Italy Beats England in the European Championship 2020
Few things are more daunting as entering the lion’s den to watch the final of the European Championship 2020, between England and Italy.
I was clearly rooting for Italy. After all they beat Belgium. And most of all they demonstrated beautiful attacking soccer. It was anti-Italian Italian football: attacking, dominating in the midfield and clinical in the defense.
Thus, here we were, entering the Britannia Arms in Cupertino, passing the many Saint-George Cross English flags to set up near in the left corner of the bar.
Youngsters with even a slight connection to England felt that standing for the national anthem was the right thing to do, while they pulled up the lyrics on their iPhones. Ha! The elders just braced themselves for a battle, as they poured another pint.
The chants varied from “Sweet Caroline”, “England, England” to “It’s coming home!” Home to what, I keep wondering. England never won a European championship, and their one Worldcup win was dubious at best.
Unfortunately, the game started with a master stroke from the English. 1-0. It changed the entire final. England never got into their game. And Italy was out of it until the second half.
In the second half, Italy started showing their true selves again. “Finally!”, as you could hear from the left corner of the bar. England never got into it. Where were Kane and Sterling?
I felt for the 2 Italian sitting at a table in Azzurri attire near the bar. They were the only ones brave enough to show the colors of the enemy.
The penalty series were fascinating: not because there were ever nerve racking penalties to decide the European champions, but because here we were in a British pub watching the penalties.
The ups and downs were tremendous: the save from Pickford, the misses from the British youngsters.
Italy wins!
The bar emptied in a heartbeat. The stranglers only had one complaint: “It was Southgate! We need to get rid of coach Southgate.”
July 11, 2021
First real-use impressions of my iPad Air
I’ve been using my new iPad Air for a two weeks. Since, I bought a Spigen protecting case and stand. This saves me a separate stand.
Thus far, the experience has been excellent. I enjoy switching between a keyboard and a tablet set up. I read the news, browse the web and scroll through Twitter in tablet mode. I write using my Bluetooth keyboard. I have to admit that Microsoft was onto something when they first came up with the transformer-laptop-tablet, or however they called it.
Wherever I can, I install the iPad application: e.g., I installed the Medium app, rather than accessing it via the browser. iPad native applications provide regularly a superior experience over a browser-based version. There are exceptions though. For example, the Google Sheets application is limited in functionality and inferior to the the browser-based version. I could not figure out how to format a cell in the app and had to resort to the browser.
There have been a few cases where I missed a large monitor. My work setup includes a large monitor, mechanical keyboard and vertical mouse. I haven’t tried if my iPad can connect to an external monitor.
I haven’t felt I needed a trackpad. The touch screen is right there in front of me. Since I have an external Bluetooth trackpad, I will try it out when I at home. However, it is not something I plan to drag along on the move. My roaming kit is a simple sleeve with an iPad, the keyboard and my AirPods. I do miss the audio jack, as my more comfortable headphones are not Bluetooth-enabled.
The iPad Air surely is a step up from the older iPads I used. Those felt a smaller cousin to a laptop. Thus far, I have not felt that way with the iPad Air, for the read-write-check type of daily tasks.
July 5, 2021
Fourth of July
The last few Fourth of July celebrations we spent with friends, at a block party in a more affluent part of San Jose. Red, white and blue. Barbecue and apple pie. It all feels bliss.
And yet.
We drove home listening to a Fourth of July playlist featuring Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the USA, John Mellencamp’s Jack and Diane, Miley Cyrus’ Party in the U.S.A., and the classic by Lee Greenwood.
If tomorrow all the things were gone
I worked for all my life
And I had to start again
With just my children and my wife
I’d thank my lucky stars
To be livin’ here today
’Cause the flag still stands for freedom
And they can’t take that away
And I’m proud to be an American
Where at least I know I’m free
And I won’t forget the men who died
Who gave that right to me
And I’d gladly stand up
Next to you and defend her still today
’Cause there ain’t no doubt I love this land
God bless the USA
As we drove from the richness of the Rose Garden past the fairly recent shanty town along Guadalupe Gardens, the contrast of America could not be more clear. People are living in tents and rickety trailers, scavenging garbage for cans.
We would be better of investing a little time today in helping those for whom America doesn’t feel like a dream today. That would be true patriotism. Share some of that “freedom”.
July 4, 2021
If everybody did billing like doctors and hospitals
As the surgeon returned to car dealership to pick up his car, he wasn’t happy. He had taken his Land Rover for a tune up and to check out where the liquid on his squeaky clean garage floor was coming from.
