What is soccer? “Soccer — also known as “the boring football” — consists of large groups of players kicking a ball, then chasing said ball back and forth on a field for extended periods of time.”
http://www.cracked.com/article_14785_cracked-faq-world-cup.html
“If there’s anything that resonates with the World Cup spirit, it’s hundreds and hundreds of cheering, excitable, weirdly dressed … RoboCop-styled policemen.”
http://www.cracked.com/quick-fixes/4-scenes-from-world-cup-right-out-dystopian-future/
John Oliver explains FIFA:
Nevertheless, this is pretty cool:
An artist created 32 incredible photos for each World Cup team:
http://www.buzzfeed.com/jamiewalker/the-definitive-ranking-of-world-cup-art-j6dg
Soccer is extremely exciting when it’s your daughter’s first game and she’s goalie AND when the coach makes you scrimmage against your daughter’s team. Adrenaline Rush!
But Jeremy is allowed to watch soccer in bed because I’m guaranteed to fall asleep. Zzzzzz
~~Trish
Weird.
1. Wow…I didn’t realize how much I miss John Oliver. 🙁 I need to hunt down his new show on the net.
2. I am not a football (soccer) fan, though I can tolerate watching a few minutes of it once in a while. Mostly, I prefer catching the highlights clips because that’s about all the real excitement the 90-minute game has to offer, wrapped up in a 5-minute clip.
3. I hope I’m wrong, but I will be absolutely amazed if Brazil pulls this thing off without a major incident.
4. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvUIbqKyppY
🙂
das
Not blog related.. but next time in Japan, can you check this out!
http://cooks.ndtv.com/article/show/this-clear-drop-of-water-is-actually-a-dessert-538540
Okay, I was skimming and thought I had read “World Cup…Robocop-style”. Now that’s a world cup I would watch!
@ JeffW – Then perhaps you should watch rugby. 😉
das
Joe, this might interest you – the CDC’s list of ‘powerhouse fruits and veggies’:
http://www.cdc.gov/pcd/issues/2014/13_0390.htm
das
My husband’s family is from Belgium…we are rooting for the Red Devils all the way!…
The king Edward III, God keep him in His Glory, banned it by decree and was banned for 500 years. A clear sign of the decline of Western culture is that this prohibition was removed.
And Brasil need education, measures against poverty and slave labor, and many more things before lavish world events.
Google Earth shows where the drones fly out in Antarctica.
https://www.google.com/maps/search/cafeteria/@-66.6036269,99.7204101,475m/data=!3m2!1e3!4b1!4m4!2m3!3m2!1scafeteria!2s-66.6035333,+99.7197917
This morning we had our first appreciable rainfall in days – weeks, even. So, I decided to go out in the rain and wash my car! And in the process I even washed me! It was a case of washing two birds with one downpour! 😀
I lemme tell ya, I needed it more than the car. 😛
das
Das: I wish we could send you some of our rain. We’ve been getting nearly two inches of rain per day for nearly two weeks! The grass is getting so high (we can’t mow it’s squishy), that might dad would have called it “snaky”. FYI, snakes like to hide in tall grass. 😉
I’m not into sports much. Rugby looks interesting though.
Couldn’t bloody care less about soccer or the World Cup.
My greatest fear, if I become a parent, is that I’ll be forced to sit through kids’ soccer games. I’m going to be heavily lobbying my kids to play anything — ANYTHING — else.
I’ll probably watch 2, maybe 3 World Cup games. If the final looks interesting I’ll look at that too. When it comes to major events in the world, like with the Olympics, it’s always good to catch at least some of it. It’s a good talking point too.
Hey nevermind all this (it’s not Rugby) I see David Hewlett is just becoming a permanent resident of Toronto, any chance of inviting him along for a “Weird Food” vid. 😉
or just put him to work lol
@Das:
I tried to when I lived in England. My love of (American) Football made watching Rugby a confusing affair. Plus I had to learn all the new position names! Too much effort; especially when I could just grab a pint at the local pub and enjoy all of the yelling and enthusiasm coming from the Brits vicariously 😉
@DP:
Did they move the Antarctica Chair to San Diego instead of Area 51?
@ Tam Dixon – Speaking of snakes, Matt the naturalist at the local state park came today and took away our northern water snake that was hanging around mom’s pond, eyeing up her goldfish. They will have him on display for a bit before releasing him into the wilds. I’ll miss him/her – it just looked so right making its home among the rocks. But mom won’t get within a hundred miles from a snake, so it had to find a new home. Matt also took a snapping turtle that showed up today. He’ll release that one right into the marshes. Hopefully it won’t end up as soup.
@ JeffW – Wot? You had trouble learning new positions such as loosehead prop, fly-half, and hooker? 😉 Rugby really isn’t that hard to understand – really – outside of some of the technicalities that supposedly even the referees don’t understand half the time (according to disgruntled fans, players, and coaches). All the average person needs to know is this – the ball can be kicked forward but not passed forward, you cannot block or tackle a player who is not in possession of the ball, and once a player is tackled (or otherwise off his feet), he is no longer in play but the ball is (it doesn’t go dead). There are other things, some of which have ‘softened’ the game a bit (such as no shoulder charges, no high tackles, no spear (pile-driving) tackles, and no tackling a player who is off his feet (in the air, such as someone jumping for the ball). But those rules also protect the players so that they can play – and sometimes even live – another day.
That said, I find that most American football fans really have trouble adapting to rugby because they can’t handle the unpredictable nature of the game (it’s not a game for ‘armchair quarterbacks’). However, that’s the very thing I love the most about the sport, and it’s what makes for some very exciting – and totally unexpected – plays.
That all said, your ‘beer option’ works well with any sport. 🙂
das
San Diego?
Soccer players chase that ball around the field for 90 minutes and can end up in a scoreless tie. Tennis is much more exciting. Points scored all the time and, most of the time, without the drama queen histrionics of soccer. ;-P
Nevertheless, I will watch some of the World Cup, as long as it doesn’t interfere with Wimbledon.
So Joe, who are you following and rooting for in Brazil world cup match? Remember Manchester United in the Primer league was once partially owned the former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin. He happened to be kicked out of office for corruption.
@DP:
This is what I get when I click on your link:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/55871901@N05/14215605880/
(Somewhere in San Diego.)
Is Google Maps having a brain cramp?
Love John Oliver.