Body-text fonts, pt. 22: Caslon no. 540

“Colorado Supreme Court Disqualifies Trump from State’s 2024 Ballot.”

Another in a long list of amazing yet ho-hum headlines about Donald Trump.

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Congrats, again, to Alexander Domínguez for carrying Liga de Quito to a championship – this time, in the domestic league. He stopped two spot kicks in Liga’s shootout victory over Independiente del Valle.

The prodigy Kendry Páez scored IDV’s goal.

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At least four parties to go, and I’m already Christmas-partied out. The partying hasn’t been bad, but the gorging has been. For the first time in years, I’m repulsed by the prospect of eating cookies and potato chips.

Come to think of it, I ate cookies and potato chips today. At home.

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There are thinner and fatter Caslons; of the fatties, my favorite is Caslon no. 540.

The italics are … dramatic. Good for occasional emphasis; bad in bibliographies.

The dubiously named QualiType Caslan is a serviceably priced (i.e. free) imitation of this typeface.

Ascension Island

Congrats to Liga de Quito for winning the Copa Sudamericana, and especially to Alexander Domínguez for blocking three of Fortaleza’s penalty kicks. Domínguez also tended goal when Liga previously won this tournament, in 2009.

Stephen says this is Domínguez’s finest hour, but I still prefer the epic time-wasting of 2021.

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I have nothing much to relate – the weekend has been low-key (the best kind of weekend) – so here is an oldish video by Un mundo inmenso that I’d somehow never viewed until tonight. It’s about Ascension Island, an out-of-the-way, volcanic, Guernsey-sized British territory in the South Atlantic.

Plenty of weirdness here. Best thing – or worst, according to one point of view: Charles Darwin had the idea of importing non-native plants to moisten the air a bit. One of the mountains ended up turning green, but its ecosystem isn’t up to the ecological purists’ standards.

The U.S. has a military base on the island. Apparently, quite a few of the Britons are getting edged out. Which they resent. They’re only temporary residents, but some have been on Ascension for many years, and like their Northern Atlantic counterparts they feel connected to “their” land.

I looked up the island’s job board to see about moving my family there, but only one job was posted, in waste management, and it wasn’t ideal, requiring various special driver’s liscences as well as unmarriedness. Besides, the vacancy was closed.

I guess we’ll stay in South Bend.

Mexico 0, Ecuador 0

It was a good night in Chicago, but this morning I worry about COVID.

Martin took this photo of Stephen, my dad, and me.

You can see many more green shirts, but there were plenty of Ecuadorians: twenty or thirty percent of the crowd, I’d guess.

We took our masks into the stadium and then didn’t think to put them on. No one was near us at first. The stadium didn’t fill up until the game was well underway. (Final headcount: about 61,000.)

And I didn’t notice any mask-wearers until people began to leave. I’m not referring to the Mexicans with lucha libre masks.

My dad and I weren’t allowed to bring our drawstring bags into the stadium. “Go hide them in the trees,” advised the guard. After the game, quite a few people were creeping among the trees, in the dark, like perverts, searching for their belongings. Maybe this happens after every game at Soldier Field.

The fans behaved beautifully. No one fought, that I saw. Everyone just seemed happy to be there. We had Mexicans to our left and lively, friendly cuencanos to our right. The Mexicans sang Cielito lindo. Near the end of the game, they did their infamous taunt of Puto. Alexander Domínguez complained; the ref temporarily halted play.

This notice appeared on the scoreboard:

The Ecuadorians all laughed.

It was a good move by Domínguez, that savvy game-freezer, because the Mexicans had been been playing their best soccer; afterward, they did nothing. Ecuador was the much better team throughout the match.

Ecuador 1, Brazil 1

Samuel is a well-read and affectionate little boy. Should he maintain his current interests, however, he is likely to become a wrestler for the WWE. Eighty percent of his waking hours are spent gleefully kicking, scratching, eye-gouging, headbutting, and bodyslamming his father. I don’t exaggerate; if he weren’t pint-sized, it would be unbearable.

Also, he doesn’t allow me to read. The last three weeks, I made it my priority to read one book. (I was out of renewals and needed to return it to the library.) It was an easy and entertaining book. I only got through half of it. I’ll blog about it should I ever finish the last two hundred pages.

Tonight Samuel is mugging me while I type. This afternoon he mugged me all during Ecuador’s World Cup qualifier against Brazil. Brazil scored in the first ten minutes; a little later, our goalie, Alexander Domínguez, was red-carded; a little after that, a Brazilian was red-carded. Then another Brazilian, the goalie Alisson, was red-carded, but his red card was rescinded by the VAR. In the second half, we were awarded a penalty kick; it was rescinded by the VAR. Then we scored the tying goal from a corner kick. Then we were awarded another penalty kick and Alisson was red-carded a second time, but again the foul and red card were rescinded by the VAR.

I thought the Brazilians managed the game quite well, though they didn’t create many scoring chances. For Ecuador, it was good to earn the draw after such an awful start.

We have three more matches to play. If we win Tuesday night’s match, away to Peru, our qualification will be guaranteed. Many other scenarios also would allow us to qualify.

It is still very cold and snowy, and Karin has built a shelter in our back yard for stray cats, using plastic bins and straw.

