Highlights of 2014

This is the last post of 2014, or the first of 2015? In either case, these are my fourteen highlights of 2014, in quasi-chronological order; you may relate to some of them.

1. Was it this or last year? I'm still humming Frozen's songs. What a marvelous soundtrack! For 2015 I want to keep watching animated films. Here we go, Big Hero 6!

2. Once some friends came to visit, I finally realised how beautiful, rich, and cultural the Toon is. For 2015 I want to visit many more sites around the city.

3. I got my last degree and the ceremony was great. Unfortunately, I don't have many pictures of it... For 2015 I want to get certified on something interesting and... well, I'm not too bothered with the lack of pictures.

4. I went to my Gran's birthday, where I confirmed my Mum's recovery; not to mention that I saw my siblings together after a couple of years. For 2015 I want for all of us to keep healthy and see each other at least once.

5. I had my first (and only) proper job interview and it was by Skype. It wasn't great but it was a highlight because of the whole experience. For 2015 I want some of them (not necessarily using Skype) and a permanent job.

6. I went to a place in the middle of nowhere and had to go through a bit of forest. The fauna were sensational: birds and mammals, what else can you ask for? For 2015 I want to see, walk, and be more adventurous.

7. I bought a new computer. Yes, that's a highlight of my year because it's a real step up from my previous one and because I certainly enjoy it. For 2015 I want to get another useful gadget Ü .

8. I went to Germany to meet the newborns of a cousin and a friend, respectively. For 2015 I want to visit more friends and family, and share a bit of what they are currently living, of what makes them who they are.

9. The Settlers of Catan was a revelation. I've now played it in three different versions and can't see the fun ending soon. For 2015 I want to invite friends over to share my joy.

10. I read another John Rebus's novel and, after a comment from an acquaintance, I decided to read them all in order. I'm in number 3. For 2015 I want to keep reading them.

11. I wanted to watch To Kill a Mockingbird and ended up reading the novel. Probably my new favourite. For 2015 I want to find a film, a song, a poem, a painting... something that makes me laugh and think long and hard.

12. I've been visiting churches around town and I found a real gem in Elswick: St Michael's. For 2015 I want to visit all the catholic churches in the city proper, and one or two of other denominations.

13. I just got my fiftieth follower on Twitter. It's nice to know that somebody out there might read your words. For 2015 I want to write more, say, get to a thousand tweets?

14. It's been a few years in which the sky, when I walk, takes much of my attention. Here, there, and everywhere, it's the perfect example of beauty, and the beginning of dreams. For 2015 I want to keep breathing and seeing.

There were other highs, and certainly some lows, but here is to the opportunity of living and loving. Cheers!

climate change in La Laguna

Everybody knows about it, nobody acts upon it. To be fair, many people are doing something to mitigate it, but they're not the bulk of humanity. Climate change is here and is here to stay. My prediction (why do I always have to predict something?) is that the weather is going to be so bad that we'll lose much of our infrastructure and only half of the population will survive by the middle of the century: 4.5 thousand million people out of the 9 thousand million that are projected for 2050 (yes, "thousand million" or 1x10^9, because I live in the UK and a billion traditionally is 1x10^12; this also conforms to the Spanish "billón" Ü ). Obviously, I don't want anybody to die, but it's as if we're begging for it. We've neglected the environment for too long, I don't need to expand on this because we can read it on the news any time. What I want to point out in this post is the fact that, because I have not lived in a city for more than 4 years in the last 12, I hadn't noticed any differences in the year-to-year weather, until now. I lived in my hometown my first 18 years, then I moved and continued moving. Now that I live in the UK I don't have the chance to go back home too often (every time I do it I largely contribute to global warming through transatlantic flights, though) and because of that I may be mistaken, but it seems that things are changing. During my childhood, I remember short winters with temperatures as low as 0 degC; at the beginning of February we would be wearing a jumper and a jacket in the mornings and they would be inside the backpack at midday. I recall long summers with weeks on end reaching 40 degC, the occasional rain, and dust storms three to five times a year. All this is from memories not from official records, I'd like to point out. On the 12th of December 1997, we had the first snow after about 30 years (that's what the people would say; it was definitely the first in a very long time). Then, before the year 2000, there was much rain, enough to fill up both reservoirs in the region which required the River Nazas to run through its natural course dividing once more the states of Coahuila and Durango. That hasn't happened again, but this year has been a bit uncommon in that respect. I read about a year ago that the average volume ("volume" in its loose sense) of precipitation in the region was 100 mm, this was just after the first rains in about 14 months of dryness (with a flash storm somewhere in the middle on July 9th, 2012). Well, all this is kind of normal in an arid place; what is not normal is that this July we had at least three flash storms easily surpassing those 100 mm of precipitation and, even, the 224 mm claimed in a more recent report which link is at the bottom of this post (said report also says that in 2008 the temperature reached 48 degC; I'm glad I wasn't there). Furthermore, yesterday the Vaqueros play-off game against Diablos in the Mexican baseball league had to be cancelled due to another storm (revealing our justified lack of experience for dealing with rains). There you go, now that the extreme weather is affecting our favourite pastimes, are we going to do something about it? http://www.semarnat.gob.mx/archivosanteriores/temas/gestionambiental/calidaddelaire/Documents/Calidad%20del%20aire/Proaires/ProAires_Vigentes/9_ProAire%20Comarca%20Lagunera%202010-2015.pdf

