Things are looking up

Since the last blog things have definitely taken a turn for the better. The baths were amazing, we made the train on time, and Vienna has been more than we expected. Both M and I agree that Budapest was a disappointment, but so far we could spend all the time in the world in Austria. I will have to go into details later, but right now I am literally on a time crunch because of the paid internet access. I of course had to check fantasy football (I won 2 out of 3 which is good) and my email (my roommate found my long lost Ipod, which was excellent) before getting to this blog. Here are the quick highlights

• The baths were amazing and after seeing the changing room I was glad it was a family friendly bath.
• The food in Austria is absolutely incredible. I can't believe everyone is skinny here.
• We went on a day trip to Salzburg today and had a great time.
• Tomorrow we are going on a tour of Vienna before our train to Graz and the wedding festivities.

I promise I will write more and include pictures when I get a chance. I wanted to make a quick post to let everyone know that Austria is so much better than Budapest. I hope everyone is doing well and I will try to write again from Graz tomorrow.

Blue Jean Blues in Budapest

I am sitting in the hotel lobby writing this since the outlets in our hotel room have decided to only work sporadically. Unfortunately that means no pictures. Anyway here is a quick recap of the day:

• M and I left breakfast at the hotel by around 9:30am to make the 10am city tour we had researched. We got to the place (the Chain Bridge) where the tour began by 10:02. The good news is that we did pretty well consideing we have never been to Budapest and only had a general idea of where we were going. The bad news is that we got there in time to see the bus leaving. We couldn't stop the bus despite our efforts of waving our hands and running down the street in order to get the attention of the driver.
• Now that we were no longer burdened by the tour we could do our own tour. That started with us walking across the Chain Bridge to the Buda side of town. The best part of the Chain Bridge are the Lions at the entrance. Legend has it though that the sculptor of the Lions jumped off the bridge into the Danube after a boy remarked that the sculptor forgot to carve out the tongues.
• We then went to Mathias Church (C: under construction) and the Fisherman's Bastion (A-) in the Castle District. Both of us bought soevniers in the surrounding area.
• Also, we passed the House of Hungarian Wines (a place we wanted to go that was written up in the NY Times) at 11am, but decided to come back since it didn't open till noon.
• After the Castle District we meander down the street and across a bridge to to the Parliament for the noon tour. When we got there we found out that all the tickets to the tour were sold out.
• The next plan of action was to go to the Ethnographical Museum across the street. This musuem was so bad it was funny. They had a Blue Jean exhibit. Basically it was like walking through a weird European department store. M even got in trouble for touching one of the jeans. A guard took exception to her touching such a piece of art and scolded her in Hungarian.
• After a few rounds of successive disappointment the weather decided to match our thoughts by starting a constant light rain.
• We grabed a cab and went to the other side of Buda to the Gelert Hill. Gelert Hill has an amazing view of Budapest. We ate lunch there at the Citadel and had a nice meal of Chicken Paprakia (Hungarians love Paprakia) and Pasta for me and Fried Veal something or another (the Hungarian version of Chicken Fried Steak).
• The sights we saw in the Gelert Hill were the Liberation Monument (B), Cave Church (A-), and St. Gelert (C-).
• We then had to walked (lots of walking today) to the Budapest National Museum (A). This place was pretty cool. I never thought a Musuem would be the highlight of the day, but at last I was surprised.
• After that we went back to the House of Hungarian Wines for our much needed 2 hour wine sampling. This was not to be as the House of Hungarian Wines decided to close at 5:30 instead of the normal 8 pm closing time. Of course we got there at 5:24.
• We then cabbed back to the hotel and promised that tomorrow is going to be a better day.

Anyway, tomorrow we are off to the bath in the morning and then to Vienna in the afternoon. M didn't want to do one of the authentic Turkish baths, so we are going to a family friendly one tomorrow.

Hopefully I can write tomorrow. Now it is off for more of Budapest Idol. Kussurnurm.