World Cup updates; “I love you”; Benidorm; the reader

With just five matches to play, we’re dragging ourselves over the finish line. Last month, in Colombia, we did some heroic time-wasting to earn a 0–0 draw. Kudos to our savvy goalkeeper, Alexander Domínguez, for wasting ten or fifteen minutes during his goal kicks; and to the VAR officials for annulling Colombia’s last-minute goal.

Then, a few days ago, we eked out a 1–0 home victory against cellar-dwellers Venezuela. We were so poor, the result was downright inspiring.

(In fairness, many of our regular players weren’t available.)

Tomorrow night, we’ll play in Chile. The Chileans also have been poor. Even so, they’re on a three-game winning streak and have climbed to fourth place, four points behind us.

If we so much as draw this game, our position will be very strong.

Colombia and Uruguay, the other nearest contenders, also have been struggling.

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The Troggs (on Spotify): “Wild thing, I think I love you.”

Samuel: “I love you.”

He doesn’t say it to his parents; he only repeats what he hears from the TV. When he first said “I love you,” he was repeating a sign-language lesson from Baby Einstein.

Tonight he said, “Love Benidorm.” He really does love Benidorm, the little weirdo.

I think he can read or at least recognize words he’s seen in his books. Today, he recognized the word “summer” when it appeared on the TV; and, yesterday, when the word “Texas” appeared on the TV, he said “taxi.” He’s been doing this for several months.

Brazil 2, Ecuador 0

The Brazilians labored, but their victory was never in doubt; clearly, they were the better team.

Although the result was just, the second goal was questionable. The VAR officials permitted Neymar to re-take a penalty kick because of a minuscule encroachment by Alexander Domínguez.

This greatly irked the Uruguayan commentators (who are as sober as any commentators I listen to). Throughout the game, they had lots of choice words about Neymar, which I appreciated. Afterward, I watched another hour of Uruguayan TV. What a good little country.

The Brazilians are massively talented, but as long as they continue to run 85–90% of their attacks through Neymar, they are doomed to lose against the best European sides.

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In Mishawaka, temperatures have been in the low nineties (F). We bought a garden hose and a kid-friendly sprinkler. The sprinkler is shaped like a fish; when water spurts out of it, it thrashes in a disturbing fashion. Karin & I showed Samuel how to run back and forth through the spray. At first, he stood just outside of its reach, yelling and waving his arms; eventually, he made a few passes.

Now the lawn is watered, and so it will be longer at the next mowing.

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Edoarda & Stephen are buying a house at the other end of our block. Of course, we also intend to buy a house, and it probably won’t be right here; but it will be nice to live near them for a short time. And when my parents move into the house where we are living now, they’ll be near to Edoarda & Stephen.

In the meantime, Edoarda & Stephen are allowing me to use their new battery-powered mower. It’s quiet; but, on certain terrain, it’s extremely quirky.

The misfortunes of Ziva – and of Karin, Samuel, John-Paul, and Ecuador

I feel much better, though I’m still coughing and blowing my nose. Karin and Samuel also have got bad colds. They probably caught the germs from me and then compromised their bodily defenses on Wednesday night.

We were outside in the cold for several hours because little Ziva had escaped through a hole in the screen door.

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It was a desperate time. We searched the yard and then the neighborhood. Then we heard Ziva mewing under our porch. She couldn’t come out the way she’d gone in: either she couldn’t remember how to, or she was obstructed.

We removed several boards nailed to the edge of the porch, only to come up against an even sturdier barrier of wood and concrete. This barrier had a gap in it, however, which Ziva approached. She mewed and looked out at us. We reached in and petted her. We gave her food. But the gap was too small for her to squeeze through.

We decided to tear one of the planks out of the porch floor. But it had been screwed in too tight, and so we had to wait a few more hours until a friend could bring over an electric drill so that we could make a hole large enough for Ziva to fit through. The drilling terrified Ziva.

An hour later, she finally mustered enough courage to climb up onto the porch. By this time it was about 11:00 at night.

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And so, ever since, Samuel and Karin have been sick. It didn’t occur to us to go back inside the house and leave Ziva in her despair – or to put on jackets. At the time, I hardly felt my own illness or the cold.

When a loved one is making desperate little cries, it’s easy to forget about yourself – and other loved ones, I’m sorry to say.

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Last night, then, Karin and Samuel lay around, pretty miserable, as I’d done earlier in the week. I spent the evening web-surfing until I was able to find a video stream of Ecuador’s first qualifier for the Qatar World Cup.

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I remember how, in 2004, Ecuador lost 1–0 to Argentina in a thrilling World Cup qualifier played in Buenos Aires. Hernán Crespo was the goalscorer.

They were two good teams, two mature teams.

Last night’s fixture in the Boca Juniors stadium had the same scoreline but lacked virtuosity and excitement.

Messi scored with a penalty kick and gave a few good passes.

Lautaro Martínez did nothing.

Ecuador’s lone striker, Énner Valencia, was stranded.

Our shining young talent, the left-back Pervis Estupiñán, gave away the penalty.

Alexander Domínguez had to tend goal rather too well for the comfort of the nation.

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Ecuador did improve as the game went on. I hope that, in the coming months, the team will be afforded more practice sessions with its new manager (so far, only two sessions have been held). The other South American teams also have been severely disrupted by the pandemic.

Ecuador will play the next game, against Uruguay, in Quito on Tuesday. Five substitutions will be allowed, which will enable more Uruguayans to come off the field once they’re short of breath.