Monday, April 29, 2013

Kudos to UNC on ACC Men's Lacrosse Title

The University of North Carolina (UNC) won its first ACC men's lacrosse title since 1996 when the Tar Heels held their home turf in a 16-13 win over the University of Virginia.

According to goheels.com, the game was played in front of 4,001 fans in Chapel Hill, NC, and both the 'Heels and the Cavaliers had to deal with the proverbial elements of mother nature as the game was played in the rain.

For the 'Heels, Davey Emala and Chad Tutton scored seven goals each. Their teammate Marcus Helman (pictured center, we believe) was named as the outstanding ACC Tournament Player.  To play UVa, the 'Heels first had to defeat their arch rivals Duke; Virginia had to upset Maryland.

For the Cavs, Matt White scored seven goals.

'Teels goalie Kieran Burke had 17 saves.

The 'Heels trailed 5-3 after the first quarter, but they took a 10-7 lead by half-time.

UNC now goes to 12-3 and looks forward to the NCAA tournament, but due to their disappointing finish the Cavs at 7-8 are not going to the tournament, a rarity for the school in Charlottesville, Va., for the sport.

SIDEBAR ONE: We saw that Link-TV, a non-profit progressive television outlet in America thanked Rick in Floyd, Va., for his support; we want to thank Rick too.....for no particular reason.

SIDEBAR TWO: Today's sponsors are Doomsday Dating, which we heard about from a female stand-up comedian from Winston-Salem, NC; she insisted she wasn't kidding about the existence of this Davidian singles group, and yes they do really exist!

SIDEBAR THREE: Since we completely neglected the Yale Bulldogs for the team's first ever men's hockey title as captain Andrew Miller lead his team in a 4-0 upset win over their cross-town New Haven, Conn., rival the Quinnipiac Bobcats....yes, we think that must be the NCAA's most difficult to spell school as well...at the Frozen Four in Pittsburgh, but we are pointing it out now.

SIDEBAR FOUR: Tomorrow, we kick off Soccer Week (pardon the pun), and as a teaser, we will issue a SPOILER ALERT to the six people in America who were taping the English Premiere League game between two lower-ranking teams Aston Villa and Sunderland (perhaps Rick from Floyd, Va., was one of them). Aston Villa really kicked butt by a 6-1 score today.

http://www.goheels.com

http://www.dailytarheel.com

http://www.doomsdaydating.com

http://www.linktv.org

http://www.yalebulldogs.com

http://www.visitfloyd.org

http://www.visitchapelhill.org

Sunday, April 28, 2013

Where's Josh Ritter?

For starters, we should point that our title is not to imply that singer/writer Josh Ritter is a missing person; it is rather a take on "Where's Waldo?"_ we are also going to explain where Ritter is performing in the coming weeks.

I have seen Ritter at Cat's Cradle three times in the last six years, and he is absolutely amazing in concert. Of course, now that I'm in my early forties, I'm glad I know the difference between Ritter and Andrew Bird.

Alas, the titles of his songs and records escape, but that's why we have Wikipedia right?

Here is where Ritter will be playing soon; and we are including a link to WXYC-FM, the student-run radio station of the University of North Carolina as he will be performing at Cat's Cradle in Carrboro, NC, a  community which literally borders Chapel Hill:

May 8 State Theatre Portland, Maine

May 9 Calvin Theatre Northampton, Mass.

May 11th and 12th 9:30 Club Washington, DC (both shows are sold out)

May 12 Cat's Cradle Carrboro (Chapel Hill), NC

May 13 The Orange Peel Asheville, NC

http://www.joshritter.com

http://www.930.com

http://www.catscradle.com

http://www.wxyc.org

http://www.whereswaldo.com


Wednesday, April 24, 2013

English Premiere League Soccer Tables_ Manchester United Reigns Supreme

It was a very good week for Dutch national Robin van Persie  (pictured top) who scored a hat trick in Manchester United's 3-0 win over Aston Villa, which secured MU with the English Premiere League titles as they have 84 points with just a few games remaining.

