While updating myself on several of the blogs I read regularly I came across a few recent posts about the ever-present issue of the job market for history PhDs. Yes, it sucks. We all know that. What really bothers me is what I consider the cheapening of the PhD degree from certain universities. (See comment #34 here). The author of that comment, on the subject of requirements and expectations for graduate students states:
1. These “minimal intellectual attainments” are falling. Only 15-20 years ago graduate students in my field had to know both French and German. Now you can do it without either. My own institution’s doctoral program is anemic, but colleagues in “healthier” ones lament the decline of their incoming students in terms of preparedness, writing skills, analytical ability, self-confidence, and most other indicators of success common to academia and the more promising fields to which gifted students are increasingly attracted. Compare that with the ever more competitive admissions processes at elite undergraduate institutions and law and medical schools.
I cannot argue with all of these statements, but at the same time I think the situation is vastly over simplified. I look at my own academic career as an example. I am by no means an elite thinker, but I have a pretty good head on my shoulders. I admit that my decision to go to grad school was pretty hasty, but I have busted my ass in school to try to make up for any shortcomings I had when I entered. The comment on foreign language really irks me. I have no problem with the requirement for foreign language knowledge. I know that I had to do a lot of French in a short period of time to get up to snuff. But the original poster's comment lacks context. Not all fields NEED foreign language knowledge. Yes, it may be helpful, but it's not always critical. The prevalence of English as a spoken and written language throughout the world mitigates, in many cases, the need for foreign language simply because so many sources are available for the native English speaker. Furthermore, Americanists generally have less need than say Europeanists. My focus in Irish history tends to push me closer to the Americanist camp simply because the sources that I need to conduct my work are in English. The trend toward easing these sorts of requirements is the result of recognizing this situation for what it is. If I was studying French or German history, it would be ludicrous to undertake either without fluency in each respective tongue.
The idea that there are more schools offering PhDs and granting degrees to students that otherwise wouldn't have them is insulting. Especially when you look at the limited number of openings at elite schools. Sure they can remain in their upper-echelon of the Ivory Tower, but to suggest that people from non-elite schools don't do good, important work is ridiculous. Because that is the impression given by commentators such as the one cited.
Intelligence is only one of many factors that determine which universities one applies and gets accepted to. Remember, applications are voluntary, so some really smart people might opt NOT to go to elite schools even if they could get in. Governing factors such as finances, location, program reputation, and, for undergraduates what one thinks they want to study, all color application choices. Personally, I wanted to teach secondary education when I as applying to undergraduate schools. In Michigan the two best programs for secondary ed were generally considered to be Michigan State and Oakland University. Those were the only schools I applied to. In hindsight, I probably should have applied to University of Michigan as well, but their program for what I wanted to study was not as good, so it made no sense at the time. I opted for Oakland University because it was smaller than MSU - I didn't want to be a face in the crowd and have TAs as instructors - and less expensive. Since I was geared toward secondary ed my history curriculum was slightly different than other history majors, and as a result I probably had fewer upper-level history courses, but the difference was probably only 1 or 2 classes overall and I rocked the upper-level courses I did take, generally getting really high grades from the toughest profs in the department.
When I made the decision to go to grad school, because of time constraints, I only applied to two schools - Loyola and Boston College. I got into Loyola and decided to go there. So my academic pedigree is Oakland University > Loyola University Chicago. Probably not the most impressive. But in reality, I have noticed that where you get your degree matters very little, no matter what people say. At conferences I have been amazed at the quality of work from people at a variety of institutions, including really bad work from people at elite schools, and really good work from people at Loyola type schools. Dr. Robert Bucholz, one of Loyola's faculty members who actually gives a crap about graduate students, has said that he'd put Loyola students in the same ring as elite schools any day. I always thought that was a bit of posturing on his end, until I started putting conferences together and seeing the kind of stuff being done. I would agree with him on that point. I know that I am always impressed with my forerunners at Loyola and how well versed they are in the discipline. As this post suggests, different tiered graduate programs serve different purposes. I think that is a better perspective on the issue raised here.
