see dan tackle

dan connor plays linebacker. he is good. big ten defensive player of the week (for the second time this season) good. yeah dan!

read dan's gopsusports bio

holy hardcore!

don't mess with columbus, indiana inmates or their families man...or your ass will get tattooed....on the forehead! this is hardcore.

ridiculous for $200

as passion and i sat down for our nightly appointment with alex trebek and jeopardy, we were treated to so much more than the mental gymnastics that alex & co. provide. we witnessed what has to be one of the best uses of commercial airspace.....ever! i could try to explain our slack jaws and extended period of befuddlement, but why would i when you can experience it for yourself.

we are not alone in our amazement.

halloween harmonies

if you like halloween songs and/or cover's of old ministry songs, i have loaded miss manion's musical machine with a good one just for you, the postmarks doing the ministry classic 'everyday is halloween'. enjoy

wisky week

badger, badger, badger badger mushroom snake

always a good start to the psu/wisky week.

enjoy

love is all

you probably know by know that ash and i are partial to all things swedish, especially when it pertains to music. later this week we are going to see the first us show of the brother & sister combo, the knife, but last night we whet our pallette with a little appetizer of a show, by the five piece, gothenburg outfit, love is all. most venues in nyc are great places to see a show but the knitting factory (a converted...you guessed it, knitting factory in tribeca) is particuarly fine. needless to say, the intimate venue and love is all's blistering pace made for a great show. the lead singer acts as one part singer, one part cheerleader and the beat coming from the drum kit will put a little pep in anyone's step. if the love is all show is any indication, passion and i are in for a good one with the knife.

love is all (official site)
the knife (official site)

hoosier(state) daddy?

t hunt is a real man, even though this offense is not very good at all.

no way that the 'down year' psu teams win a game like that. it feels pretty good to be able to win on the road in the big ten with one arm tied behind your back.

the shutout (hell yeah) is the first for penn state since 2002.

see the ball, be the ball

vote for joe

while i think that joe and his staff have been sucking eggs this year, i still think that he should be liberty mutual coach of the year, as this award takes character and responsibility into account. wait, come to think of it he is not taking responsibility for the character that he hired as offensive coordinator, jaypa. ohh well, he must be better than bob stoops and mark richt. vote for joe here.

get better

my little lion.

no speaky!

i never wished that i had command of the swedish language more than when i stumbled upon this headline. well, speaking swedish would have come in handy the time passion and i got stranded in the stockholm airport all night with no place to sleep. yeah, that would have been helpful.

breaking news: maybe the swedes are just reporting on w using the "internets" to reach "the google". you can't make this stuff up. first "nu-cü-lar" and now the "internets". see for yourself.

forget road blues, i love road whites

anytime the nits take the field on the road, you know they are going to look good. majestic, old school, the way that college football was meant to be. now if they could just play as well as they dress.

i have long had an affinity for penn state's road whites. my pennsylvania blood gets pumpin' when i see those long john looking uniforms, especially as the weather turns and we get closer to the real highlight of the fall in central pennsy...huntin' season.

with penn state firmly entrenched in a 'middle of the pack' position in the big ten, the battle with wilford brimley's purdue boilermakers will go a long way in determining if psu can elevate themselves to a very respectable third place finish in the big ten, behind the top two teams in the country. the nits have seemed to have purdue's number since joining the big ten and this is the kind of pick'em match-up that gives psu a 7-3-1 advantage against purdue.

with that in mind, there is no way the nits escape west lafayette with a win by repeating the pathetic offensive effort on display in last week's homecoming debacle against the illini. closed door, player only meetings only go so far (especially when there is only a week between games) and i don't expect the lion o-line to look like the hartings and rivera led '94 line, but they are going to have to elevate their game at least to the level of minny-ha-ha and let tony hunt do his thing (i.e. pick up more than 30 yards in a game). if morelli can resist starring receivers down and/or throwing into double coverage for less than half the game, the nits should be able to score some points against a rather pedestrian 'makers d.

poz and connor should be energized by last week's efforts and the fact that they were both named semi-finalists for the bednarik award (best defensive player in the nation. poz already has one so don't count on him winning another this year). the defense should be able to give the usual, maddening mixture of great and sloppy, uninspired play. word out of the program has a.j. wallace and lydell sargeant splitting time with tony davis at one of the corner positions, so look for a couple of badly blown coverages there (not a particular player's fault, just an organizational shortcoming).

