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How awesome/sad is it that I only have 4 lj entries in october? I pay for this stuff you know. Anyway, I'll have plenty more this month, including the long announced geek/Star Trek update. Just warning you in advance.

Now I'll talk about the belgian masters, a yearly tennis tournament with just the top 6 male players in Belgium. I went the first year when they organised it (Malisse won!), and now again this year (4th edition). This time, I "worked" there ahaha. I just had to show people their seats. What a responsability! Although there's always something people complain about and stuff, whatever. I liked doing it (and I would've enjoyed it even more if I wasn't so damn tired - Antwerp always has this effect on me, so weird), might do it again. Only problem I had was with 4 guys, and one of those guys just couldn't stop talking. I mean, really, he didn't shut up for more than 30 seconds at a time, really. It was so annoying, and I (and even members of the audience) told them to quiet down, but that one guy just kept on going. A compulsive talker. Ugh. I just gave up trying to get him to STFU, because I know it's no use, and because I can't throw him out or anything. Very very annoying. Apart from that, it was pretty cool. Especially when the younger volunteers came to me for advice and stuff. I did what I do best: pretending to know what I'm talking about!! The funniest moment related to that was when they asked me where to send people asking for the toilet, since the nearest one was closed. "oh, I just send them to the entrance. To be honest, I don't even know if there is a toilet there, but no-one I sent there came back to complain, so yeah..." It made them laugh, but obviously, there actually were toilets at the entrance, it's only logical.

Anyway, the actual matches! Oh, but first, this. I don't want to talk about it, because it still makes me very, very, very angry. So unfair, unjust and plain mean. I hope they find a way out because otherwise, it's the end of X-man's career. So I didn't get to see him play, and he was easily the player I was looking forward to see the most. Not a big fan of the other guys. On saturday (my 'work' day), the matches were Dick Norman vs. Christophe Rochus and Steve Darcis vs. Olivier Rochus. Second match was the best one, some really awesome rallies. Bad thing was that both matches lasted around 2 hours, and I only got back at 3AM.

On sunday, there was a doubles game first, Dick Norman and Wesley Moodie vs. Olivier Rochus and Steve Darcis (the latter replacing Malisse). Rather a one-sided match, as expected, but still good fun. The finals were between Dick Norman and Olivier Rochus. Norman won. As I expected. He was so awesome on saturday, I really couldn't see him lose the next day. His serve is his biggest weapon, but since he's mainly a double player, he's a pretty good volley-er as well. There were also a lot of between-the-legs attempts, most of them went over the net, but none of them were winners heh. Sunday was certainly more fun than saturday, much more relaxed. Might have had something to do with the Malisse thing, especially since the players had a t-shirt on with his face on the back on saturday, and Malisse was actually there to sign autographs and stuff. ALSO, you won't believe this, but everyone got a doping control on sunday. THE NERVE, holy crap. Salt in the scar-inducing wounds, that's what it was. Wow.

Still not sure about going next year, especially if it's without Malisse again. I realised the other players (apart from Dick, actually) all have the same playstyle, and since I've seen them play a couple of times before, it's just not that interesting. I wish there were more male tennis tournaments/exhibitions around here, there's one challenger tournament but it's quite far away and didn't have that many interesting players this year.

Anyway, more tennis talk soon.

