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Jon

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Posts posted by Jon

  1. Posted

    I've not had a great week/fortnight for fitness. My right shoulder has been a pain and I've had a few issues with the wrist on the same hand. Boooooh. We've got a holiday booked in Spain coming up and that should give me some time off to rest and recover, plus the start of the new term after that.

     

    I had throat surgery for Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease 2 weeks ago and it's killed my workout regime. In addition to eating a liquid diet for the past week, i'm now on a "soft diet" for the next 6 weeks. No working out for at least 6 weeks until wounds have healed :(

     

    On the plus side, down the line hopefully I can eat like a normal person again!

  2. Posted

    Got to look at what Sam did at Sunderland last season. Took a team with no confidence and ability to perform under pressure (England lol) and made them almost unbeatable. I think he's the exact personality they need to reignite the passion for playing for the country.

  3. Posted

    I agree completely with what you're saying, particularly about how the U.K. would be very unlikely to get caught up in this sort of mess. I do wonder though, if this had been China and not Russia, would the reaction have been different? I was also against the Beijing Olympics and didn't watch any of it, but the fact that we have many mutual financial interests and that they are more open financially to the West, seems to warp the view of our leaders when it comes to things like human rights. Russia still seems to get treated as the old, uncooperative enemy.

     

    Incidentally, despite the shaky start, there seemed to be a lot of international goodwill to Russia following Sochi. The controversy based discussion was mainly around the Olympic ring that didn't light at the ceremony and little else. It seemed to be a success. Two weeks later Crimea happened, and the rest is history.

     

    Whether it's right or wrong I think that's just a by product of being a western country. Places like China are very much out of sight, out of mind for the western world unless it's fits their agenda for something. The culture of the middle east is completely different our own and so we don't try to compare the two where as you've said we kinda see Russia as a failure because they don't perhaps do things they we believe they should be done.

  4. Posted

    Considering I have a Master's degree in Russian history, live in Russia and speak Russian to an advanced level, I find that comment pretty insulting. I don't claim to know how Russia works but I could give you a much better insight than any Western media source. I am by no means a supporter of the regime in Russia, but I understand, in the context of geopolitics why it exists in its current shape. The 90s was a very harsh lesson for everyone in Russia with regards to what happens when they play by Western rules, the poverty and sheer economic destruction went largely unnoticed by the rest of the world.

     

    I'm sure Edward Snowdon and Chelsea Manning will attest to the fact that no government has a perfect record. Would Snowden last long in the US?

     

    The sense of patriotism and love for their country runs deeper in Russia than anywhere I've ever experienced. Not in the balls to the wall cries of USA, USA sense you see in America, but it's deeply rooted into people's sense of personality, culture and history. There's a reason the 'Russian soul' exists as a concept. Speaking out internationally against Russia amounts to treason in many respects, not that it's right, but it's simply how it's viewed. It's fine to criticise and disagree, but to do it so openly on a global scale is seen as a betrayal.

     

    There are many, many issues which exist today in Russia. A number of which are looked at unfavourably by the West, of course, with good reason. But similar problems also exist in the West and it's the level of hypocrisy that infuriates me personally. I have no trouble criticising Russia or the government, but I would prefer to do so from a neutral standpoint, and not one where the mirror of the West is held up against them. That mirror is just as dirty as Russia's.

     

    Critics of Russia should stop judging it by Western standards, especially when China is rarely afforded similar treatment. Russia is not, and has never been a traditional 'Western' nation and expecting it to behave like one is like expecting apples to taste like oranges.

     

    Yeah, fair enough, I apologise, didn't mean to make out you have no idea about anything regarding Russia and it's history, you clearly do.

     

    I don't have anything against Russia at all, it's a country I've always wanted to visit due to the way it operates so differently from the rest of the typical western world. In regards to your comments about China, I was totally against their awarding of the Olympics, they have blatant disregard for human rights and only got it because because the world seems to be in awe of this rising super power. God knows the Olympic movement is corrupt as hell, it stands for integrity and that's probably the last thing that comes up when it comes to awarding competitions to countries and cities.

     

    There's nothing wrong with wanting to be the best but for it to reach this stage is beyond disgraceful. I literally cannot see any mechanism of defence that can be made for Russia in this regard. I feel comfortable saying that I don't think would ever have happened in our country.

  5. Posted

    See, I don't understand this. Why were they damn lucky? Should London 2012 have been boycotted because of Libya, Iraq or Afghanistan? What about Atlanta 1996 after the first Gulf War? The Olympics are supposed to be apolitical... Even if Moscow 1980 was boycotted, precisely because of the Soviet's intervention in Afghanistan. It's this kind of hypocrisy that makes me sceptical to the real extent of this doping scandal, or whether it's just another political tool to publicly punish Russia. After all, it's not only them that want to be seen as the best at everything. The USA, China and the U.K. are just as guilty of this.

