San Antonio Spurs: Manu Ginobili

When people talk about the three superstars of the San Antonio Spurs, they are talking about Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili.

When Ginobili drives to the basket, his limbs fly everywhere and he always seems like he's about to lose control, but somehow in there he manages to get to the basket, take a good shot or draw a foul. It's a little like watching a bowl of spaghetti while someone shakes it.

Spurs Head Coach Gregg Popovich has said he doesn't try to coach Ginobili, but I think that's just his way of saying he doesn't understand how Ginobili plays. Part of that is that Ginobili is Argentinian.

Now, at my odd and obscure international school in Wales, I felt like I developed a pretty good sense of different countries' national identities.

Although each of the 300-odd students at my school was different from the others, when I put all the people from a particular country together, I could usually see a single thing they all had in common, like how Americans have this overwhelming sense of the power of the individual.


Not to oversimplify, but the Argentinians were all weird. They were funny, they had a lot of energy, and even with the introverted ones, you felt like there was at least part of their brain that was going 100 miles a minute.

I got along pretty well with the Argentinians at my school, and when I think about them, the way Ginobili plays makes a lot of sense.

Ginobili (who, as I understand, is a national superstar), comes from the only basketball town in what is, of course, a football country (although I don't know whether this led to Ginobili's prowess or the other way around.)

In fact, and this is one of my favorite things about Ginobili, he led Argentina to a gold medal in the last summer Olympics. Isn't that great? It's as if Alexander the Great conquered the world and then came back to my hometown to be my lieutenant in a regular Warhammer 40,000 game.

Ginobili is a part of why the Spurs are such a strong road team because he doesn't mind being the villain on the road.


He hasn't really taken off during any particular game in these playoffs, but I remember last year he went to Denver and just humiliated the Nuggets during that series. He is still booed there.

I would also be remiss if I didn't mention that he is one of the league's best floppers, which I always find mildly embarrassing. Apparently one of his team nicknames is "El Contusion" because of how he lets himself get banged up during a game.

The one thing I know I don't understand about Ginobili is why he plays so well off the bench. Ginobili, basically a starter, has played on and off for years as the sixth man.

Maybe it's a Seabiscuit thing, like he needs to be a little behind at the last turn to push himself for the finish.

Or maybe it's that Ginobili, one of the most entertaining and energetic players in the league, brings that shot of energy and enthusiasm to the Spurs just when they need it to be a championship team.

ribble's Weather

It is snowing again in New York City. Some lady told me it was Winter's last gasp, but I'm accustomed to Winter turning a last gasp in to a horrid downpour of freezing-cold pain.

I read yesterday about a Chicago janitor who wrote a 16,000 page book. He thought that the weather was God's domain and humanity had no business trying to predict it. He kept an extensive journal of yesterday's predictions matched against what the weather actually was.

Weather may be God's domain, but man is responsible for doing what he can to survive it.

Rain
I have written before about the weather in Wales. In summary, it is almost always raining, but not in any decisive way. It's more than a drizzle but nothing bold enough to be a downpour, which I always considered wishy-washy and annoying.

Rain in Wales was always accompanied by a deeply bitter wind that went though your clothes and skin and straight through to your soul. A section of my soul will always be frostbitten by my time in Wales.


I had a Welsh girlfriend at school, and she was the one who taught me how to be comfortable in the rain.

When it starts to rain and we are without an umbrella, most of us tend to hunch over and lift our shoulders, as if we are sheltering a baby strapped to the front of our chests, although we rarely are.

My Welsh girlfriend pointed out that this reflex was pointless. The rain will hit us at the same rate, and no particularly important body part is being sheltered.

By relaxing my shoulders and standing up straight, I found that, although I wasn't staying any drier, I at least felt better about my situation.

Heat and Humidity
Some people, often people from Southern states, think of Texas as having a dry heat. It does not; it's humid as all fuck. In San Antonio, I usually attribute this to a river running through the city, but the San Antonio River is a lot smaller than San Antonio - it doesn't seem like it could do all that on its own.