in the end joe and the lions can not go into a 'cocoon' if they want to win a tough one on the road, getting themselves closer to a bowl birth and a respectable finish in the big ten. nits 26, boilers 20.

go state...beat the boilers!

big shout to the st. petersburg shuffleboard club

fill in the gaps

i am not completely sold that we as tax paying citizens are getting our money's worth on the whole 'build a fence to keep the poor..i mean mexican people out' fence building initiative. &700 million and it's as porous as penn state's offensive line.

get yer ghost dance on

it's almost halloween and i feel like dancin'.


hella - 1-800-ghost-dance
(thanks said the gramophone)

the postmarks - every day is halloween
(thanks you ain't no picasso)

sky mirror

lunch is normally a time for me to remove myself from the world of work and grab a little, fleeting moment of sanity. however yesterday's lunch was altogether different. eschewing the usual cobb salad or french onion soup for lunch, i opted instead for a heaping serving of public art, in the form of anish kapoor's sky mirror @ rockefeller center.

i was familiar with kapoor's recent public work, as i had made of point of seeking out cloud gate (2004) on my last trip to chicago's millennium park. not unlike cloud gate, sky mirror is a large, polished stainless steel sculpture that engages it's audience immediately upon encountering it. in the case of sky mirror, it casts a reflection of both the sky above and the iconic silhouette of 30 rockefeller plaza east bound and the bustling action of 5th avenue on the west bound side. the amazing thing about this work is that while it is a massive 23-ton sculpture, it is capable of almost acting as a void or window into something far more serene and peaceful than the chaotic reality directly below and surrounding it.

my only wish is that new york could find a permanent home for kappor's work ala chicago, but unfortunately this work will be removed october 27th.

mfd and the sky mirror: a photographic journey

play for your mammies and pappies

as l-o-u-s-y as old joepa thinks he has it, it isn't as bad as it is for that dat gum old coach down in tallahassee, bobby b. the calls for bowden's head have escalated tremendously the last couple of months and it appears that it is much more than just the rumblings of a discontented fan base. if only joe and bobby could have avoided the siren's call of nepotism, they might have been able to call there own shots as to how their coaching careers would end. as it is, that is looking less likely.

maybe joe and bobby could arrange a playdate for their sons/offensive coordinators, so they could play some videogames.

existential thoughts

what is the meaning of life? what was i put here to do? is evolution a reality?

why the hell do human beings manufacture so much marvin the martian merchandise?

these are the truly existential questions in life.

i had the pleasure of riding home on the train last night with a woman who had to be in her 40s and who appeared to be commuting home from a wage-paying job, sporting a black, marvin the martian beret.

i will restate that in case you missed it...a marvin the martian beret.

i know that looney tunes strike a cord with a lot of people (case in point: michael jordan), but do you really want to wear pleather jackets and wool berets adorned with a green martian? is there a latent political/social statement message in this act? if not, wearing marvin the martian merch looks like you traded in 20+ stuffed animals from the claw game in your local value city for the limited edition mtm beret.

c'mon...you are better than that.

crown their ass!

i was stunned when i heard ol' joepa's depressed, "l-o-u-s-y" press conference this past saturday, but i still don't get the kicks from it as i do denny green's tirade after the cardinals loss to the chi-town bears last week. hilarious.

listen: crown their asses

no we can't, no we won't

it is always fun to see talented people making their way in the world, but there is something especially cool about seeing said people when they are young and just getting their start. passion and i had the pleasure of seeing tokyo police club, a young canadian band, perform their first headlining show this past week at new jersey's famed club, maxwells. their music is still a little raw, but i suspect that the unpolished nature of their music is part of their appeal.

if you get a minute and you want to see what is spinnin' on the mfd turntables these days, check out the bands website and download or listen to a few tracks of their debut ep, a lesson in crime.

simple

simple.
white helmets, plain jerseys, no names.
first and goal. 4 runs up the middle.
penn state better roll up the illini this weekend.
no matter who is at quarterback.
simple.

psu 34, illinois 17

go state...beat the illini!

