DC Wins!

There’s something about seeing a grown-man cry that just gets me every time.

After the first game of the season, I am pretty confident that DC United is the greatest soccer team in the world. After scoring just 21 goals in thirty games last season, they scored three times on Saturday to start the season off with a commanding win.

Although it’s extremely tempting, I’m not interested in turning the Muted Guerrilla into some fan site for DC United, but their performance on Saturday was truly remarkable and the story, I think, is appealing to more than just soccer fans. The first goal was very well done and was the result of the goal scorer, Josh Wolff, working his tail off throughout the game up to that point, but the next two goals are what, rightfully, people are talking about.

DC United’s newest forward is Charlie Davies, a man who 18 months ago seemed destined to lead the US to the World Cup. He emerged as a star throughout the qualifying stages of the World Cup, but in the days leading up to the final qualification game (coincidentally held at DC United’s home, RFK Stadium), he was a passenger in a car crash that killed one passenger and left Davies with life-threatening injuries, including a lacerated bladder, which sounds awful, and the need for doctor’s to pull back the skin from his face, leaving some pretty intense scars.

He also broke his leg in a few places and his career was almost certainly over. Saturday night was his first competitive game since October 2009. Coming in as a substitute, his first touch of the ball was when team captain Dax McCarty (what kind of name is Dax!) handed him the ball to take a penalty kick, which he converted. The second goal was, as they say, in the run-of-play as he beat both a defender and the goalie.

As wonderful as it was to watch it happen, the post game interview helps put it into perspective.

Well done, CD9. Best of luck throughout your comeback! Vamos United!

First Kick!

Last night, a new season of Major League Soccer officially began with 36,000 fans witnessing the Seattle Sounders falling to the LA Galaxy in the driving rain and cold winds of Seattle in mid-March. I’m not a fan of either team and the game itself wasn’t very good, but I cannot be more excited for the season to be under way.

My team, DC United, was terrible last year, record-setting-ly so, but I can’t help myself from being hugely optimistic and expecting the team to make the playoffs easily and challenge for the championship. Only time will tell though, and for DC, time begins Saturday night at 7:00 against Columbus.

Last night’s game began at around 10 at night. I stayed up for the whole thing, but it was definitely way past my bedtime. Not long ago, I could stay up late every now and then, getting just a few hours of sleep for the night. Those days appear to be over though as, today, I am zonked. I guess I'm not as young as I used to be.

I'm not, however, too old to be down-right giddy about soccer season. Vamos United!

Free Money and Expensive Coupons

Yesterday marked the twentieth and final day of my blogging strike.  The impact on my life has been small but measureable.  The strike began as a result of the moneymaking aspect of this blog, Google AdSense, disappeared at some point last month.  I have tried to counter the lost revenue – expected to be in the 3-5 dollar range (that’s dollar with a D) – through various means. 

 

My first attempt in surviving these difficult times was to be extra vigilant in my lost coin collecting.  In theory this should work out.  I figure that on a typical day with AdSense, I get somewhere between 2 cents and 10 cents, and then every now and then it spikes to around a dollar when some secret criteria of viewership is met.  You’d think a penny or two, maybe a dirty nickel or looked over dime would be easy to find if you were searching for it.  Well, it’s not… so stop fooling yourself.  I experienced no such luck.

 

Then, I got a coupon book in the mail that claims to have $18 dollars in savings!  I’m not much of a coupon-clipper, but that’s more money than I made in my first three years of Google AdSense!  Armed with this little pot of gold, I headed off to the store, where I proceeded to clog up the aisles as I searched for each coupon.  When I was investigating what size tub of cat litter my coupon qualified me for, I heard a man trying to get through say, “The cats cost nearly as much as the damn kids!”

 

“Ain’t that the truth,” was the best I could come up with as I struggled to flip through pages of torn out coupons.  I wasn’t prepared for the awkward conversation that followed, and like my claim of having “damn kids,” I found myself stating that coupons are a necessity in finding the lowest price cat food.  As I turned away, I ran the math through my head and realized that I was paying about as much as I usually did at another store.

 

In the end, my shopping bill was around $59, and that’s after my $3.25 in coupon savings.  I saved a good bit, but it turns out that it’s expensive to use coupons.

 

Discouraged and down, I returned home and happened to check my AdSense Account.  Not only did I make $1.85 in one day – cha-ching! – but my Blog was back on board!  Good times are here again!  Now that my blog is once again fully loaded with targeted ads, I encourage everyone to check out my sponsors.

The Power of the Press

Today, I am pleased to announce that my strike is officially over. In an unspoken truce, Google has restored their advertising here on the Muted Guerrilla, just days after my protest made headlines. Yes, I am once again free to stretch my babbling mind and exercise my vast egotism for the whole of the world to enjoy. (I hear I have regular readers in far-away lands!)

I will never again doubt the amazing influence that the media has in making change happen. And for this reason, I offer my services up for anyone who needs help. You got a problem, yo’ I’ll solve it… with a little help from the internets. I feel like my "Power of the Press" post should include something more meaningful than this, but it doesn't. 

In truth, I have no idea what brought back my advertising. I can only hope that individuals among my massive following sent letters complaining, because otherwise, Google’s all-seeing eye is a little frightening.

I'm On Strike

My Favorites died off towards the end of the month, but, all in all, it was a pretty fun challenge. My wife still has quite a few topics that she wants to find out the answer to so I may be revisiting this challenge soon… although I remember saying something similar shortly after my month of ties was over.

There is a reason I haven’t posted anything recently actually: I’m on strike.

For some reason, my Google advertising, what they call Adsense, has disappeared from this page and now I’m left with nothing but public service announcements telling me about solar panels. I think public service announcements are great, but these PSA’s don’t feature any primetime television stars, nor do they have any rainbow star shooting across the screen with a four-note melody. And, they don’t get me any money.

I didn’t use to care about the money. I was writing for the people, and even now, once I get started I just can’t help myself; I have to write for the people. But the thing is I know that the Adsense will come back and I will once again get a few pennies every day – maybe even a quarter on a good day! – and I just don’t want to use up all my good thoughts and witty comments without getting paid. So, I think you’ll agree that I have no choice but to strike.

I was going to create a video of me striking. I had it all planned out: It would begin with a shot of me, well-dressed, in front of my front door, with a microphone in hand addressing the camera.

Sunday Morning Haikube

I didn't intend on doing JUST Sunday Morning Haikubes... but here's today's:

I had a writing teacher tell me to never center-align poetry, because the form can have meaning, so with that in mind I pushed it all to the left.  It reads:

A DREAM ABOUT MY WORK LIFE

one single clamor
realize my spiral down, I
finally yelled #@&*#!!