In the end, I recognize that the prospects of finding a secure/rewarding academic job is unlikely and that my opinion doesn't matter on the subject, because as Tim Lacy pointed out here the system for evaluating programs is inherently flawed. I'm not trying to say that Loyola is a top-tier school. Don't get me wrong. But it is a very good school, and there are a number of other factors (size of school/department, funding, necessity for part-time work, etc.) that contribute to Loyola's, and schools of it's ilk, being branded as "inferior" - a label that is then siphoned off to it's graduates in the academy. Are there some bad eggs at Loyola. Sure there are. But I'm sure people would be surprised at the similarities between our department and that of a top flight school, at least intellectually. In the end, isn't that what really matters? No matter where someone goes for their PhD they're going to bust their asses to finish the degree. At the same time, all the literature and commentary indicates that newly minted PhDs shouldn't expect their efforts to be acknowledged by a tenure-track job. Anyone who enters grad school with the mentality that that is the only acceptable situation for them are setting themselves up to fail. But I would hope that during the course of one's training as an historian (or any humanities field) that (s)he would be able to revise their thinking.
Basically I refuse to be labeled as an inferior historian simply because of where I went to school. In the words of W. Axl Rose - "Don't Damn Me!"
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Derry redux
It's actually looking to be a lovely day outside here in Derry. Actually, the weather here has been pretty good, considering I'm in Ireland. All-in-all things went really well this week. Things seem to have really come together in Derry this week.
I was able to get a good deal of work done. Priority numero uno. So that was good. I spent 3 days at the Harbour museum looking at the War Memorial collection. I think I have over 1k pictures I took with the old digital camera. Needless to say, I'm glad that I bought those extra camera batteries before I left! I spent Thursday and Friday at the Derry Central Library going through newspapers on microfilm. For the most part these were really helpful and had some good stuff in them. At least I hope so. As with everything, I have no idea until I actually go through everything I've collected.
A number of other positives in terms of research this week: I got an email from a gentleman at the British Legion in Belfast about working there. I had sent an email to someone at Legion HQ in London looking for the Legion archive and he passed my info on to this person in Belfast. So I was able to communicate with him and I should be good to go to check out some Legion records in Belfast. Score! The other development also came via email. I had contacted a professor at King's College London who had written his diss and a book on the British Legion. He wrote me back and not only did he say I had an interesting topic, but gave me some leads on Legion sources. He also mentioned that he had a meeting with the general director of the Legion next week, and that he'd mention my project in case there was anything he missed regarding Ireland in the Legion archive. Very cool.
Next week might slow down a bit, much of which is beyond my control. Today, the 12th of July is a holiday in Northern Ireland, so everything is closed. Monday is a Bank Holiday so everything is closed then too. I had planned to spend some more time at the city library but it's also closed on Tuesday because of the holiday and there is strike action planned, effectively closing the library on Wednesday and Thursday. So it looks like the early part of next week will be spent trying to plan my next move. There are two regimental museums that I didn't think I was going to be able to get to, and now, with a little coordination, I should be able to see at least one, if not both. One is the Royal Inniskillen Fusiliers regimental museum in Enniskillen, and the other is the Royal Irish Fusiliers museum in Armagh. I tried calling both places on Friday, but the curator of each respective museum was out of the office. So we'll see about next week. The RIF museum is closed M-W, so hopefully I can get to the Inniskillen's museum on Wed and his the RIF on Thursday. That would be ideal. But we'll see what happens.
In other news, my credit card finally arrived! After three weeks of errors and other bullshit USAA FINALLY came through. As they say, better late than never. So that's one major obstacle overcome. I can rest a bit easier now.