Another family member has a theory involving swimming pools.


The heat in Texas is awful. At some point, it becomes impossible to function. You cannot walk from your air-conditioned car to your air-conditioned big box store without sobbing in pain and exhaustion until you eventually give up.

Growing up in Texas, I learned two good strategies for dealing with the heat. Second, there is a particular way to stick to the shadows outdoors. Walk on the shady side of the street. Stand in the shadow of a street sign while you wait at the corner. Do anything to keep even a portion of the sun away.

But first, don't go outdoors in the first place. San Antonio has an excellent cooling infrastructure. It is where I developed my weaknesses for central air and ceiling fans. It is also where I developed my instinct for hiding inside whenever it gets pretty out.

Some people prefer heat, some cold. I will take heat over cold any day of the week. I mean, this city is all pavement, and it does get hot, but I cannot tell you the number of times that I've rolled out of bed already sweating, suffered many of the symptoms of heat exhaustion on the one-block walk to the subway, and ended up dehydrated and half dead in Hell's Kitchen and still said, quite truthfully, that it still wasn't as bad as the heat in Texas.

Cold and Snow
Once, in Wales, a friend recorded my reading a short piece about the cold in New York for a project she was doing on accents. I liked it so much, I gave her two readings - my standard, post-television American, and my best Brooklynese. My favorite line was "New Yorkers deal with the cold in two ways - they dress for it, and they talk about it."

Because it never snowed and rarely froze in San Antonio (once every three years when it does freeze, they have to shut down the whole city because everyone drives their trucks off the highway), I gained my first real experience with cold and snow at my high-pedigree college in the frozen North of these United States.


My school had long ago determined that the key to fighting a long winter was large, open spaces with lots of light. When I got to New York, I made a big deal about finding them.

I did okay, but I've still got a serious problem with the heat in my apartment. This is a deal-breaker: by next winter, I'm out of here. Or I'm buying a space heater.

One last thing: I realized when I started thinking about this as my "annual post about the weather" that my blog will be one year old in exactly one week.

I am not sure if it's improved.

How I Got My Other Nickname

Remember how Wales is a couple of years behind the United States? Well, lately former students at the inexplicable school I attended in that country have slowly been discovering Facebook.

I link to my blog from my Facebook profile (it is, indeed, the way in which most people end up here), which means that some of those people will soon discover this site, which means they will just as inevitably leave comments, which, trust me, means that I would have had to tell this story eventually anyway.

So. Funny story. So when I got to this odd, foreign school in Wales, I was American, carrying a large computer (although, ironically, it was this computer), wearing glasses and I guess there's a little bit of a resemblance from the side and, well.

My college nickname was Bill Gates.

At first, I tried to fight it. This, of course, made it worse. Then, I just came to accept it. This is kind of cool in that I can now give out a name that has absolutely nothing to do with my actual name and know that I will have no trouble answering to it.

However, it is generally very uncool.

I now have what I consider to be a somewhat cool nickname. It is ribble or, barring that, ribbles. It is ambiguosly posessive. I have exploited this fact. It is somewhat unique. I am beating licorice ribbles.

However, I know now that, just as you cannot fight the ocean, we cannot fight our nicknames. At best, we can choose the nicknames for our pets

ribble's Coffee

Coffee is my favorite beverage. It is the only widely available potable liquid with magical properties.

I first started drinking coffee with my mom, who drinks half-decaf, half-caffeinated coffee with sugar and lots of skim milk heated in a small pot on the stove, so that's how I took my coffee.

Then I went away to school in Wales, where the nearest grocery store was 20 minutes walk in the rain each way. Sugar and especially milk were often not available, so I got used to having my coffee black. Also, we had no coffee maker, so it was plunger coffee all the way.


When I went to college, I drank coffee at the local joint. I went through all the different brews and all the different drinks.

My favorite drink (to stay) was the cafe au lait, which at the Dirty Boy a little metal pot of strong, black coffee, and a little metal pot of warm milk. My favorite drink (to go) was the Jamaican Blue Mountain with a double shot of espresso - basically the strongest type of coffee that could be legally sold.

