicago so I'd be right there for any concerts, then I wouldn't have to worry about transportation and lodging on top of the ticket. Hanson's coming there on November 3 and 4 and I haven't made up my mind yet if I'm going, but I should, it's already been three years since I've seen them, and as they obviously think of Iowa as nothing more than a drive-through state, as they have not played here for more than eight years, this is going to be as close as it gets. 

I did tell my mom I'd come home in September if she drives me 2 1/4 hours to Kansas City for the concert there, but she didn't agree to that. I figured if I'm going to pay 120 dollars to go to Percival to share a room with my little brother, be constantly insulted by my mom's boyfriend, and sweat in a 95 degree unairconditioned house, I should at least get a concert out of it. 

On Monday "Wanna Bet?" is finally premiering on ABC! I heard a while ago that they were bringing this show to the US and it finally happened. It's where celebrities make bets that people can perform various stunts, such as identifying CDs by licking them. But don't be fooled by the hosts who are misleading potential viewers, trying to make it sound like this is based on an ingenious show invented by the British, because what they fail to mention is that the concept of the British show was taken from another show. That's right, the true inspiration is not from some lame pale imitation already cancelled, but rather the most successful t.v. show in Europe, "Wetten, dass...?"! In case your language deciphering skills aren't up to par and can't identify something by two words, such a brilliant show as the above is of course German! The only thing the American version needs is the always impeccably dressed host, Thomas Gottschalk! 

awww the red panda being nursed by the cat died after choking on milk. If you want to see some really cute pictures of more interspecies families and playmates, you should click on this link.

 This is posted on the main page of the Team Germany application on Facebook for the Olympics.

What are the three colors of the German Flag?
1) Red Black and Yellow
2) Red Black and White
3) Black White and Blue
4) Black Red and Green

See anything wrong here??!

I'm not sure which country's flag I like more.... the red, black and GOLD German flag, or the red, white and turquoise American one, or is that red, cream and blue? No wait, it's crimson, white and blue.

Well, looks like I may not be leaving Iowa City for a while. I just took the bus last month, but when I checked for tickets on greyhound.com today to see what the schedules and prices looked like for possible Hanson concerts, I was shocked to see that they eliminated the cheap one week and two week in advance tickets. So now it literally costs DOUBLE to go anywhere with the bus! It'll cost me $120 just to go home and back ONCE (and even more for around the holidays, which would probably be when I would be traveling) and my mom and brother are already asking me all the time when I am going to come back. Maybe greyhound doesn't realize, but their customer base is POOR, now they have such ridiculous rates that I could probably fly there for cheaper if I'm going far enough. I hope they lose tons of money through loss of business and are forced to lower them again.

In a zoo in the Netherlands they have a cat nursing a baby panda. Here's the story.

And since I was inspired by the spot I saw on them on the German children's news, you can read about and see the pictures of a few really overweight monkeys here. Personally whenever I see extremely obese animals or young children for that matter it makes me mad. Rolls of fat are not cute! If they were skin and bones instead of being ridiculously fat people would be outraged. But now they just take pictures and feed them even more!

According to salary.com, Omaha, NE is one of the top five places in America to build personal wealth. I hope my mom doesn't read either this website or yahoo.com, because she's always telling me to move to Omaha. If she thinks Iowa City is too far away, she should just feel lucky that visiting me at this point doesn't yet entail buying a plane ticket, because as soon as I get my millions I'm moving to Europe! I'm thinking a house in every Western European country except Spain and Italy, they're not getting any of my money! 

I boycotted Italian food during the World Cup, and I would boycott Spanish food now, but I'm not sure if they eat tacos in Spain or just Mexico. Having a anti-Itatian diet did get a bit complicated though. After days of shunning pasta, I was suddenly hit with the horrible realization that I had still continued with my daily tradition of eating a nutella sandwich for lunch. Nutella comes from Italy! How could I have been so stupid?! But I comforted myself with the knowledge that my particular jar was made in Germany, and I'm sure the Germans took the original formula and improved on it, so that didn't really count. Anyways, I bet Italy was really regretting their cheating ways. I single-handedly almost ruined Italy's economy that summer.

