DAY 33

Milwaukee, Wisconsin
May 15, 2009
Fri 11:47 PM

still playing with my zippo... god i love that. saw angels and demons today, good movie. maKES ME WANT... oops, bumped the caps button there. makes me want to go to rome, rome looks cool. i love being italian, being italian is the best. name another ethnicity that has the complete package. food, culture, fashion, art, sports, sports cars, attractive people, did i mention food... italians have it all. how bout all those amazing italian artists... michaleangelo, dante, raphael, vivaldi, verdi, pacino, de niro, that guy that jumps on seats at the Oscars... right, benini. scientists- da Vinci, galileo, marconi, fermi, volta... great food- pizza, spaghetti, anything parmigianna, minestrone, marscapone, gelatto, Chef Boyardee. and sports- they kick butt at soccer. i mean, how can't they, their country is shaped like a boot. and their cars- ferrari, lamborghini, mazeratti. and the hottest names in fashion are italian- armani, gucci, prada, fendi, dolce & gabbana. not to mention they're all increidbly sexy (they don't even need to wear the hot clothes)... well, not all, but most. and the language is super sexy... so much cooler than french, to me, french sounds snooty and uppidy, italian just sounds suave. like dr. albright says to dick on 3rd rock (in the episode when dick is trying to pick out a nationality)

...after reading a bunch of Dr. Albright's anthropology books
Dick: These books are all dry facts but no value judgement, you're the expert you tell me, which one is the best?
Albright: Oh, there there's no best it's all subjective.
Dick: Well, which do you find most interesting?
Albright: Oh, I don't know... I like the creative ambition of the Maori people, the Polynesians with their love of nature, the...
Dick: Which is the sexiest?
Albright: Italians.
Dick: Italians?
Albright: Smokey, swarthy, gotta have them.

if 3rd Rock says it, it has to be true. i mean, don't get me wrong, i also like being german and slovenien... but germans have a lot of baggage (the two times i watched schindler's list i felt terrible... and that was a movie about a good german!) and nobody has even heard of slovenia... that nice, picturesque little country in the alps. i think there are two types of people in the world- italians, and those who wish they were italian. thank goodness i'm italian, and even better, i look italian. i can pull it off. my sister is, allegedly, just as italian as i am, but she doesn't look it at all. she can have the aryan looks, i'd rather be more mediteranean. although, it's funny, right there, i used the word "aryan" in the way that hitler (that bastard) did; refering to blue-eyed, blonde people... when in actuality, aryan originally meant people originating from south-central Asia- Iran, India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. I wouldn't exactly call those people blonde and blue-eyed. Kinda also like how those stupid nazis hijacked the swastika... which originally was (and still is) a symbol used in hinduism and buddhism. geez, did hitler have any original ideas? uncreative bastard, no wonder he never cut it at art school, he stole all his ideas from other places... not to mention twisted them to make them evil.

anyway, back to being italian and why it's awesome. because it is. current world cup champions baby, the biggest sporting event in the world. yeah, viva italia! forza italia! Mamma Mia! all that good stuff. but i will say this, pride in your ancestor's place of origin apparently skips generations because my parents don't care at all. well, i shouldn't say don't care, but certainly don't share my enthusiasm. take for example the world cup, the only time i ever care about soccer (once every four years is enough for me). Italy and Germany routinely dominate, so that's pretty cool cause that's who i cheer for. I don't even cheer for the U.S. because nobody in america cares, i'd rather a country that would appreciate it more win. so, i was all excited last world cup because both italy and germany made it to the semi-finals. and i asked my parents if they were excited... here's what they said.

Me: Dad, Italy is in semis, aren't you excited, don't you want them to win?
Dad: No, Italians stare at you. (apparently when we were in Italy my Dad didn't like how Italians stared... I didn't have a problem with/even notice this... I guess i was too busy talking to the nice, cute guy at the foot locker outside venice who kept asking me how good his english was.)

Me: Hey Mom, Germany is in the semis, are you cheering for them?
Mom: No, Germans are rude.

so, there you have it, my completely american parents who are not enthused about the athletic dominance of the teams representing their grandparents. fine, i'll cheer enough for both of them. speaking of the world cup, recently i read an article on Yahoo! Sports about the possibility of hosting the Super Bowl in london... yeah, good idea (dripping with sarcasm). the author goes on to say that hosting america's biggest sporting event international would put it on par with the olympics and the world cup... hahaha, don't make me laugh. here i will pick apart these arguments...

5. Knowing that a Super Bowl is coming to London will give folks in England an incentive to learn more about the game. It will create natural interest in the sport in the years preceding the event, and it will help the sport take a chunk out of the obsession with soccer.

yeah, hosting an american football game will really take a chunk out of the obsession with soccer. sure it will. just like hosting the champions league final here would take a chunk out of our obsession with american football. uh huh, it'd do just that... NOT. and give folks in england a chance to learn about the game... what makes you think they want to learn about the game? nobody cares about AMERICAN football but americans, it's just too complicated. and i don't blame them, as much as i think it's boring, i understand why soccer is the most popular sport in the world... it's easy to understand. kick ball in goal... got it. saying english people should learn about american football is like saying that we should learn about cricket... a sport that no one, NO ONE outside the former british realms can ever hope to understand. we shouldn't care that the rest of the world doesn't know about and doesn't care about our sport... it's our sport! and forcing it on them is not the way to go; it's arrogant to think that just by playing it there, they'd want to learn it. Oh, look at this gift america is giving us, by sharing their amazing sport with us... it's not like they don't have their own sports.