More predictions. European football

For the last six years, I have taken a strong interest in European football competitions. To be more precise, I have followed a few leagues, and I have documented the last six UEFA Champions League (UCL) and UEFA Europa League (UEL) competitions in a spreadsheet that contains some useless details of the participant teams. Yesterday, I was going through the files, filling up what developed in the past week (completion of the third preliminary round of both tournaments), and I realised that my favourite team this year (St Pölten, Austria) had been eliminated. This team was my favourite because it comes from a division that is not the highest in the country. For those who don't know the rule, a team in a lower division could still play in the UEFA Europa League by reaching the national Cup final; from next year onwards, such a team has to win the national Cup. Many other teams have participated being from lower divisions, sometimes a few every year. In case you're interested, FC Vaduz is the one that comes up most frequently because, being from Liechtenstein, they have to play in the Swiss League and most of the time they are in the second or third tier of the Swiss football pyramid. Incidentally, FC Vaduz was promoted to the Swiss Super League last summer and now they play in the highest tier of Swiss football; they're already out of international competition this year. Something, then, came to my attention whilst revising the files, and it is that there are teams that play 20 or so matches in Europe, reaching the finals of the UEL, usually. Let's make an account of the last six years looking at the runs of the teams in the finals of both European competitions in next table:

In the table, the teams in bold font are the winners of the competition and the numbers in brackets are the number of stages that given team had to play during the tournament. Generally, 5 stages means 13 matches, whereas 8 stages is 19 matches. In the past six years no team has played 20 matches. Generally, teams in the final of UCL are directly qualified to the proper event (Group stage) and only come from four countries. In UEL, most of the teams in the final had to play 17 games in competition; that did not happen in 2012-2013 (*That season, the team that played more matches in Europe was Fenerbahce with 18). Also, usually one team reaching the final began its participation in UCL and then was downgraded to UEL. Only three countries have been represented in the UEL finals. With all that information from the past 6 years, I suggest that this season, the finalists for UCL will be Roma (my team in Europe, this might be the year) and Manchester City (have more potential than other teams, I think), whilst Torino (bringing a 4th country into the mix, good signings) and Arsenal (from UCL, seems strong enough) will play in the UEL final. Obviously, we're just beginning the season and not only effort but luck (in the tourney's draws) will play a part in the lifting of the trophies at the beginning of next summer. Here my speculative post ends. What do you think?

helping out?