gigs	[Nov. 1st, 2009\|01:40 am]
So, time to review 2 gigs I've been to lately. Health Support act was Pictureplane, sorta DJ stuff, but pretty fun. Health then. Saw them at Pukkelpop. They were right before Patrick Wolf, so I only ended up seeing about 20 minutes of them. Liked what I saw. So much, in fact, that I bought a ticket for this show and 2 of their albums. While the albums haven't really impressed me much, they're pretty damn awesome live. A lot of energy and clever trickery with instruments and effects units and stuff, it's great to see them make all this work live. There aren't really many stand-out tracks, because the quality is pretty consistent throughout. I also keep forgetting names of the songs (they all have silly names anyway). The only one that really stands out to me is Death+, which is quite repetitive. The good kind of repetitive as far as I'm concerned. I suppose this song, and the band on the whole, can be compared to Liars. Which makes it even more surprising that I like them, because I ended up hating pretty much all those other "if you like Liars, you'll like (this band)" recommendations. Bat For Lashes Yes, again! First of all though, something went wrong with the train I was on, which made me miss the support act, Hecuba. I listened to a song or two of their and it seems like something I would enjoy live as well. So, the gig! Oh, I should say that I saw her earlier this year, and that that gig was (and, I suppose, still is) gig of the year for me. So even though I snapped up my ticket from the moment I heard about the gig, I was still thinking this might be a bit pointless, as she can never really be as good as she was then, can she? Weeeell...they're actually quite comparable, this one was really really great as well. First of all, something I thought before the gig was "well, if she plays Trophy, it's already worth it" (because she didn't play it earlier this year). And, of course, she did play Trophy. I love Trophy muchly, and the irony is that it wasn't even one of the highlights of the evening. Really, the gig was that good. I wasn't too happy about the sound, but then I was standing (too!) close to the right speaker. She kept pointing and running off the stage between songs, I don't think she was very happy with the sound either. Some more song talk then: she played Daniel in a more dancy version (and no acoustic version this time), What's a girl to do was also in a much more dancy version (they even added extra handclaps!! It sounded okay but I prefer the "slow" handclaps of the original), she also played Tahiti, Horse and I, The Wizard and Prescilla from the first album. The Wizard gave me goosebumps, it was SO SO GOOD. But the real highlight was the combo of Pearl's Dream and Two Planets. 2 of my favourite songs on the album, and they're even better live. The electronical bits in these songs are so satisfying live. And Two Planets, oh boy. There's just so much in this song already, but live, it's an entire universe on its own. Lots of instruments, random handclaps, Natasha dancing like a loon, extremely satisfying drum pounding,...this was, as some people say, my eargasm of the year. I didn't want it to end, and I wasn't alone. The extremely talkative lesbians behind me were all "wow" and "why isn't anyone dancing?" (the answer was: because there was no room, gig was completely sold out, and they were at the side/front of the stage where there's always a bit more room to move. tsk.) Oh, and something different from last time: they had a huge banner/curtain thing with a picture of a wolf in front of a moon. They changed the lights behind it from time time, so sometimes it was a "normal" moon, then a red moon, etc. Lights stuff was pretty good in general - although, I, ever the minimalist, wouldn't have gone overboard like they did during some songs. Natasha was also wearing a ferocious looking white wolf mask on her back. She also asked us to howl "because it's halloween". Yes. So yeah. Very much worth it. Wouldn't mind seeing her again in 6 months heh. ( more random music talk ) Oh, I think I remember why I stopped updating so much: I started feeling somewhat guilty after I do some "me" talk. I know it's what journals are for, but you know.
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Ian's third birthday	[Oct. 19th, 2009\|08:59 pm]
It's so cute how he does the 3 thing. He looks at his hand, makes a fist, sticks out his thumb first, then his index finger and his middle finger. He looked so happy and proud when he did it at the party. ( 2 days of party! ) More here. And since I'm not sure I made an Ian-related post last month, the september pictures are here.
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Patrick Wolf gig	[Oct. 14th, 2009\|10:34 pm]
I suppose I should write something about the Patrick Wolf gig I went to last weekend (lately, reviewing things has started to feel a lot like a chore - something's wrong with me I think). If I had to sum it up in one word, it would be...GAY! No really, I've never seen so many obviously gay people at one gig. I was on the right side of the stage, and around me I counted 8 gays. But you know what the worst part of all this was? There was like only one moderately attractive guy amongst them haha. And obviously he was with someone. Anyway! The gig! It was...good. Not as good as Manchester, not as good as Pukkelpop 2009. Still good. My main problem was the setlist: he played practically every song from The Bachelor - except Vulture, which is one of the few outstanding songs on the album. This obviously left almost no room for the other albums: there was only The Magic Position and The Stars (okay, I love both songs) from the previous album, Tristan and Lands end from Wind in the wires (Lands end was a strange choice, but I love the song anyway), and only Paris from Lycantrophy. Really, of all the gigs I've seen (5 now), this was