Wednesday, June 23
Catching Up (Again!)
No, I didn't die, I've just been quite busy for the past few days, and haven't got round to writing anything here.And good busy, not busy doing nothing...
I think my last post was early on Saturday, when I was still up from the night before, working non-stop on this very blog (thanks for all of the positive comments on it, by the way). My plan at that point was to stay up until about 9 in the evening, and then to collapse into bed for a solid 15 hours of sleep, which would return me to my usual daily sleep cycle.
Of course, this didn't quite happen. I watched a bit of Saturday morning TV for the first time in years (I haven't been missing much), and then the repeat of The OC on Channel 4 (one of my new favourite shows. The girl is so incredibly beautiful!).
I managed to keep awake through Football Focus, but I could feel my eyelids drooping by about 3 in the afternoon. It probably didn't help that I was lying on the most comfortable sofa in the living room, with the volume on the TV turned most of the way down, and no-one else around.
It was at this point that I came up with an utterly genius solution: I would go to bed for an hour or so, and set my alarm for 5 in the afternoon, so that I could watch the football. I would then go back to bed at 10, after the second game, and sleep through until the next morning. Genius!
Of course, as per usual this plan went to shit. Typical.
I woke with a start at about 6.30, in the middle of a somewhat vivid dream, and very confused. For one, I didn't remember waking at 5 and turning off the alarm, which I must have done, since the switch on the side of it was pushed down into the 'Off' position. I distinctly remember setting it to 'On' before I dropped off. Weird.
I managed to catch the end of the Latvia-Germany game, and was wide awake for the second match of the evening, the Czech Republic and Holland. Thank fuck I was, because that was quite simply an awesome game. Truly one of the greatest games that I've ever seen, and worthy of the world stage. Fuck the FA Cup "not needing no Don", this game should be sent on video around the world to promote football. This could even penetrate the American market...
Anyway...
I can't remember anything else of any note happening, so I guess that I must have gone to bed pretty soon after. Meh.
Sunday. What did I do on Sunday? I'm struggling to remember the day's events, so nothing particularly important could have happened. In the evening we (me and a few housemates) went to the pub to watch the football. Yes, I know that it was on the BBC, but we wanted to watch the Greece game, and that was on digital BBC. Any excuse for a couple of pints, to be honest.
After that, we got back home to discover that Goodfellas was just about to start on Channel 4. I'd never seen it before (yes, shame on me), and everybody else was up for it, so that dominated the evening's viewing. Admittedly, 3 of us had laptops in the living room as well, all playing Champ, but we did watch the film.
I'm going to be absolutely frank for a moment here, and say that Goodfellas isn't all it's cracked up to be. Yes, it's a very good film, but I wouldn't raise it to quite the exalted platform on which it has been placed. It's definitely not as good as The Godfather I and II, and I can think of a fair few better films than Goodfellas. Cue loads of abuse from Goodfellas aficionados.
I was wide awake again by midnight (this is what happens when you don't sleep the night before), so I decided to sit up and watch the baseball on Channel 5. Baseball's my second-favourite American sport, behind American Football, and I enjoy watching it. It's very relaxing at 2 in the morning to hear the gentle and almost disinterested voices of the commentators, wittering on about whatever takes their fancy.
The fact that I understand baseball probably helps. Ice hockey is the only American sport which I don't really get, and it's also the only one that I don't particularly enjoy watching, save for that Stanley Cup 7th game a few weeks back. Give me some NFL or MLB any day of the week, and even some NBA.
I used to be into the NBA in a massive way when I was younger. I played for my school basketball team (I may even have been captain for a few games, if memory serves), and I used to religiously watch the NBA magazine show that used to be on Channel 4 on a Saturday and Sunday morning. This was around the time that the Bulls had their legendary Jordan-Pippen-Rodman team, and when the Houston Rockets won a couple of NBA titles. It must have been 1996-7, or thereabouts.
Getting back to the present day, it was thus nearly 4am by the time the baseball finished and I was able to roll into bed. I feel wrong watching a sporting event for (say) 75% of the way through, and then going to bed without knowing the result. This is why I sometimes found myself back at home, watching the repeats of the evening's Super League game at 2am. I don't even really like fucking rugby league, but it was on, and I was sure as hell going to watch it!
And that was my weekend. I'll start Monday on a new post.