Cross-town rivals Manchester City are a distant second with 68 points. They had a dismal weekend as they lost 3-1 to Tottenham Hotspur, which is in fifth place with 61 points. American Clint Dempsey (pictured bottom) previously with Fulham and the New England Revolution in the MLS, scored a goal for the victors in the 76th minute of play.

Brothers Ryan Bennett and Elliot Bennett helped secure a win for Norwich in the team's 2-1 win over last place Reading, while German national Per Mertesacker helped Arsenal, sitting in third place with 63 points, to a 1-0 win over Fulham.

And, Luis Suarez, the star striker from Uruguay who made a dubious handball that lifted his national team to victory over Ghana in the last World Cup, scored an impressive literal last minute goal in the 97th minute to help his Liverpool squad (pictured center) tie Chelsea, in fourth place with 62 points, 2-2. This does remind one of the title of an American documentary film "Harvard Beats Yale 29-29."

Here is the complete table for weekend play; Chelsea is in action tomorrow for a UEFA match with Benefica of Portugal:

1. Stoke 2 QPR 0

2. Sunderland 1 Everton 0

3. Swansea 0 Southhampton 0, tie

4. West Brom 1 New Castle 1, tie

5. West Ham U 2 Wigan Athletic 0

6. Arsenal 1 Fulham 0

7. Norwich 2 Reading 1

8. Tottenham Hotspur 3 Manchester City 1

9. Liverpool 2 Chelsea 2,, tie

10. Manchester United 3 Aston Villa 0

http://www.premiereleague.com

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Happy Birthday, William Shakespeare

Today is both William Shakespeare's 449th birthday, and it is National Talk Like Shakespeare Day here in America. Apparently, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel formally recognized the occasion at city hall today.

There are plenty of Shakespeare productions going on domestically (and, assuredly in England and other parts of the world as well).

The American Shakespeare Center (we still like to call them Shenandoah Shakespeare, their old name) in Staunton, Va.,  is performing both "Twelfth Night" and "Love's Labour Lost," right now.

Just down the road in High Point, NC, the North Carolina Shakespeare Festival is holding auditions for "MacBeth" or the Scottish Play from April 29-30th.

And, the Reduced Shakespeare Company will be performing throughout the United Kingdom as well as well as performances in Urbana, Ill., on April 27th and in Columbia, Md., on June 22nd.

We are told that they can do "Romeo and Juliet" in 14 and a half minutes!

http://www.talklikeshakespeare.org

http://www.amerianshakesperacecenter.com

http://www.ncshakes.org

http://www.reducedshakespeare.com




Happy Children's Day

Since today April 23rd is National Children's Day in Turkey, we thought we'd continue with our annual tradition of posting images of Turkish children for this blog entry.

It was 35 years ago today that I participated in a Children's Day parade in the town of Eregli in Zonguldak province.

The TRT (Turkey Radio Television) organizes a festival each year where children from around the world gather in Turkey. Last year, children from Azerbaijan, Egypt and Vietnam were among the participants.

The first Children's Day was celebrated on April 23, 1920, and it was founded by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, Turkey's iconic political leader who formally established The Republic of Turkey on October 29, 1923. October 29th is now recognized as Republic's Day. May 19th, a day set aside to recognize youth and athletics in Turkey, is also one of Turkey's main state holidays.

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Things To Do List: All That Jazz


Here is our latest installment of the semi-weekly Things To Do List, which seems popular, or at least in Latvia and Slovakia (yes, for some reason we are popular in these places), and frankly is a lot easier to do than what we are planning which hope to get to between now and doomsday whenever that may be (perhaps our 'good friend' the fringe pastor the Rev. Johnny Robertson of Martinsville, Va., can give us a clue!)