easily the worst setlist. He made it up for me (somewhat) by being extremely talkative and cute towards the end of the gig. He talked about some songs (I'm not depressed! Really! Some of my songs might be, but I'm not!), his memories of Brussels, and that he has an unfinished song about Brussels that he intends to finish (oh wow, after Paris and London, Brussels! Ahaha), the fact that this was the last date on the tour (you have no idea how many times I've heard that, and I'm getting quite sick of it. I know they have to pick one city to finish the tour in, but more than half of the time it seems to be Brussels. Hate it.) That last bit is also the reason why the gig was somewhat short, as he had to catch the ferry back home (was it really that expensive to stay in Brussels another night and give us a "full" gig for once?). Also, someone in the audience asked him to play Wind in the wires. "Oh, that's one of my favourite songs! But my ukulele died halfway through the tour, sorry!" UGH. So yeah, all this left me a bit frustrated and definitely unsatisfied. Of course it would've been hard to follow up his Pukkelpop performance (hell, even someone next to me said "oh I liked it, but Pukkelpop was better. More...FUN"), but it's still below my expectations. I mean, it wasn't BAD, it was just...not as great as it should've been. It very much reminded me of seeing Liars in 2007, also a month or two after their absolutely amazing Pukkelpop gig. It also ended up being a disappointment. Although this really wasn't as bad as the Liars gig though. And it's still Patrick Wolf you know. If you haven't seen him live yet, you really should. His voice is SO awesome, and he's a great showman. This (and other reasons) sort of put me off going to any more concerts for the rest of year (apart from those I already have tickets of). Like, there's a The Bug gig this weekend, another band I enjoyed a great deal at Pukkelpop, but it's at the same place as the Liars one was, so I was already thinking "okay, it really can't be as good as at PP, so what's the point?", but the P-wo gig made it even worse. Today I sorta changed my mind again heh, and I might go. And I'll probably talk about it some more, but 2009 hasn't really been a good year for me when it comes to music. Saw some very good things live, yes, but when it comes to albums and discovering new stuff, this year has been rather empty. I know it's just me, since I haven't even bought the new albums of bands I usually enjoy. I guess I'm just getting bored with a lot of stuff. I wonder if next year will be any different.
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my sister may not know roman history, but I do	[Oct. 13th, 2009\|11:04 pm]
You know what today is? My sister's birthday! You know what else? Claudius' death-day! How convenient that, today of all days, I finally, after struggling with them for nearly 2 months, finished both of Robert Graves' Claudius-related books. I really had no idea about the date, I only found out at the end of the second book (and obviously it's on wikipedia's main page too - they always have the deaths of (important - hello Hadrian!) Roman emperors in that "on this day" section). I should've really reviewed the first book after I finished it, since I finished it more than a month ago. Still, comparing the two books, the first one is far more interesting, and the one I can easily recommend to anyone, even if you have no interest in Rome at all (and you SHOULD be interested in Rome, not just for pure historical reasons, but so you can find out for yourself how little we've advanced in terms of morals, politics, society,... in 2000 years. Quite shocking in a way - or were the Romans simply far ahead of their time?) I'll try to stop putting things between brackets from now on. Anway, first book deals with everything from Augustus to Claudius acually becoming Emperor. The whole family history can get quite confusing, especially since the Julio-Claudian dynasty has so many members, and a lot of them adopted. That's really about the only bad thing I can say about the first book, those pasages about the family history, or even the ones about Roman society might be considered boring to some. But the style in which it's written is one I really love. Old-fashioned maybe, but rather dramatic and very clever in places. My favourite moments is when Claudius (who is the narrator - hence the I, Claudius title!) stops summing up facts, and goes "I truly am sorry, dear reader, to bore you with all this, but it is necessary that you know these facts, as they have great significance later in my story". Some of them are quite funny, but I can't really remember any of them. Then, the second book, "Claudius the God". It starts with a couple of chapters on Herod Agrippa, a friend of Claudius'. A somewhat weird way to start, but he plays a big role on the first part of the book. Overall, I found this book to be rather boring at some points. In a way that's somewhat normal, since the first book spans a period of more than 50 years and 3 Emperors, while this one is all about what Claudius did during his reign, about 13 years. It does have some interesting sections though, like his conquest of Britain, the eastern situation (including his view on the new christian religion), and umm...that's about it I guess. But that's about 60 or even 70% of the book, so it's not that bad. The rest is more about all the things Claudius did as an emperor, and some of those were quite boring heh. I don't really know what else to say, so I'll talk about or quote some of my favourite passages:( write no more now, Tiberius Claudius ) And since this is related to how I started this entry: Nero, the successor of Claudius, became Emperor on 13th october (like I said, my sister's birthday) and died by his own hand on 9th june, my birthday.
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chaos reigns.

