Grr-owl

Went to my first NRL games last season after living with Union as the expat sport of choice for 10 years. Yeah, it's a different experience to footy. The game itself is attritional, and I can well understand that many footy lovers find it boring - I always did until last season. Not sure what changed, but my guess is that I learned to appreciate the physicality, something to do with being entirely certain that I could never play it myself, and something to do with the AFL doing everything it can to take physicality out of footy, to the game's detriment imho. I also learned to appreciate the atmosphere, which is kind of like going to a factory family picnic and over there on the field the boyz are at rugger... The crowds are pathetic. At a Storm game last season the commentators were ecstatic at the crowd that almost (almost but not quite) filled a 30,050 seat stadium (think the crowd was 28000). It was a final. Most games are fortunate to get 12,000, I believe... I have a theory that this can be explained by the game requiring a body type that only a small percentage of blokes possess - that being very sturdy of limb and light of mind (dig) - whereas footy requires a much broader range of the population. This limits rugby's appeal as only a small percentage of kids could ever hope to make it. This conversely explains the dominance of NSW and QLD players in the Aus cricket team, as athletic blokes in VIC, WA, SA, TAS and those parts of NSW fortunate to live on the right side of the Barassi Line who might otherwise maximize their cricketing ability, instead maximize their footy ability with a fair chance of making it to the big leagues. This then has a knock-on effect in terms of coaches and infrastructure that only multiplies the phenomenon. No evidence. Just an idea... In any case, I'll be supporting Storm again this season by turning up to games. There's some interesting personalities in the team and there's a special kind of joy at having a team from Melbourne, of all places, that regularly pantses those Sydney knobs at their own game.

... now wondering what chance ANY team has of maintaining a critical core of elite personnel when playing an extremely taxing game style for an extremely long season... ?

Mate, you're job is awesome.

A new road will be built not far south of the tunnel....

Also, I know a bloke who used to get a load of yabbies out of the lake...

Clarissa would be a decent addition to our AFLW team....

Got Max with his knee. Max's fault. Moved into his path while Mason was in the air. Unavoidable. 😉

Of course...

Wall Street.

No, I get it.... was making a joke, of a kind. Think the kind is technically termed "sh*t."

They are reconciling three campuses into one....

Ajax play there. Bears are at Koornang Park.

Princes Park?

There is no way the NIMBY's will approve the MFC development unless community use is a priority. Local pollies and people agree that Glen Eira has the smallest amount of green space of all Melbourne municipalities and want that to change.... Having lived in Asia and the Middle East, it is bizarre how some Australians define a small amount of green space, but there you go.... It's the same phenomenon as most people believing they are middle class.... Worth 5-10 million? Middle Class. Worth 10-20 million? Middle class. Worth .5-1 million? Middle Class.... Truth is, unless you're living on the street, Australians are rich already because they speak English natively, go to school, get to vote for their "leaders", can insult politicians personally in public without being murdered, and are pretty much guaranteed of at least one meal a day. Today I'm going out on my balcony and shout at my neighbors, "Wake up!"

Melb/Sydney dichotomy in a nutshell. Soul vs Sin....

A beautifully targeted joke...

Is he from the Barlow Group? Heard they had some setbacks with that project at the airport a few years back...

People are so easily offended these days.

Clearly Clarrie and Cleary have clarified concerns.

Think that was Kostya.... 🤔

Well, I liked Perty and I'm sorry to see him go. Prepared to accept that it's the right time, of course, as I genuinely know nothing of what has been going on and it may indeed be for the best. Regardless, I look to the future with trepidation, understanding there's no guarantee that a replacement will do a better job... Careful what you wish for...

Jesus has a basketball background, apparently...

Actually, there's another there in the foreground, modeled on Moorabbin...

These days 4K 75" can be had for $1400 or so at Costco.... Big enough for most.

All depends on screen res plus how much of your field of vision is taken up by the screen. If it's HD and you sit far enough away it won't matter. If its huge and you are close to it, you would. 4K is gonna matter when your screen is big and it is taking up a lot of your field of vision.