Hooked on a Feeling

Well we made it to Budapest. The flight from Chicago to London was long and cramped (we were in the middle seats in the middle row), but overall it wasn't that bad. After that we had an easy flight from London to Budapest and made it into Budapest at around 5pm today. After getting a bus to our hotel (the Best Western Hotel Hungarian) on the Pest side we decided to head out looking for food. One kind of funny note was that on the bus ride over to our hotel they had some weird random American station on that played Hooked on a Feeling among other American songs. I was kind of upset that being so close to Germany we didn't get to hear David Hasseloff's version, but at least it was nice understanding the words.

Anyway, when we ended up going to a place that was recommended by the hotel staff. M got a cherry duck with mashed potatoes and I got some duck pasta, pea, carrot thing. I would have to look up the offical names, but right now I am on a 30 minute time crunch because I bought a 30 minute internet card.

I have added a few pictures from dinner. Tomorrow there will be more as we are planning on going to the Castle District, Gelhert Hill, the Baths, etc. Now it off to watch tv of this random Budapest girl doing her version of Ironic.

Off to Budapest

I wanted to thank everyone who wrote encouraging emails to me yesterday. From my old mentee to my old mentor at Target there were a lot of people that were A) Surprised I had a blog B) Excited for my trip and C) Wanted to see pictures and hear updates on the trip. I am very excited for the trip and as long as I get Internet access in Eastern Europe I will be posting thoughts and pictures along the way.

I have my passport, 3 books (Moneyball, A Season on The Brink, Neither Here Nor There: Travels in Europe), plenty of magazines, shirts, socks, shoes, a jacket, a sweatshirt, sweaters, a tux, and more than what I thought could fit in my largest piece of luggage. It is definitely a lot more difficult packing for a vacation in the winter than in the summer. Also, for those of you that don't know I am taking the tux because I will be a bridseman in the wedding party. I am excited to be in my first (and possibly only) wedding party.

Now, for some people when I mention that it is a mixed wedding party are a little bit confused. Traditional wedding culture has it that the groom can only have males on his side and the bride can only have females. I can't find the article that I read in the New York Times about 2 years ago, but I think it stated that 10% of all wedding parties now are mixed. If anyone can find that or another statistic on the % of mixed wedding parties then that would be appreciated. Anyway, some people are very traditional especially when it comes to weddings and do not like the idea of the mixed wedding party. I am not as traditional and think it is great that Nicholas and Nancy have agreed on the mixed wedding party.

Speaking of statistics I did find the below website on wedding statistics that I thought was very interesting:

http://www.aweddingministers.com/wedding/statistics.htm

Some things I thought were interesting:

• The Wedding Industry is a$50 billion dollar industry or basically the size of Target.
• $22K is the average cost of wedding and $4K is the average cost of honeymoon. If you take into account the average wedding couple is only making a combined $60K a year before taxes then one could see wedding couples that don't come from affluent families being forced to a diet of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for a year or two to pay for the wedding/honeymoon.
• 60% of brides will change their surname. (Props to my sister)
• More money is spent on the flowers or music then on the rehearsal dinner. Personally I think the rehearsal dinner is one of the best parts of the wedding weekend.
• Under most popular activities 10% said Golf/Sports vacations. I could definitely see a baseball roadtrip as a great honeymoon possibility.

Anyway, check out the site if you have time and/or interested. I am off to work before leaving Minneapolis at 7:30pm on a flight that goes through Chicago and London before touching down in Budapest at 5:30pm on Saturday.

Response to the Hansbrough Comments

It was interesting to be listed on the campus links section on cnnsi.com. I definitely enjoyed the increased traffic even though it looks like from the comments not many people agreed with my “Top 10 Reasons Why You Should Dislike Tyler Hansbrough.” Here is my quick rebuttal:

-Some of the points on the list where jokes. I guess the jokes don’t come as well when someone is fired up about someone insulting their favorite player.

-No, I couldn’t beat Tyler Hansbrough in a 1 on 1 game. Not that I am a sportswriter, but I don’t think many sportswriters are better than the athletes they critique. Just because you can’t throw a football like Brett Farve doesn’t mean you can’t comment on him as a player.

-I shouldn’t have brought up the Gerald Henderson incident. There is no way of rationally bringing that up to a Duke or Carolina fan because both sides have already made up their mind on that point.

-I loved watching JJ Redick play basketball. Most people couldn’t stand him. By just posting his name once I got two responses that challenged his skill level/accomplishments. I think everyone just needs to calm down about Redick.

