This blog’s a bit weird. When I post, it appears as if nobody’s reading it. When I stop posting, I start getting emails and phone calls wondering why I’m not posting any more.

Maybe I just need validation. Either way, if you’re actually following this blog, be sure and comment your little hearts out. Otherwise, I assume nobody’s reading, and can’t be arsed to post…

Every St. Patrick’s Day, it’s always the same. A few days before, I start getting offhand comments from coworkers and friends, saying things like “I bet you’re not coming to work on the 18th!!” and “So how much are you going to drink?”

The day arrives, and people are asking me where I’m going out. And when I politely tell them I’d rather gouge my eyes out with a rusty spoon than set foot in a bar on St. Patrick’s Day, they wonder why I’m not going to “represent”.

Even yesterday, when I had a checkup on the periodontal work done, the hygeinist asked how much I had to drink. On a conference call at work, folks were asking me if I recovered yet. Jesus – as if I need some sort of holiday or excuse to drink!

This folks, is why I never go out on St. Patrick’s Day. Because despite the stereotypes, the Irish aren’t raging drunks who need to get hammered until we can’t stand – but most of all, there’s no feckin’ way I want to be the token mascot for a gang of Budweiser-swilling, plastic green hat wearing Americans who think they’re Irish just because they’re so drunk, they vomit every few minutes. Case in point…

For the record, on St. Patrick’s Day, I spent a couple of hours in the front garden pulling weeds, and rewarded myself afterwards with a hot shower, and a beer on my couch with a bowl of stew.

Yes, there’s been more going on other than Liverpool wins, and here’s the quick update.

We’re in house mode – or at least, I am. After getting the recessed lighting installed in the living room and office, I’m all about getting more crap done while I’ve got the motivation. Against all odds, we actually found a piece of art we both liked, so now our living room wall isn’t completely barren. Plus, with our meager tax return, we toddled off and bought a new sectional couch. Nice and comfy, and finally Tracee’s disgusting brown monstrosity has been condemned to the basement – where one day, she’s going to come home and find that it accidentally fell into the back of a truck, which just happened to be on the way to the dump.

The big kerfuffle is the garden(s). So we recruited friends of ours to do the design and planting for us. Back in October. And it still hasn’t been done. Not only that, they’re not responding to phone calls and emails. And the $3,000 we spent on removing all the ivy and poison oak is for nothing now, since while we were waiting for them to get started, weeds have infested our blank canvas. So this weekend, we finally resolved to take matters into our own hands, since it’s obvious they’re not going to come through for us. We got a quote from the guy who did our clearing – $1,600 for the front. While I’d love him to do it (purely because I can’t stand garden work), the cash isn’t there, with the humongous Marin County property tax bill we’ve got, so we’re going to tackle it ourselves, and save some money. THAT ought to be interesting…

In other, much cooler news, Mr. Frigo popped out for a visit the weekend before last! Hooray! It was good seeing him, made us miss our old crew from DC, and a fun time was had by all. Did the wine tasting thing (spent more money…), ate one of his phenomenal calabreses (and got the recipe!), and headed out to West Marin for some beach time. Behold gratuitous photos…

Finally, the dental work continues. Finally went in for that periodontal surgery last Thursday, and feck me if that wasn’t awful. The root canal was a walk in the park compared to this. For those that don’t know what crown lengthening is, it’s “giving your gums a haircut”, in the words of my dentist. In reality, it’s having excess gum tissue and bone hacked off, and it feckin’ gargled my balls. Nothing like lying there in the chair, and suddenly tasting/smelling barbecue – before realizing it’s yourself you’re tasting and smelling. The procedure itself wasn’t bad – the joys of novocaine – but once that wore off, it’s been nonstop pain and discomfort. I managed to pop the stitches in my mouth pretty much immediately, and nothing like waking up in the mornings with little pools of blood all over the pillow. It’s getting better day by day, but Christ if I’m not really really ready for this to be over and done with…

Kisses for the camera, when we take the lead…
Jesus H. Christ on a bike. Not satisfied with thumping Real midweek, Liverpool Football Club continued to completely and utterly mess with my feckin’ head this weekend, by giving Man United a solid kicking in their own backyard. Torres was rampant, United looked confused, and the poor feckers in my living room (Professor Mike, JB, and Greg, as well as Tracee) were subjected to my mixture of caffeine fuelled tourettes and euphoria that only a win over the Scum™ can bring.

“I was going for the ball! Honest!!”
What made it more impressive was coming from behind. A dodgy penalty (in my eyes) gave the Scum™ the lead, but that lasted all of 8 minutes when Torres molested Vidic like an altar boy for the equalizer. Just before half time we took the lead, with Gerrard getting clipped in the box and stuffing the resulting penalty. The second half saw us defending deep, and looking shaky doing so, before the highlight of the match – Gerrard, through on goal, was hauled down by his nads by Vidic. Straight red card, and potential for sexual assault charges (see above!) Aurelio stroked the 20 yarder into the net, Dossena added a fourth in injury time, and yours truly was on cloud nine.

I’m certainly not deluded enough to think we can somehow win the title – still too much bed shitting against the likes of Boro, Stoke, Hull, Everton, City, etc. to overcome – but giving the regular members of “the big four” a good kicking should make for an interesting confidence boost for next year.

And this was just the beginning…
Supporting Liverpool this season has been a challenge. I’ve watched the lads give the Scum™ a thorough kicking (despite a 2-1 scoreline) only to see them draw with Stoke in the next match. Inspiring w ins against Chelski were followed by defeats to Spurs and Everton. We’ve gone from top of the Premiership at the beginning of 2009, to third place, seven points behind United, who have a game in hand to boot. Performances on the pitch all season long have been poor and uninspired. Our owners have continued to play the evil spoilers to our progress, and to top it off, our manager has on more than one occasion lost the plot completely, with bizzare rants in the press. Our fans are getting on the team’s back, and the much vaunted “Liverpool Way” seems more and more to be a thing of the past.

So going into last night’s game, given recent performances against Middlesboro and Man City, I was a little nervous, despite a 1-0 first leg lead. You always expect magic at Anfield, especially on European nights, but this season has seen as much disappointment as it has excitement.

90 minutes later, I’d seen the finest display of flowing attacking football Liverpool had produced in 10 years. A Real Madrid side in great form were given a complete and utter lesson, and ran out of Anfield with their tails between their legs on the receiving end of a 4-0 whipping. And in truth, had it not been for a man-of-the-match display from Iker Casillas, it could have, and should have, been more like 6 or 7-0.

Er, Juan, what the fuck just happened?
So it begs the question, where the feck has that been all season long? I can’t help but wonder where we’d be in the league had that level of passion, flair, and determination been on display a bit more this year. Would we have turned a few of those draws – where we looked disinterested and uninspired – into wins? Can’t help but think yes.

Still, here’s hoping that this outstanding performance gives the lads all the inspiration they need this weekend when they travel to Old Trafford. And here’s also hoping that it gives Rafa an idea of what his team can do when he doesn’t shackle them with batarse, overthought tactics…