PopWars

Barcelona, long the best football team in world, fell apart. They got so big they couldn’t afford their big money players. Messi, still the best player in the world, is paying in Paris with Neymar and Mbappe. Others took a cut in salary. A former player has returned to coach the team and he is playing youngsters, 17 and 18 years old, with the remaining veterans, the mentors, Pique and Busquets. They still play the beautiful game and they are even more fun to watch. Unfortunately they can’t seem to win but they are coming closer.

The Bilbao club is the opposite of a big money team. They only hire people born in the Basque region. That region, in northwestern Spain stretches in France. Basque before country! This last match was played in Bilbao and before the match began, while the stadium was bathed in deep red LED lights we were treated to tradition Basque music played on xalaparta, a hollow wood instrument.

Bilbao has a famous soccer academy and the graduates for the most part stay in the region. Most Spanish teams have their ultra fan sections. The fans in Bilbao are all ultra fans. They are loyal backers and proud of their team. They beat Barcelona in overtime and will advance to the final rounds of the Copa del Rey.

We opened the ESPN app to watch the Copa de Rey match between Atletico and Real Sociedad in San Sebastian and found a group of people out on the pitch dressed as chefs. We became rabid Atletico fans last year during their improbable run to the top of La Liga but this year things have fallen apart for them. Real Sociedad has some of the most boisterous fans in La Liga and the were louder than ever last night. There was no way Atletico could have won.

The city was celebrating the feast day of their patron saint, San Sebastian, with a festival called Tamborrada, where groups of locals form street parades, dress as soldiers and cooks. San Sebastián has long been noted for their culinary arts and members of their famous dining societies meet at midnight in the Plaza de la Constitución and then march through the streets with drums for the next 24 hours.

Back in Rochester old man winter showed he could still get it up. We had eighteen inches of snow at the beginning of the week and have skied for four days in a row now. It was only 12 degrees when we got out their this morning and we didn’t expect to anyone else out but we underestimated our fellow citizens.

Peggi and I home-tested for the first time since this thing began. We were getting to gather with two other couples to celebrate Jedi’s 67th and someone suggested we all test before the event. We bought some test kits back in the fall when we thought we might have been exposed. We felt ok and never went anywhere so we didn’t use them. The package said they expired in January so here we are. Negative.

We arranged to take Jedi and Helena’s dog, Bigz, for a walking the morning. Jedi was still in pjs when we stopped by. Bigz was roaring to go. He pulled us along, down Hoffman to the golf course and into the woods. We came up on Center Entrance and met a neighbor walking her new puppy. The puppy was three time the size of the Notorious Mr. Bigz but Bigz was the aggressor. I’ve had this song going through my head all day.

Keeping up with the three LaLiga teams we follow is handful. Imagine if you were one of the players. In addition to the 38 regular season fixtures there are Olympic and World Cup qualifying games for their home countries and then, if the teams are lucky enough, the tournaments which are woven into the season. The Champions League, the Copa del Rey and today’s Super Cup.

Real Madrid meets Barcelona today (always an “El Classico” when they meet). Atletico meets Athletic Club Bilbao tomorrow and then the winners meet each other on Sunday, all matches in Riyadh, the capitol of Saudi Arabia. The four teams qualified by being the first or second place finishers in last year’s La Liga and Copa del Rey tournaments. Why Saudi Arabia? Money. Lots of it. Will MBS be in the stands? I will report back.

We picked an armload of collard greens and kale from garden. In January! Petra from Fruition Seeds says it gets sweeter after a freeze. I eat the very top leaves of the kale plants while we are down there, the smallest but most tender. We found enough cilantro and even some arugula standing in the snow to compliment the tasting. Super greens for Supercopa!

The first round of Spain’s Copa del Rey happened midweek between La Liga fixtures. Second and third tier clubs are eligible so the matches took us to unknown regions while the country celebrated Los Reyes Magos (Three Kings Day.) We enjoy the pageantry of the pregame as much as the match and watched one match each day for the last three, Barcelona playing in Linares, Real Madrid in Alcoi in Alcoyano’s tiny stadium and then Majadahonda vs Atletico. All three of the big teams won but just barely in some cases.

I see the 99 year old Betty White did not die from complications of the Covid vaccination. I’m running out of band width keeping up with the fact checks!

I didn’t want the acrylic primer I bought online to freeze so I was keeping a lookout for the Amazon truck. It was dinner time and dark when we got an email saying our package had been delivered. I walked around the house but I couldn’t find it. We texted the neighbors on three sides and emailed Amazon that we didn’t receive the package. On their site we found a photo of our package sitting somewhere in the dark, a beige blur on a solid background shot in a vertical orientation. We took the photo into Photoshop Elements and jacked up the levels enough to see the box sitting in front of our neighbors front door.

When we closed the street pool this fall I brought the two large flower pots home to repaint. I love winter for all the time it provides for projects but I am already backed up. I asked the paint guy at Meyer’s if he could mix me some turquoise paint with primer mixed in. I was under the impression that that was how things were done now. He told me that was a scam and I would have to use “bonding primer” first and then the paint. But their primer was backordered on account of one of those Covid supply chain issues.