This past week I wrote a paper on namburbi rituals, which were these Mesopotamian rituals that they used to undo bad omens (knowing this is rather useless without understanding the extent to which the Mesopotamians pain-stakingly recording and compiled omen compendia. To them it was a science).
Anyway, thinking about how we lived their lives and how they lived their lives got me to thinking - I always assumed people were people, and you could drop me off in Assyria and once I knew the language and stuff, I would be just like them.
Really though, that is not true, because they must have looked at things in such a completely different way. First, you have all these omens. Every event could have possible repercussions, so you would pretty much see everything as important, and perhaps terrifying.
Also, as I was walking back to my room the other day I realized another thing. Mesopotamians, and they were not alone in this, literally thought their Gods were living in the sky. They thought the sun and moon gave them life and watched them. They thought they could win their sympathy with offerings. What would it be like to look into the sky, and see Gods there? To look at the moon and imagine not a chunk of space rock, but a radiant being that had watched you like a parent, to look at the constellations as something more than mere assemblages of stars (which, by the way, I can hardly identify with the exception of the Big Dipper, Orion, and Cassiopeia. I will work on it). I don't know what I'm getting at. Maybe just how different our lives would be as animists, or something. Could we look at the sky in the same way ever again?
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Sunday, December 4, 2011
Sports after Saturday
Sort of good and bad night yesterday for my squads, which I probably didn't mention before.
Anyway, terrible night for the Leafs. They played well, but at the same time, not well at all. Boston definitely looked like they had their number, and the Leafs were definitely a little intimidated, not by their physicality (I think I'll call them Blackshirts when they're playing at home from now on to express my distaste for the Bruins), but by their depth, talent, what have you. When Kreijci, Lucic, Horton, or Seguin were together on the ice, the Leafs had a lot of trouble getting the puck out of the zone, especially in the third, and Leafs draft pick Tuukka Rask was solid as usual (as a Leafs fan, I'm so unexpressably jealous at Boston's goaltending depth, with Thomas and Rask among the best goaltenders in the league and a decent and probably NHL ready Anton Khudobin still in Providence). Mainly though, it seemed to me that Boston was a million times more aggressive defensively and the Leafs couldn't take advantage. While the Bruins stood up the Leafs powerplay multiple times in the neutral zone, Toronto collapsed on defense, leaving the Bruins' points open. Another year older, with one less spot for Steve Kampfer, the Bruins defense is significantly less crappy than it was last year beyond Chara and Seidenberg (and Kaberle eventually; despite the complaining of Bruins fans, he was their highest scoring defender on their Stanley Cup run). The Leafs usually play an up tempo game, and I'm willing to bet, although sadly I didn't see their 7-1 wins over Washington and Tampa - only their terrible losses to Boston and Florida - in the past week or so, I'm willing to bet that they weren't playing the collapse game then, and were challenging the puck more. Doing that, however, means a greater chance of making mistakes, and it was clear that Boston was going to make the Leafs pay for any mistakes over their meetings so far this year. Let's hope they can get the Bruins out of their heads and win some games.
On the other hand, across the Atlantic, my two favorite football squads are doing well. Manchester City continues their domination (knock on wood) of the Premier League with a 5-1 win. Here's hoping they can keep it up. Kind of like the Leafs, they've got a long history but not so much to show for it recently. Udinese, meanwhile, has also continued their surprising solid play - much like the Leafs
- I wonder if I end up rooting for teams because they all follow the same hallowed but unsuccessful mold. I mean, when I was a kid the Leafs were a top team, but I think I've become a lot more loyal but sticking with them through tough times. Danny Markov and of course, Mats Sundin, are still my all time favorite Leafs, but I still have a soft spot for guys like Antropov and Tlusty who were part of some bad Leaf teams, and of course I still love Kulemin, Grabovski, Gunnarsson, et al. I even feel uncomfortable with the possibility that Kadri gets traded, and he hasn't even played a full season. The Chiefs are sort of the same story as the Leafs. They were good when I began rooting for them, with Trent Green, Priest Holmes, and Tony Gonzalez, but they haven't won a Super Bowl since 1970. Udinese's kind of the same thing, plus I guess I think of FVG as like the Maine of Italy, being over shadowed by Venice (Maine to Boston) and being up in the Northeast, and they were founded in the Ottocento. Man City is kind of the same I guess, being always overshadowed by Man U yet still having a rich, yet unrecognized, history (non-Leafs fans are too quick to ignore guys like Charlie Conacher and Frank Mahovlich as bonafide superstars, and underrate solid and consistent guys like Mats Sundin). I guess it's not really a model for choosing teams, but I just assign them some value along it. I'm kind of leaning toward Kaiserslautern or Arminia Bielefeld for German soccer, so I can probably make them fit. I'm still a free agent for NBA as well. My rugby squads - the Sarries, Chiefs, and Biarritz - have more varying histories, so I don't really know. -
Anyway, Udinese beat Inter, which makes me happy, although I hate Inter much less than I do Juventus, so I'm hoping i Friuliani can take out their similarly striped nemeses, and hopefully get revenge on Napoli also.
