Wednesday, 9 July 2003: Within the last couple of years, I've become a fan of a great sport known as boxing (yes, I can feel my mom cringing right now wondering where she went wrong). No, I don't participate in it, but I do enjoy watching it.

While we were on the cruise, the heavyweight title fight occurred between reigning champ Lennox Lewis and the #1 seeded challenger Vitali Klitschko. It just so happened that for the first time ever, I had the proper channel to watch this match (HBO). In the past, either I didn't have HBO or they were all on Pay-Per-View. This time I had the channel and the desire to watch it but I was going to be on the cruise. So I taped it. Tonight, I finally got around to watching it.

Okay, so we all knew the results already. Klitschko was ahead for the entire fight, but Lewis won by TKO after the sixth round because of some supposedly wicked gash he opened up just above Klitschko's left eye. The ring doctor felt it was his duty to have the judge call the fight. There was booing all around by the fans and Klitschko was in shock as he was ready to keep going.

I still had to watch it, though. And I'm glad I did. This fight was wicked. Lewis was slow and lumbering only really starting to warm up to the fight in the third round. Of the six rounds, Klitschko had won four on the judge's score cards. I feel that if the fight had been allowed to continue, Klitschko would have been the new heavyweight champion. And I would have loved it. I really dig on both of the Klitschkos -- Vitali and his younger brother Vladimir. They are massive Ukrainians who were raised and trained in Germany. Both have Ph.D.s in sports science and they can fight. Before his loss to Lewis, Vitali was 32-1 with 31 of those wins coming by KO. How can you argue with that record?

Before the fight, Lewis had been trashtalking Klitschko saying he had no heart and no fighting skill. Even though this fight proved otherwise, very decisively, Lewis was still trashing him after the fight. He was saying that he was just getting his second wind, that there was no way Klitschko could have gone the distance if the fight had been allowed to continue, and that Lewis was really winning despite that the judges seemed to say otherwise. Man, Lewis was so full of it. Klitschko outboxed him every step of the way. He even won over the crowd. It was kind of like watching Rocky Balboa in Rocky IV when he started to win over the Russian crowd. In the beginning, Lewis was the crowd favorite. By the end, they were all booing the result and cheering as Klitschko ran around the ring raising his glove in a show of triumph. It was great.

But still, you should see this match if for no other reason than to see the gash that was opened over his eye. Nasty.

Sunday, 6 July 2003: It's like summer in a cup...

That was the quote Katie used to describe a Root Beer Float that we got at McDonald's on the way back home after Ribfest yesterday and it's a beautifully simple quote, too. The best of two worlds -- vanilla ice cream and root beer -- merged together in one incredibly thirst quenching summer treat. Okay, sorry to get so remniscent on you.

Yeah, so we had a pretty busy weekend. Well, we caught up on the last two weeks of Sex and the City on Friday while eating dinner so we can be all up to speed for the third episode of this season which aired today. Then we went in to Naperville for the Ribfest/Fourth of July fireworks which, despite the constant mosquito attacks, were incredible.

On Saturday, we biked from our apartment to the Charlestowne Mall to see The Hulk which wasn't an altogether bad movie despite the horrible reviews it's been getting. At least it made up for Legally Blonde 2 on Thursday. Then we biked home and showered up to go to Ribfest in Naperville. The reason we went back was because Blondie (yes, the band with Debbie Harry on vocals) was playing. We grabbed our ribs and drinks and scouted out a place on the lawn to kick back and listen. Talk about disappointment. The sound system sucked and Debbie wasn't miked up enough for us to hear her over the instruments. That in addition to the terrible sound quality led to us leaving early because I couldn't even discern her staple songs like "The Tide is High" when they were playing them.

On Sunday, while Katie was at work, I finally caught a screening of The Matrix: Reloaded which I've been wanting to see for a while and it may be gone pretty soon. Not too great, but not horrible. It's what I had been expecting it to be. Afterwards, I went to Woodfield Mall to have the battery swapped out on my Fossil watch. They have to be changed out at Fossil stores or the warranty is voided which sucks. However, this gave me an excuse to lose a few pounds in drool at the Apple Store gawking at the computers and peripherals that I could so easily spend a year's worth of salary on. Oh if only. Where's a winning lottery ticket when I need it?