Apparently Jürgen Klinsmann, my favorite former Germany coach, used to play for the Orange County Blue Star back in 2003! They played games in Irvine too! I am so mad. I blame my German friend for not giving me the heads up that the future coach of and also a celebrated past player for my soon-to-be favorite team was living and playing practically next door!!

Monday I applied at Target and I know why they have you do the application on the kiosks, because otherwise the thing would fill books! I miss the old applications, the ones where you just filled in your work history, skills and references and then were done with it. Now they want you to take 30-50 minute questionnaires to get a psychological profile of you. Just for a minimum wage job! They ask you all these questions wanting you to rate yourself compared to other people, say what you would do in all these situations and questions to find out how little faith you have in your fellow humans (what percentage of people cheat on their tax returns, how many tickets does the average person receive in ten years, etc).

So anyways, I had the interview at Target today and I think it went horribly! First I had to take yet another questionnaire wanting to know what the best and worst thing to do in a situation was and also basic math problems. Then I was interviewed by two different people and I guess I wasn't prepared enough even though I knew it would be that way. At Wendy's, since my mom already worked there I was good as hired, and at Hillcrest Marketplace I got asked maybe three real questions before being hired, so I've never had such an intense interview before. I was so nervous and I kept being bombarded by pages and pages of questions, most of which started with "tell me about a time when...". Unfortunately my mind went blank and I was lucky to even come up with the lamest examples. 

Well, she said she'd let me know either way in 3-5 days. I also applied at Old Navy, Panera Bread and Best Buy on Monday, but have yet to hear from them. It's so sad to think I went for college for six years and have three majors, but not only can I not get a real job, I can't even get one that pays $7.25 an hour!

Well once a month FIFA updates their world rankings of all men's teams in the world and the good news is that Germany moved from #5 to #3!! The bad news is that Spain isn't #4 anymore, they're #1! grrrrrr And it gets worse, Italy is #2! At least Brazil and Argentina are below Germany now, although not even appearing on the list would be the more preferred place. And bad news for those of you who thought USA's 8-0 whipping of the football-powerhouse country of Barbados would propel them to the top, they slipped off the top 25! We should give our thanks to Mexico that even a single country from North or Central America appears on the list.

I'm glad I had the good sense to stop learning Spanish after high school, I would hate for my brain to be contaminated with a language spoken by the worst country in the world. I don't know if I can write this post, it's only Tuesday, it may be too soon to bring up all the bad memories associated with last Sunday. Such a horrible, depressing day. The one good thing about living in America is that afterwards you don't have to listen to all the stupid Spain fans celebrating in the streets. Hours after the World Cup final ended I could still hear people driving by honking their horns while I was lying in bed trying to sleep and cursing all Italians.

You know who I blame for this loss? Lehmann! He should have trusted the defenders to do their job and stay by the goal! Instead he runs up to try to pick up the ball but isn't fast enough, and that Torres easily kicks the ball into a completely undefended net. He's obviously past his prime. For the good of the team he should just quit, Germany will win next time and he'll have more time to spend with his great grandkids, it's a win-win situation. If he would have never let that goal in it would have went into overtime and maybe Germany would have gotten their act together then and managed to score a goal. Because that game was painful to watch. I wish I was there beside their coach so I could scream at them too. The point is to keep the ball AWAY from the guys in the red jerseys! How about a little more passing accuracy and a little less hesitation so they don't keep snatching the ball away.

Spain didn't need to win anyways, prior to Sunday they've only won one major title which was decades ago. Spain fans are used to defeat and failure and early exits at tournaments. A lot of them probably weren't even born the last time Spain won at anything soccer related. Germany on the other hand has won the World Cup three times and the European Championship three times, and it should have been a fourth!

I bet Austria is happy! I read an article and they were interviewing all these Austrians who hated Germany and were rooting for Spain. I'll never support their country again!

I was reading the gamecast for the Germany-Turkey game, and I have seen such blatant Germany-hating and pro-Turkey bias in my life! 