There's a great traditional Irish pub in town that me and the roommates have frequented this week called Peadar O'Donnell's (hence the lack of postings). They have trad sessions every night and the price of a pint is about $5.20, which is about what you'd pay in the states for a good pint anyway. Even though the exchange rate here is worse, the prices are much more favorable, in general. So far Derry has been the hands down best part of the trip so far. I can see how people can get attached to a place like this. I wish I was back home in Derry, indeed!
All for now. Long weekend ahead. Cheers to all four of my readers!
I was able to get a good deal of work done. Priority numero uno. So that was good. I spent 3 days at the Harbour museum looking at the War Memorial collection. I think I have over 1k pictures I took with the old digital camera. Needless to say, I'm glad that I bought those extra camera batteries before I left! I spent Thursday and Friday at the Derry Central Library going through newspapers on microfilm. For the most part these were really helpful and had some good stuff in them. At least I hope so. As with everything, I have no idea until I actually go through everything I've collected.
A number of other positives in terms of research this week: I got an email from a gentleman at the British Legion in Belfast about working there. I had sent an email to someone at Legion HQ in London looking for the Legion archive and he passed my info on to this person in Belfast. So I was able to communicate with him and I should be good to go to check out some Legion records in Belfast. Score! The other development also came via email. I had contacted a professor at King's College London who had written his diss and a book on the British Legion. He wrote me back and not only did he say I had an interesting topic, but gave me some leads on Legion sources. He also mentioned that he had a meeting with the general director of the Legion next week, and that he'd mention my project in case there was anything he missed regarding Ireland in the Legion archive. Very cool.
Next week might slow down a bit, much of which is beyond my control. Today, the 12th of July is a holiday in Northern Ireland, so everything is closed. Monday is a Bank Holiday so everything is closed then too. I had planned to spend some more time at the city library but it's also closed on Tuesday because of the holiday and there is strike action planned, effectively closing the library on Wednesday and Thursday. So it looks like the early part of next week will be spent trying to plan my next move. There are two regimental museums that I didn't think I was going to be able to get to, and now, with a little coordination, I should be able to see at least one, if not both. One is the Royal Inniskillen Fusiliers regimental museum in Enniskillen, and the other is the Royal Irish Fusiliers museum in Armagh. I tried calling both places on Friday, but the curator of each respective museum was out of the office. So we'll see about next week. The RIF museum is closed M-W, so hopefully I can get to the Inniskillen's museum on Wed and his the RIF on Thursday. That would be ideal. But we'll see what happens.
In other news, my credit card finally arrived! After three weeks of errors and other bullshit USAA FINALLY came through. As they say, better late than never. So that's one major obstacle overcome. I can rest a bit easier now.
There's a great traditional Irish pub in town that me and the roommates have frequented this week called Peadar O'Donnell's (hence the lack of postings). They have trad sessions every night and the price of a pint is about $5.20, which is about what you'd pay in the states for a good pint anyway. Even though the exchange rate here is worse, the prices are much more favorable, in general. So far Derry has been the hands down best part of the trip so far. I can see how people can get attached to a place like this. I wish I was back home in Derry, indeed!
All for now. Long weekend ahead. Cheers to all four of my readers!
Monday, July 7, 2008
(London) Derry
I arrived in Derry last night right about on schedule. The bus ride up from Cork was very long. In the States, with our interstates system it would probably take all of 4-5 hours to drive from Cork to Derry. It takes about that long to drive from Chicago to Detroit, even on the Megabus. I tried to read a bit on the bus but the road was so bumpy I started to get a headache. I opted for watching a movie or two instead. The first leg, from Cork to Galway, I did some sudoku and tried to read. The second leg from Galway to Derry I watched Wayne's World and got through most of I Heart Huckabees. My battery died just as we were getting to Derry, so that was alright.
