Back in the office after a nice Memorial Day weekend break, one which included three consecutive nights of eight hours of sleep. That hasn’t happened since I don’t know when.
Though many other things occupied my mind these past few days, sport is always a happy distraction. I was able to catch some softball this weekend, and was disappointed that my Cal Golden Bears failed to advance to the World Series. I was happy that Virginia (Wahoo-Wah!)brought home the men’s lacrosse title, and happier still that Cal won the NCAA women’s crew title. For the first time ever, a Cal player won the women’s single tennis championship. Though I do care about college football, I also care about the so-called "minor sports" a great deal.
One of the famed local races is the Mt. Wilson Trail Race; two of my best friends, Sharon Pevsner and Jannifer Heiner, finished first and third respectively on Saturday. I’m very proud of them! I didn’t run this year myself — my next race is tentatively scheduled to be this one.
And of course, I’m looking forward to the World Cup, which starts in less than two weeks. I’ve followed every World Cup avidly since 1982. I’ll be rooting for England and all the African countries, of course; my wife will be rooting for Croatia. And naturally, we’ll be madly rooting AGAINST Brazil and Germany, the two countries I would least like to see win another championship.
Why not root for your country as well? Is the U.S.A. that bad to you liberals?
Sorry, I meant “progressives.”
The USA dominates the world in many things, Man o; I see no reason why they must dominate in soccer as well.
Mind you, if the US was playing Brazil, Germany, or Mexico (my three least favorite international teams), I’d root for the USA.
BTW, I carry a UK passport as well as a United States one. “My country” can mean more than one thing to many of us.
The Freudian in me is wondering why you posted a somewhat fluffy post about sports right after a long, smart post on the hard limit accusatins of homosexuality impose on masculinity in our society. Kinda screams “I’m not gay!!!!” to me…
It was a good weekend for women’s sports at Northwestern too! Women’s LAX won their second straight national championship, and softball is in the Women’s College World Series for the first time in 20 years. Maybe this will help get past some of the bad press about the women’s soccer hazing…
Lorie, yes, well done — with Cal out, I’ll root for you in the WCWS. And congrats on women’s lax, too.
Dustin, I posted this BEFORE the post on homosexuality! :-) And I post pretty frequently about sports, though less about the big ones (NFL, NBA, MLB) and more about the minor ones (cross-country, marathoning, women’s basketball and softball, men’s soccer, and so forth).
Yeah, yeah, Hugo. Insist all you want…
You do know I’m just kidding, right? I don’t have an inner Freudian.
Re the World Cup: Well, being an expat, even though a liberal/progressive, I usually root for the US. I think living overseas tends to make people more gung ho about supporting their country’s sports teams.
Also because I tend to root for the underdog and the US usually is one in soccer.
But, although I know Brazil has won so many World Cups, I just love to see them play as a team. They just seem to be all parts of one completely integrated whole. And I always support Nigeria, which is unfortunately not in the World Cup this time, so may have to go with S. Africa, which really did poorly in the recent Africa Cup that was held here (and Egypt won, Go Egypt!) Or, then again, Cote D’Ivoire (who lost the final match in the Africa cup but was a really good team and has that really great player Drogba), hmm, I can’t decide.
Oh, I will definitely be rooting for Ivory Coast. I am sorry that Nigeria and Cameroon aren’t in it this year.
I agree, the Brazilians play beautiful soccer — but they still have dominated for too long, and it’s time for someone else.
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