Extra, Extra: Read All About It

After a slow start to the week, it has suddenly taken a turn into blogworthy territory. First, the bad news: We lost on Saturday. We played great for 3 quarters and had a few tough possessions, a few bad calls, and a few mismatches we couldn't fix in the fourth and ended up taking the L. There is no excuse and we definitely should have been able to hang on for the win, but that's why they play the game. I don't want to go into too much detail because it might upset me. As you can tell from this and that, the papers did not want to talk much about it either. I think I had around 10 points with like 16/17 boards. We were still a little upset that night and did not do much, but whatever dude, life moves on.

And move on, it did.... On Sunday, we not only discovered one of the greatest shows in recent memory - The Tool Academy (Matsuflex, Tiny Tool, and Shawn are legends) - but we also had a VERY traditional German meal with our land lady. It was interesting to say the least. It began with us sitting around the couch in a dimly lit family room, sipping beers and freshly squeezed orange juice with the man in the house (huh?) and ended with some epic battles in darts. In between, we had zee German meal.

Although I must admit that the mashed potatoes were extremely tasty and scrumptious.. yum yum yum.. the rest of the meal was more interesting than scrump-diddly-umptious... First, the other side dish - sauerkraut. Now, I am not a big sauerkraut guy, but I definitely felt it was necessary to eat as much as possible so as to be polite to my lovely hosts. It was pretty tasty (I mean it was OK) and I am sure for all you sauerkraut lovers out there, a traditional German 'kraut would have made your day, but everyone has their own tastes, and 'kraut has never made my taste buds tingle with delight.

The main dish of the night is known as "eisbein." Wikipedia describes it very well here, even commenting on what the side dishes usually are with this meal. Man, wikipedia is so SMART. Now, eisbein is pig leg. It looked to me as though this pig leg was hacked off by some sort of large butchering knife and placed in an oven or something. The outside skin of the meat was so crispy it was nearly impossible to cut with a steak knife. Our host described this outside portion as her favorite part, almost like a potato chip, except harder to chew.

Me: ehhhhh, the outside was not my fave as it was solid as hell and full with fattyness. I ate most of my eisbein without gagging or doing any of my other standard maneuvers which used to plague the Goldsmith dinner table during my younger years (I was a bit of a picky eater).

After dinner, we had a lovely little orange, gelatin type cake thing... yes, that is the best way to describe it, and, I must admit, it was quite tasty. As we were about to leave, we got swindled into sitting down in the living room again and than challenged to some darts. Obviously, I was down and we ended up staying for probably another hour after the meal. It was a great time and definitely something any self-respecting German-American who lives in Germany should experience in his life... ONCE... at the most...

This dart game lead to some chatter between the housemates and somehow forced Marko into challenging me to a dunk contest. This dunk contest took place last night. I will now go into my alter-ego sports reporter and shamelessly hype this contest (video will be coming shortly thanks to the ever-so-talented Trevor Wittwer).

THIS JUST IN: BIG NEWS FROM WERNE, GERMANY

In a historic move, Marko "the Serbian Sensation" Filipovic has challenged Matt "the One-Legged American Vet" Goldsmith to a slam dunk competition. This contest will be hyped as "McSnack presents: the 2009 TV Werne Slam Dunk Contest." (In no way does McSnack represent or serve McDonald's affiliated cuisine, bringing pea soup, currywurst, and other strange German specialties to the foreigners of Werne every Monday and Thursday.)

In an epic battle of bitter rivals, Filipovic has challenged Goldsmith to something much larger than even he could understand, reminding many spectators of the Rocky vs Ivan Drago fight in Rocky IV or even the movie Miracle, chronicling the 1980 US Olympic hockey victory over the Soviets.

Marko "the ex-Yugoslavian, ex-Serbian-Montenegroan, current Serbian" Filipovic is a young, 21-year-old talent with immense amounts of potential, a 6'10" frame, and a naive outlook on life. Don't worry though ladies, he is not like most Serbians, and still chooses to cuddle as frequently as he can. He hopes to come to a town near you as soon as possible, currently studying hard so he can pass the SAT's and go to college in the States.

The much wiser, far more experienced Goldsmith is a wily veteran full of big ideas and high hopes. Matt "the One-Legged Wonder" Goldsmith aka "Peg Leg," aka "the Jersey Jumper," aka "I-will-take-reverse-lay-ups-and-lefty-hooks-all-day" is hoping to bring the American style of showmanship and pure, uninhibited, Nascar-esque power to all of his dunks. He describes himself as a crowd-pleaser with "a few tricks still up the old sleeve."

With a rivaly so ingrained in history, the "McSnack presents: the 2009 TV Werne Slam Dunk Contest" will surely be one for the ages. My early prediction: mark one more down for good ol' Amurica.

Video to come soon...

- MFG

Clip of the Week!

Ok, this week's clip is an oldie but a goodie. It is a clip of a bunch of "gamers" playing World of Warcraft (a computer game) online. They are strategizing and deciding how to attack the next level. I guess they talk to each other using headsets and are like in a group who consistently play together or something. I dunno, but, all I do know is, the only one I would want to hang out with is the infamous Leroy Jenkins and you can see why for yourself.



Hope you enjoyed it!

- MFG

5 Smurfs vs. A Viking: A Summary of Karneval Weekend

If you have ever seen 5 smurfs take down a viking, you may have been to the most recent celebration of Karneval in Germany. Before I get into the nitty-gritty of Karneval weekend (Carnival in Brazil or Mardi Gras in N'Orleans), let me just say that this is definitely one of the most insane celebrations in all of Germany and I am surprised that it does not get as much coverage as Octoberfest. Then again, I am sure the Brazilian version (which gets way more hype than the German version) is far more ridiculous with its warm weather and notoriously beautiful Brazilian women. Now, let the stories begin (this post may be a long one).

