El Zen

14 hours ago, lapal_fan said:

How many Stone Island patches do you own? 

I’ll admit it, I have one. 

Only set me back about £250

It’s perfectly possible to follow trends and fashion and not look like a copy of the next guy. 

I like nice clothes and trainers, I’ll happily pay extra for brands I like too. Maybe that makes me a sucker, but f*** it, I feel good about it.

I also have about five different baseball caps in rotation. And I’ll wear them back to front whenever I want. 

9 hours ago, blandy said:

One of my favourite towns. Went there with work years ago. Stunning place, fabulous people.

Hey now, we don’t want the people of Bergen to get any cockier than they already are. 

1 minute ago, mjmooney said:

Oh, yes? Things are looking up. 

Very much so. 

(Literally 1100 meters up yesterday ) 

3 hours ago, TheAuthority said:

I was just approached today about a potential job in Bergen.

Where is that and where are you in Norway?

Very cool! I’ll leave regional rivalries aside and admit Bergen is a beautiful city. If you can make it work, I’d strongly consider it if I were you. Norway is a very good country to live and work in, not to mention raising children in. Let me know if you have any questions, buddy.  

My picture was taken on the way up from Arnafjord to the Stølsheimen landscape. Spent the day hiking with my GF yesterday and spending the whole week visiting her family in Sogn. It’s literally all mountains, fjords and waterfalls. Bergen is in the same county as this, Vestland county (West coast.) 

I grew up and still live in the Oslo area, and I’ll forever say Oslo is the best damn city in the world, but if you move to Bergen, I’m sure you’ll love it. 

3 hours ago, il_serpente said:

hvilken fjord?

The Arnafjord branch of Sognefjorden. 

On 02/07/2023 at 23:29, mjmooney said:

No interest in superhero movies, but I have to say Rachel Brosnahan is perfect casting for Lois Lane. 

But I came here to rave about War Sailors (Krigsseileren) - Norwegian film about their merchant fleet on the Atlantic conveys in WWII. Currently showing in three parts on Netflix. Very powerful stuff - have you seen it, @El Zen? 

I haven’t. But the story obviously has cinematic potential, so perhaps I’ll give it a look. 

52 minutes ago, Hughes said:

Hehe guilty as charged. However, to me the Vålerenga story is basically romantics. You may dislike Trøim but fact is he owns and controls the club and even interferes with footballing matters. This is very different from Brann and Rosenborg who are  member owned and governed. Lyn as you "hate everything about" has as you know adopted a clear "German" position  where the club is member owned and no one person or group can have control. Their fans at no more posh than a large element of your fans. Vålerenga WAS gifted the ground by the municipality and you DO have lots of celeb fans who like to associate themselves with Vålerenga for the exact reason that the storytelling of this east end cameraderi club where everyone is poor and helping each other out still prevails. I have no particular dislike for Vålerenga but I call BS on quite a bit of what I still find to be storytelling. Sorry, my friend. Anyway, UtV. 

And make no mistake, plenty of members (myself included) are actively trying to get Trøim out. I absolutely agree he uses his financial stranglehold to exert illegal and disruptive influence and control over matters he shouldn’t interfere with at all. But, he isn’t the club and he isn’t representative of the club’s membership and fanbase. Lyn actually have the exact same operating model as we do, just that the shares are owned by more than one individual. I repeat, we were given the land on which the stadium was built, and financed the stadium. Not that being given anything by the city makes you any less working class, so I’m not really sure what your point is. In fact, nothing about ownership and finances really says anything about the socio-cultural identity of the club’s fanbase. 

Of course we have celeb fans, and wealthy fans. We’re by far the biggest club in the nation’s capital. But again, they are not representative of the club’s membership and fanbase. 

Vålerenga is historically and currently a predominantly working class club based on the historically and currently predominantly working class eastside of Oslo. You can’t rewrite that or deny that - yeah, we have fans outside our traditional base, but go to any game in the home end, or any members meeting, or to the hockey, or to any of our pubs, and tell me this isn’t an overwhelmingly working class club. But, of course, it’s also a modern, professional football club, and overwhelmingly the biggest in the most populous region in the country: Of course our fanbase will be heterogenous. 