[Oct. 8th, 2009|09:32 pm]

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Is this the largest gap ever in my lj history? Hmm.

I suppose I just had nothing interesting to share. In the meantime, I restarted my geek journal, again (6 month gap).

Let's see...My sister came over one weekend, with the family. Pics of Ian. Hummer still doesn't listen very much. Ian is still cute and talkative, but definitely not a morning person hahaha. Getting his clothes on is the most difficult part of the day. Otherwise he's generally cheerful. Until they go back home. Clinging to me and shouting "nooo, I want to stay with Tim!" and lots of crying. It broke my heart, just a little bit. I know he does that everywhere though.

Went to Ghent, met up with T&V. Had a fight with Thomas heh. Not going to elaborate. It was his fault! I think I'm still a bit mad (or at least, uncomfortable with the whole thing). He got mad at me for nothing, at first I didn't mind but looking back, he was very rude and hurt my feelings. Only spoken to him once or twice after this, everything is okay though.
I'm also not in a very social mood these days (and, to be honest, this usually goes from late september to early april or something. Awful).

Oh yeah, we saw Antichrist. They hated it. But Valentine still talked about it muchly. I don't think it's a particularly good film, but it definitely left an impression on me, and I don't think I'll forget it any time soon. The things I didn't like were the very arty-farty bits (yes, the very start of the film - and the end) and the torture porn (I've seen a lot of that stuff but this was still painful to watch). What I did like: the underlying themes and the between-the-lines stuff, and analysing the characters and symbols. Since you, dear reader, probably won't go see it (I can't really recommend, it but it's still...interesting), I'll spoil some stuff: I very much liked the part in the middle of the film, the whole "nature is evil" part. It's very much like that story I have in my head about the evilness in the alps. Really the exact same feeling I'm going for. And obviously, I liked the whole "women are evil" part even more! Heh. A lot of stuff in this is up for interpretation, and, if you like analysing stuff like I do, you actually should have some amount of "fun" with it. Just close your eyes when the woman grabs some scissors.
OH, I have tons of respect for Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg. It must've been really really really hard for them to act in a film like this. I know how hard Björk had it during Dancer in the dark, but really, this is on an entirely different level. Lars von Trier is such a sadist, wow.

So, that was the past, now for the very near future: sister is coming over tomorrow. We're going to empy my granddads house with a whole bunch of the family on saturday. And saturday evening, I'm going to Patrick Wolf. Yay! I feel so un-ready.
I also should visit my dad sometime soon. Haven't seen him since august or so :/ Oh, and there's Ian birthday party next saturday.

More...later this year. Maybe.

mind tricks.

[Sep. 21st, 2009|12:53 am]

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Right! Dream talk!

So, I was with a group of people, on our bikes, going somewhere. That ended up being...Berlin! (fake, dream Berlin, I doubt it's surrounded by hills, and I also doubt that it's as big as it was in my dream. But still, it had that famous tower thing, so it WAS Berlin, mmkay?). Anyway, the group splits up, and we all try to find something to eat. Everyone went for the chip shops, but I had some the day before (in another dream actually, not in real life). I followed some people who went deeper in the city, but then I lost them and just explored on my own.
Later. Lost the bike, now walking around on foot. I'm in a "normal" street with lots of houses. Then suddenly a fight breaks out between two gangs who came out of nowhere (very The Warriors!). But then one gang starts going after me and another innocent bystander (Italian guy. How do I know? He just was, okay?). We enter one of the houses (big, with at least 3 floors, used as an apartment), and go all the way to the roof. We pass a lot of rooms, but the house really seems deserted. When we finally reach the attic, I hear that one of the gang members is right behind me, and I feel him hit me on the head with something heavy. Blackness follows.
Next, I wake up in a bed, in the same house. I start looking for the people who put me here. I start having a déjà-vu, really the feeling that I've been here before and that all of this happened before. I walk towards a door, thinking "that's the bathroom. When I open it, some old lady will be sitting in the bath". So, I open the door, and who was sitting in the bath? ...two children. I'm even more confused now, but then a woman (their mother probably) finds me and starts talking to me. In german! She invites me to dinner with her family, and talks about how she found me. This was all a bit weird, because I had the feeling I had done this before, but with slightly different variations. The family also gave me a weird feeling, my presence didn't really surprise them at all, it was like they knew this would happen, and that they expected me to stay there for some time.