     

    Competing under the international flag is a compromise which makes sense, but if outright banning all athletes is the goal of the international community in the hope that it inspires some kind of political change within Russia, then they are delusional.

     

    The West has used this 'dissidents' tactic for around 100 years and it has never worked. All that will happen is those Russian athletes who are outraged with the government will move abroad and be rolled out as a spokesperson in front of the Western media to criticise the regime. They will be forgotten in Russia, forever. Those that don't speak out will stay and get on with it.

     

    You don't seem to understand how Russia works. You don't simply move to the west and speak out against the regime, Russia doesn't take well to what they clearly see as some form of treason, look at the man who lifted the lid on this whole process. He's in hiding in the US for a reason, he wouldn't have lasted long in Russia.

     

    Russia has a fairly terrible human rights record, they've never one to agree on the matter of the UN and Europe. Parts of Russia are flat-out war zones, places such as Dagestan have been on the brink of civil war for years, look at what went on in Crimea, whether you agree with them annexing it or not, it's not exactly something that should be going on in the home of an olympics.

     

    I don't understand where the whole feel sorry for Russia comes from, this sort of doping is unprecedented. It's unheard of for a government to lead such a corrupt program that goes so against the pure nature of the very essence of sporting competition.

  6. Posted

    I think it's a terrible grey area. Look at people like Justing Gatlin, he was banned and came back. The issue being that with stuff like EPO, it's not a one job thing. Research shows it will boost your performance going forward forever, which defeats the whole point of a ban then, unless it's going to be permanent.

     

    This isn't a problem that will go away anytime soon, the dopers will always find new ways to avoid the tests. We've seen so many examples over the years of people who continually passed anti-doping tests but were cheating the whole time. Yes they'll no doubt get caught eventually but by then it's too late for the clean, honest people who competed against them and lost.

     

    Is anyone really surprised by this? Russia knew they were hosting Sochi and were damn lucky to be doing so considering they're recent actions, hardly in the vain of the Olympic movement. It really doesn't surprise me that this came from the top, Russia always want to be seen as the best and they damn wanted to make sure on their home soil that they would be, whatever it took.

     

    The next step for me is to see the individuals who cheated. At the moment it's just a number but once we can put a face to the name of each cheater, it will probably get even worse.

  7. Posted

    Been watching the Netflix original, Bloodline. Pretty good series and the second one only just came out so loads of episodes of it too.

     

    Just watched the pilot yesterday. Really wasn't sure what to think. For a pilot I thought it was terribly weak, very muddy story and pretty poor narrative. I'll give it a chance but you usually expect the pilot episode to be one of the strong episodes of a series.

  8. Posted

    CBS something.. Basically CBS's own streaming service similar to Netflix.

     

     

    I agree.. Then again in the end it doesn't matter.. As long as I get good stuff on my Netflix.

     

    Yeah this is getting merged but:

     

    Edit:

    They also made a deal to include all previous series in their catalog. I believe this is also worldwide. Looking forward to relive Star Trek starting with The original series. Everything should be available by the end of the year.

     

    That happened quite a bit before this announcement today. All the series have been on Netflix for a couple of weeks now.

  9. Posted

    Isn't this start/pre-season the same as any other year for Arsenal? I don't see any real difference.

     

    I can understand Leicester wanting to sell Kante, but I would also prefer for him to stay at the club. He's earned his right to play Champions League football and it's better for the league, for the club and personally for him to stay an extra season. But, if he doesn't have as good a season as he had last year, there's a chance his value will decrease. What Leicester don't want is a situation where 4 or 5 of their players leave. Basically, Southampton. (Can't believe Pelle has left...)

     

    Just because there's no difference, doesn't make it any better.

  10. Posted

    I scratch my head with Arsenal. Every club around us is improving massively. We've signed one player, we've lost Rosicky and Arteta and signed one striker who is clearly the next Sanogo. The majority of our "best" players won't start the season till late because of the EURO's and we've got Walcott to start up front. The sooner Wenger goes the better.

  13. Posted

    Enterprise got far too much hate. It took a while for it to find it's feet but it was always going to struggle with the so called "trekkies" right off just because they hated the creators and what they perceived as them damaging the brand. S3 was one of my favourite story arcs of any tv shows, they whole season long arc was quite unique for Star Trek and I thought it worked so well. You'll even find most fanatic fan's actually enjoyed the show in S4, so many episodes with throwbacks to the earlier seasons that explained things and filled in missing pieces.

