Losing Is Winning

 My long-time friend and lover of football (REAL FOOTBALL not that American run around with the ball in your hands version), the Count, have a long tradition of betting on the results of certain games. This started innocuously enough as he is a passionate supporter of the English Premier League team Chelsea, and I am a passionate supporter of no one. But for some reason we decided that I would root for a recently promoted minnow team (I can't even remember their name!) that clearly was going to go nowhere. We jokingly bet a meal on a game where my team was visiting Chelsea where no minnow would be expected to win. But no! They did win. Next year, I jokingly up the ante with a double or nothing offer. Damn my team won again. This improbable run continued through a third year with the Count now in debt to having to visit Ghana! (More on this in a future post).

We then zeroed things out and started over. Our next bet ended up with me losing and the price was I had to go to lunch at a fast food place called Arby's to mock my usual culinary focus. Yesterday was pay up day.

I approach feeling a little like Christians being fed to the lions in the Colosseum

Gad, how many freaking options are there. One of the Counts people say I should try the Fish Sandwich. I hate Fish Sandwiches. No way.

The Count orders the improbable Gyro with Lamb. Who serves lamb in a U.S. fast food place? Evidently Arby's does. I really like lamb. I am going to give it a try too.

Damn! It's really good. Real meat. Not the reconstituted meat paste that you get at so many Greek places here in Albuquerque (including some higher end ones!)

I can see this being something I will be going back for. Who would have believed?

World Cup Fever - Death By Underachievement

I coached football...I mean soccer...even though it is called football in all the rest of the world but the US...for 20 years. I think I have a pretty good appreciation for what the 'beautiful game' can be. But I have never been a fan of the World Cup (or for that matter any of the tournaments featuring nations' National Teams).

The reason is simply that the quality of the soccer sucks. There are all kinds of reasons for this and they've been around for decades but are blithely ignored by some kind of mass delusion among the football faithful around the glove. First, all the players make their money playing professional soccer for nine months out of the year. These tournaments all come when the top players and even middling players are exhausted from their long, long seasons. Second, they are played in summer when it is freaking hot. The combination of these two tend to drag the speed of play down to a crawl. Combine this with a third factor, most teams play to not lose. They pack their defenses back, try desperately to not give up a goal, are perfectly happy to take their chances with penalty kicks. This leads to some incredibly dull action.

I managed to avoid  the entire opening round and just read about things in the paper. But my buddy, The Count, who is a big football fan, goaded me into joining the event. This has led to my actually watching some games (sadly given their quality) and of course missing the few games because of schedule that were pretty good. Because the Count and I tend to text back and forth during these encounters, it also has led to a happy revival of my innate cynicism. Here is a sample dialog:

de-I
    Russia vs Spain - ah now we are at the real World Cup - 90 minutes (including the overtime) of no attempt to score whatsoever  to get to penalty kicks. Can’t wait for more excitement like this

The Count
    Yes, that was a boring match.

de-I
    I love the between game commentators “Could the incredibly heavy schedules of these stars affect their play?” Really you think? This why I am not a World Cup fan. The game played at its most exhausted
  
 -------------
de-I
    Let’s take a deep breath and hope game two (Denmark vs Croatia) does not put us to sleep

The Count
    Lol
    I really like Croatia
    Tough team

de-I
    Onwards Catholics against the Protestant for glory in the World Cup

The Count
    What a start (two goals were scored in  the first 4 minutes - the only goals of the match!)

de-I
    Now time for the two of them to pack it in for the rest of the match!!!

The Count
    LOL

de-I
    I am very disappointed in Denmark...actually trying to possess the ball and attack. What are they thinking?

The Count
    You are on a roll today

de-I
    I should have stuck to just reading about it in the paper
    Donated blood yesterday and too tired to do productive work

The Count
    LOL
    I am much happier you are watching now
    This cynicism makes it incredible

de-I
    This unseemly actual playing of the game is not giving me much to be cynical about
    It has been very difficult to nap with all this attacking taking place

The Count
    LOL

de-I
    I’m counting on Denmark packing it in in the second half so I can rest (which they did!)

So as we come to the quarter finals,



Let's see what’s on our sumptuous buffet

I’d say two games that have promise and two that one would hope they would just cancel

Croatia vs Russia - Well Russia is just going to pack it in so can we cancel the game, promise we’ll watch 15 minutes of commercials and go right to the shoot out?

England vs Sweden - Hard to imagine much excitement here. They will sort of attack but look tired doing so and most passes will miss. So I recommend the organizers limit us to one half of action, we promise 10 minutes of commercials and then go to PK’s

Uruguay vs France - Hmmm this actually might be something worth watching as long as the Uruguayans don’t revert to their pre-Tabarez thug mentality

Brazil vs Belgium - dare we hope for what these two teams can bring us? I hope so.