The dealership had found the leak, did a full tune up, and even had cleaned his car in and outside. The free detailing was part of the superior service Land Rover provided its customers.
And yet, the doctor was not pleased. He was surprised by the bill: it was much different from what he was told when he had dropped off the car: Tune Up $449 + leak detection: $150 = $599 estimate.
He received the following combined bill:
- Regular Tune Up: $449
- Oil filter and oil: $200 - this was apparently not part of the original fee. The regular tune up fee is only for the facilities, oil drain pit and access to the shop. It doesn’t cover materials.
- Recycling fee: $15
- Overalls cleaning fee: $25 x 2 = $50
- Covid surcharge: $25
- Leak mechanic: $260 - He is not affiliated with the dealership and uses his own billing service. His fee was not included in the original estimate, yet nobody informed the doctor.
- Oil mechanic: $130 - He too uses his own billing service, though he is part of the Land Rover network, and therefor you get a discount.
- Gasket: $25
After swiping his credit card, the dealership explained that his balance was now $0. However, he may receive still a bill from the liquid diagnostic lab.
Have a nice day and come again.
June 30, 2021
15 years
I’ve been with RTI for 15 years! Fifteen years. That is a long time to work for the same company in Silicon Valley.
As a thank you, the company gifts you an iPad. I didn’t want yet another generic tablet. I wanted it to be the device: the device which becomes my new personal machine for all things writing, reading, browsing and watching.
At first, my eye fell on the iPad Pro with its M1 hunky hunky processor. It is a fantastic machine, except for the iPadOS software. Most reviews I read want to load macOS on the machine, or advise you to buy a MacBook M1 Air. The iPad Pro is expensive.
I didn’t want another computer. I wanted something smaller, easier to take on an outing or a trip. I was ok with a more limited operating system. After all, the iPad does great for the tasks I wanted to use it for. I wanted a better writing station, better than my iPhone/Bluetooth keyboard/stand combo.
I therefor opted for the sky blue Wifi iPad Air with 256GB of storage. On day one, the device exceeds my expectations. It is beautiful, and light and small enough. I use it with a bluetooth keyboard I already had and a separate stand. I probably will switch to the Logitech keyboard and case in the future.
The only application I lacked thus far was an native WhatsApp app. Although I read that is in the works.
Some of the apps I use: Medium, Day One, Twitter, YouTube, Netflix, Disney+, Pocket, Dropbox, iA Writer, NY Times, Dashlane, NordVPN, Google Works applications, Google Photos, Chrome, Discord, Dr. Wolf Chess and LinkedIn.
June 26, 2021
LinkedIn, what am I doing wrong?
For the past year LinkedIn pings fall into two categories. The first group commends you on your work, your company, your skills, your writing only to go for the kill next and try to sell you something. The second group is more direct and pitches you candidates for the open reqs in the team in their first communication.
LinkedIn has become a nuisance rather than a benefit.
Where is the promise of professional networking without too many strings? What happened to peer discussion groups and expert panels? What happened to free learning on the Lynda platform?
Since the purchase by Microsoft, it appears the strategy is sales-all-the-time. Salesforce made a colossal mistake not to buy LinkedIn first. Imagine the power-combo.
Or I may be doing this LinkedIn thing all wrong.
June 20, 2021
Belgium in the Euros
Game 1: Belgium - Russia - Check, and now move on.
Even though Belgium defeated Russia 3 - 0, it was not a great game. The Red Devils played mediocre, lacked accuracy, lost the ball too often in the midfield, and didn’t show a lot of creativity. After the opening goal from Lukaku, you expected brilliant counter attacks. They were not there.
Sure, all this may have been sufficient to beat Russia, when it comes to the bigger teams, it won’t cut it.
Luckily we’ll have De Bruyne back. Also Meunier was strong. I’ve been a fan of both for a while.
Game 2: Belgium - Denmark - A wake up call
Due to a conflict at work, I didn’t watch much of the game live. I skipped the disastrous first half entirely. I did see the magical two goals in the second half.
The second half reaffirmed that De Bruyne, Lukaku and Courtois are what makes this team great. I was also carefully encouraged that Eden Hazard and Axel Witsel didn’t slow the game down. They are both amazing players. However in the past their style of playing wasn’t compatible with De Bruyne - Tielemans - Lukaku - Carrasco - Meunier fast and deep style of playing.
Game 3: Belgium - Finland - strong Hradecky in the Finnish goal
Watching the summary of the game, it could have been 4 or more goals from Belgium. The Finnish goalie was strong.
It is great to see how De Bruyne - Lukaku machine is getting more and more steam. Unstoppable.
We need to keep the speed and flow in the game. That’s specific advise for Doku and Eden Hazard.
