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Rooney, Rooney

A certain Shepherd must be further ruing the day Rooney turned down the chance to join his flock. Manchester United beat Newcastle United 3-1 at St. James’ Park with the Boy Wonder contributing two goals. (Reports: BBC, Soccernet, Guardian, ManUtd.com)

Some notes:

  • Both sides went forward with gusto and the score shouldn’t be construed as being an indication of the Red Devils’ overwhelming superiority. Newcastle had the advantage for long stretches of the match and it was by no means an easy win for the Mancunians. If Kluivert and Shearer were more clinical with the chances they had, Ferguson would have been the one ruing the day.
  • United got an early lead when Rooney got on the end of an excellent Fletcher chip and produced a fantastic finish to beat Shay Given.
  • The score remained the same until the 71st minute. Brown stumbled and lost the ball to Shearer who got clear after Heinze (not for the first time in the match) lost his footing as well. The King of the Geordie Nation made the best of this bit of good fortune by slotting the ball past Carroll to level the score.
  • Newcastle’s joy was short-lived however. Three minutes later, van Nistelrooy fired home a penalty after Scholes was brought down in the box by Given.
  • Rooney made the scoreline look a little more impressive by slotting home his second close to the end of the match.
  • United are now in seventh place and 11 points off the pace. Embarrassingly, the Red Devils remain behind Everton, Bolton, Middlesbrough and Aston Villa.
  • Ronaldo’s teamplay wasn’t too impressive in this match. On two occasions, he went for goal rather than lay the ball off to a teammate in a better position. Wilf McGuinness noted the young Portuguese player’s decision-making needs improving but I think this has more to do with Ronaldo desperately wanting to get his first goal of the season.
  • Ferguson is still tinkering with his team selection and tactics. It was almost a 4-3-3 in this match with Rooney and Ronaldo frequently joining van Nistelrooy from the flanks. The most interesting aspect of this formation was that Ferguson finally found a place in the starting eleven for Fletcher who certainly justified his selection with his performance.

Posted in Football.

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By Gobi – Wednesday, November 17, 2004

Skill my heart

If you’re a fan of anime songs, you need to check out the JAM Project’s “Return to the Chaos” concert video. You’ll know you’re in for a treat the moment the spotlights flood the stage to reveal what appears to be the Japanese Village People.

Recorded in September 2003, the video is two hours JAM-packed with energetic songs filled with enough catchy hooks to get you singing along to peculiar lyrics like “Skill my heart, to the very end of the dimension, make the story spring up! I’ll never die!” and “Crush all right! Crush on hippy! Crush Gear fight! Fly to the dream-like future! Unlimited Energy! Ready Go!”

Motto Motto!

(For bonus XP, try to spot the guy with the Manchester United jersey and keep count of the number of blonde Japanese in the video.)

Posted in Music.

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By Gobi – Monday, November 15, 2004

Quick Slinger

Xevoz Quick Slinger

Click on the thumbnail for another photo of a Xevoz Quick Slinger.

Posted in Pix, Toys, Xevoz.

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By Gobi – Sunday, November 14, 2004

In search of …

Microsoft’s testing a new version of its search engine based on its own web crawlers and algorithms. I tried the local version and got this:
Seek and ye shall find ... this
To be fair, it’s in beta, which means it’s going to be buggy.

And to be snarky, it’s by Microsoft, which also means it’s going to be buggy.

Posted in Software, Web.

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By Gobi – Thursday, November 11, 2004

Firefox turns 1.0

I’ve been happily using Firefox since the Phoenix 0.5 build so I was delighted version 1.0 was finally released. I downloaded the 4.6MB installer, upgraded the browser and have been using it since last night.

Admittedly, Firefox isn’t perfect as I still find I require the mighty Proxomitron to complement the browser. However, I feel confident most, if not all, the Proxomitron’s abilities will eventually be available in Firefox via extensions.

(Incidentally, if you absolutely hate it when web sites open new browser windows, you might want to make use of Firefox’s experimental settings to ensure web pages are opened in new tabs in the current window.)

One last thought: Firefox is being touted as the safest browser around but I feel that’s a bit misleading. The browser alone isn’t going to keep you safe online. You will still need a firewall, anti-virus software, anti-spyware software (1, 2) and you will still need to practise safe surfing.

Posted in Software.

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By Gobi – Wednesday, November 10, 2004