When I left school and got my own place, I bought a bed and then I bought a coffee pot. I got whole beans from one of the many spots around Park Slope and ground them myself. I had no consistent philosophy on milk and sugar, preferring them when faced with mediocre coffee but letting good coffee speak for itself.


Then I started working in media and drinking coffee with Speedrail. We drank either the really cheap coffee from the deli down the street or the really cheap coffee from the gas station at the corner. In either case, it was always large, light and sweet.

I lost that job and started working on film sets. Film means weird hours, stress and very little sleep. If it weren't for coffee, the film business would not exist. Because PAs never really got breaks and always had the least time for meals, I had time to pour in milk but no time to stir in sugar. (Although, on the one Bollywood film I worked, the craft service guys made a really strong instant with condensed milk and only served it at tea time. It was to die for.)

Now I'm a little bit between careers, and I haven't hit a new coffee philosophy. Will I be a writer, keeping the pot going all day and all night? A producer, forcing lackeys to buy me some very specific type of Starbucks? A film star, demanding only coffee made with organic beans and bottled water? Or maybe a film guerrilla, drinking deli coffee when I can get it?

A Very Interesting Post About the Weather

I used to think seasons were just a polite fiction, like money. This was because in Texas, there were no seasons. For ten months out of the year it was either very hot or mostly hot, then around December or January it was a little chilly, and then it went back to being hot again. When I saw the traditional representations of the four seasons, I honestly did not believe in them. It was like seeing pictures of the Easter Bunny.

Then I lived in Wales, which had seasons but also the worst weather ever, which I've already written about. After that, I lived in New Hampshire. Again, beautiful place, but the weather could kick your ass. The problem with New Hampshire is that you would think winter was over and suddenly it would come back twice as wintry as it was before. It was a constant, almost daily battle between the sun and the snow, and it would last for months and months. It nearly cost me my ability to hope.

All of this has made me a bit paranoid about the weather. When it's nice and sunny out, my first instinct is to hide indoors in an air-conditioned room with the shutters drawn, because when it's sunny in Texas, it's generally too hot to do anything else. When spring is in the air, the birds start singing and teenagers start falling in love, I steel myself for the cold. Like a man who's just taken a 12-hour flight across an international dateline, all my instincts are backwards.

Here in Brooklyn, it's getting very nice out. In yesterday's mail was an offer to extend my lease. I realized that I've been in New York for nearly two years, and I don't have to worry any more about being betrayed by the weather.

The Origins of Boris

Some of you may wonder what I'm doing awake at this hour. I'm waiting up for Boris, my friend the Russian spy, to get in from the airport.

Boris and I met at my obscure school in Wales, where Boris was charged with covertly monitoring Welsh agriculture. This being Wales, Boris chose to disguise himself as a sheep, which was relatively easy, because Boris is a sheep.

After smuggling himself in to a care package from my mother, Boris and I first met. Boris is about a foot and a half long and fluffy. He has a black face and ears and a friendly smile that makes him very popular with the ladies.

When we first met, Boris didn't speak at all, but one night when I had spent a particularly unaccountable period at the pub, Boris started talking to me.

"Hello," he said, in a thick and (I feel) very plausible Russian accent. "My name is Boris. Have you seen, perhaps, any official agricultural documents hanging around?"

Over the next several weeks, Boris would talk to me whenever I had a little bit to drink. Pretty soon after that, he started talking to me all the time. Soon after that, he started talking to my friends. And by then, of course, he was already hitting on women.

When I left Wales, Boris came with me to school, where he became involved with a Mexican beauty and Zapatista sympathiser, but that's a story for another day.

Women love Boris. The fluffiness, the accent, something about him drives them crazy, even when he's half-dazed with drink and seran wrap. Once I walked through the dining hall at my college with Boris poking his head out of my messenger bag, and no less than four seperate women in a five-minute period came up to him and yelled "Oh! What a cute lamb!" I finally had to tell him, "Boris. Stopping hitting on the pretty girls in the dining hall." He would not listen.

