I grumbled out of bed early on Saturday morning – okay, I didn’t grumble. But I grumped out of bed early on Saturday morning to head down to our local EuroCafe in Astoria to watch England beat Paraguay one-nil (as Stuart insists on my saying, rather than one-zero, pfah, pedant). Yes! I got out of bed early to watch sports. I know, what’s next, NASCAR?
In all seriousness because I’d never enjoy the near-death that is race-car driving, I enjoyed the game immensely. Football – and before you say anything, I have to call it that, it’s in my marriage contract – is one of the few sports I both understand and enjoy watching. I understand baseball but it’s boring unless it’s the minor leagues, I willfully do not comprehend [US] football because I was on drill team and was forced to watch a whole year of games wearing lycra, and basketball is just too loud for me to enjoy in person and too boring to watch on TV. So that pretty much leaves football and cricket, which will take a full lifetime to explain to me and I’m using my lifetime, thanks.
So, what I’m saying is, World Cup = good. I’ll be watching all the England games (and the games in England’s group) and the Brazil games, as well as the USA games for, ahem, as long as they continue. I even spent 20 grueling minutes of my lunchbreak finishing off the Czech-USA game in the bar across the street (I had a COKE, okay). My personal favourite moment of the football-laden weekend was when Stuart explained offsides to me for the umpteenth time but this time involved TEAM SWEET-N-LOW V. TEAM DOMINO with a wadded bit of napkin as the ball. GO TEAM DOMINO! I still barely get it and whilst watching an actual match, have a hard time spotting an offside until someone points it out, usually Marcel Balboa, that sweet-voiced young thing.
Also, wicked points for all the hot young players on the field (hello, baseball, NOT SO MUCH) and getting a little verklempt when Stuart hums “Three Lions”. Forty years of hurt, indeed. Plus, watching the afternoon games on univision because ABC has moved on to golf means hearing “GOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA … AAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLL!” reverberating across the apartment.
This month could make a hooligan out of me yet.
there are quite a few VP’s in my office that are brits, or brit-raised, so we were actually sent INVITES to watch certain matches of the World Cup. Just spent a good two hours, while “working”, watching the US v Czech game (so sad). Glad to see you made it across the street to enjoy as well!
I noticed that you’d tagged this entry “sporty,” so out of curiosity I clicked to see what other entries are in this category…HA!
Leah – the blog, SHE EVOLVES WITH ME, see.
I peh-peh-ed football due my my straight up aversion to most things sporty on televison.
We too, sit up on the early couch of Saturday and Sunday to watch Univision.
I have never had so much fun following something. Our brother in Oz celebrates the wallop to Japan while we shrug in indifference as the US doesn’t manage to domintate something else.
So, GOL! GOL! GOL! to you and yours.
Cheers!
Just for you, krissa, this is how the offside rule works:
You sit in the pub with your husband, getting a crick in your neck as you watch the men run around after a ball in a country far away, and wish you had brought a book, albeit one that no-one would notice.
Keep your radar alert for sudden intakes of breath. Whenever this happens, glance at the screen to catch the replay, and nod or shake your head as appropriate.
Whenever the husband, or other members of the crowd, yell “OFFside!” in an aggrieved tone, make dismayed noises. Study replay carefully. See where the one guy was running towards the goal ahead of the ones from the other team, and someone kicked the ball to him? That’s the offide. Why they make such a big deal about it is the real mystery.
Karen, you’re hilarious.
There is now a bit of my flesh-and-blood in Astoria (28th St? 27th? I am a bad parent), so if you do go all “England-RULES-I’m-gonna-beat-your-face-in, you-git!” as the result of the World Cup, avoid the tall blond guy that way.
Oh, and anytime you want to stop by and organize his closets, feel free. God knows his mother and I had twenty-three years and we couldn’t do it. Apparently you young people have to BE ON YOUR OWN before THE WISDOM OF YOUR ELDERS takes effect.
why are you spelling words like the British? I get that you’re married to one, but you’re not one. You’re like Madonna who suddenly developed a british accent after just after marrying her british bloke. Accents don’t compute that way and neither do spellings.
Gosh, ohdear, I guess we can’t have an email discussion about my fakery since I doubt goway@gmail.com is actually an address!
To answer your concern, I spell a lot of words th e “british” way because I went to school overseas in a very British-influenced American school and have always naturally spelt words that way, like favourite. It has nothing to DO with marrying a Brit, so I’m not much of a fake there. That spelling was how I was taught.
I’m using English words for soccer terminology to please my husband and all my English friends while I support their team. No fakery there. Please keep in mind that I’m not faking an accent, “ohdear”, I’m just borrowing the football terms.
Although you probably meant it as an insult, I’d be thrilled to be as hot and rich as Madonna when I’m that old, actually.
I do SINCERELY hope I’ve satisfied you, though. Must be that fake acquiescent English impulse I’ve developed.
I’ve hated sports all my life (except for hockey). But ever since moving to Prague and watching my first REAL football game 2 years ago in a pub surrounded by crazy fans, I’ve caught the bug, big time. Proper football rocks! I can see why everyone in Europe goes so crazy for it… HOWEVER… seeing as I watch all the games in Czech pubs with all my Czech students and I’ve been happier here in Prague for the past 2 years than I’ve ever been… I have to say the Czech USA game was EXACTLY as I hoped it would be. My loyalties… they’re fickle.
A treasured memory from my time in Budapest, working for a world music website: I was instructed that the first rule was AMERICAN ENGLISH ONLY, because “we don’t want subscribers to think we are all hoity-toity europeans.” Yay for being a hoity-toity user of what I like to think of as European English, krissa. You are cosmopolitan, not fake; and mr goway should keep reading PH in order to broaden his horizons.
Krissa, please make no apologies for spelling or using words in the British fashion – especially not football. I’m an English girl living in Australia and I’m about to lie down and take a nice nap for the duration of the three hours and 47 minutes I’m afforded before the next England match (2am AEST) to RECOVER from the exhaustion of explaining to my goddamn gloriously stubborn Australian friends that it is NOT the Soccer World Cup. Prats.