So on Friday we were invited by Ivan, our coach, and one of the guys who takes care of all things TV Werne to go to this Karneval celebration. We knew NOTHING about what this weekend was for or what we were getting ourselves into besides the fact that it was only men, but we went nonetheless. I guess Friday is like "Man Day" of Karneval weekend and Thursday is "Woman Day" because on each day there are parties which can only be attended by one gender or the other. I thought it was strange sounding going in, but I now think it is great.

When we arrived at the party, our host told us to simply, laugh, be loud, and drink beer. We all happily obliged, helped along by an 11 liter mini keg of Krombacher for the 5 of us. Throughout the night, they had comedians on stage and good looking women in funny outfits doing dances and such for the crowd. Between every act, a girl would come out holding the number of the round we were on (similar to a boxing fight), with 11 rounds in all. This lasted from 7 to 11. This night was more similar to a boxing fight than you may imagine, as one of the fine German gentleman sitting near us was KO'ed by a deadly combination of Krombacher, beautiful women, and dancing on our table (which he smoothly fell right off in mid-cheer).

After arriving back at the house, we decided that the only logical course of action would be to continue this wonderful evening at a local bar. On Friday nights, it is 99 cents for any mixed drink at a bar right here in Werne, and we took full advantage of our Saturday day off by abusing this bar's specials. In addition, Marko pulled some black-market-Serbian-sweet-talk to get us into the bar without having to pay a cover charge. A fun night for a small fee: Glorious.

When the house finally awoke on Saturday we were not a very energetic bunch. We relaxed mostly and stayed in for the night, teaching a few drinking games to Marko throughout the evening and going to bed a bit earlier than the night before. Uneventful to say the least. Since I had to work on Monday, I did not plan on going out Sunday night but Marko, Junior, and Trevor supposedly had an amazing evening at a famous local pajama party in Waltrop. Sounds good to this guy... but now, we shall proceed to the really good stuff.

I awoke Monday like any other Monday: sleepy and upset that it was only Monday. I had little to no expectations for the day. I was very excited, however, that we got to leave work early to attend the local parade / party / Karneval celebration. I had heard rumors that Karneval was a good time but we live in Werne and how good could a silly parade in a small town be?

ANSWER: AMAZZZZZZZZZING

First off, Karneval is similar to Halloween in the US - everyone is dressed in costume (or mostly everyone), and the people on the parade floats fire candies in the crowd the entire day and you know I love me some German gummy bears - 1 point Karneval... In addition, there are no laws prohibiting open containers and such and Germans encourage everyone to drink at the earliest hour possible: in this case - we were drinking by 1 PM on the streets of Werne, patiently waiting for the parade to begin - tack on another punta for Karneval.. Cheap Vodka = point, Good Orange Juice = point, Even better screwdrivers = multiple points - you get the drift. I think I can stop officially awarding points now and let the reader come to his or her own verdict after hearing the story of the rest of the day...

So, while drinking our screwdrivers and hanging out on the streets of Werne all day, we witnessed many hilarious events. One of my personal favorites was the old, drunk German lady who walked up to Junior, licked her thumb, and proceeded to try to rub the blackness off of his face. I guess she had black make-up on her face (I sure as hell didn't see it) and was curious as to whether Junior, T, and Junior's friend Jemell were wearing the same black make-up she had on. Much to her dismay, they were going all natural for the day.

Throughout the day, Junior's friend Jemell attempted to contribute to the liveness of the parade as much as possible. I don't know how it was in other parts of Germany, but our parade had no barriers and therefore, it was quite easy to join in and participate in any number of ways. For instance, Jemell used the old Dave Chappelle robot move and followed a few unsuspecting Germans along their parade route. He then grabbed a toy rifle so that he could lead a march through the streets of Werne. Oh yea, and 5 smurfs supposedly beat up a viking... You get the point, hilarious stuff to say the least.

After the parade finished, we headed over to our favorite local bar to continue the party. It was a ridiculous 4 or 5 in the afternoon and we ended up staying there until it felt like it was 6 am (it was actually only 8:30 PM or so but who's counting?). The day ended with some of us looking a bit different than we normally do...

I dunno about you, but when I can get my Serbian roommate to wear something like this, I call the day a success.

Overall Rating: Karneval gets an A+ for pure liveness..

Hope you enjoyed it!

- MFG

Clip of the Week!

I have decided to unveil a new feature on my blog... The Youtube Clip of the Week!

Throughout my time here in Germany, I feel that my youtube searching ability has improved tenfold. This may be due to boredom (most likely) or because I have a primal instinct to see videos with english in them or maybe, simply because one Marcus "Ya Boy" Bradley inspires me. Nevertheless, my ability has improved.... thus, my first youtube clip of the week:

This week's clip is an ad campaign from Gatorade called "Mission G." It is a spoof of Monty Python and the Holy Grail and stars one Kevin Garnett. Although you may have seen parts of this on TV, when put together it becomes a wonderful short film. Last night, I was in dire need of a movie and with our DVD player currently on the fritz, this youtube clip had to suffice... and suffice it did...



I know it was a bit long, but I feel it is well worth it! Somehow, a boring week in Germany became most blogworthy... Three posts in one week... Let me know what you think of the new feature... haha..

- MFG