r.i.p zombie nation

mfd has it from good sources "inside the program" (likely one of jaypa's videogame playin' buddies) that zombie nation's "kernkraft 300" will play a continuously diminished role at beaver stadium (and unlike last week, it will not be b/c the lions don't give guido a reason to play it). i guess it was fun while it lasted (i'm talking about good times at the beav, not that damn song).

read the collegian's article on zombie nation's demise

pure nostalgia. get some!

make up, make out

i know that kim jong has consumed a chill pill for the time being, but these are still some crazy, nuclear times that we are treading in. it is like the cold war, but with a bevy of new players, all with their own agendas. what to do? don't run to your local bombshelter or hide under a school desk while sirens wail...just make up, make out! enjoy.

it's getting personal

if the blogosphere is good for one thing, it is talking some smack and generally pissing people off. i present mfd's evidence against michigan:

michiganzone disses not just psu, but the whole damn state.

when we whoop their asses...not a damn word about super mario. not a word!

¡viva la pennsy pride!

enough

first it was gratuitous mjf (see minnehaha prediction)
and now it is miss 'from the block'. love it...hard!

losing is never fun. but when when that losing lasts nine years to a team as hate-worthy as michiganistan...it is downright unacceptable. joepa from the block has no business losing 7 straight to a whining, sniveling sob like floyd. like jenny taught us....enough! the helmets, the 'go blue' banner, floyd carr, and jim carrey's dumb and dumber stunt double (chad henne) are just a few of the many reasons to lavish large quantities of haterade on the wolverines.


in addition to the primal desire to win this game, the nits need this to define their season. the time has come for this team to shed the shadow of last year's squad and distinguish themselves as the bucknuts of this year. by that i mean, build off of some early season losses and develop into the team to beat for the '07 campaign. the 'young' and 'tentative' tags no longer fit. anthony morelli has been playing football for more than half his life and he knows how to throw and should know how to read a defense. it is time for him to step up and begin to make the kind of impression that his fellow pennsylvania high school quarterbacking legend, chad henne, has at michigan.

that brings us to henne. i hope that bradley has something in his bag of tricks on the first series of defensive plays that involves putting henne firmly into the beaver stadium grass. when (not if) this happens, the powers that be will be grateful that they did not include a roof in the stadium improvements of the last few years, because that damn thing would be blown off from the crowd's reaction (think rich gardner's pick6 against nebraska).

as for the game...psu is nowhere good enough to play mistake-riddled, lethargic football against a team as good as michiganistan (they tried against a below average team in minnetonka and should have lost in ot). therefore, it is time for punch and judy/frick and frack (galen & jaypa) to stop making this offense as predictable as a pop warner team and let players make plays. the crowd will be the 12th man, but without any offense to get excited about (ala dwheel's smoking hawk around the edge and into the endzone) ecstasy could lead to nothing more than 108,000 drunk, cold, and pissed psu fans. anyone who saw last year's osu game, knows that it should be an unbelievable scene and not unlike last year, you get the feeling that it will embolden the nits and give them the sense that they cannot and will not lose. saturday should be fun and in a close one penn state makes it a night to remember with a 24-21 win. go state...beat michiganistan!

heja sverge!

sweden maintained their perfect start to their euro 2008 campaign with a 2-1 win over fellow scandinavians, iceland, wednesday. couple this with a few shock results (see spain losing to northern ireland and the danes drawing) and sweden's solid, if unspectacular play, and things are looking good for the swedes in group f, one third of the way through qualifying.

and then joe spoke

from joepa's tuesday presser:

"I think this Saturday night should be a very exciting, special night. The crowd won’t win the game for us. I will give you a clue. We have to win the game. It isn’t going to come down to the crowd. The Michigan kids are not going to be intimidated by any crowd. They are going to play because they are a good, solid football team. The crowd will help, they will have a lot of fun and it will be great to see all of the white. It makes you feel like it is one of those events in your life that very few people take part in, but it isn’t going to win the game."

holy crapola am i excited.

we want the lion

this message brought to you by the beaver stadium luxury suite owners association

whiteout

i found this rant entitled whiteout supremacy on cenredaily.com's monday morning quarterback blog, concerning the planned 'whiteout' for this weekend's game:

"ok, here's the deal: it is a stadiumwide whiteout this weekend. apparently this request is difficult for some folks to understand. let me be clear and speak slowly but firmly:

please... wear... white. please don't complain. it's very simple. there's plenty of white apparel out there. if the students can do it and it looks impressive, it'll look even more intimidating. the opponent will not know where the student section is, since we're all going to be loud, right? right? that's better. besides, blue is one of the opponent's colors, and the other, maize, is out of the question."

should be interesting to see how effective the 'stadium wide' part of this whiteout is. personally, i find white washes me out, so i don't know about my level of participation. only time will tell.