     

    I know the music divided people but personally I loved "Where my heart will take me", thought it fitted the human element of the show beautifully and helped keep the show grounded and different from the others. "Archers Theme" is also a phenomenal piece of music and I always looked forward to the end of each episode just to hear it!

  14. Posted

    Scotland has had this decision forced upon them. They have constantly been on the receiving end of ill conceived Tory policies and in-fighting since the Thatcher days, despite the Tories having absolutely no support in Scotland!

     

    In my opinion they have a stronger than ever mandate to choose their own way out of this mess. Are we really prepared to just ignore the democratically supported wishes of Scotland's governing party because they had a (very close, btw) referendum only two years ago in a Great Britain that looked very, very different from the one this morning?

     

    As a half-Scot, I would be proud if Scotland could initiate a progressive answer to the vile and base rhetoric and politics currently swamping the UK and leave it.

     

    The road may be long and immensely complicated, but it beats the alternative option of isolationism by a country mile.

     

    It really wasn't close at all 55% to 45%. As a full-Scot, this is not something I want to see, I voted no because I wanted to stay part of the United Kingdom. Did I want us to leave the EU? Absolutely not but in no way do I suddenly want to be an independent country. Have the Conservatives served as well? No they have not but this it's short sighted too look back just a few years. Scotland thrived under Labour a decade ago and i'm sure they'll come a time when the Tories are not the ones calling the shots.

  15. Posted · Edited by Jon

    Yes but back then being part of the Union also meant being part of the EU.

     

    Would the result have been the same had people known the UK would leave the EU a couple of years later?

     

    Well an independent Scotland would still have to leave the EU for a substantial period.

  16. Posted

    The last referendum was about being part of a union which was part of the EU. Now it is not. She has every right, given exactly how Scotland voted, to call another one.

     

    It was about being part of the Union, i.e. the United Kingdom. People voted to stay in that, not as the SNP would have you believe, exclusively staying in the EU.

  17. Posted

    I find it absolutely sickening that Sturgeon is using this to further her agenda. She calls it democratically unacceptable for Scotland to be taking out of the EU against it's will yet she has no problem forcing another independence referendum down the throats of the 55% percent who dismissed the last independence referendum.

  18. Posted

    A Scottish referendum was on the cards regardless of the EU vote. I don't see an Irish reunification in either the short or medium term however. The conditions in the island of Ireland are very different to those in Scotland.

     

    No it wasn't. We voted overwhelmingly that we wanted to stay as part of the UK and EU. Without this verdict, another independence referendum would not be happening anytime soon.

     

    Would they win another referendum? Who knows. No one wants to have the euro and you can bet your arse that England won't allow us to use the pound. Also bearing in mind if we become independent we will also have to re-enter the EU, which is not a quick process. We'll have an eu customs border between Scotland and England. It's not necessarily a given that independence would occur.

  19. Posted

    I think t-shirts would be a great way for people to get involved who maybe live far away from London (like myself). Could run some sort of social media campaign with everyone wearing a t-shirt in a different location or something whilst playing a game of some type? (Just thinking out loud here).

  20. Posted

    Love steel tongs for movie posters. My only gripe and it's purely a personal thing is having the bottom titles all starting and finishing at the same margin where at the moment it kinda gets closer to the centre each line if that makes any sense.

     

    I'd love to know more about the film and the technical details behind (i'm also a filmmaker). What was it shot on? what did you edit with?

  21. Posted

    I woke up with massive DOMS in my legs and back. The DOMS must have been caused by those few sets of deadlifts I did. I don't think I have ever felt it in my back before. Also, am I also supposed to feel it in my legs?

     

    I went on a dinner time run today. I ran 4 miles, well it was basically limping to be honest.

     

    Absolutely. One of the unique things about the deadlift is the doms in the lower back. It's not an area that you can target with all that many exercises outside the deadlift so it feels a bit weird.

     

    You're suppose to feel it in your legs for sure, it does work literally every muscle there after all.

  22. Posted

    Anyone fancy doing quids in Fantasy Football next season but donating the proceeds to Cancer Research? Name the league in his honour?

     

    Or sweep stake for the Europa League Final, we all chuck a quid in for each Liverpool goal?

     

    Yeah, would definitely be up for doing something.

  23. Posted

    Devastated to hear about this. I still struggle to comprehend how he dealt with it so well. So much to go through at a young age and yet he handled it with such dignity and honour. Life is so precious and we all owe it to MadDog to make sure we try and make the most of it.

     

    RIP MadDog

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