6. A London Super Bowl would be the most hyped sporting event of all time, with unprecedented coverage—not just in the U.S. and Britain but in every other country. It would place the event in the running to compete on equal footing afforded to the Olympics and the World Cup, and it could elevate the game's status as possibly an international sports holiday.

again, don't make me laugh. Most hyped sporting event of all time? Unprecedented coverage? Look, the entire world is not in love with all things america, i think the world would be like, hey, why the hell are they playing the super bowl in london? that makes no sense. using this logic, by playing the, oh, i don't know, kansas high school state basketball championship in new york would turn it into a national event. no, it wouldn't. equal footing of the olympics and world cup... you seriously think that a game between the miami dolphins and philadelphia eagles (just picked two teams at random) could equal entire nations competing against each other in either the most poplular sport in the world (world cup) or the oldest and most prestigious sporting event ever (olympics)? hahaha, wow.

7. The aftermath of the event could propel the NFL into a real competition for top sport in the world, akin to the '70s-era domestic battle between baseball and football. And why shouldn't fans of American football want our greatest sport to be the world's greatest sport? If folks can get worked up about a bunch of guys in shorts chasing a white ball with not much scoring, they'd be downright rabid about football once they give it a full and fair chance.

again, no they wouldn't. you're assuming that the world wants a change in the heirarchy of sports. soccer is popular because a) its easy to understand, and b) anyone can play it.. and you really need is a ball and nets. true, football you can play with just a ball, but the rest of the world will not suddenly jump on the american football bandwagon overnight... or ever. it won't happen. what world is this guy living in... a world that only exists within a tiny radius of canton, ohio? this argument also assumes that there is something inherently flawed in the game of soccer... that people have to be messed up in the head or something to like it. yes, i will admit it's boring for me, but have you watched it with soccer fans?? they love it, they don't see it as the simple, inferior game it's being painted as by this argument. i know a lot of people who don't like watching golf, i do. it's personal preference. and as a big american football fan, i don't care at all if it's not the most popular sport in the world. as long as i can watch it and follow my team, i'm happy. the fact that people in brazil or france don't share my infinity for it is inconsequential.

9. In a roundabout way, it's the kind of gesture that could help other countries truly believe America doesn't look down its nose at other nations. By sharing our most prized sporting event with the rest of the world, the rest of the world might think, at least for a day, that we're not a bunch of jerks.

i think i love this argument the most, because it puts out the notion that everyone in the world hates us for hoarding our sports championships for ourselves. Oh, what a great country, America, for staging the Super Bowl in London... yeah right. The rest of the world would feel like we're jamming our sport down their throats like we already try to do with our values. It would not be seen as a gesture of goodwill, because, again, it wouldn't do anything for non-american football fans. nobody else cares about the super bowl.

here's the link to the article... see for yourself if i'm being too judgemental... i don't think i am.

http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?slug=maybealondonsuperbowlisn&prov=tsn&type=lgns

anyway, back to being italian and why its amazing... i think i might even qualify for italian citizenship. how cool would that be? apparently, a lot of coutries in the world determine your citizenship status not by where you were born, but who you're descended from. my great-grandparents immigrated here from northern italy, and my grandmother was born before my great-grandfather aquired u.s. citizenship. because of that i've always known that my father qualifies for italian citizenship, but, i just read that perhaps i do as well. all this is meaningless though, i'd have to track down birth certificates that probably don't exist anymore, but it's still cool to ponder. i mean, imagine the benefits of having an EU passport... being able to travel the world without everyone hating you, and, it would make traveling in Europe even easier that it already is, shorter lines in the airports... and when you land they'd say "Welcome Home." I have a friend, oh, i don't know if i came up with a name for him yet... I'll call him Bat. Anyway, Bat has a British and American passport, so when he flys to London they greet him with "Welcome Home, sir." and when he flies back to the states they also say, "welcome back" pretty cool, i'd like that. According to wikipedia, the absolute final word on EVERYTHING, you can qualify for Italian citizenship if (through jus sanguinis)...

Your paternal or maternal grandfather was born in a country other than Italy, your paternal great grandfather was officially recognized as an Italian citizen at the time of his birth, neither you nor your father nor your grandfather ever renounced your right to Italian citizenship.

yep, i'd say i qualify then. i love the provision "ever renounced your right to Italian citizenship," can't renounce something you never knew you qualified for. that would be sweet to hold dual-citizenship, have two passports, be served by two embassies and consulates when traveling abroad. being able to move to italy in case you committ a horrible crime because they don't extradite citizens... at least that's true on law and order. and i wouldn't really plan on really ever using that perk.

salbrent