28 minutes left, Senegal 2 Belgium 0

Senegal has looked to be the dominant team in this match until just after their second goal. Belgium finally woke up. But

Watched the England v Congo match

The cameras had a shot of the head cheese booth.

Reminded me of pictures of the Politbureau.
A bunch of stone faces.

The Haitian decision

From another source.

The fact that Stephen Miller is saying that the US is closed to asylum seekers from Haiti but open to those from white South Africans tells you all you need to know.

World cup, here der Weltmeister,

That would be world master.

Marketing adn sponsorships don't take a break. I can get German flag coloured pasta. Tonite we had official stadium wurst. Not coloured like the flag. Found these urinals at the main Lowenbrau restaurant the other day. Yes that is the Germany flag, Schwartz, rot, und gold. And then today there was this iceberg lettuce in the store.

Perhaps others can share promo stuff for the games that strike you as odd or funny.

World Cup Lettuce

In Munich we have had World cup Pasta, in German fla golours of course. Tonight we had official stadium wurst, not in German flag colours. And in the vegetable section of my grocery store was this...

Iceberg lettuce, ready to go, posted with my appologies to CA Peggy

I cut Teslas off... cross posting from humour

I cut off Teslas....

Saw a snippet of a comic. Here is what he said

I cut off Teslas. You just know they won't let you in.
Why bother even signalling your intent. I just cut tehm off.
You know Tesla's self braking is really something else.
I cut them off, look in the rearview and the driver is shaking his fist and cursing.
The car is saying go ahead sir....

A disclaimer, I don't own a car. But I might try this when I rent one.... Sarcasm.

With this leadership and corporate base

we are screwed in a war.

We don't take others seriously. We don't want to learn from the best (Ukraine) and our procurement system is too bloated and rigid. Todays wars aren't the same as in Afghanistan. which wasn't the same as the Kuwait war.

This is a good paper covering our issues, and those of Europe as well.

https://www.lowyinstitute.org/publications/modern-war-and-the-systemic-learning-deficit-in-western-military-institutions?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

CA election and ballot

We live in Germany and vote by mail.
We waited to see what was going to shake out before we sent in our ballots.
We mailed our ballots on the 23rd of May.
As of today, Alemeda county says they haven't gotten our ballots. Over 2 weeks.
The delivery has never been this slow. Don't know if they are behind in the updating of the website or they just haven't made it there.

For the General election it looks like we will have to mail a month in advance or find a way to fax in the ballot.

Noon thursday, Pacific time, it starts

The Football world cup. Like it or not. Like the nasty political nonsense by a certain country the first gameis Mexico v South Africa.

As a former referee I like to keep track of the laws. Prevents me from making too much of an ass of myself commenting on the laws of the game. So here is the site of the group that does all the law updating. This link will give you the 2026-2027 rule book. It is effective July first but the teams will be playing under these laws as written.

https://theifab.com/

Under the 'hamburger"symbol, 3 horizontal ines, drops down and you can get the laws one at a time.
This gives you a pick list including changes for this year.
Expand Laws of the Game. That will get you a list including laws 1-17, and a glossary.

there is a section on VAR protocol and for the soccer geeks, guidlines for match officials.

Enjoy the matches. I don't know if I will see many as we are 9 hours ahead and except for Germany's matches I will have to pay for find an outdoor venue. The first USA match is at 3 AM our time.....