I thought this was an awesome dream because it combined 2 kinds of dreams I like: city dreams (mainly places I haven't been yet) and time travel/déjà vu/recurring dream stuff.

Had another one with a similar feeling, this time game-related heh. In the dream, I start up some Castlevania game, after not having played it for a while. It's a 2D game, SNES-like, but the difference is that there's a (small, and also 2D) world map where I could walk around on. I think the goal was to go to a big mansion on the left side of the map, where I was supposed to meet up with a lady. But first I go to another arena I've never been to, a land road somewhere between a field and a forest. I immediately get a boss encounter, some guy who seems to control ice. I expect to lose against him, but suddenly I have this awesome weapon (hard to explain, sort of combination of a chain-whip and a flail, with several iron spiked balls attached to it). Beat him with this in no-time. Um, the end. This one was special because of the feeling that I had already played this game before, it really felt like I hadn't played it in months. But, this game doesn't exist! Don't remember dreaming about it at some earlier date either. Very weird. But, with this and the other dream, sorta awesome how my mind plays tricks on me, heh.

(no subject)

[Sep. 20th, 2009|11:54 pm]

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First off, some tennis news! Davis cup news! (...it's like, the country vs. country thing in male tennis). I'm not going to explain everything here (it's quite complicated), but the good news is, Belgium is back in the world group! ( hurray! )

And now for something completely different:
I can't believe the amount of gaming I've been doing in the past week, and especially in the past 2 days. It's been a very, very long time since I played more than 5 different videogames a day (and a year or two ago, I decided that it would be best to only play a maximum of 2 "core" games a day, keep playing them until I'm finished/bored with them, and then move on). The main culprit in all this is Steam. 4 years ago, they only had Valve games. Now, they pretty much have everything, and every week a special promotion. Bought Braid and Secret of Monkey Island for less than €5, played through Knights of the Old Republic (24 hours of game joy for €8,99, bargain!), and there are so many awesome packs available (like the iD pack, with every Doom, Quake and whatnot ever released). And there are plenty of other great download services with cheap stuff. I'm impressed. I'm already used to downloading games for consoles, but until earlier this year I had no idea it was this widespread for pc games as well. I'm still going to buy "hard copies" I guess (if I can find them cheaper), but I can definitely see myself buying more games through download. Especially on Steam, there's no copy protection thing (I have Half-Life 2 installed on 3 PCs), and once you buy the game, it's yours FOREVER. All your game purchases are stored on your account, so if you buy a new pc or format your harddrive, you just log-in and you get the list of games you bought, and everything is ready for you to download. Awesome, and so easy. And to think, when Steam first came out, everyone said it sucked and would die within the year. Ahahaha.
Also, I might have an extra version of Half-life 2 and Episode 1 (I plan on buying Orange Box for pc as well) so if anyone is interested and doesn't have these yet (which would be very weird and stupid), I should be able to gift them.

Next update: dream time!