In case you haven't noticed, the name of the blog has changed. Before, it was called Sistema de Almacenamiento: a name in Spanish, but everything else was in English. Because I'm venturing (with my poor commitment to blogging) with another blog purely in Spanish, even more personal and at the same time more didactic, I wanted to completely differentiate this one. The other blog can be found at mexoracontinua.blogspot.co.uk . The reason for the previous name was that my initials are SA and I wanted to use them as the initials for the name of the blog; this idea I took from a book (can't be sure whether it was La fuerza de Sheccid) by Carlos Cuauhtémoc Sánchez. The current name, Lights at noon, is more related to the corresponding URL and also depicts better the topics that are covered: details and anecdotes that may be common place but some times don't go unnoticed, like lights at the brightest time of day. A few weeks ago my wife and I went to the cinema on Saturday morning, as we generally do, using the city's Metro system. We arrived to the station almost at the same time as the train we wanted to take and I ran to buy the tickets to catch it. Unfortunately, there was not enough time to catch it but in my desperation to pay the fare I asked my wife to go into the train without a ticket hoping that the machine would provide the tickets on time. It was about 9:10 AM and there was another train that we could take in ten more minutes. When my wife entered the wagon, a young man who had boarded the same train at the same station blocked the door so that I could go in. Once I got the tickets, I boarded the train and the young man let the doors go. I thanked him as profusely as I could and went to sit down. A moment later, the driver admonished us through the speakers reminding us that blocking the doors could grant us a fine of £100 or something like that. The driver took about ten more seconds of awkward silence before the train moved and we were finally on our way. I was grateful to the young man but at the same time I kept thinking that the whole incident should not have happened. Obviously, my wife and I couldn't keep the incident out of our minds and the trip was not as pleasant as in other occasions. Was the act of the young man harmful? Was it instigated by my wife coming into the train before I did (in other words, by me asking my wife to go into the train)? Would I do the same thing for somebody else? The action per se produced a delay of half a minute in the schedule. I don't think that it caused any of the passengers to miss another train or change their schedule drastically; it might have, though. I don't think, either, that the safety of the passengers was jeopardised. But, I do think that the action was not correct because those are the rules of engagement if you want to use the service in a compliant way. Am I too square? In addition, it may be that our behaviour brought about the young man's reaction; if we had not run or had looked less anxious, the young man wouldn't have noticed us. With all those facts and thoughts, I don't want to block the doors for other perfectly-able people... On the other hand, I can't but admire and respect the interest of the young man for others. I don't think I would have noticed that other people were trying to get on the train against the clock. What he did was unselfish and risky; I would like to have those attitudes... Oh, that young man, helping us get on time to watch a movie and teaching us to care for others with bold actions. #respect

2014 World Cup challenge

It's been days since I want to write something. Sure, something like... anything. I've got a couple of topics I'd like to discuss which soon will become obsolete but today I don't want to touch them. I want to talk about the World Cup (obviously football), but there is nothing that I can originally add to what is written in the news or social media. Therefore, I will just outline the schedule of the tournament and make my predictions. You can predict the outcomes too, and send me the filled form attached below (nobody reads this blog, but just for the sake of it you can contact me at @mexbguy on Twitter). So, let's see: there are eight groups with four teams each; that means six matches in each group to total 48 matches during the Group stage. Group A: Brazil wins with difficulty against Croatia, easily against Mexico and draws with Cameroon to top the group. Cameroon draws with Mexico and tops Croatia to take second place. Croatia wins against Mexico and takes third place. Group B: Spain has difficulty beginning these tournaments, so they tie with the Netherlands and Chile, crushing Australia to win the group. Chile draws with the Netherlands and wins against Australia to take second place. The Netherlands wins against Australia, but the goal difference is lower than Chile's and stays behind. Group C: Colombia's Radamel Falcao doesn't get fit on time for the first games but Colombia passes over Greece, wins against Ivory Coast and ties with Japan to win the group. Japan ties with Ivory Coast and wins against Greece to earn a place in the Round of 16. Ivory Coast wins marginally against Greece taking third place. Group D: England begins defeating Uruguay and Costa Rica, and tying with Italy to win the group. Italy defeats Costa Rica and draws with Uruguay to take a place in the Round of 16. Uruguay wins against Costa Rica to avoid the bottom of the group. Group E: Switzerland wins against Ecuador and Honduras easily and draws with France to be top of the group. France also ties with Ecuador but wins against Honduras. A point for Honduras and Ecuador is third. Group F: Bosnia-Herzegovina upsets Argentina, defeats Iran and ties against Nigeria to win the group. Argentina wins the remaining games taking the second place. Iran can't earn points and is bottom of the group. Group G: Germany can't win against Portugal or Ghana but win the group defeating the US. Portugal ties with Ghana and wins by a lower margin against the US. Ghana draws every game and is third of the group. All CONCACAF teams are bottom of their respective groups... Group H: Belgium is the only team that wins every game. Russia wins easily against Algeria and marginally against South Korea, whilst the Asian team defeats the African to avoid the bottom place. With no more margin for error, Brazil, Colombia, Switzerland, Germany, Spain, England, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Belgium advance to Quarterfinals. In Semifinals Brazil defeats Germany and Belgium takes care of Spain to allow the Germans to have another third place trophy. Finally, not only Belgium gets the glory in the Maracana, but also Romelu Lukaku becomes the best scorer with 7. By the way, Miroslav Klose scores three times to beat Ronaldo as the most prolific scorer in the history of the World Cups and finally a European team wins the Cup at American (I mean American as in the whole continent) soil. Ah, and a few days after the end of the tournament, a new vote for the venue of the 2022 World Cup is scheduled and Joseph Blatter is destitute of the presidency of FIFA. Ok, I should consider beginning a career as an oracle, but for now I just leave you with the rules of the World Cup challenge in case you want to participate. Nothing to lose, glory to win: - 1 point for each disqualified team - 1 point for correct position of disqualified teams - 2 points for each team in round of 16 - 2 points for exact place of team in round of 16 - 4 points for each team in quarterfinals - 4 points for each team in its actual cell in quarterfinals - 8 points for each team in semifinals - 8 points for each team in its actual cell in semifinals - 12 points for each winner or loser in semifinals - 15 points for correct fourth place - 20 points for correct third place - 30 points for correct runner-up - 40 points for champion - Best scorer used if two or more participants tie in points

