6/07/2002 - Entry #10
Yeuch, I have a splitting headache all down the right side of my skull. I seem to remember it's usually a migraine if it's only down one side, but who cares? It bloody hurts, either way.
Oh well. We went bowling today, and jesus, I Can't Believe It's Not Gutter couldn't be further from the truth. We're so terrible it's incredibly funny. We paid for three games, expecting to find our stride pretty quickly. I mean, it's been about 2 years since I last bowled, and it's ridiculous how you lose it after a while. You come back after 2 years, stand in front of those pins with a ball in your hand and suddenly you've forgotten how you're supposed to bowl. Where abouts did I used to stand? Did I swing in from the left, or the right? What weight ball did I use? Did I used to whip it down the lane and go for speed, or walk up slowly and place it? For the life of me, I can't remember. So the first game is always like making pancakes. You have to get the first one out of the way, and pretty much disregard it. You have to find your stride and get your arm back in. It's the only way to do it without regularly bowling once or twice a week. So we played the first game, and it went atrociously. I got, like, 90 or so. Fucking terrible. The second game rolled around, and I came in second place with 107. Hardly great. The third game was a complete write-off, cos we were going for the Triplex game. That, for you non-Hollywood-bowlers, is where you play three games and take the best turn from the three. So if your first turn in the first game is an 8, first turn in the second game is a strike, and first turn in the third game is a 9, then your Triplex score for the first turn would be a strike. Cos you take the best of the three, see? So by the third game, apart from being fairly 'knackered', we were deliberately wasting balls cos we knew we couldn't get better for the Triplex score. So that game didn't really count. But the fact remains that I was absolutely terrible. For someone going into a league TOMORROW (yes), I really need to improve. Luckily for me, Ollie is good enough to carry the team up through the league table. But seriously, I'm gonna need to play so many games to get to a halfway respectable level. How do you get better at bowling anyway? Is it just practice, or is there some kind of brilliant tactic that gets you a strike every time? If so, please let me know, eh?
Oh well. So what's happening in the world then? Ahh, the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade have called upon all Palestinian organisations to attack American targets throughout the world. Those cheeky young scamps. At first I thought it was a pretty damn stupid move, cos it's going to spark fierce retaliation, but then I realised the strategic brilliance of it. Firstly, America all but declare they're pulling out of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict by officially asking Palestinians to replace Yasser Arafat. The Palestinians could never hope to beat Israel in a straight fight, so they really have to keep America involved one way or the other, and that includes attacking American targets. Arafat obviously distanced himself from the entire Al Aqsa statement, claiming that he doesn't control them, despite both Israel and America having authorised cash payments to the Al Aqsa, signed by Arafat, in their possession. What I can't decide is if it's worth shedding the political ties with so many countries. I mean, the Palestinians have come a long way since they resorted to the likes of murdering Israeli athletes during the 1972 Munich Olympics, what with Arafat even winning a Nobel Peace Prize, and now a lot of nations support them in order to score brownie points with other Arab states. But those political ties would be severely damaged, if not destroyed entirely, by resuming attacks outside of Israel. Think of this way: most of the people who support the Palestinians view the suicide bombings as being acts of retaliation against an occupying force. Tolerable, right? But how the hell will they defend and justify themselves if they start attacking non-Israeli targets, far from their borders? There's no occupation there. No retaliation to supposed oppression. They have no defence. So they're in a dicey situation, if you ask me. The whole Palestinian strategy is of internationalising the conflict, bringing in other nations to force Israel to make a deal. This has worked a treat, because the United States have constantly pressured Israel to be all nice and friendly with the oil-rich Middle Eastern states (in the kingdom of the blind, he who has the most oil is king). But if Washington washes its hands of the conflict (which it has done, by making ridiculous demands such as Arafat's replacement, and new security arrangements), then the Israeli military will be rolling into Hebron before you can say Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade. The threat of violence against America is all too credible. The Palestinians would rather be hated than ignored, right now, because they need to make America readdress the conflict, even if it requires them forcing Bush to attack and ultimately sort out their country's future. They're certain they'll get a better deal out of America than they will from Israel, so they have very little to lose, aside from a few thousand lives, and since when has Arafat cared about that? Because the Palestinian problem isn't going to go away any time soon, if America DOES broker a deal with them, it can surely only result in some form of statehood.
Fair play to them, if their plans work, it's one of the most intricate strategies I've ever seen in global politics. It's ingenius. Fairly despicable, but ingenius.
What else has happened? Mmm, Colombia is getting worse. Apparently President-elect Alvaro Uribe Velez has requested several billion dollars in aid from the US, so that he can clean up Colombia and stop it from, like, flooding the entire world with cocaine and stuff. I don't think that he's gonna get that aid, considering he's stated many times that Pedro Juan Moreno will hold an important place on his cabinet. What's wrong with that, you ask? Well, Moreno is the target of an open DEA investigation on supsicions of involvement in, you guessed it, the narcotics trade! He runs a company called GMP Chemical Products, which happens to be one of the world's prime dealers in potassium permanganate, a precursor chemical used to make cocaine. I'm sure it has other uses, but in all honesty I don't know what they are. Feel free to enlighten me, if you know. Anyway, meanwhile the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) are threatening to kidnap and assassinate over 5,000 government officials before Velez becomes President in August. I guess controlling 90% of the entire world's cocaine trade is fairly important to them, huh? I like Colombia, I really do. It's one of the most politically interesting places on earth, surely, and certainly one of the few I can be bothered keeping tabs on. The whole drug trafficking problem makes for great geopolitical viewing, and anywhere with guerrilla partisan groups is always good. Good ol' Colombia. Keeping it unreal.
Anyway, politics is boring. I bet you all want more football! Yeah ya do. So France sacked their manager yesterday. That makes poor old Roger Lemerre the fourth gaffer to be sacked since the World Cup, in some kind of mass-culling of unlucky managers. Argentina are likely to sack Marcelo Bielsa, Robert Wasiega has resigned from Belgium, Scolari has announced he's unemployed despite Brazil winning the World Cup, Japan's Phillippe Troussier has stepped down, Mexico's Javier Aguirre has left to coach Osasuna, Cesare Maldini has left Paraguay, Jerzy Engel was sacked from Poland, Antonio Oliviera was sacked (by fax) from the Portugal job...the list goes on. There's only 11 managers likely to still be in charge of their team inside of a month. What's going on?! The whole footballing world has gone mad. And Paris Saint Germain are probably going to transfer list Ronaldhino, since Canal Plus are on the brink of going under. Everything's going mental.
Oh! And has anyone seen the latest Honda advert? I couldn't stand the last one, going on about how the world's favourite word is "okay", and what if our favourite word was "what if?". Stupid, stupid advert, that barely made sense and was irritating anyway. But the new one, with little kids playing with toys and stuff, I'm partial to. Not because of anything going on on-screen, or even what the guy says (I don't even know what he does say, in fact). But the music playing is by the one and only André Popp! It's one of the songs from Delirium In Hi-Fi, which is one of the albums listed in my Gallery of Essentials. It's an absolutely superb CD, that is most definitely one of the most essential on the list. They obviously only play a tiny clip, but keep an eye (ear?) out for it. It's basically a bunch of people singing a polka rhythm backwards with a load of echo on their voices, and a trombone interlude. Watch out for it. It's a great song.
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