1. Eat a gyro

2. Write a letter to "The Daily Tar Heel"

3. Listen to jazz on NPR

4. Recycle

5. Laundry

6. Get the Sunday "Washington Post"

7. Take a pilates class

8. Watch English soccer game you taped today

9. Write a poem

10. Watch "The Antiques Roadshow" on PBS







Saturday, April 20, 2013

SPOILER ALERT: Kudos to Florida on Winning NCAA Women's Gymnastics Crown

The University of Florida Gators are only the fifth school to win a NCAA Women's Gymnastics title; they join the ranks of UCLA, Utah, Georgia and Alabama. Each of those schools, except Utah, qualified for the Super Six finals.

In victory, the Gators edged out second-place Oklahoma, third-place Alabama, the two-time NCAA champ and fourth place UCLA, the host school. LSU finished fifth; Georgia came in sixth.

For Gators' Coach Rhonda Faehn, a UCLA alum in her 11th year as coach of Florida after a coaching stint at Penn State, the title comes after years of heart-breaking near misses, includes last year's NCAA Championships in Georgia.

The Gators team consists of two Olympians: British national Marissa King, who also celebrated a birthday on Saturday and American Bridget Sloan, who is a freshman from Pittsboro, Ind.

Other stand-outs on the squad include Kytra Hunter (pictured top), Randy Stageberg (pictured bottom), Ashanee Dickerson and Alaina Johnson.

Here is the order of finish:

1. Florida 197.575

2. Oklahoma 197.375

3. Alabama 197.100

4. UCLA 197.100

5. LSU 197.050

6. Georgia 196.675

We issued a SPOILER ALERT because the meets airs on ESPN-U at 8:00 p.m. on April 30th.

For a look at the individual results from today's competition, go to our sister blog:
http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com

Friday, April 19, 2013

Friday Night Tweets: Sports, Sports, Sports....well, mostly college women's gymnastics

Since I may well be the one crossover NCAA Women's College Gymnastics fan who also happens to love Turkish soccer (I'm a Turkish-American), I want to start by mentioning that Istanbul powerhouse GalataSaray clubbed ElazigSpor, a team from Elazig, which is in eastern Turkey, by a 3-1 score thanks to two goal from Didier Drogba, the former Chelsea star and Ivory Coast national, and one goal by emerging Turkish superstar Burak Yilmaz, earlier today.

Now for the reason 97 percent of you are tuning in, here are some tweets that were generating in regard to the the first session of today's NCAA women's gymnastics championships being held on the campus of UCLA.

The college gymnasts pictured here are British Olympian Marissa King who competes for the Florida Gators (top) and Canadian Olympian Brittany Rogers who competes for the Georgia BullDogs/GymDawgs; both teams, along with the LSU Tigers, advanced today.

The two Big 10 schools in the first session: Illinois and Minnesota were both competing in their first national championships.


There are some other tweets regarding other sporting events, but they are not many, not many at all in fact!

Here we go:

1. @UIBaseball Iowa Baseball: "Tonight's game has been postponed due to rain. #Hawks play a double header with Penn State tomorrow starting at 1:05 CST."

2. Gators Gymnastics: "Gymnastics team advances to Super Six; Bridget Sloan is All-Around leader."

3. Illini Gymnastics @IlliniGym: "Florida, LSU, Georgia advance to Super Six #Illini women finish 5th in session with a 195.7, their highest team total ever."

4. MacKenzi Caquatto @MackMacko (a gymnast with Florida): "@AlexMorganVarga: Congrats to @MackMacko and the Gators for finishing first at NCAA Qualifying #ncaagym_ thank you. Good luck to y'all "

5. UCLA Gymnastics @uclagymnastics: "Session 1 #ncaawgym Finals: Florida-197.775, LSU 19.325, Georgia 197.150, Minnesota 196.375, Illinois 195.700, Stanford 194.700"

6. Minnesota Gymnastics @GophersWomensGym: "@KylaSledita recieves a 9.85 on vault and @JennyCovers gets a 9.825."

7. USA Water Polo @USAWP: "Also don't forget to mention our own Adam Kirkorian @WaterPoloCoachK will be live tweeting tonight's USC-UCLA matchup."