hairy spider friends	[Sep. 16th, 2009\|12:50 am]
Hello! The past 10 days have been nothing but tennis and videogaming for me. Tennis is gone now (been writing a big entry about that, will publish it tomorrow), so I suppose I have time for an entry. Not that I have anything to say really. Um...met up with Thomas and Val on sunday! They came to Ostend. Friends, yay! I love Val. I think it's slightly disturbing that I prefer talking to her than to Thomas haha. I suppose it's just easier to have a proper conversation with her (while Thomas is even more flippant than I am!), I enjoy talking to her about random facts of life. And I enjoy bickering with Thomas, sorta trying to impress her, and flirting with her haha. Aah. Anyway, might see them again this weekend or the next. I now officially have a beard, since it's been over 2 weeks that I used a razor on it. Actually, from june on, I've just been trimming it, never fully shaving it. It looks a bit weird since I have very little hair on my lower cheeks but lots under my chin, and very thick and sturdy hair as well. Fun! I suppose I'll take a picture of it to prove my vanity, and shave it tomorrow. Need a haircut as well. It's september. In my house, that means...spider month! Didn't take pictures this time (mainly because they're the same kind of spiders as the previous years), but they really were out in force this year! First one: saw it sitting right in front of my bed. And you know how much of a spider friend I am, so I tried to capture it. FAIL. It ran under my bed. Checked under my bed right away. Couldn't see it anywhere :( So it must've ran superfast and hid somewhere else, grr. And yes, I actually did manage to sleep that night. I also vowed that I would kill spiders from now on, instead of being stupid and trying to save them. Second one: right in front of the bathroom. When it saw me, it tried to run (into my room!!) but I put my best foot forward and crushed it. Third one: right next to the tv in the living room. I again was feeling merciful, and try to make it fall into a cup, so I can throw it outside. You know what that little fucker did? IT JUMPED AT ME. I am absolutely not kidding you. It didn't quite reach me, but when it was on the floor, it started running towards me as well. Again, I saw no other choice than to crush it under my flip-flops of DOOM. Fourth one: actually this happened even before the first one, but the other three were all "big" spiders, this one was a bit smaller. This one was hiding...UNDER MY SHEETS. Believe it. Mr. Spider must've been unaware that only 4 creatures are allowed in my bed: me, Ian, plush Cthulhu and my (imaginary) sexual partner, and that, if you're not either of those 4, the punishment for intruding my bedstead is DEATH. So I delt it swiftly to that vile beast. Aah yes, I forgot how much I enjoy writing about my adventures with my 8-legged friends. I certainly hope I haven't killed them all, hmm. Maybe I should leave the windows open all day again...
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US Open! Closed!

[Sep. 15th, 2009|11:49 pm]

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Yeah, I suppose I still have to do an update about that. I suppose I kept delaying it because I pretty much already said everything on twitter. And other, videogame-related reasons, yeah.

( Read more... )

Had enough now?

US Open!

[Sep. 5th, 2009|03:04 pm]

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Now that the first 2 rounds are over, time for an update, no?
( and why men are better than women )

a different head space	[Sep. 3rd, 2009\|12:47 am]
Time to complain! I have not been well recently. My mind is a mess. I only properly seem to function after 8PM as well. It's all my own fault, I've been staying up far too late in the past two weeks. I need a job, simply so I can live in a normal day pattern. And have something to concentrate on, I have no focus at all now. My dreams have been so messed up recently as well. I can't remember them clearly, but a lot of them just felt bad. Not because of the actual content, but just...the feeling. Nothing happens in them except talking, I seem to be some politician or whatever who needs to listen to and consult people, and then make decisions. It's awful!! But in my dreams I seem to be so good at this, and in many different situations as well. I'm pretty sure I was a roman emperor one night, and a Starfleet commander another night. Oh, and I just remembered one in which I was some sort of astronomer, and I discovered tons of new stuff, and I had to convince my fellow scientists that it was all real. It's so confusing and annoying, in those dreams I'm super smart but when I wake up I feel like the complete idiot I am. I had a good dream two nights ago. It involved...Los Angeles! No, that's not weird, when it comes to the US, I have more LA dreams than NY dreams, really. Anyway, content wasn't that interesting maybe, but it was a dream in two parts. First part, I was in LA. Second part, it was the day before I left to LA. Second part was more interesting (or at least, the part I remember best), lots of bad and very, very weird things happened. There's a possibility that my dream/spiritual guide is no longer Xena, but a rather arrogant cop who looked vaguely familiar and knows all about me, and who in this dream, was undercover as a (female!) prostitute. Hmm. I think I prefer Xena. The past few days, I've been mainly listening to HTRK, Little Boots and The xx. I love HTRK muchly, individually their songs don't seem that strong, but that dirty, passive, nostalgic atmosphere on the album is so, so good. It's a perfect late night/early morning album. Adam told me to listen to the Little Boots album, and I did! Multiple times! And while I still think I won't buy it, but it certainly isn't as bad as I thought it would be. Every song has something I dislike (mainly related to being too poppy for me), and at least half of the songs could be Kylie songs, but at least they're good pop songs. Apparently The xx are quite the hype on the island, but they don't get any attention over here (yet). Listened to the album a couple of times, and I'm still undecided. In one way, the songs are beautiful and brilliant, so minimalistic and melancholic yet very poppy. But on the other hand, something prevents me from getting really into this. Don't know what. I'm sorta considering seeing them live, but this music is usually not very exciting to see live. Incoming albums: The Bug, first Health album, and I'll probably give the La Roux album a few listens as well. Short tennis update next I suppose.
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that tennis update

[Aug. 31st, 2009|01:31 am]

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Yes, the US Open is about to begin! Exciting!!! Except that I probably won't see that many matches due to the time difference. But still!

