Day 5 - Wimbledon

Wow. Day 5 was absolutely amazing. It was like I was watch two finals! The first was the match from my favorite womens player and the number three seed, Jelena Jankovic versus the number 25 Lucie Safarova. It was a great battle with Safarova winning the first set 7-5 and then Jankovic winning the second set (which lasted around an hour!) 7-6 after an unbeleivable 11 (or 12) dueces filled with killer rallies. This image is of Jelena taking a breather after winning a point from a 20-shot rally. Jankovic went on to win the last set but Safarova fought an amazing fight.

I don’t have a favorite mens player but I usually cheer for the one that plays good tennis. When I don’t know either of the players playing, I usually go for the underdog. This time, the underdog was an excellent choice. The unseeded Janko Tipsarevic beat the NUMBER FIVE Fernando Gonzalez in the five set thriller. The first set went to “Tipsy” and the next to “Gonzo.” They continued to alternate sets until the end when Tipsarevic cameback from being down 2-5 to winning the final set 8-6. It was a great match. It is the first time Tipsarevic has ever reached this far in any Grand Slam Tournament. And I should add that the Gattuso look-alike was a pleasure to watch also .

Marat Safin and Roger Federer’s game was entertaining but very predictable. I was sad that Martina Hingis was elimenated this round. Andy Roddick had a good game but almost didn’t win straight sets, since the third set almost went to Fernando Verdasco.

I’m watching Wimbledon on ESPN2 where they have about 10 straight hours of LIVE coverage (awesome!!) so they generally show us the important/interesting/notable matches of the day plus commentary and analysis. Day 6 however will be short so only 4 hours today. I hope they will be covering these matches:

+ Amelie Mauresmo (4) vs. Mara Santangelo (28) —> Mauresmo is the defending Champion.
+ Rafael Nadal (2) vs. Robin Soderling (28) —> Not a fan of Nadal but I’m sure the game will be pretty.
+ Maria Sharapova (2) vs. Ai Sugiyama (26) —> Sharapova is a good kid.
+ Marcos Baghdatis (10) vs. David Nalbandian (23) —> Baghdatis is just so fun to watch.
and also the doubles matches featuring Jankovic and my new favorite Tipsarevic!

Missing Wimbledon

Wimbledon started yesterday and ESPN2 is having FULL COVERAGE of the tournament (not just 3-6 hours like for the French Open). Today, they’re covering the early round from 8AM to 5PM while I have class from 9AM to 3PM (and again from 6.30PM to 9.30PM). I’m so pissed.

I can’t wait to graduate and be done with this crap. School sucks. There is only so much a person can “learn.”

Hmph.

WWE Wrestler Benoit, Wife and Son Found Dead

The station said investigators believe the 40-year-old Benoit killed his wife, Nancy, and 7-year-old son, Daniel, over the weekend, then himself on Monday. The bodies were found in three rooms.

Read the article.

This is absolutely unbelievable! It’s kind of hard to believe something like this to come from someone you’ve watched on TV so many times. It’s so sad that he “allegedly” wiped out the family.

I guess we’ll have to see after investigators determine officially what really went down.

Cheerleader Cat Fight

Omri Evron: “Why I can’t become a soldier in the IDF”

This is why we shouldn’t hate all Iraelis or all Jews. There are good ones out there. Many Jews are against Zionism and many Israelis are against the occupation of Palestinian lands, and as vaguely mentioned in the article, they don’t know it yet.

“I, Omri Evron, refuse to serve in the IDF because I am faithful to the moral principles in which I believe. My refusal to enlist is in protest against the longstanding military occupation of the Palestinian people, an occupation that deepens and entrenches the hatred and terror between peoples. I oppose participation in the cruel war for the control over the occupied territories, a war waged in order to protect the Israeli settlements …

Though I am aware that this act constitutes an infringement of Israeli law, I am compelled to stand by my democratic, humanist and egalitarian values. Military rule over millions of Palestinians is not democratic. It is my duty to oppose any law that makes it possible to deprive others of their rights and freedom, or to treat them with such violence that their fundamental humanity is negated.”

Read the article.

Also, check out these great cartoons by Latuff, an Arab man (I think he’s Arab) living in Brazil. They are about the recent developments in Palestine. Click on the images for a full view.

Divide and Conquer 1
Divide and Conquer 2
Divide and Conquer 3

Indy.. My First Love

Photo by Steven Speilberg

My childhood crush is back! And I’m still crushing! The “Indiana Jones” series is my third favorite Stephen Speilberg work right after “E.T.” and “Close Encounters..” Rumors of a fourth installment have been stirring for years and it was announced last year that there definitely will be a fourth. Harrison Ford still looks good as the rough and scruffy professor/action hero.

Production began yesterday, June 21st, and the movie is expected to be released on May 22nd, 2008. That’s unfortunate because there’s a chance I won’t be in the USA. But if I am, I’ll be there with my authentic Indiana Jones fedora that I have!

Shia LaBeouf, who’s been in almost every movie this year, is also starring as Indiana’s son. Other actors the movie include Cate Blanchett, John Hurt, Ray Winstone and Jim Broadbent.

One of the reasons I loved the movies was because the action sequences look real. That’s because they were real physical action sequences with real stuntmen and mechanical machines. I really hope they don’t rely too much on the computer generated technique.

I can’t wait!

Transmission - Selective Downloading

‘Selective downloading’ is a new feature in torrent clients. For example if you have a huge torrent of a whole season of a TV show but you already have half of it, you don’t have to wait until the whole thing downloads. Just download the episodes you don’t have. It’s really useful.

But for Macs it was only available on Azureus, which was an incredibly heavy program that sucked up almost all the disk usage and made actually using the computer while downloading a complete nightmare. But, it was still popular because it was the only client that did that.

An SVN version of Transmission was released recently. I don’t exactly know what SVN is but I think it basically is a version where users-developers edit and add to the program. It isn’t supported by the main site but support is given through the site’s forums. The official program is found here but that doesn’t have the ’selective downloading feature.’ You can find the SVN version here. Notice the long list of disk images, these are updated versions. Install the latest one, at the very bottom of the list.

The program is incredible. So light and simple. Looks good too and not overly flashy with unnecessary stuff. Enjoy.