8. Chelsea Davis @Gymdogchels: "RT @ChelseaDfans: Congrats to Georgia #supersix! Thank you!!!

http://www.collegegymfans.com

http://www.twitter.com/turkishsoccer

Friday Night Tweets: Terror Suspect and Major Storms

With so much chaos going on in Boston and the fact that a major rain storm struck our mid-Atlantic part of the country from Greensboro, NC, to Philadelphia, which got particularly nasty in Washington, DC, Baltimore and Annapolis (Maryland), we were more or less stuck inside.

We should point that image one, a recreational boat in Smith Mountain Lake, Va., (near Roanoke) was used because the Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokar Tsarnaev, a son of Chechnyan immigrants, was hiding inside one such boat. The second image is because it is raining in Baltimore, where major league baseball's Baltimore Orioles play. And, the third image is for the four victims of the bombing and police shoot-out. Boston University student Lingzi Lu (her name has also been spelled Lu Lingzi) was among the three killed in Monday's blast.

So, here is a look at some of the more interesting tweets we saw tonight as a real-life episode of "The Fugitive" unfolded before our very eyes. Some tweets have been reworded to avoid confusion:

1) Boston Globe News @GlobeMetro: BREAKING NEWS: Police have taken the cover off the boat; the man believed to be the Marathon bombing suspect is inside.

2) Capital Weather Gang @capitalweather: "Wow, a gust of 70 mph clocked near Charles Co., MD, as storms roared thru.

3) Will Wheaton @Wilw: New York Post reporting, CNN confirming: D.B. Cooper is in the boat (not to point out the obvious, but this is a joke)

4) Boston College @BostonCollege: "Also thanks to all students and parents who tweeted appreciation. It did not go unnoticed."

5) Politico @politico: "Injured man (Jeff Bauman) who helped ID Boston suspects is uninsured."

6) Jake Updegraff @OnAirJake: "Poor Dzhokar Tsarnaev, apparently he never watched Disney movies or any movies at all. The bad guy always loses."

7) The Boston Globe @BostonGlobe: "BREAKING NEWS: Police appear to be preparing a robot with a camera to approach the boat."

8) Nicholas Kristof @NickKristof: "And our awareness of geography is such that Czech Republic has to explain that it's not Chechnya." (Chechnya is a part of Russia)

9) Lucas McNelly @lmnelly: "This is generally the part of the story where I start wondering if I could have gotten away."

10) The Fix @TheFix ("Washington Post" political reporter Chris Cillizza): "Serious Q: More reporters or more cops on the scene in Watertown?"

Thursday, April 18, 2013

Record Store Day is Saturday

Albums from David Bowie, Herbie Hancock and the late Cem Karaca (1945-2004), a Turkish psychedelic music icon are among the selections one may find on any given day at an independent locally-owned record store, but Saturday is a day that has been marked as Record Store Day.

Some of the stores you may want to check out, depending on where you reside, may include Wuxtry Records in Athens, Ga. (with two other locations in the Atlanta-area), All Day Records in Carrboro (Chapel Hill), NC, Enterprise Records in Portland, Maine, and Plan 9 Records with locations in Charlottesville and Richmond, Va.

Folk/rock singer Billy Bragg who we mentioned a few entries back is also performing a regular concert at The Cat's Cradle, which is in close proximity to All Day Records, on Friday, but we imagine he will be too busy with soundchecks to stop in that store. Hopefully, if you live in Chapel Hill, that will not be the case with you.


http://www.wuxtry-records.com

http://www.alldayrecords.com

http://www.catscradle.com

http://www.billybragg.com

http://www.davidbowie.com

http://www.recordstoreday.com

http://www.enterpriserecords.net

http://www.plan9music.com






Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Happy 75th Birthday, Superman

While it is common knowledge that Superman has been played in tv and in film by the likes of Dean Cain, Brandon Routh, the late Christopher Reeve and the late George Reeves, it is not commonly known that he was also played by the late Turkish actor Tayfun Demir  (pictured here) in the 1979 rip-off film "Superman Donuyor/The Return of Superman").