-To Dan’s comment: I spent less 2 hours coming up with the finding the videos and pictures, coming up with the list, and posting it on my blog. Unfortunately my job doesn’t let me take a month off to work on posts.

-Also, let me guess the 5 that don’t make sense (they were all semi-jokes): Awkwardness, Poor Sportsmanship, Psycho T, Whiteness, and Poor Public Speaking. And the 5 that aren’t true: Constant Flopping, Teary Eyes, Talent Level, Success, and Lack of Class.

-Final rebuttal to Dan’s comment: I do think you make a good point on the “reason why you don’t win games” is because of 1 person. I shouldn’t fault Tyler Hansbrough alone for not succeeding in a tournament that is the definition of a small sample size. I agree with you on that point.

-You can’t argue with the fact that Tyler Hansbrough is not projected to be a good professional player. UNC fans usually hold the lack of success in the Nba (see Christian Laettner, Danny Ferry, etc) against Duke, so I just flipped it around on Hansbrough. The truth of the matter is for better or worse Tyler Hansbrough is a good college basketball player and will be a terrible pro. I think most Duke fans would agree they would rather see more Brandon Wrights (one and done) than Tyler Hansbrough’s (4 years) of the world.

-Don’t post anonymous. If you are a UNC fan you should be proud of your school and your comments.
PBrooks - #1 preseason ranking means nothing. Believe me I like Duke and they have been preseason #1 many times.
I can get tickets the Dean Dome a lot easier than Cameron. Also, why did you put YOU in all upper case letters? All it made me think of was the chorus of “Crank That.”

-I have read many books on Carolina and Duke basketball history. Believe it or not both teams sometimes lose.

-JOKE: Did Carolina steal the old Raiders motto of “Just Win, Baby” and I just didn’t know it?

-I don’t think Michael Jordan is the best player ever. I would rather have Bill Russell if I was starting a team.

Just in case all the posters were curious I have multiple family members who are proud UNC graduates. The posting is all in good fun. I hate writing this, but I respect UNC, the basketball program, and their history. Chapel Hill is one of the best college cities I have ever seen. That being written I am a loyal Duke fan who loves hating UNC

Top 10 reasons why you should dislike Tyler Hansbrough

I have been reading a lot of college basketball articles touting the merits of a certain junior post player from the University of No Class. I don’t know why the media has such a love affair with this player, but I am here to provide a counterargument. Here are the top 10 reasons (in no particular order) why you should dislike Tyler Hansbrough:

1. The constant flopping: Just because a player is awkward doesn’t mean you should call a foul every time. Next time you are watching a UNC game look for Hansbrough to power his way to the basket, flail his arms, shoot an awkward shot, and get the foul call.


2. Teary eyes: Why does it always seem like Tyler Hansbrough is about to cry?There was the infamous bloody nose game from last year. Also there was the time when he got hit in the face against Duke in 2006: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kf7KE7JntJU or





3. Awkwardness: With or without the face mask nobody plays or looks more awkward than Tyler Hansbrough. Basketball is a graceful game when played well and Hansbrough's anything but graceful.
   
4. Poor Sportsmanship: Why was Tyler Hansbrough in a game with 20 seconds left and the Tar Heels up 12? You could say that it is Roy Williams’ fault for leaving him in and I might agree with that argument. Then the next question comes up is why did Tyler Hansbrough go up for a shot with 20 seconds left in the game that was already over? Most basketball players would get the rebound and then pass it out, run out the clock, and move on to the next game. Tyler Hansbrough wanted to work on his scoring average.


5. Psycho T: Should we be rooting for someone whose nickname is Psycho T? I am not saying the nickname isn’t appropriate (it is), but should we be encouraging the youth of America to follow the actions of someone who from all account is psycho. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czlSRUUC1vc&NR=1
   
   
   
6. Whiteness: There is JJ Redick white, Powder white, and then there is Tyler Hansbrough. Maybe SI should have picked another background besides white for their cover with Hansbrough on it:
   