The walk from the bus station to the University was bearable, even while hauling my luggage. The folks at the university security station were nothing but pleasant and helpful. Already Derry was good in my book. I got to my room and it was comparable to the apartment in Cork. The only differences being that there was no tv, no en suite bathroom, and a smaller bed - all things that can be easily dealt with. I was pleased to see that I DID have an internet connection in the room, which is all I really needed anyway. In the words of Nick Monterosso, "hooray for me."
Today I went down to the Harbor Museum and started to go through the War Memorial collection there. It's fairly large and will probably keep my occupied for the remainder of tomorrow and part of Wednesday. I spent the lunch hour wandering around Derry. It reminded me a lot of Quebec City, what with the river below and the hills, etc. Perhaps I'll take some pictures from the city walls this week. Speaking of pictures, I was able to use my digital camera today at the harbor museum, which is always a boon to my pocket book.
On the way home I went to the grocery store. While eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich another fellow moved in. He's from Bristol and goes to Oxford where he studies geography. I can't remember his name for the life of me, but we had a good evening. We went out in Derry, which apparently shuts down at about 5pm. We managed to find a watering hole or two, where we procured sustenance in the form of food and beverage. At one particular place the price of beverages on Mondays was about $3USD, so that was also a boon to my pocket book. Needless to say, I'll probably be there next Monday as well. It was nice to have some good conversation as well.
All in all, Derry is the highlight of the trip thus far.
In other news, it looks like I should be able to get a credit card mailed to me here in Derry after all. Of course, I'll believe it when I see it, but there is hope. They said they'd send it FedEx, so we'll see what comes of this. Apparently the reason I never received the card in Cork was due to a rep error, and they sent another card to Chicago. Brilliant.
All for now, back in a few days probably.
The walk from the bus station to the University was bearable, even while hauling my luggage. The folks at the university security station were nothing but pleasant and helpful. Already Derry was good in my book. I got to my room and it was comparable to the apartment in Cork. The only differences being that there was no tv, no en suite bathroom, and a smaller bed - all things that can be easily dealt with. I was pleased to see that I DID have an internet connection in the room, which is all I really needed anyway. In the words of Nick Monterosso, "hooray for me."
Today I went down to the Harbor Museum and started to go through the War Memorial collection there. It's fairly large and will probably keep my occupied for the remainder of tomorrow and part of Wednesday. I spent the lunch hour wandering around Derry. It reminded me a lot of Quebec City, what with the river below and the hills, etc. Perhaps I'll take some pictures from the city walls this week. Speaking of pictures, I was able to use my digital camera today at the harbor museum, which is always a boon to my pocket book.
On the way home I went to the grocery store. While eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich another fellow moved in. He's from Bristol and goes to Oxford where he studies geography. I can't remember his name for the life of me, but we had a good evening. We went out in Derry, which apparently shuts down at about 5pm. We managed to find a watering hole or two, where we procured sustenance in the form of food and beverage. At one particular place the price of beverages on Mondays was about $3USD, so that was also a boon to my pocket book. Needless to say, I'll probably be there next Monday as well. It was nice to have some good conversation as well.
All in all, Derry is the highlight of the trip thus far.
In other news, it looks like I should be able to get a credit card mailed to me here in Derry after all. Of course, I'll believe it when I see it, but there is hope. They said they'd send it FedEx, so we'll see what comes of this. Apparently the reason I never received the card in Cork was due to a rep error, and they sent another card to Chicago. Brilliant.
All for now, back in a few days probably.
Friday, July 4, 2008
Finishing up in Cork
Obviously there weren't any updates this week. I can't really say why. All 4 people reading this probably don't care anyway. Not a whole lot happened this week. It was actually pretty productive in terms of research, or I should say I did a lot of research and hope that it turns out to be useful. I think I was pretty fortunate this week. I was researching at the Boole Library at University College Cork, looking at the Grehan estate papers. Major Steven Grehan fought in the First World War and when he came back to Ireland to take over the family estate, he became involved with the British Legion in Ireland. All the available information for the collection said that the British Legion files were closed for 30 years from 1996 to protect the families of those mentioned from any potential embarrassment. I inquired about the collection when I was there and the archivist told me that a few years ago the family went through the collection and blacked out all the names in the papers, and that I could now look at them. So it took me about 2.5 days, but I got through the whole collection. It was nice to feel like a real historian again. I can also add that the UCC archive was a really nice place to work: the staff were nice and the archivist was very friendly and helpful. It's too bad that I'm not researching a subject that is better suited to the available sources here because the archives at UCC and the CCCA are both really nice facilities (even if they close for 1.5 hours for lunch).