Superman first appeared in Action Comics #1 on April 18, 1938, and according to the Overstreet Comic Book Guide, it is worth (in mint condition) a staggering $1.75 million.

One can find considerably newer "Superman" comic books at places like Acme Comics in Greensboro, NC, or Chapel Hill Comics, which is just down I-40 in Chapel Hill, NC.

One famous quote from "Superman" comic books comes in Justice League or America #4, where Superman tells Wonder Woman: "I can only tell you what I believe, Diana: humankind has to be allowed to climb to its own destiny. We can't carry them there."

SIDEBAR: There is yet another tragic development from the Boston Marathon bombing incident on Monday as a third person Lingzi Lu, a Chinese national who was a student at Boston University, died from injuries sustained in the blast.

Another Chinese student from the school Danling Zhou, who was with Lu near the finish line, was seriously injured. The Boston University web site reported that Robert Hill, the dean of Marsh Chapel at BU, visited Zhou and said that she was successfully recovering from surgery at the Boston Medical Center.

Our thoughts go out to all the victims of this horrible act of terrorism.

http://www.acmecomics.com

http://www.chapelhillcomics.com

http://www.bu.edu

Happy 76th Birthday, Daffy Duck

We want to wish Daffy Duck a Happy 76th birthday. The beloved Looney Tunes cartoon character, who is arguably among the fussiest and most negative of cartoon characters, first appeared in the cartoon "Porky Goes Duck Huntin" on April 17, 1937.

Daffy Duck was the subject of a brilliant Jeff Greenberg column which said that political candidates who were more like Bugs Bunny, such as Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama, were more likely to win elections than ones who were more like Daffy Duck, such as Walter Mondale and John McCain, who is coincidentally talking about guns in America in the U.S. Senate today.

One famous quote from Daffy Duck is from the cartoon "Duck Amuck" (1953): "Thanks for the sour persimmons, cousin"

We are going to wish Daffy Duck a happy birthday in six different languages:

1. Grattis pa fodelsedagen (Swedish, ironically Donald Duck is very popular in Sweden)

2. Dogum gunun kutlu olsun (Turkish)

3. feliz compleanos (Spanish

4. joyeaux anniversaire (French)

5. Alles Gute zum Ceburtstag (German)

6. furaha ya kuzaliwa (Swahili: a language spoken in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda)

Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Silly Photo of the Day- Day Without Shoes Day 2013

 
Even though we are politically liberal here at "The Daily Vampire" (apologies to Oak Ridge Boys fans), we are not inclined to take part in Day Without Shoes Day, although we are taking a yoga class at the Northern Arizona Yoga Center in Flagstaff, Ariz., later today (this is a joke: Though there is an actual place called the Northern Arizona Yoga Center, we don't live anywhere near Flagstaff_ not even in the same time zone).
 
The day is meant to recognize starving children in places like Ghana, Guatemala and Tahiti (well, we suppose rich people also go around barefoot there).
 
With this in mind, we are featuring an image of the British women's beach volleyball player Zara Dampney, who has one of the few professions where one can go to work barefoot every day!
 
SIDEBAR: On a more serious note, we want to take a moment to recognize the three people killed and scores more who were injured in yesterday's bomb blast at the Boston Marathon. For me personally, this brings to mind Amanda Rigg, a 22-year-old Australian tourist who was killed in Istanbul, Turkey, on Sept. 10, 2001, the day before September 11th. I was in close proximity to that blast and I will never forget it. We wrote a story about Rigg in a 2011 entry here:
 
 
 
Other links:
 
 
 

Friday, April 12, 2013

The Weekly Grocery List

In the early days of our blogging ventures, we used to simply post grocery lists as we couldn't conjure up anything else back in that stone age era of 2005.