"Lost and unorganized" "struggling to get into the game" "goal is a perfect cameo of how Germany have performed in the opening 24 minutes, namely pathetically" "They don't deserve it, but they're level" "soft goal" "got it horribly, horribly wrong" "What was he doing?!" "made himself look stupid there" "His distribution has been abysmal all evening" "If Germany do go through it'll be a travesty of justice"  "possibly one of the worst performances in the competitions history! Turkey have been robbed!" "I suppose the only consolation is that if Germany don't transform in the next few days, they'll get hammered by whoever wins tomorrow's semi-final between Russia and Spain"

"amazing" "full value" "Turkey are having a right go! Good on 'em!" "Turkey having a right pop at Germany, who are seriously wobbling" "Turkey can sniff victory here. Go on lads" "Smashing move from Turkey" "lovely ball" "Turkey have been FAR superior this evening" "The Turkish players are crushed, and they've every right to be. They've outplayed Germany, taken the game to them, and somehow, somehow, they're out. Astonishing."

Obviously this idiot wasn't watching the same game I was! And those are just a few examples. The whole thing is full of him praising Turkey and overlooking every mistake they made, and then when it comes to Germany he can't type a single sentence not containing some snide remark!

Well the Russians showed their true colors, after causing a few upsets, at last their overratedness is clear. They lost 3-0 against Spain! How embarrassing. The Russian coach should count himself lucky if he still has a job. The Austrian coach already resigned and just today I read that the Italian coach has been replaced. Even Germany's coach was thinking of throwing in the towel after that very dark day they lost to Croatia, and probably would have done so if they would have lost to Austria.

Now I agree that suffering defeat at the hands of Austria would be the epitome of humiliation, but I think quitting is a little dramatic. Although personally, I wouldn't mind if the old German coach came back. His excitement after every goal always made me so happy, but he left and moved to America to spend time with his family. As if that's important.

Germany vs. Spain should be fun. Hopefully they're a little more into the game than the other lame fans. The Portugal fans listened to Portugal bashing five feet away for 90 minutes and then just meekly left after the game. I gave a group of Turkish fans the evil eye as I passed their table on the way back from the bathroom, okay not really, I just looked at them, daring them to give me the evil eye. They too didn't choose to pick any fights. Too bad. I think a brawl in Iowa between Germany and Turkey fans over a soccer game probably isn't a regular occurence. It'd be a good news story. 

I know I have millions of readers who depend on me for their Euro 2008 updates, but I was just too excited to post yesterday! Turkey's fairytale endings that they somehow manage to get are over! Everyone expected Germany to win this game, and of course everyone was right! I just wished I could have seen the whole game! Apparently "hurricane" like winds came up and knocked out something in Wien, off and on throughout the game for about 20 minutes in total the screen would go black and then they'd show the Fan Zone in Basel and the commentators while they were trying to fix the problem. We missed not one, but TWO key goals!

So Turkey scored the first goal which was very depressing because now Germany had to score at least two to win. But then Germany scored and it was tied. Then the screen went black and some guy whose son had a laptop told us that Germany scored again, I wasn't sure he was trustworthy, but I guess lying and making us believe that Germany had the lead would be a sick thing to do. That's right up there with throwing puppies off bridges.

So then it came back and while it was off again, some stupid Turkish fans that were there started cheering and all of us were filled with horror. I was still in denial that the worst possible thing had happened until I saw the 2-2 score for myself. At this point it was 86 minutes in and the Turkish people were looking pleased as punch. They were like, HA Germany, all those people were wrong, our last-minute-goal-scoring luck hasn't run out yet!

But don't count your chickens before they hatch Turkey! Four minutes later in the 90th minute....Goal for Germany!!! After three minutes of added time it was game over and Germany was celebrating their place in the finals and the Turkish players were crying in the locker room.

well, quarterfinals are over! So if you're tired of soccer, just think, only three more games! Then they'll be no more soccer until the World Cup 2010, oh wait, they've already started qualifying games for that, so I guess they'll be no break.

So we know who we're up against now, Turkey! And I bet Croatia is really pissed off right now. The game was scoreless after regular time and then with 29 minutes of overtime gone, Croatia scores a goal, there's only a minute left, they think they have the game in the bag, but no! With literally seconds left, Turkey scores a goal! So then it goes to penalty kicks which Croatia loses.

