Phil Ball shows again why he's my favorite futbol writer, this time discussing the struggles of the Spanish national team, and its relationship to the fractured nature of the Spanish national identity. Writing about the first meeting in 35 years between the Basque and Catalan national teams, Ball notes:

And of course, it's not really about football. Let's get the cards out onto the table. There's no point in writing about much else this week. If you read this column regularly and are interested in Spanish football, then you need to know these things. Without them, La Liga would lose its spark overnight. The political tensions that underlie almost every match, almost every official act that takes place in the corridors of Spain's football, are directly related to what happened this weekend.

The presence of the Basque Lehendakari (Prime Minister) at the match, shoulder to shoulder with his Catalan counterpart, Pasqual Maragall, both solemnly standing for the two communities' anthems, must have had General Franco turning in his grave, along with several of his present-day acolytes.

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Another week, another mix album. The DFA Remixes: Chapter Two features eight of James Murphy and Tim Sweeney's more recent remixes, incluidng Junior Senior, N.E.R.D., Nine Inch Nails, and Goldfrapp. Only eight tracks in total, but because remixes have to be long as hell the disc clocks in at a whopping 71 minutes, or close to nine minutes per song. I had not heard the Junior Senior song until I bought the disc, and it's probably my favorite track out of all of them. The title is stupid, but the bassline isn't.

Junior Senior / "Shake Your Coconuts [DFA Remix]" (left-click yousendit)

For the original version, go here.

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The economic case against charity:

In fact, the closer you look at charitable giving, the less charitable it appears to be. A recent experiment by John List, an economist at the University of Chicago, and a team of colleagues, showed that donations are less than magnanimous after all. Using controlled trials to compare different methods of door-to-door fund-raising, professor List's team discovered that it was much more effective to raise funds by selling lottery tickets than it was to raise funds by asking for money. This hardly suggests a world populated by altruists seeking to do the maximum good with their charitable cash.

More effective still was simply to make sure that the fund-raisers were attractive white girls rather than a dowdier assortment of males and females representing all shapes, races, and sizes. This dramatically increased the average contribution, because many more men decided to give money. Altruism?

Anyway, kinda typical economics stuff. I don't doubt that the status quo isn't the most efficient way of bettering the world, and that many people volunteer or donate money so that they can feel good about themselves or make others aware of how "good" they truly are. But it's also wrong to ignore that little by little, acts of charity, economically inefficient or otherwise, also contribute to everyone feeling a little better about humanity (and encourage us not to be total assholes). Which is OK.

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Lego-shaped ice cubes? Count me in.

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A guy robs a bank so he can get caught and sent to jail. Yep, it's come to this.

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Harsh Times, Christian Bale's new flick, now has a release date: November 10th.

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The secret lives of baseball card writers.

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Fantasy baseball gets a little real:

"It's '92 or '93," Candiotti says. "I'm playing for the Dodgers, Jeff Kent is with the Mets. I'm in a fantasy baseball league. I don't have Kent on my team and he's off to a torrid start and he's killing me."

The Dodgers are in New York to play the Mets. Ramon Martinez is warming up in the Dodgers' bullpen to pitch the series opener. Candiotti strolls to the pen and, within earshot of Martinez, tells pitching coach Ron Perranoski, "Perry, I just talked to Bret Saberhagen, and Sabes told me that if Kent gets drilled his first time up, he's mush for the rest of the series."

First inning, Kent steps to the plate.

"Ramon just absolutely buries one in Kent's ribs," Candiotti says. "It was so bad that he went down on one knee, and he had to come out of the game. I sat there thinking, 'What did you just do? You told a complete lie, you got this guy drilled!'

"After that, it was funny. Pedro Martinez (Ramon's brother) started drilling Kent, and so did all the other Dominican pitchers. For years, Ramon drilled Kent every time. ... That winter I'm at a charity golf tournament, I wind up in Kent's group. We sit together at dinner. He's the nicest guy in the world. I didn't tell him."