Today, there are simply too many things going on at once and we have more competition thanks to Facebook, Twitter and my friend Chris Knight, who reportedly has the most popular blog in the world (that is a joke, but he gets more hits than we get).

Hence, we are returning to the grocery list. And, these are items that we either need to get at the grocery store or we added to fill space; here we go:

1. Tomatoes (Our friend Bruce Piephoff from Greensboro, NC, has a great song called "Home Grown Tomatoes")

2. Oatmeal

3. Milk

4. Nutella (we went with an image of the Turkish equivalent Cokokrem to be original)

5. ice cream

6. bananas (America's favorite Costa Rican import, after coffee)

7. Sunday Washington Post (Love 'Date Lab' and Keith Knight's Comic Strip "Knight Life")

8. shaving cream

9. apples

10. cat toys

..........There you go!

http://www.theknightshit.blogspot.com

http://www.ulker.com.tr

http://www.facebook.com/brucepiephoff

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Billy Bragg on the Death of Margaret Thatcher

Yesterday on his Facebook page and his official web site the unapologetic left-wing folk/rock English singer Bill Bragg who was getting ready for a concert in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, issued a statement of the death of long-time conservative British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, also known as 'The Iron Lady.'

Bragg was heavily critical of Thatcher and in 1985, he released a powerful ballad "Between the Wars" about what he perceived to be her neglect of the working class and a useful war with Argentina over the Falkland Islands.

Here is Bragg's statement:

"This is not a time for celebration. The death of Margaret Thatcher is nothing more than a salient reminder of how Britain got into the mess that we are in today. Of why ordinary working people are no longer able to earn enough form one job to support a family; of why there is a shortage of descent affordable housing; of why domestic growth is driven by credit; not by real incomes; of why tax-payers are forced to top up wages; of why a spiteful government seeks to penalise the poor for an extra bedroom; of why Rupert Murdoch became so powerful; of why cynicism and greed became the hallmarks of our society.

Raising the glass to the death of an infirm old lady changes none of this. The only real antidote to cynicism is activism. Don't celebrate---organise."

Bragg comes to America with concert dates that include a concert at the Eagle Theatre in Iowa City, Iowa, on April 15th.

The American right-wing Republican political figure Newt Gingrich, the former Speaker of the House, who ran unsuccessfully for president last year was quite different in his remarks regarding Thatcher, who was called the 'Demir Leydi' in Turkey.

Gingrich tweeted yesterday that: "Margaret Thatcher, Pope John Paul and Ronald Reagan changed history. The world would be a different place without them."

SIDEBAR: On a personal date, I was very saddened to hear about the death of American filmmaker Les Blank who died at age 77 after a bout with cancer at his home near San Francisco. His landmark films included "Burden of Dreams" (1982) about eccentric German film director Werner Herzog and his grand efforts to put the epic film "Fitzcarraldo" with the late Klaus Kinski. I had the change to meet Blank in person and talk to him over the years. As one person said on his Facebook page today: "An artist may die, but his art never does."

http://www.billybragg.co.uk

http://www.twitter.com/newtgingrich

http://www.lesblank.com



Thursday, April 4, 2013

Remembering Rogert Ebert- the Great American Movie Critic

With an image of the Tower Theatre in Salt Lake City, Utah, we are honoring Roger Ebert. He was an inspiration to all of us 'movie people,' and his show "At the Movies" which he hosted with his fellow Chicago film critic the late Gene Siskel gave attention to many small films such as "The Brother from Another Planet," "Paris, Texas" and "Roger and Me."

He also championed films such as "Aguirre, Wrath of God," "The Last Temptation of Christ" and "Monster" while remaining  equally outspoken about movies he despised, such as the infamous rape revenge movie "I Spit on Your Grave!" (1978; amazingly enough, it was remade just a few years ago).