The next day was also a sad day for my (very distant) second favorite team, the Netherlands. :-( First those stupid Russians knocked out the Swedes and now the Dutch. Obviously those two teams must have been paid a lot of money to throw the game, because that's the only conceivable explanation for their losses.

Spain also managed to break the misfortune that was cursing the top team from each group, which means, Italy gone!! The way the quarterfinals worked, the top country from each of the four groups would play the runner-up team from another one, and up till Spain, the countries ranked second were picking off the first ranked ones one by one. Italy predictably lost in penalty kicks, which is kinda strange actually, because with faking fouls right and left, they get quite a bit of practice at taking them.

So this means: Germany vs. Turkey and Spain vs. Russia in the semis!

Soccer is obviously the reason for why the Germans invented such a handy word. "Pleasure derived from the misfortune of others"? Yeah, that pretty much sums up my emotions for every time I'm watching Germany mercilessly crush another opponent. I don't know about you, but I love it when the camera shows shots of the crowd, I receive such glee from the looks of desperation, despair, horror and shock. The poor Portuguese, I bet it sucks to be them. Good thing I'm a fan of the winning team!

HA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3-2!!!!!!!!!! I'm so pride of Germany right now! Even some German fans thought they'd have a tough time beating Portugal, but never me! I always had full faith that we were gonna kick some Portuguese ass today! That was such an awesome game! Even though I thought I was going to have a heart attack in the last few minutes because I was so scared that Portugal would score another goal. The four minutes of added time seemed like an eternity.

I'm still proudly wearing all my German stuff: shirt, hat, lei, and scarf. I'm getting a few looks. I also brought three flags with me to Buffalo Wild Wings, two to decorate the table and one to wave when Germany is scoring all their many goals! There were even some Germans watching the game, they're planning to come back for the semifinal, which is us versus Croatia/Turkey.

I'm so pumped up for Wednesday already, I can't wait! You better hope Germany wins! Or else you're going to have a very depressed and disgruntled German fan on your hands. And before/during/after the game, anyone saying anything that I construe to be pro-Croatia/Turkey receives a lifetime ban from being my friend! I take my soccer very seriously!

I wore blue and yellow today in honor of Sweden, the better team for sure, based on past matches and tournaments all the odds were for Sweden winning, but somehow Russia managed to score two goals and my beloved Swedish team who had zero were knocked out. :-( If I were a Russian fan though I wouldn't celebrate too much, you have the unstoppable Netherlands to take on in the quarterfinals, if I were Russia I'd save everyone's time and forfeit now!

So this means that the group stage is over! First Quarterfinal starting tomorrow! And here's what they'll all be:

Portugal vs. Germany
Croatia vs. Turkey
Netherlands vs. Russia
Spain vs. Italy

Eliminated: Switzerland, Czech Republic, Austria, Poland, Romania, France, Sweden, Greece

they're like freaking cockroaches! You can't get rid of them! I thought surely today they'd be eliminated from the Euro 2008 once and for all, but no! I would like to know, in the history of Italian football, have they EVER won a game based on them actually outplaying the opposing team? Because today Italy won 2-0 against France, and three guesses how many of their two goals were scored after free kicks. I heard a good joke during the last world cup which is sadly so true.

Who's the best player on the Italian team?

Answer: the referee!

So the Austrians were right, they would need luck to beat Germany, and unfortunately for them, they didn't have any! And I love it when a team admits before the game is even played that if they happen to win, it was only because they got lucky. It's refreshing to see that the Austrians weren't so delusional to think they could defeat Germany based on skill. So this means that the Germans are on to the quarter finals, playing Portugal!

I remember the last match I watched with those two teams, battling for third place in the World Cup, with Portugal being destroyed by the home country 3-1. Beforehand I predicted the game would be 3-0 and was told I was underestimating Portugal, supposedly a "good" team. HA! I just wished I would have guessed that Germany would allow Portugal to score a pity goal and bet some money on the game.

There was this guy at my table watching the game, he kept dissing Germany and talking about how much he hates them and they're going to lose against Portugal. He's also a Poland fan. Ugh! He's lucky he didn't get punched! By me!