'go blow' mixtape

an mfd mixtape (you know those are hot as hell) made 'special for this weekend's michiganistan game. this is a work in progress so check back from time to time this week (which you should be doin' anyway).

dj shadow "holy calamady: bear witness II"
(thanks to analog giant)

sean lennon "dead meat"
(thanks to the yellow stereo)

thunderbirds are now! "the veil comes down"
(thanks to you ain't no picasso)

the go! team "the power is on"
(thanks to berkeley place)

...and you will know us by the trail of dead "wasted state of mind"
(thanks to i guess i'm floating)

ohh, it's on suckas!

in my preparation for this weekend's instant classic between the mighty nits of psu and the michiganistan wolverines, i came across some rather interesting info. michiganistan's mario manningham is likely out for this weekends clash, taking one of the wolverines most lethal bullets out of their offensive chamber. i followed this developing story to a link that lead me to this exchange. it is sooooo on.

holy crap!

this is one of the most disturbing and unsettling things i have ever seen.

1. follow this link to barbie.com
2. click on the 'tanner the dog' video link
3. watch barbie's dog take a poo. unfortunately, i am not kidding. pooing barbie dogs are almost as frightening as north korean nuclear capabilities.

i never knew that working on children's toys was going to carry with it the risk of this level of mental trauma.

back to the future

gratuitous michael j. fox imagery!
it was too good to be true. an undefeated team coming off a dramatic win against northwestern on the road, a pitch perfect day in the gentle rolling hills of central pennsylvania, and no trickeration by glen mason and his gophers. hard to believe...psu undefeated and on their way to a 12-1 finish and #3 ranking and no trickeration from minny ha-ha.

some things change, while others stay the same. glen boy is still a statesman/preacher for the art of trickeration, psu is coming off a win over the cats from evanston, and the hills of state courage are still gentle, rolling, and mostly happy. however, this years lions are not undefeated and with the game under the roof at the homerdome, the 'phers are more than likely not going to wait until they are bruised and buried before they whip out an onside kick, trick defensive scheme, or halfback pass.

there were signs of life from the nit offense last week (keeping in mind it was the fightin' fitzies of northwestern) and the defense is gelling into another one for the ages. with that in mind, psu should continue their winning ways and give themselves a nice little boost going into the michiganistan game. however, this team seems intent on doing everything the hard way: terrible play calling on offense, inept red-zone effort, drop balls on wide-open fly patterns, asinine special teams play, leaving the nittany nation wondering what to expect from week to week.

in a lot of ways, this game is the first measuring stick of this psu team. they are facing a good (not great) team on their home field, with a young team banged up (brown, shaw, etc.) and no consistency to call upon. that being said, psu is superior in just about every way to the gophers of minnetonka and their talent should see them through some rough spots. nits 27, minny ha-ha 17.

go state...beat the 'phers!

one last thought: i know that the students don't speak for the players or the coaching staff (to hear joepa tell it, he is incapable of looking past the likes of d-1aa youngstown state), but psu needs a win in minnetonka this week just as badly as it needs a win next week against michiganistan. don't sleep on the gophers. i mention this, as i have read several articles/posts about the university not allowing paternoville to set up for the michigan game.

ok, one more thought: why can't penn state take the metal rod out of their ass and let what could be a harmless, fun crowd just enjoy themselves. so far this year (on the heels of the first exciting season in 6+ years) psu has: doubled the cost of parking, banned tailgaiting during the game, banned the passing of the lion, and now they have moved to kill one of the truly original and positive developments from last year by not allowing students to camp out for tickets. the fans have been lack luster this year, but in some ways a portion of the blame falls on the administration for sapping the environment of all the fun and whimsy it could/should have.