   I have been to Chapel Hill a few times and know for a fact they do have sun there. You couldn’t tell that from looking at Tyler Hansbrough. Does he have some type of skin condition we don’t know about? Does Psycho T lock himself in a gym during the daylight and practice his awkward jump shot? Also, not to go all Spike Lee on you, but do you think that one of the reasons that Tyler Hansbrough is getting so much attention is because he is white? He is not as good of college player as Chris Lofton from Tennessee or even his own teammate Ty Lawson. I can tell you that as Duke fan I am much more worried about Ty Lawson. The reason why is that he is a better player than Tyler Hansbrough. That brings me to the next point:
   
7. Talent level. Something that is never mentioned in the articles that I read about Tyler Hansbrough is that he just isn’t very good. The reason he didn’t go pro wasn’t because he loved the college lifestyle or because he wanted to win a National Title. The reason Tyler Hansbrough didn’t go pro was because at best he was a late 1st round draft pick. If he would have been a top 10 pick like Brandon Wright, he wouldn’t be at UNC. Everyone is fawning over him, but Tyler Hansbrough doesn’t have half the skill of JJ Redick. Just in case you forgot here is JJ against UNC: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIeggAWXvWs
   In fact Tyler Hansbrough isn’t much different than Nick Collison, Sheldon Williams, or Josh McRoberts. In fact I would say that Tyler Hansbrough is definitely not as good as everyone just listed except for McRoberts. Check out a mock draft to see where Tyler Hansbrough is projected to go in 2009. http://nbadraft.net/index.asp?content=mock2009
   
8. Success: Fill in the blank: In 2 years Tyler Hansbrough’s led teams have accomplished (blank). In case you didn’t know Tyler Hansbrough has never been to the Final Four. In both of the last two tournaments his team lost to teams (George Mason and Georgetown ) with less talent than the Tar Heels.


9. Lack of Class/Dirty Play: Ask Brandon Costner about Tyler trying to slap him during a UNC loss to NC State: http://youtube.com/watch?v=o8HwU-toj2g


10. Poor Public Speaking: During an awards banquet Tyler did the following:
    1. Said: "I just want to thank my teammates (pause) for missing so many shots."
    2. Accidentally called his coach the wrong name.
    3. Egotistically announced that he was coming back for his Junior year
    4. Punctuates the announcement with an awkward salute to the audience.
    5. Finishes his speech by suggesting that UNC fire Assistant Coach Haase.

If you want to check out this 40 second clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-zgm62KBeg
Lets hope Psycho T never decides to become a comedian or a basketball announcer. He is much better suited for awkward white bench post player.

At least he has cool tribute videos like:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JzFz3U7iRg

If you don't like that you can check out more of the egomaniac at http://www.tyler50.com/

More of the Dolphins

I know the Dolphins are 0-8 and its a bye week, but I still can't get enough of them. From the story I heard on PTI about them paying celebrities to attend their games to the fact they still haven't named John Beck the starting quarterbacks it keeps getting worse and worse. Thanks to those who commented on the last blog. I definitely want to make a youtube video on the song. I am thinking about using some of the revenue I have received from the blog to pay my friend Johnny to make a video. Until then here are some youtube vidoes I like:

Old School Dolphins rap:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=pJvTWmUYTII

Ted Ginn Jr.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=P--YcVjmfZw

Dan Marino:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=FYXZqP4P9a8

Ronnie Brown:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=hPMVEXHKefE

Other random notes of interest:

• Can espn.com calm down with the "upset watch" special that comes on http://scores.espn.go.com/ncf/scoreboard? A few weeks ago the UPSET WATCH at the top of the screen alerted me to a potential upset when Florida was beating Kentucky. The defending national champs were beating a basketball school and it was an upset? Today I am being alerted to the fact that there is an upset alret on 23 ranked Virginia beating 24th ranked Wake Forrest 10 to 6. If you check the Vegas odds on the game (http://www.usatoday.com/sports/gaming/sheridan.htm) it is actually a pick em game.
• What kind of college football world do we live in when Kansas is a 19 point favorite over Nebraska? The same world where there is the blog: http://firebillcallahan.blogspot.com/. Oh yeah the mighty Jayhawks have scored 42 points so far in the first half against the Cornhuskers. That might be acceptable for a basketball game.
• I went to the play the Lion King last night. Good play except that one of our four tickets had limited viewing. That meant that one of us could only see about 30% of the stage.