I wonder... just an insignificant coincidence

This post was supposed to go live a couple of weeks ago, but I just managed to allocate the time to write it. I had the opportunity (and the necessity) to visit Edinburgh on a Tuesday... as stated, two weeks ago. When I bought the train ticket I chose the cheapest fares and did not realise that I would have to use the Metro system to get to the station because it was too early to take a regular bus. Boring details, I know, but they're important for the story... please bear with me. So I left the flat with just enough time to get to the station and buy a drink for the trip; people who have travel with me know that I'm not a fan of arriving too early to the station/airport. So I crossed Jesmond Dene before 6 AM and there were already people running. Nice! A block away from the Metro stop I noticed that a lady had parked her small white Fiat very close to an intersection, which made me wonder whether it was on a lawful parking spot. She walked towards the Metro stop smoking and I moved to the opposite side of the road to avoid the smell. The train trip was fine; when I arrived to Edinburgh I went directly to take the free shuttle bus from the city centre to King's Buildings. After waiting for it for about 10 minutes I realised it was not on for that week! Bummer. The weather was alright and the walk was very enjoyable. Then I did what needed doing and said a sad good-bye to my colleagues... Coming back to the city centre I bought a couple of ginger marmalade jars and unsuccessfully looked for vanilla-flavoured assam tea, items that I haven't been able to find in Newcastle. I bought a sandwich and, with too much time on my hands, went to eat my lunch at the Princes gardens with a lot of people who were also enjoying the weather. On the way back I was planning to watch The Big Lebowski, but the blinding sun didn't let me. Hopefully loads of vitamin D were activated during the trip... Now in Newcastle, all went according to plan but for some reason I took too much time to get off the Metro. I guess I was just enjoying the day, not paying much attention and doing everything slowly; after all it was about 2PM, the time for my nap. Just kidding!, I can't nap. After a few steps out of the Metro stop, I noticed that the lady in front of me was opening the white Fiat that caught my attention a few hours early. I would not have identified her but for the car, so I'm not 100% sure that it was the same person. Nevertheless, the coincidence made my day. I didn't react quickly and, therefore, I didn't approach her to share my joy... later I regretted that but at the same time I think it would've been pretty creepy for her if I had done it. Many things were in play here, from having to go to the Metro stop 20 minutes away from home instead of taking the bus in front of the flat, to the fact that I didn't walk as fast as I use to after getting off the Metro. Was the lady working in Newcastle the whole time? did she, like me, travel to another town? Why did she choose that Metro stop and that parking spot so close to the intersection? So many variables... Did that whole thing mean something special? I don't know, I don't think so, but it made me smile and I felt a bit of a connection with the world, with the city, with another human being. A connection that that human being doesn't know of... creepy! How many of those situations happen everyday? in a given city? how many of them are acknowledge by one of the people involved? how many are they perceived by all the people involved? Do people ponder about it? or is it just me who gives certain value to something so common or so trivial? I just hope next time I'm more alert and can share it with the people involved; I may creep them out, but there is also the slight possibility that they will smile with me.