Other than archival research I've continued to look at various newspaper sources available online. This morning I had an appointment at the College Archive, which didn't have much useful material for me, but the archivist there was really nice. She recognized my Grateful Dead tye-dye because her husband is apparently a Dead head. Who knew?! The internet access situation here, or should I say lack thereof, has really limited my ability to get work done outside the archives.
In other news, the new credit card USAA was supposed to send me never showed up. Couple that with the fact that I am unable to receive mail where I'm staying in Derry and I'm pretty much SOL. So that sucks. Oh well. Good bye savings! Most of the time they're a great company and I can't say enough good things about them, but in this situation they have failed miserably.
Tomorrow is laundry day and Sunday is the trek up to Derry, which will be an all day affair. The bus leaves Cork at 8:25 and gets in to Derry at 19:15. UGH! Hopefully I'll have an internet connection in Derry, but based on the way things have gone thus far on this trip, I won't count on it until my computer is connected and online. Seeing truly is believing over here.
All for now.
Other than archival research I've continued to look at various newspaper sources available online. This morning I had an appointment at the College Archive, which didn't have much useful material for me, but the archivist there was really nice. She recognized my Grateful Dead tye-dye because her husband is apparently a Dead head. Who knew?! The internet access situation here, or should I say lack thereof, has really limited my ability to get work done outside the archives.
In other news, the new credit card USAA was supposed to send me never showed up. Couple that with the fact that I am unable to receive mail where I'm staying in Derry and I'm pretty much SOL. So that sucks. Oh well. Good bye savings! Most of the time they're a great company and I can't say enough good things about them, but in this situation they have failed miserably.
Tomorrow is laundry day and Sunday is the trek up to Derry, which will be an all day affair. The bus leaves Cork at 8:25 and gets in to Derry at 19:15. UGH! Hopefully I'll have an internet connection in Derry, but based on the way things have gone thus far on this trip, I won't count on it until my computer is connected and online. Seeing truly is believing over here.
All for now.
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Jackie Lennox's, Christy Moore, and other items from Cork
The end of the week finished out much better than the start of the week. I guess I can cease whining for a bit now. I was actually able to get some work done and feel as though I was rather productive. Hopefully things will remain on the upswing next week.
Today (Saturday) I had two goals. One was to eat fish and chips and the second was to successfully navigate myself to the evening's Christy Moore show. I've heard that Jackie Lennox's is the best chipper in Cork, so naturally I had to try it. It was about a 15-20 min walk from where I'm staying, but there was an extra 15-20 minutes spent looking for an ATM before I was able to dine. 
In the States there's an ATM on every corner and in every convenience store. Not here. Apparently that part of convenience hasn't gotten over here yet. Oh well. I got a piece of cod and some curry chips. Both were very delicious. Like Burdock's in Dublin, I had no need to eat for the rest of the day after scarfing the huge amount of food I was served. Since I've been living off of ramen and pasta it was a nice change of pace to have a filling meal. I happily took a picture of the vestiges of my meal. Mmm.... I spent the rest of the afternoon tooling around the city center and managed to finally have a few pints in Cork. I went for a few Murphy's although I generally prefer Guinness, but when in Cork.... I was so full from Lennox's that I had 
only had room for 2 pints, that, and my wallet would only acquiese to 2 pints as well. I had about an hour and a half to get to the gig so I figured I'd take my time walking there. I neglected to bring a map with me because I generally knew where to go. I ended up getting lost of course, so it's good that I left myself ample time. Now The Marquee was the venue where Christy was playing. Apparently there is a whole series of shows there this summer. Eric Clapton and Jay-Z already played there and Paul Simon will be there later this week. What I wouldn't give to see Paul Simon again - one of the best live shows you will ever see. Period. Anyway, I got there and they hadn't opened the doors yet. That included to the parking lot. Now there was no where to go and hang out in the area, so why with 90 minutes to showtime they weren't letting cars park, I have no idea. It seemed a bit overkill to me.
