10 for 10 (7th Entry): Virtual Postcard from North Carolina....

Greetings to our readers in Uruguay, Panama, and South Korea....

Our initial choice for a virtual postcard was the quaint small town of Madison, which is hosting a heritage festival on Saturday, Oct. 3rd, with 100 vendors, but we couldn't find a suitable image. Madison is in Rockingham County, which also includes the towns of Eden and Reidsville.

Instead, we opt for this photo of Old Salem in Winston-Salem, some 45 miles west of Madison. Winston-Salem is also the host of the River Run Film Festival in April, and the home of Wake Forest University.

In European soccer action today, Eden Hazard of Chelsea scored a late goal to solidify a 2-0 victory over their London crosstown rivals Arsenal.

In the Netherlands, Heracles upset PSV Eindhoven 2-1. And, in Turkey, the Istanbul powerhouse Galatasaray managed a 1-0 victory over perennial contender Trabzonspor.

http://www.townofmadison.org/

http://www.shoprockinghamcounty.com/

http://www.oldsalem.org/

http://www.visitwinstonsalem.com/

Washington Post Comics Survey: Brewster Rocket Rules....

Greetings to our beloved blog readers in Panama, Cuba and Serbia.

This week, we look at our ten favorite comic strips from the Sunday, Nov. 30th "Washington Post." For a look at the "Roanoke Times" survey, go to our sister blog "The Daily Vampire" http://www.nocturnalguy38.blogspot.com

"Brewster Rockit" which poked fun of both Black Friday and Cyber Monday came in first, hence the reason why we have an image of "Aliens" (top image) as the comic strip takes place in outer space; perhaps Brewster and George Jetson run into each other on their work commute.

Second place goes to the Danish import "WUMO" which shows a family dog getting a lot of perhaps slightly unwanted attention as he or she swallowed the remote control (center image). Third place goes to "Pearls Before Swine," which has a brilliant line that makes of Southwest Airlines (bottom image) which most assuredly can't be as awful as American Airlines (we didn't just say that!).....

Here are our top ten strips:

1) Brewster Rockit

2) WUMO

3) Pearls Before Swine

4) Foxtrot

5) Knight Life

6) Lio

7) The Argyle Sweater

8) Reply All

9) Prickly City

10) Big Nate

http://www.gocomics.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/comics

http://www.southwest.com

World Cup Lists (1 of 4): The Goal-Keepers

Greetings to our readers in Panama, Canada and the Czech Republic, who are among the many countries which alas did not make the World Cup field of 32.

We start our series of World Cup lists with a look at the goal-keepers for teams that have made the knock-out round of 16 in Brazil:

1) Jasper Cillessen. Netherlands. Age 25. Ajax Amsterdam (pictured top)

2) Fernando Muslera. Uruguay. 28. Galatasaray (Turkey; pictured center)

3) Vincent  Enyeama. Nigeria. 31. Lille (France; pictured bottom)

4) Orestis Karnezis. Greece. 28. Granada (Spain)

5) Julio Cesar. Brazil. 34. Toronto FC (Canada/MLS)

6) Tim Howard. USA. 35. Everton (USA)

7) David Ospina. Colombia. 25. Nice (France)

8) Keylor Navas. Costa Rica. 27. Levante (France)

9) Diego Benglio. Switzerland. 30. Wolfsburg (Germany)

10) Sergio Romero. Argentina. 31. Monaco (France)

11)  Thibut Courtois. Belgium. 22. Chelsea (England)

http://www.espn.go.com

Little Thinkers Quotes (7 of 16): Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Greetings to our blog-readers in Slovakia, Panama and Vietnam.

Tonight, we feature a special quote from Wolfgang Amadus Mozart, who has been the subject of the award-winning play and movie "Amadeus"as well as a '80s pop song by the late Falco, who also hailed from Mozart's Austria.

For those who enjoy listening to classical music on the radio, we highly recommend WETA, an NPR station in Washington, DC, dedicated virtually exclusively to classical music.

For those who want to see a symphony, as luck would have it, The Cleveland Orchestra in Cleveland, Ohio, is performing Mozart's 'greatest hits' this weekend (our words!).........

Here is the quote from Wolfgang Amadeus:

"There is no female Mozart because there is no female Jack the Ripper."

SIDEBAR: Brigham Young University's men's basketball team won a road game over San Francisco (university) last night; the final score was 83-76.

The visiting Cougars, which has a roster that includes former Wake Forest U stand-out Chase Fischer, were lead by Kyle Collingsworth (soph. guard who happens to hail from Provo, Utah, where BYU is located) who put in 19 points. His teammate and fellow Utah resident Skyler Hlaford Jr. added points for the Cougars (12-7, 4-2 in West Coast Conference). The home town Dons (yes, that is really the team's nickname!), which have a record of 12-7, 4-2 in the WCC, were lead by 26 points from Cole Dickerson. The game aired nationally on the ESPN networks.

Bonus Quote of the Week- Sugar Ray Leonard

Today, we conclude our month-long series of quotes from American athlete who won medals at the Summer Olympics with quote from boxing great Sugar Ray Leonard, 55, who won gold at the 1976 Montreal Olympics. Earlier this month, we quoted Bruce Jenner, the decathlete who also won gold in Canada.

Leonard was born in Rocky Mount, NC, but he spent most of his growing years in Palmer Park, Maryland, in the DC-Metro area. Leonard defeated the Cuban boxer Andrew Aldama on his way to gold in the light welterweight division.

Ironically, Montreal was also the site of his first famous bout with Panamanian boxer Roberto Duran in 1980. Leonard lost that initial fight, but he defeated Duran later that year in New Orleans.

Leonard also won a much-anticipated bout against a then-undefeated Thomas Hearns in Las Vegas in 1981.

Here is Leonard's quote:

"Before I fight, I always pray no one gets hurt."