Before I Forget...

Next weekend marks the start of the Most Important Sporting Competition In The Whole World, possibly excepting the World Cup: the English Premier League. Every year I predict who will finish where, and every year I forget what my prediction was. (My predictions are, apparently, eminently forgettable.) So this year, I'm writing it down. Here:

1. Arsenal
    Yes, things will finally come together for the Gunners, and things will fall apart for their main rivals.

2. Man Utd
    Close, but no cigar.

3. Chelsea
    The wife's favourite team will have more than its share of problems, and their manager's verbal antics will lose a lot of their ability to distract.

4. City
    They'll just barely squeak into the last UCL position, after another tumultuous season of melodrama on the sideline.

5. Spurs
    Sure, why not?

6. Liverpool
    My favourite team has really not inspired me to believe they can get back into Europe. Their signings, as much as their inability to retain the top people they've had (Suarez, Sterling...) reflect their diminishing status in the world of European football.

7. Saints
    And this time, they won't start off surprisingly high in the standings and then fade; they'll just putter along slightly above mid-table.

8. who cares?

Winnipeg? Winnipeg!

When the ethically-challenged governing body of soccer in the world announced that the United States team would play its first two games of the Women's World Cup in Winnipeg, my first reaction was that I would stay home and watch it on television. After all, I mean... Winnipeg? Jeez!

Then, of course, after a couple of seconds and only the whisper of a breath of a hint of serious reconsideration, I thought, Oh, well, Winnipeg. Okay. A week or so there can't be any worse than three days in Waco, which I have done, and survived (and did so without a car; at least in Winnipeg I'd have a car).

Polar bears all
over the place

Turns out, Winnipeg is a pretty good place to spend about a week. Probably could manage a second week there if there was a reason. It's actually a nice, clean, thriving city, with hints of culture both high and popular, and reasonably friendly people. If I had to live somewhere outside of Texas, Winnipeg wouldn't be too bad a choice. Plus, having booked the week through ProActive Soccer Tours, the same outfit that we used for the 2011 cup trip to Germany, ensured that we'd be in the hands of people who had actually researched the town and picked out interesting things to see & do. Kudos to them.

Of course it suffers from chronic vague post-modern guilt, and points too resolutely and too desperately at its glitzy new-age museum and purportedly francophone area as a result, but underneath it's a collection of some 800,000 souls going about their business. Like Austin, without the internalized stress.

Anyway, been there, done that, and the pictures are up on the Picasa web site. Take a look if you're interested. You can click on the bear, or here.