In the States there's an ATM on every corner and in every convenience store. Not here. Apparently that part of convenience hasn't gotten over here yet. Oh well. I got a piece of cod and some curry chips. Both were very delicious. Like Burdock's in Dublin, I had no need to eat for the rest of the day after scarfing the huge amount of food I was served. Since I've been living off of ramen and pasta it was a nice change of pace to have a filling meal. I happily took a picture of the vestiges of my meal. Mmm.... I spent the rest of the afternoon tooling around the city center and managed to finally have a few pints in Cork. I went for a few Murphy's although I generally prefer Guinness, but when in Cork.... I was so full from Lennox's that I had 
Christy came on at 8:15pm and played until about 10pm. It was a really good show. I haven't been to too many concerts recently and this was defintely worth the price of admission. I tried to take some pictures, but I was far enough back that I had to use the digital zoom so they didn't come out too well. C'est la vie. I ended up walking back to the apartment from the venue, which took about 50 minutes and was clear on the other side of the city. But it was a decent night out and the walk wasn't too bad. All-in-all, it was a good day. So things are looking up in Cork: good work getting done, good music, good brew. All for now.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Don't Mess With... Cork?
Cork is rebel country. The People's Republic of Cork. I gotta get me one of them t-shirts. It should come as no surprise that a large number of men from Cork enlisted in the British Army during the First World War given Cork's role as Ireland's "second city." Furthermore, it is also not surprising that there is little information here on the men who served in the British Army. At least little that I've found so far. The strength of Republicanism in Cork would probably prevent veterans with weak political allegiances from vocalizing their past service for fear of reprisal, especially in the early 1920s.
Oh well. Such is life. I spent two days at the Cork City and County Archive and have about 7 pages worth of typed notes to show for it. None of which is very meaty. I did get an idea for another project based on one of the sources there, but that does me little good for the current undertaking. Instead of wasting more time at the CCCA, I'm moving on and by moving on I mean going back to newspapers.
This time I'll head to the Cork County Library because I can get more time on the microfilm readers. It's about a 15-20 minute walk from where I'm staying, so it's probably a little bit closer than the city library. Plus you don't have to pay to use their computers there. What library makes people pay to use their computers? Isn't that the point of the library, to get those basic services for free? (Ok, so libraries serve a much broader and significant purpose, but you know what I mean.)
On the bright side, the weather here in Cork was much improved over yesterday when all it did was rain whenever I set foot outside with 20mph winds to boot. I think tomorrow is going to be crappy too, but I believe things should shape up a bit on Saturday when I go see Christy Moore perform. Now THAT will definitely be a good time.
I've got the remainder of this week to do research here and next week as well. I have a feeling that unless I find a real gold mine next week when I go to the Boole Library, I won't need to come back to Cork in the future - at least for research purposes. It's a shame. It's a nice city. I like it much better than Dublin. I'd rather work here, but the sources, or lack thereof I should say, makes such a proposition unrealistic.
