Fans can be overly dramatic about tiny moments in a long season, both good and bad. Keep that in mind when I tell you that Johnny Furphy has saved KU’s season.
He certainly saved the game Monday against Cincinnati, the only KU player who seemed to be locked in and engaged for every minute he was on the court. He had a career-high 23 points on 7–8 shooting, grabbed 11 rebounds (also a career high), kept several other balls alive until teammates could grab them, and hit the biggest shot of the night, a 3 as the shot clock expired to put KU up 10 with about four minutes to play in what ended up as a five-point win.
As we had a pretty quiet weekend and KU plays tonight, I’m going to flip my normal routine and cover high school hoops today.
Two more games last week - both wins for JV and varsity - but L was a little off.
In Tuesday’s practice she rolled her troublesome ankle when she landed on a teammate’s foot. She complained about it when I picked her up, but later in the evening and Wednesday morning seemed to be walking normally so I didn’t put too much worry into it.
open.spotify.com/playlist/…
“Blue Tuesday” - Francis of Delirium Spotify has been spitting a lot of FoD tracks at me lately. I’ve yet to hear one I did not like. I don’t think I realized, when I’ve shared songs from them in the past, that they are based in Luxembourg. That might be a new pin on our musical map.
“Mother Mary” - Late Bloomer The first song of 2024 that has grabbed me and won’t let go.
Julia - Sandra Newman My first book of the year was a real uplifter! Officially sanctioned by the estate of George Orwell, it is labeled as a re-telling of his classic 1984. Newman flips the script, and instead of focusing on Orwell’s protagonist Winston Smith, she uses Smith’s lover, Julia, to explore Oceania.
It’s been a decade or so since I last re-read 1984. As I processed Julia I wished I had done another review of the original just to better compare the books.
Chart Week: January 5, 1985
Song: “Centipede” - Rebbie Jackson
Chart Position: #24, 14th week on the chart. This was its peak.
This is at least the third entry in the RFTS series that is as much about the massive cultural impact of Michael Jackson as the highlighted song or artist.[1] This time we will see how Michael helped pull the least known of his siblings into the spotlight.
By 1984, eight of the nine surviving children of Joe and Katherine Jackson had achieved some measure of stardom.
A super busy week with a very exciting ending as L and her teammates played in the Indianapolis City tournament.
Tournament rules allowed for three swing players who were eligible for both JV and varsity games. These players had to be named before the tournament and could not change from game-to-game. L was one of Cathedral’s, which was cool, but it also limited her minutes for the week.
In Tuesday’s quarterfinals, the JV squad won 57–3, giving up just three free throws.
Kind of a strange weekend, mostly due to the weather, which kept us cooped up inside. I spent roughly 87.2% of Saturday and Sunday on the couch, under a blanket, either watching sports on TV, watching shows on my laptop, or reading one of two books.
Jayhawk Talk: Hoops It took awhile to get going, but a very nice bounce back game against Oklahoma. Johnny Furphy moving into the starting lineup worked out pretty well, both for him and Elmarko Jackson, who looked more relaxed coming off the bench.
I should register some NFL picks before it is too late.
After a wild, uncertain regular season, I don’t feel great confidence in any teams or matchups. No upset would surprise me. The NFL is League Chaos, which makes it extremely fun.
NFC Dallas over Green Bay. People are getting too excited about the Packers recent good play. And the Cowboys might be the best team in the conference. Detroit over Los Angeles.
open.spotify.com/playlist/…
“Grace” - IDLES Even though this is band is always surprising, this is miles from anything I’ve ever heard from them before. It veers dramatically from their normal, caustic sound towards gentle, Radiohead territory. I like it.
“Sage” - Sun June I had a few weird, intense dreams last night. This song was inspired by a recurring dream the singer had about her childhood home. So I guess that kind of matches up.
Events demanded an emergency sports notes post. I’ll try to keep these relatively brief.
