US-owned ManUre

As my cousin BK so proudly pointed out, my Magpies finished in 14th place last season, 11 spots lower than his "mighty" Manchester United. Well, Cuz, that's OK... at least my team is still rightfully owned by a Geordie, not some fat NFL tycoon who's only into the EPL for the money. I know, I know, I know - it's the Amercian Way. I just don't see how Glazer's £25mil transfer budget is going to help "Sir" Fergie. He hasn't spend that little on a single player in 3 seasons!!

(It's true, though, that I am less than positive about my team's chances this season. Our manager's hopeless, we've transferred 8 players out of an already too thin squad, and only brought in 4 to replace them, one a 17-year old goalkeeper! We've managed to get rid of the head-cases, trouble-makers and wasters (Bellamy, Robert and Butt, specfically), and continued to chase the biggest mental case in Europe - Nic Anelka - for most of the close season as our potential replacement for Big Alan Shearer, the greatest striker the Premiership has ever known. Thankfully, we lost that battle -- but we still haven't signed anyone to help ease Shearer's scoring burden. I've got my fingers crossed and my hopes up, but I don't see Al's final season as a player ending well for him.)

Six months old

So Reilly's over six months old now. Tara is a little saddened by the fact that our little girl is now "closer to her first birthday than she is to her birthdate" - it just means our daughter is growing up. That's hard to take for some. I think we all kinda wish our babies stayed babies for a just a little while longer!

Introducing Reilly

So... My cousin BK has this blog, and he posts what's on his mind at the moment, photos of his family and other cool stuff, some links to his favorite websites, and even gives props to whatever existential beliefs he chooses to espouse on the day.

I figured we needed one, too. The equivalente electrónico of "keeping up with the Joneses," so to speak.

My wife, Tara, brought our daughter Reilly into the world at the end of January 2005, and she's almost 6mos old. We receive requests from family and friends, both local and far-flung, for new pictures of her on a daily basis -- and let's just say that Tara takes A LOT of pictures of Reilly, so they know when we do send them out, there's GOT to be more where those came from!

I want to give her grandparents and great-grandparents, as well as said family and friends, a place to see her grow up, with pictures and the like. I'm just setting this up today, and will update it more in the next few days.

I'll also take time to vent my spleen from time to time, on such varied topics as work, family, TV, movies, music and football -- the round one with B&W pentagons and hexagons on it, specifically my two beloved clubs, Newcastle United of the English Premier League and Major League Soccer's San Jose Earthquakes. More on that later. Much, much more.

That said... Yep! That'll do it for now!