On to another subject: sports. I've never really been a soccer fan. It's been growing on me since the last World Cup, but I can only get into "good" games. Some soccer games are like watching the 1995 New Jersey Devils, and that's just plain painful. Yes they won the Cup, but they set the NHL back 10 years in the process. See, nothing good comes from New Jersey. Anyway, like I mentioned before the European Cup, or Euro 2008, or whatever it's called is going on now. I've watched a handful of games and the number one thing that stick out to me are the announcers. It's no secret that I hate most sports announcers in the States. Outside of Mickey Redmond, I'm hard pressed to find someone I actually like. CBC is good for hockey because the commentators don't talk over the entire game. The same is true of soccer in Europe. The commentators basically tell you who has the ball. That's it. There is NO discussion of players' personal history, trade history, or any other hogwash your typical American commentator spouts off. There are no stupid graphics or sound clips of the player shown simultaneously with the game. No. It's just the game. The commentators respect the audience enough to let them watch in peace. It's a welcome change to the CONSTANT banter of sports commentary in the States. Since I watch a lot of hockey, I can say that the various teams on Versus are atrocious. The same is true of ESPN's coverage of lacrosse - professional and college. Most of that is due to the verbal vomiting of Quint Kessenich. For lax, I understand why they do it - not a lot of people are familiar with the sport and the players. But for those that ARE familiar, it's like running your ears over a cheese grater. Sportscasters pandering to the lowest common denominator gets really old, really quickly.
Oh well. Such is life. I spent two days at the Cork City and County Archive and have about 7 pages worth of typed notes to show for it. None of which is very meaty. I did get an idea for another project based on one of the sources there, but that does me little good for the current undertaking. Instead of wasting more time at the CCCA, I'm moving on and by moving on I mean going back to newspapers.
This time I'll head to the Cork County Library because I can get more time on the microfilm readers. It's about a 15-20 minute walk from where I'm staying, so it's probably a little bit closer than the city library. Plus you don't have to pay to use their computers there. What library makes people pay to use their computers? Isn't that the point of the library, to get those basic services for free? (Ok, so libraries serve a much broader and significant purpose, but you know what I mean.)On the bright side, the weather here in Cork was much improved over yesterday when all it did was rain whenever I set foot outside with 20mph winds to boot. I think tomorrow is going to be crappy too, but I believe things should shape up a bit on Saturday when I go see Christy Moore perform. Now THAT will definitely be a good time.
I've got the remainder of this week to do research here and next week as well. I have a feeling that unless I find a real gold mine next week when I go to the Boole Library, I won't need to come back to Cork in the future - at least for research purposes. It's a shame. It's a nice city. I like it much better than Dublin. I'd rather work here, but the sources, or lack thereof I should say, makes such a proposition unrealistic.
On to another subject: sports. I've never really been a soccer fan. It's been growing on me since the last World Cup, but I can only get into "good" games. Some soccer games are like watching the 1995 New Jersey Devils, and that's just plain painful. Yes they won the Cup, but they set the NHL back 10 years in the process. See, nothing good comes from New Jersey. Anyway, like I mentioned before the European Cup, or Euro 2008, or whatever it's called is going on now. I've watched a handful of games and the number one thing that stick out to me are the announcers. It's no secret that I hate most sports announcers in the States. Outside of Mickey Redmond, I'm hard pressed to find someone I actually like. CBC is good for hockey because the commentators don't talk over the entire game. The same is true of soccer in Europe. The commentators basically tell you who has the ball. That's it. There is NO discussion of players' personal history, trade history, or any other hogwash your typical American commentator spouts off. There are no stupid graphics or sound clips of the player shown simultaneously with the game. No. It's just the game. The commentators respect the audience enough to let them watch in peace. It's a welcome change to the CONSTANT banter of sports commentary in the States. Since I watch a lot of hockey, I can say that the various teams on Versus are atrocious. The same is true of ESPN's coverage of lacrosse - professional and college. Most of that is due to the verbal vomiting of Quint Kessenich. For lax, I understand why they do it - not a lot of people are familiar with the sport and the players. But for those that ARE familiar, it's like running your ears over a cheese grater. Sportscasters pandering to the lowest common denominator gets really old, really quickly.
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