Mexican women at the top

This week was a mixed bag of results in the sports I'm interested in. First, I was gladly surprised with Wake Forest's win over Duke almost at the end of the season. The win doesn't mean much in terms of the post-season for the Demon Deacons, but it may prove decisive for the permanency of Wake's coach, Jeff Bzdelik. Another positive outcome from this game was the fact that, during the season, Wake won against all of the other schools in the Tobacco Road (Duke, UNC and NC State). Let's see what happens in the ACC Tournament and if Wake makes it to any of the national tournaments. In football, Santos Laguna won and Oribe Peralta scored to reach the top half of the table; Chelsea won by four against Spurs to stay in contention to win the League; Heaton Stannington lost at home; and Roma undeservedly lost at the end of its game against Napoli. Roma's chances to win the league are now very slim; actually, they have to be careful to not let Napoli reach them (now just two matches behind). The biggest problem for the giallorossi is that Kevin Strootman, a promising Dutch defensive midfielder, is out of the season and the World Cup with a torn anterior crutiate ligament. I, particularly, think that he's a fine player and wanted to see him in Brazil. Such a pity! The Six Nations just hasn't gone according to desire: Ireland, England and France can go all the way, with Scotland only aspiring to fourth place. Finally, I'm very excited for the beginning of the F1 season this Sunday. Let's see if Ferrari, the Mexicans or Massa get good results. Now that the current events are covered I want to mention something I just realised, but that it's kind of evident: lately, Mexican women have stood out more in sports at the international level than their male counterparts. This can be seen more clearly in the Olympic Games, but it's not limited to them. Please see this report published in August 2012 by CNN Mexico for a detailed analysis on the Olympics: http://mexico.cnn.com/deportes/2012/08/04/las-mujeres-dominan-el-podio-del-deporte-mexicano-en-el-siglo-xx . Here, I just want to present chronologically some data: 2000 (Sydney): Soraya Jiménez (1977-2013) wins the first Mexican gold medal for a woman in the Olympics in weightlifting having many international championships in the run to the Olympics. Ana Guevara finished in 5th place in the 400m final. Fernando Platas (diver) was the flag-bearer having a successful career in regional and worldwide competitions. 2002: Ana Guevara wins the World Cup (400m) in Madrid. 2003: Ana Guevara wins the World Championship (400m) in Paris. 2004 (Athens): Ana Guevara wins silver in 400m showing her consistency in the discipline. 2007: María del Rosario Espinoza wins the taekwondo World Championship in the -72kg discipline in Beijing. Lorena Ochoa becomes the top-ranked golfer in the world and wins her first major Championship in St Andrews. 2008 (Beijing): María del Rosario Espinoza wins the +67kg discipline in taekwondo. Paola Espinosa and Tatiana Ortiz win bronze in the 10m platform synchronised diving. Paola Espinosa is the Mexican flag-bearer. 2008: Lorena Ochoa wins her second major Championship in Rancho Mirage. She continues being the number one in the world. 2009: Paola Espinosa wins the 10m platform in the diving World Championships in Rome showing how dominant she's been in the sport. Lorena Ochoa is still the top-ranked golfer. Paola Longoria wins the racquetball competition at the World Games in Kaohsiung. 2010: Lorena Ochoa retires from professional golf having accumulated 158 weeks at the top of the rankings. 2012 (London): Paola Espinosa and Alejandra Orozco win silver in the 10m platform synchronised diving. By this point, Paola Espinosa has won many regional titles and World University Games. Aída Román and Mariana Avitia win silver and bronze, respectively, in archery. María del Rosario Espinoza, being the country's flag-bearer, wins the bronze medal in the +67kg competition in taekwondo. 2012: Paola Longoria and Samantha Salas won the women's doubles in the racquetball World Championships. Paola Longoria won the singles competition too. Mexico also won the women's team competition and the third place in the men's team discipline. 2014: Aída Román wins the World indoor archery Championship in Nimes in the recurve category. A Mexican team integrated by Rosalía Domínguez, Brenda Merino and Linda Ochoa also won gold medal in the compound category. Paola Longoria has won all the racquetball tournaments to date accumulating 120 consecutive titles since May 2011.* In summary, I've named ten women who have been top of the world in their competitions. So far, in the same period of time, I only remember youth male teams in football, baseball and basketball doing the same. Is our chauvinistic culture pushing women to fight with bravery all the way to be world champions? If so, even though I'm happy with Mexicans being at the top of the rankings (by achievements and effort, not just by being Mexicans) I won't justify sexism. Far from that, I simply think that the energy that we, as Mexican men, spend showing our "supremacy" could be redirected to support our athletes both male and female and, why not?, to work on being the best at something. On a side note, I just thought of a Mexican man who's been dominant in his category, but I'm not sure he's earned his title fairly... Carlos Slim. What do you think? * http://www.mediotiempo.com/mas-deportes/noticias/2014/03/09/paola-longoria-triunfo-en-nj-y-sumo-su-titulo-30