MGN Weekender 1.31.25
Rome, Hoops, Snow, Drinks, Work, and Viruses
My daughter had the flu for a week or so. Miraculously, no one else in the house was affected. We are happy about that, and also feel lucky. We have an infant in this place, so we didn’t want it to spread. Credit to my wife, of course, for wiping everything down with manic effectiveness.
The whole household routine was changed, however. Children slept in different rooms. Food was eaten differently. Our sleep patterns changed. MGN did not write as much as we would have liked. Such is life.
The hoops squad has been surviving some games. I cannot say there have been two put-together halves in any of this win streak but it does not matter too much. Winning is the most important thing. The coaching staff are working on the details and weaving it all together. The league is weaker than usual, and so winning the regular season would only serve to put North Texas in “Check them out, aren’t they fun?” category but by no means would clinch anything like a tournament berth. We can leave nothing to chance. The beauty of this sport is that winning the league tournament will guarantee an appearance in the big dance. This is the goal and should remain so forever and always. We simply cannot rely on the beauty pageant that is an at-large bid.
Thinking about all that will mess you up. You will not be able to appreciate the basketball in front of you. This particular team is older, skilled at a few more levels than past NT teams, and has more athleticism throughout the roster. They don’t put together bouts of beautiful basketball, but they do defend, and do compete.
To be clear, I mean that this group is effective in haranguing themselves into the paint, throwing up a few pump fakes, and getting the ball to get in the hoop. Kareem’s sky hook it is not. It is effective. Brenan Lorient is working his way into the legendary status befitting long time NT greats. Without a hint of knocking anyone who is now playing elsewhere (Rutgers), Lorient is doing the things we wanted to see guys achieve last year. He can attack the paint, he has a second-bounce. He is a threat defensively all over. He will add to his offensive game and can become a real dynamic threat as he progresses to the professional ranks. For North Texas fans of basketball, you should see about getting him his NIL due as he will command attention in free agency/transfer portal time. It is deserved. He is a good player. He came out of nowhere (FAU).
I’ve been reading Pax by Tom Holland. It is a history of Rome during the golden age. I passed all my world history classes and yet it seems some of the facts and details of the Roman period here have slipped away from my memory. It is nice to get another look at it. I will not lie to you. I saw Gladiator II and like any average dad I was a little hyped to get back into some Roman history. The aforementioned flu had slowed me down a bit, but I am working my way through it. I like it.
The snow here in the midwest is just now melting. I know DFW had a nice blanket of powder, but here we had it for about a month. On the side streets where the sun cannot reach, there are still icy streets. One pile of snow has melted enough to reveal part of a bumper from a car that ran into another car, likely during the heavy snow and ice we had. It is strange to see the streets literally open up. The snow banks on the streets made even the normally wider ways tight and cramped. I am enjoying that it is merely 50-degrees out, and so I can wear shorts.
I’ve been on team Hot Toddy this past month, although I’ve had my share of beers after some rec league wins. I am a little over the beer drinking. Time and age have made it harder to recover from even a single beer. This will change during the summer when I get out to a baseball game. Fear not.
I appreciate your readership. I know things have been a little inconsistent with the posting. MGN’s Clark Kent job is way busier since the start of the new year, and well I have become important at work. The children’s extracurricular schedule is new for January and finding the times where I can watch a game/break down a game and post about it are inconsistent. I don’t like overpromising anything. I also don’t like half-assing things. So it goes. I do want to restart the podcast on Sunday with a new basketball co-host. So apply within, etc.
Enjoy the weekend, folks. Have a drink. GMG
Aha! Getting into the ol' Roman history/mythology, eh?
This user remembers playing through the ol' "Rome: Total War" computer strategy game from 2004. There should be at least one (original and/or remastered) version for sale on the likes of GOG (https://www.gog.com/dreamlist/game/rome-total-war) and/or Steam (some say Steam's doesn't work, it might be an old post). Of course, there's the route of just torrenting such from the likes of, say, bitsearch . to.
The Roman campaign on "Empire Earth: The Art of Conquest" expansion to the original EE game is also nice to play, too! Am sure there's more user-made scenarios/campaigns made by users on ee . heavengames . com / downloads. Not particularly muh own, personal, favorite time period to play in on such games, or when doing such research, as someone who just doesn't like the Romans in-general, as they seemed to behave much like the original Atlanteans and may have been the original neo-Atlanteans, and their model of rulership seems to have been usurped by the English/French of today. Muh ancestors may have very well sacked Rome on at least one occasion, somewhere in either line. The more-fully Germanic side is a given, but the "Polish" side is the one with less information on it and conflicting reports of where that side came from, but in at least one potential origin point, may have also rebelled against Rome, in their own Right. Most people could claim this, given how far-and-wide the scope of the Roman Empire was; virtually all of Europe and MENA was conquered by those people! Kind of iffy on, even in a fictitious-setting, playing as people who attacked ancestral lands/families/neighbors....