Anyway, terrible night for the Leafs. They played well, but at the same time, not well at all. Boston definitely looked like they had their number, and the Leafs were definitely a little intimidated, not by their physicality (I think I'll call them Blackshirts when they're playing at home from now on to express my distaste for the Bruins), but by their depth, talent, what have you. When Kreijci, Lucic, Horton, or Seguin were together on the ice, the Leafs had a lot of trouble getting the puck out of the zone, especially in the third, and Leafs draft pick Tuukka Rask was solid as usual (as a Leafs fan, I'm so unexpressably jealous at Boston's goaltending depth, with Thomas and Rask among the best goaltenders in the league and a decent and probably NHL ready Anton Khudobin still in Providence). Mainly though, it seemed to me that Boston was a million times more aggressive defensively and the Leafs couldn't take advantage. While the Bruins stood up the Leafs powerplay multiple times in the neutral zone, Toronto collapsed on defense, leaving the Bruins' points open. Another year older, with one less spot for Steve Kampfer, the Bruins defense is significantly less crappy than it was last year beyond Chara and Seidenberg (and Kaberle eventually; despite the complaining of Bruins fans, he was their highest scoring defender on their Stanley Cup run). The Leafs usually play an up tempo game, and I'm willing to bet, although sadly I didn't see their 7-1 wins over Washington and Tampa - only their terrible losses to Boston and Florida - in the past week or so, I'm willing to bet that they weren't playing the collapse game then, and were challenging the puck more. Doing that, however, means a greater chance of making mistakes, and it was clear that Boston was going to make the Leafs pay for any mistakes over their meetings so far this year. Let's hope they can get the Bruins out of their heads and win some games.
On the other hand, across the Atlantic, my two favorite football squads are doing well. Manchester City continues their domination (knock on wood) of the Premier League with a 5-1 win. Here's hoping they can keep it up. Kind of like the Leafs, they've got a long history but not so much to show for it recently. Udinese, meanwhile, has also continued their surprising solid play - much like the Leafs
- I wonder if I end up rooting for teams because they all follow the same hallowed but unsuccessful mold. I mean, when I was a kid the Leafs were a top team, but I think I've become a lot more loyal but sticking with them through tough times. Danny Markov and of course, Mats Sundin, are still my all time favorite Leafs, but I still have a soft spot for guys like Antropov and Tlusty who were part of some bad Leaf teams, and of course I still love Kulemin, Grabovski, Gunnarsson, et al. I even feel uncomfortable with the possibility that Kadri gets traded, and he hasn't even played a full season. The Chiefs are sort of the same story as the Leafs. They were good when I began rooting for them, with Trent Green, Priest Holmes, and Tony Gonzalez, but they haven't won a Super Bowl since 1970. Udinese's kind of the same thing, plus I guess I think of FVG as like the Maine of Italy, being over shadowed by Venice (Maine to Boston) and being up in the Northeast, and they were founded in the Ottocento. Man City is kind of the same I guess, being always overshadowed by Man U yet still having a rich, yet unrecognized, history (non-Leafs fans are too quick to ignore guys like Charlie Conacher and Frank Mahovlich as bonafide superstars, and underrate solid and consistent guys like Mats Sundin). I guess it's not really a model for choosing teams, but I just assign them some value along it. I'm kind of leaning toward Kaiserslautern or Arminia Bielefeld for German soccer, so I can probably make them fit. I'm still a free agent for NBA as well. My rugby squads - the Sarries, Chiefs, and Biarritz - have more varying histories, so I don't really know. -
Anyway, Udinese beat Inter, which makes me happy, although I hate Inter much less than I do Juventus, so I'm hoping i Friuliani can take out their similarly striped nemeses, and hopefully get revenge on Napoli also.
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