Jayhawk Talk: Disaster Well that fucking sucked. Arguably the worst Big 12 loss of Bill Self’s career, the first time his team lost when they led by 16 or more points. Having that big lead is what made it worse than the TCU loss in 2013. Because they had this game won. They were toying with UCF.
Tuesday we learned that Sinéad O’Connor died of natural causes. As so often happens in these situations, that initially came as a relief but then was even more heartbreaking. I’ve been sitting on this very good remembrance of her by people who knew and admired her for a bit. Seems like the right time to finally share it.
Yes, she was controversial and ahead of her time, but aren’t all our favorite artists controversial and ahead of their time?
The Irish were back on the court for two games last week. It ended up being a pretty frustrating stretch for L.
Thursday the teams took a bus to Louisville to face Assumption. About all we knew about them was that they are a national volleyball power. They’ve won at least six national championships, if you can believe the banners in their gym.[1] They even honored their volleyball team for their latest state title at halftime of the varsity game.
It was odd walking downstairs this morning. We put all the holiday decorations away Sunday, so this was the first time since Thanksgiving I was greeted by a dark main floor. C said our family room looked “emo” without the decorations yesterday. I’m not sure if emo is the term I would pick, but it does always take a few days to get used to the tree, etc being packed away for another 11 months.
I’m still transitioning out of the long stretch at the end of each year where I listen to holiday music, I put the finishing touches on my Favorite Songs of the Year list, and I’m generally too busy to listen to new music. So this week’s list begins with a few new(ish) tracks then pick up some other things I’ve read about/listened to. As I look at it, it’s kind of a bummer playlist.
Bing Crosby: The Hollow Man - Donald Shepherd and Robert F. Slatzer Each December, as I listen to a shitload of Bing Crosby music, I think, “I should learn more about his life.” I picked up a little of the general, collective pop-cultural memories of him as a kid. But I was six when he died and that was all basically background noise. This year I finally looked into his biographic options.
After playing six games in the first 19 days of December, L and her Irish teammates are in the midst of a much more leisurely three-games-in–18-days stretch. Throw in three days off for Christmas and two for New Year’s and it has been a nice breather after that tough run.
Their only games over the holidays were big ones: split doubleheaders against big rival Bishop Chatard. Last Friday the JV boys and girls played back-to-back at Cathedral, then Saturday the varsity teams matched up at BCHS.
I dropped our Denver relatives off at the airport early this morning and returned to a quieter and emptier house than we’ve had in about ten days. The decorations are still up and the college kid is still with us, but the holiday season has ended.
We had a busy and mostly fun week-plus of holiday celebrations. S’s brother from Boston and his family were in town for about a week over Christmas, staying with another sister.
Holiday Stuff Most of the usuals are in here. One thing missing, though, was The Office Christmas episodes. This is the first time in a few years we haven’t subscribed to the streaming service that allows you to watch the episodes of your choice. Maybe they’ll be back somewhere real (i.e. not Peacock) next year. Or I’ll just record them all off Comedy Central over the course of 2024 and save them for next holiday season.
You may have noticed I stopped posting my monthly listening stats a year ago. Or maybe you didn’t. I’m not sure why, I just decided it wasn’t necessary. I will not be skipping the annual updates, however. Here’s a look at what Last.fm says I listened to most in 2023, and since I began logging my music with them in 2005
2023 Pearl Jam - 236 The National - 201 Ratboy - 186 The War on Drugs - 166 Bully - 148 boygenius - 126 Frightened Rabbit - 125 Middle Kids - 124 The Gaslight Anthem - 124 The Rural Alberta Advantage - 110 All Time Frightened Rabbit finally knocked out of the top spot.
I planned on taking most of this week off from blogging. But Tuesday’s bizarre shitshow of a football game that was the Guaranteed Rate Bowl[1] required me to share a few words about the mighty Kansas Jayhawks winning nine games for the first time since the 2007 season. I mean, I was up until 1:45 AM, and then struggled to sleep, because of this stupid game and its aftermath. I’m going to have some thoughts.