I had the chance to meet Ebert at the Virginia Film Festival in Charlottesville some 20 years ago, and I am very thankful I had a few minutes to tell him how much I admired him.

Here is one of his more famous quotes:

"No good movie is too long and no bad movie is too short."

Let the final credits roll for this remarkable man.

http://www.virginiafilmfestival.org

http://www.saltlakefilmsociety.org

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Top 10 Things 2 Do List for the Next 2 Weeks (or so...........)

Here is a look at ten things that we must do or ought to do within the next two weeks; for those of you in Dubai, Tax Day here in America is April 15th (that will be on a similar list on my sister blog "Politics, Culture and Other Wastes of Time" http://wwwpoliticscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com

This is not to be confused with my sister's blog, well actually she doesn't have one.

Here we go:

1) Wheel alignment (that is the reason for the Model T Ford, though my car is considerably newer than that)

2) Watch the Chelsea-Rubin Kazan soccer game on tape (Gokdeniz Kazadeniz, is a Turkish player who plays for the Russian team Rubin Kazan based in the Tartar region of Russia)

3) Make hotel reservations

4) Go to North Carolina

5) Go to the state DMV

6) Read "Cat in the Hat" by Dr. Seuss (pictured bottom, well if it wasn't obvious)

7) Go through the comic books

8) Pay the light bill

9) Buy groceries

10) Take a Body Flow or yoga class at the gym

Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Tilly Gokbudak is NOT Moving to Bulgaria (It was an April Fool's Prank)

For those of you in El Salvador, Dubai and Sri Lanka who read this blog on a daily basis, it is time to fully fess up. Though the American College of Sofia in the Bulgarian capital of Sofia is a real place, I have not accepted a job as an English teacher there. In fact, I have not been to Bulgaria since our family traveled through there en route from Belgrade, Serbia (it was the capital of Yugoslavia then) to Istanbul, Turkey, when I was a child in the 1970s.


We also need to add a correction to yesterday's piece as the national airlines of Bulgaria is actually called Balkan Bulgarian Airlines; perhaps they can find you a flight from JFK or Dulles to Sofia or Varna (another Bulgarian city).

Approximately 11-14 people fell for my prank yesterday, but it is nothing compared to what my good friend and fellow blogger Chris Knight of Reidsville, NC, did for April Fool's Day of 2009.

For that prank, Knight convinced people all over the globe that a radical minister named the Rev. Johnny Robertson from the Church of Christ in Martinsville, Va., created an unholy scene in Vatican City, of all places!

Here is a sample of that entry (we will post a link bellow):

"Johnny Robertson has been arrested in Vatican City following what is being called a 'coordinated and persistent' attempt to threaten Pope Benedict XVI within the very Papal Apartments of the Apostolic Palace."

Knight said in a April 9, 2009, entry that he received messages from both the State Department and Vatican City expressing concern about the 'incident.'

http://theknightshift.blogspot.com/2009/04/breaking-hard-johnny-robertson-arrested.html

http://www.theknightshift.blogspot.com


http://www.air.bg/en (Balkan Bulgarian Airlines)

http://www.acs.bg (American College of Sofia)

http://www.bulgaria_embassy.org (Bulgarian Embassy in Washington, DC)

http://www.allaboutclowns.com

Monday, April 1, 2013

Tilly Gokbudak is Moving to Bulgaria in August

All of us here at "The Daily Vampire" are pleased to announce that our managing editor Tilly Gokbudak, who happens to be me, is moving to Sofia, Bulgaria, to teach at the American College of Sofia.

He was accepted there for a full-time position teaching English, and Gokbudak will also travel to his late father Mehmet Gokbudak's native Turkey to assist elementary school teachers teach English in the provinces of Edirne, Tekirdag and Kiriklareli.

Turkey and Bulgaria share a common border, and there many ethnic Turks in Bulgaria.

But, we are happy to announce that this blog will not discontinue in any way.