Sadly no Van Aken as a sub.
Who will be the opponent in the next game. I hope Wales.
Game 4: Belgium - Portugal - meeting the butchers of Lisbon
The highly anticipated game between powerhouses Belgium and Portugal turned into a bloody meat festival. Portugal clearly had sharpened their knives, under the “leadership” of head butcher Pepe. What a disaster! Both Pepe and Palinha deserved dark red cards. Another red card should have gone to the referee who was terrible. Both the Portuguese and Belgium commentary on twitter was unanimous on that. Aren’t they always?
Belgium did not play well. A strike of Thorgan brilliance got us to win this game. The defense however was solid: Vermaelen was my man of the match. Vertongen, Alderweireld and Courtois completed the defense. Also Tielemans was very composed and reliable. Witsel, no my favorite player, was solid as a rock.
The two Belgians who didn’t play well were Eden Hazard and the coach Martinez. Eden Hazard was having fun by himself, dribbling away,and then losing the ball. The connection to the midfield was missing, and therefor Lukaku was on an island. Lukaku surely was missing his buddy De Bruyne.
Martinez failed when he brought in an underperforming and out of form Mertens. Why didn’t he bring in Carrasco instead of Mertens? When Carrasco joined the troops later in the game, the counter attack was much more lethal - although it lacked efficiency.
Next up: Italy. Let’s hope De Bruyne is fit again. And let’s pray Martinez starts with Carrasco instead of Eden Hazard. Let’s be clear, right now: horgan > Eden. And Thorgan + Carrasco = magic.
Game 5: end of the line.
Italy played courageous and great soccer. This was not Italy from a decade ago where they waited patiently for a counter attack. This was brilliant and exciting soccer.
Belgium on the other hand was slow, uninspired and a one trick pony: play it to Lukaku. The midfield was non-existent, neither in the build up, nor in the defense. The yellow card for Tielemans early in the game was dumb and impacted the play.
Playing Jeremy Doku was a surprise. I could see why Martinez selected him. Yet, Doku lacks a great pass or shot. He is fast and dribbles amazingly. And that’s it.
De Bruyne didn’t play well. It seems at the highest level, when you play for all the marbles, he falls short time after time. After the game, I learned he was still injured.
There are a lot of questions why Carrasco or Trossard didn’t play today. Or Vanaken on the midfield. Putting Mertens, who was so clearly out of form, was a mistake.
Ultimately, you have to conclude that the Golden Generation, was just a Golden Wrapper Generation. Great on paper, but rarely the dominant team, the fantastic game against Brazil in Russia not withstanding.
Coach Martinez didn’t really get the swung in the team. Not the way Mancini is getting his team fighting. He has been fighting too many conflicting goals: Eden vs Kevin, Anderlecht v Bruges, Flemish vs Walloon, known non controversial players vs young potential. Today’s game showed that: not-inspired, a lack of brilliance, and too static.
June 12, 2021
The Dark EK2020/2021 horses
I enjoy the soccer wisdom from Sporza’s Filip Joos, Peter Vandenbempt, and co. The recent Tribune episodes were especially insightful: Filip Joos en Wim De Coninck and Peter Vandenbempt en Aster Nzeyimana.
- Leave Witsel on the bench. Keep the smart deep passing Tielemans and feed Lukaku. Allow Dendocker to grow into the game.
- Carrasco over Hazard. It enables also Thorgan Hazard to do his thing.
- Doku is an ideal sub to ratch things up and find the opening later in the game.
- Lukaku, Courtois, DeBruyne are the true toppers in the Belgian team.
- Turkey and Italy will be the dark horses.
- England has a deep team and with 5 or 6 substitutions per game, that can make the difference.
- Portugal will be strong and is a France-light.
- The likely path of Belgium will be a tough path where they encounter strong teams in earlier rounds. A better path is one where you end the first round as second in your group.
June 9, 2021
Euro 2020/2021
The European championships will be a repeat of the mundial: France over Belgium in the half final or the final. And overall, France is my favorite to win it.
France with Kante, Benzema, Mbappe is battle hardened and lethal in a hurry. Lloris will be their weakest point.
For Belgium, this is the last opportunity for the golden generation. The team is entering the tournament suboptimal with several key players recovering: De Bruyne, Hazard, Witsel. There is a lot of goodness as well: Thorgan Hazard and Carrasco on the left, Courtois is a rock in goal. There is some new blood with Tielemans.
In a head to head between France and Belgium, it will be about efficiency and strategy. Thus far, the French have proven to have that cooler killer instinct when it counts.
June 9, 2021
