happy 233rd birthday

Programming note: I have a four-day weekend, and am going to spend the vast majority of it not blogging. I will probably put together one, maybe two new videos if I get bored enough, and alerting you to their presence is more than likely the extent of posting you'll see here this coming weekend. That plus a special Fourth of July post. I do want to try and write one Examiner.com article; right now I'm on a schedule of once every three days and that seems to be working for me, which means you can expect a new one on Saturday.

The most important thing for today, then, is to wish a heartfelt happy 233rd birthday to the United States of America. We have our flaws, to be sure, but this is a weekend to celebrate all that's good about our great land - our prosperity, our freedom, and the courage of the Founding Fathers who brought it all to fruition. Iran has done a very timely job of reminding us of what we enjoy here - or rather, what we don't have to deal with.

The second most important thing would be the two verbal commitments that dropped our way today: LB Henry Coley and OT Conner Davis are now on board. Neither is a surprise, though Davis provided us with some sporadic tense moments by flirting with Tech. In the end, as with Mark Shuman going their way, fanhood and family ties won out. I could do a writeup on either one (Coley technically came first so it'd be him) but I was planning on not putting that much effort into today's post, so it'll have to wait til next week. Today is just a couple links that I liked.

- Vic Hall is playing offense now, did you know? You knew, right? All I ask of Jerry Ratcliffe right now is that he keeps the Harlequin-esque descriptions out of future articles.

- Pete Gillen does a very commendable thing. This is the sort of thing that comes naturally to him; Gillen was always one of the nicest people. He took a trip to visit the troops in the hospital in Maryland, then flew to Kuwait and afterwards to Afghanistan. No truth to the rumor that he called time-out twice in Maryland and three more times in Kuwait and didn't have any left for the guys at Bagram.

- A little bit of reportery stuff on the UA All-American lacrosse game and Dom Starsia's thoughts on the incoming freshmen who played therein. Here's my thought: Connor English is our biggest incoming recruit and I don't care what Starsia says about maybe being not ready, if "Connor English" doesn't sound like the name of a lacrosse megastar, then nothing ever will.

- Oh snap. Pat Forde knows something that we know too, but the thing is, you usually can't get ESPN types to actually say it:

The Terrapins have shocked the Tar Heels each of the past three seasons, and no fan base in the ACC is as irritating (and occasionally tasteless) as Maryland's.

Zing.

- Our incoming soccer class, speaking of all-stars and whatnot, is ranked #1 in the ACC. As mentioned in the article, incoming freshman Will Bates has played for the national U-18 team, and he's done very well for himself. Bates was the star of a game against Australia that won us a U-18 tourney hosted by the Aussies. The soccer season is something I'm very much looking forward to. Add this class to a hopefully healthy bunch of scorers this year and we could do some major, major damage.

Right, that's all then. Enjoy your weekend. Please don't blow your hands off. And at some point while you're out enjoying a few well-earned cold ones, raise one to the fifty-six men (and one, obviously, in particular) who risked everything they had to give you what you now enjoy.