Despite his hard- and fast-living ways, Boris is a good friend to have. There's always vodka in the apartment, I know where to find a good poker game in the city, and I always feel safe because if anyone ever broke in, Boris would just call a hit on him. My only nagging doubt about Boris is that I think he might secretly be Latvian, but don't let it get around.

Tonight, I'm waiting for Boris's flight to get in from Bratislava. All of his missions are confidential, of course, but many involve an amoral, expressionless penguin named Phibs who, coincidentally, also lives in my apartment.

This particular time, I believe Phibs was involved in some sort of kidnapping of a subcontinental princess and the replacing of certain nuclear plans of attack with forged protocols that would mean any nuclear escalation would ultimately destroy walruses around the world. I believe Boris was successful in foiling these plans and rescuing the princess, but I'll know more after he gets back, any moment now.

Hawai'i memories

Never been to Miami. Never been to L.A. But I did spend two years in Wales, so this is a story about Wales.

Wales is a wonderful place. For example, I lost my virginity there. But the first thing you have to know about Wales for this story is that it has the worst weather of anywhere I've ever lived.

It was, of course, always raining, but it was never good, honest rain -— a thunderous storm that makes you happy you stayed inside with a mug of hot chocolate, or a sun-drenched, get-naked-with-a-loved-one drizzle, or a good suburban downpour that you float little boats in.

No, Welsh rain was a fine, cold, steady trickle. There was never too little to ignore and never enough to really make a point. It always made me think of cat piss. And not in a good way.

What made the rain just so much worse was the very cold, very relentless wind. You could bundle up. This wind did not care. It would blow through your coat, then through your skin and finally through your very soul. You know that machine in Princess Bride that takes a year off the end of your life? It was like that, but for happiness.

And then it was dark. I went to an environmental conference once where a guy said if you had solar panels on your every other roof in Europe, you could power the continent, but in Britain you'd need to put it on every roof, full stop. When I first got to Wales, I noticed that for every nice, sunny day, there was one overcast day, and as the year went on, the ratio got worse and worse.

The second thing you need to know for this story is that, technologically, the U.K. is just a bit behind.

At the obscure school where I lived, the nearest internet access was at a town 20 minutes away. We had one phone in my dorm, but what with the time difference and the expense of phone cards, internet was really the only way to get in touch with friends at home.

The last thing you need to know for this story is that this was the first time I'd lived abroad and that my school was a very strange and sometimes lonely place.

Here is the story: I am in the local internet cafe. Outside it is already dark and there is rain and wind. I am reading and writing emails home to my friends. I look up, and I see the most beautiful, sun-drenched scene I've ever seen in my life. It is on T.V.

The only thing I can compare it to is opening up your window, walking to the other side of the room, and then looking back and realizing that although you live in suburban Detroit, your window is opening up in the Sahara.

I watch only for a few minutes. The picture quality, the clothes and the cars place it mid '70s for me. I see a desperate man with binoculars, a criminal, watching a particular landing outside a room at a large hotel. He is watching for a signal, a red flag or towel. I'm not sure, but maybe the signal isn't there, maybe someone is watching him, too.

What I remember most is the light in that place. I can't describe the light. Everything seems to glow with that light. Everyone is wearing sunglasses - there is so much light, they are fighting to keep it out!

The man with the binoculars has a jeep with an open top. He is squinting with the binoculars, there is so much light. He looks again for the signal. I feel like I could climb inside there that T.V. and walk around in that incredible light. It is more real than the world in which I am living.

I pay for my half-hour of internet and walk back to my school.

With the massive body of television knowledge I have since obtained, I can say that the show I saw was definitely probably Hawaii Five-O. I've been to Hawai'i twice with family, but I don't remember anything like that. It's sunny in Texas, but it's a hot, brutally muggy sunny. Never been to Miami. Never been to L.A. My only memory of light like that is that one day in Wales, on T.V.

St. Patrick's Day memory

Me, Ben and Gordon, staggering through a field in Wales with a bottle of Bailey's. It is friggin' cold.