Just for fun, I signed up for this ATP draw challenge thing. You just predict who's going to win matches, from the first rounds to the final. It's like gambling, only there's no money involved (you can win prizes, but you know). It's interesting because they also show stats and the percentage of people who think this person or another wil win the match. I'll post some interesting stats at the end of this update heh.

My draw is pretty boring and predictable, I have Federer as winner, Murray as finalist. Roddick and Tsonga as semifinalists. Tsonga might be a somewhat controversial choice, but the opponents he gets are doable for him. He'd come out against Nadal in the quarterfinals, but I'm actually convinced Tsonga will have the mental advantage in that case. In the round before that, Nadal should come out against Monfils, also not a very easy opponent.
Federer has a rather "easy" draw, the only player he has to fear (somewhat) is Roddick (or Djokovic), and then he'll already be in the semis. It's also likely he'll come out against Söderling, but Federer will probably get his 12th win against him (12-0 for Federer).
The lower side of the draw looks more interesting. How about Murray - Del Potro as a quarterfinal? Should be awesome, I hope it happens. Like I said, I have Murray in the final, but I consider myself more of a Del Potro fanboy, so I wouldn't mind him reaching the final instead. I'm 100% he'll win a grand slam within the next 3 years though.
This is all interesting (for me at least) speculation, but I've always been wrong this year haha. I expected Del Potro to win Roland Garros and Murray to win Wimbledon heh. But I was right about Söderling reaching the RG final though! I'll be wrong about so many things this time, I can feel it. But I suppose that would only make things more interesting. Like, in one way I'm half expecting Federer to make an early exit, but when I look at the draw it seems only Roddick is a danger, and that's already the quarterfinal. Yeah, Hewitt fans, your guy has been playing exceptionally good lately, but he hasn't won against Fed in -7- years! So, no. Federer will have to be injured for something like that would happen. And my disbelief in Federer this year has always been wrong (apart from the Australian Open, but let's not talk about that now heh).

One of the first matches on monday is...Gulbis vs. Murray!!! Awesome! The epitome of Gulbis' crappiest year since...ever probably. I'm not even sure if he ever made it past the second round this year in anything. He's currently ranked 101. Can you believe it? Last year at Roland Garros everyone was convinced of his awesomeness (even Nadal!). But this year...I guess it's a mixture of truly bad luck, and of something bothering him mentally (maybe the bad luck?). Now an anecdote I'm going to bring up every so often when I mention Gulbis: earlier this year, he was playing a match, and his coach was encouraging him and yelled "let's go Gulbis!" His reply: "go where?" Ahahaha. ...it's probably funnier when you imagine his face when he's saying that. Or, if you're a Nadal fanboy/girl: someone shouts "vamos Rafa!" and he replies with "que? donde?" Aah, I don't know why I find this so damn funny, but I do.
Yes, well, anyway, he can win against Murray! But he mostly likely won't, of course. Certainly would be one of the biggest upsets ever. One can dream.

Okay, then, the stats:
- 65% think Federer is going to win the US Open. 12% pick Murray, 10% Nadal, 6% Roddick, 4% Del Potro. This means about 3% think a non-top 5 player will win. Hmm.
- 99,4% think Hewitt will lose against Federer. The other 0,6% are australian. Obviously. And of those, 0,1% believes Hewitt will win this tournament. Blimey mate!
- 66,6% think, if a Djokovic - Roddick match will take place, that Roddick will win.
- almost 70% think Nadal would win against Tsonga. But if there would be a Nadal - Del Potro match, slightly more people think Nadal will lose than the other way around.
- 0,5% is sure that Gulbis will kick some Murray behind in the first round. Go go Gulbis fanclub!!! Heh.
- even better/worse, my guy Tursunov comes out against Roddick in round 2. Only 0,3% is behind Tursunov :(

...okay these probably weren't interesting, but they amused me for a moment or two.