Lyn are west side, and even the quickest glance at their (small) core will tell you it’s rather homogenously white, upper middle class. Nothing is ever black and white, of course some of their fans are «normal» people, but just as obviously, their core fanbase is posher than ours. And that’s fine, but you can’t deny it’s a fact. 

Not really sure why you’re barking up this particular tree, buddy. 

Well, f*** this shit. What the actual is that moron doing? 

3 hours ago, Hughes said:

Stop this nonsense now... Vålerenga is owned by one of the richest guys in Oslo and has a lot of fairweather very well off fans. They also has the worst hooligan element of all clubs in Norway. They were even gifted their Stadium and all this romantic fairytales about being east end and poor is just storytelling. So is West Ham apparently and they are shit throughout. Rename this thread so we do not have to see this w**nkfest. In the meantime you are of course spot on with Molde

- Trøim can f*** off. The club belongs to the members and he can take his money and illegal influence and get in the sea. He is a cancer to the club. 

- The land was a gift from the city, the stadium was self-financed. Nothing wrong with that. 

- We are literally from east Oslo, and predominantly working class, both past and present. How is that storytelling?

- Us, Brann and RBK are pretty even in terms of hools. 

- I know you’re trying to wind me up, and it clearly worked

Won 0-5 at Stjørdal, leaving plenty of time to catch the last flight home. Paparazzis found me again (second row, right.) 

Good. I hope they sell the rest too. 

Multi club ownership stinks, and I don’t want my club to be associated with it in any form. 

I haven’t been as switched on to the baseball in 2023, for different reasons, but I can’t not mention Domingo German’s perfect game at Oakland last night. Didn’t watch it live, but even watching the highlights I felt the suspsense before the final out. 

A perfecto is such an insane feat. 

9 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

There was absolutely no need to take it off Mings, but now that it's done, and McGinn has warmed to it, I don't see a need to snub him by removing it again.

Besides, Mings hasn't shrunk into himself. A leader doesn't need an armband. I'd expect him and Martinez to continue to step up as they have done even if McGinn remains captain.

Absolutely where I’m at. Taking it off Mings was nuts, but the way Captain Meatball has stepped up under Emery, he might as well keep it now. 

Time flies. Both Vålerenga and Rosenborg have sacked their managers (Dag-Eilev Fagermo and Kjetil Rekdal respectively.) Vålerenga are yet to land a full time replacement but Rosenborg have installed an interim coach from the academy to spend the rest of the year trying to implement the attacking 433 style football of their glory days. He lost his first game in charge 0-3 at home. 

It’s been a while since our last game, but on Wednesday I’m making the 1000km roundtrip to Stjørdal for the fourth round cup tie against level three side Stjørdals-Blink (literally Stjørdal’s Target.) If the game goes to extra time, I’ll miss it, as the last plane back to Oslo leaves an hour after the end of 90 mins

I can’t get the round badge to work for me. The shape is bland and boring, and the lion facing the other way looks weird. On the shirt, it almost looks like the lion is trying to run away. 

I’d love to see something more simplistic and modern. 

Not a fan. Shoulders look tacky, overall it looks like a Burnley shirt, the sponsor logo is absolutely hideous and I don’t think the badge works very well at all. And I say this as someone who’s not normally that bothered with this stuff. 

F*** it. Focus on the football, try again from scratch next year with a better looking badge and hopefully do something about that crappy sponsor. 

It all stinks. Football is f***ed. 

I’ve had my ID3 for a little while now, and it’s great. Very roomy and comfortable, very smooth ride (lane assist aside, it is complete rubbish on the motorway and is best just to switch off completely,) big enough to fit my son’s bike with the back seats down if I need to, and I really only have to charge it a couple of times a week overnight for my commute. 

And it saves me a fortune every month compared to the lease and fuel expense on my Octavia. 

On 16/06/2023 at 11:59, Stevo985 said:

I used to do it in Red Dead Redemption. Because why not

On 16/06/2023 at 12:38, BOF said:

Gaming sadism ftw

14 hours ago, Follyfoot said:

Is this a new term for gingernut?

No, it’s a new term for ‘I’ll happily execute the royal family, but let’s be humane about the methods.’