Conflicted viewing

As most of the world knows, FIFA's World Cup started on Friday.

Aside from a 1994 World Cup t-shirt I received as a gift, I recall that when I first remember hearing about the World Cup in 2002.  I was in Newfoundland at the time and was relatively upset to hear people who otherwise seemed to have no interest in soccer/football acting as though this was an event they cared about.  I couldn't understand how something that I basically hadn't ever heard of could be used as an excuse to cancel classes at university or motivate departments to book lecture halls for mass viewings.  Just about everything associated with the World Cup seemed implausible and upsetting.

In 2006 just as the next World Cup was getting underway my parents began hosting a Brazilian grad student for the summer.  Not surprisingly, she was interested in watching the World Cup - or at least those games in which Brazil was playing.

My recollection is that my parents didn't have cable or maybe they didn't have a functional TV - in any event, it was decided that World Cup viewing would happen at the house in which I was staying at the time (and that just happens to be adjacent to my parents' house).  As I didn't have all that much furniture we were able to arrange everything in the living room to maximize our comfort while watching Brazil's games.

Of course, it didn't take all that long for Neil and I to enjoy watching the games and start rooting for Brazil.

Somehow in this midst of this increasingly intense World Cup experience a English friend without cable called out of the blue and asked if he could bring his Canadian-born kids over to watch England play for the first time.  Within a matter of minutes they were in place for the game.

We were then drawn into the World Cup experience in a way I could never have expected even a week or two before.  All of a sudden I began to see why even people who otherwise aren't particularly soccer fans might enjoy following the event.

By the time 2010 rolled around I was living with Neil and Rebecca in Halifax and most of the games were easily streamable.  Instead of studying for then still-unscheduled comps (in my defense, I likely didn't even have a reading list by the time the event started) along with Neil (and sometimes Rebecca and Jeannette) I watched many more games than was likely healthy.  I was fully hooked on the experience and even more convinced that of all of the non-annual international sporting events it was the best.

It's so clearly the best because it happens only once every four years.  Or to put it differently, not so frequently that its appearance isn't noteworthy or that you're still burned out from all of the soccer you watched last time around.  On top of that, and very much in contrast to the Olympics (Summer or Winter), by including only one sport it is almost possible for an dedicated individual to watch every game.  And even if you don't watch every game there are few enough games that it is quite easy to keep up with the developments occurring in those games you don't watch.  Of course it's also nice that even though soccer is played world-wide only a limited number of the best teams qualify for each World Cup.  And even better is that when you live in a place like Canada that isn't likely to qualify this means that you (and also the networks covering the event) can focus on good games rather than distracting national allegiances.

Of course as enjoyable as the World Cup is as casual viewer, it's not entirely without its issues.  Last Week Tonight with John Oliver did a great job of introducing a variety of these significant issues in a recent episode.



[Embedded video]

So, eight years after Neil and I first began watching World Cup coverage Neil opted out because of dissatisfaction with the organization behind the event.  I, on the other hand, am also disappointed with the organizing body - but obviously not to the extent that I have decided to skip the event.  Instead, Jeannette have taken advantage of several cancellations this weekend to watch as much of the coverage as possible.

A Few Quick Notes 439

-As mentioned in the last post, today has been quite rainy and overcast thus far. To make matters worse, there has even been some suggestion that we may be in for thunder and lightening later today. Sounds like fun.

-We had our third Ultimate game of the season last night. Like our game last week, we were beaten pretty easily. Actually, we were really trounced in last night's game. I still don't know what happened, or how we lost so badly, but it almost seemed as though we barely even got a chance to touch the disc.

-On Thursday we went to a stand-up show at our local Yuk Yuk's comedy club. While the headliner wasn't my favourite, the show was generally quite enjoyable.

-Apparently the Canadian navy is in the midst of celebrating its 100th anniversary. Because of these celebrations quite a number of foreign naval vessels (and their sailors) are in port. This has meant that for the past number of days the place has been infested with foreign sailors, many of whom appear to be in their early twenties. One of the strange upside of this seems to be that some of the bars showing World Cup soccer matches seem to have more nationals for many of the matches than they might otherwise have had. Yesterday while walking down Spring Garden as the England-Germany match was about to start I heard what must have been a few dozen British sailors singing in one of the local sports bars (though I presume this rather jubilant mood was brought to a rather sudden halt due to both the English team's goal deficit and because of bad officiating).

-I should get going, I have to head to school to drop a few things (including library books) off.

A New Shelving Unit: As Good as Being Present

A few days ago Neil and Rebecca realized that they needed more storage space. After a brief search and period of contemplation, they settled on a shelving unit that is on sale this week at Canadian Tire.

This morning Neil and I made our way over to the local Canadian Tire to pick one up. Amazingly the shopping experience was relatively quick and painless (I wasn't paying).

Not to long ago we brought the shelving unit back to our apartment. After a few minutes of dilly-dallying (meaning until the end of the Germany-Serbia World Cup game) we started to unpack the the shelving unit. At this point I thought that our readers would really probably like to follow along with the assembly process through a session of live-blogging, so here we are. Check back to follow our progress.

10:35 - Neil and Rebecca's bedroom has been rearranged so that he assembly of the shelving unit can take place on site. We have also pulled all of the parts of the shelving unit out of the box and placed them at various points around the perimeter of the room or in the adjacent hallway. My sense is that right now Neil is counting the hinges and screws to make sure that we have everything before we start.

10:37 - I am now busy live blogging while Neil continues his preparations. If he doesn't hurry up I may end up just taking a nap.

10:40 - I am now back in the room. We just discussed how best to cover this momentous event - we agreed live-blogging would be better than a time-lapse as we missed the key unboxing phase of the process.



10:52 - The assembly process has now started in earnest. We have attached two pieces to one another and are about to attach the third.

11:01 - We now have 5 pieces completely or partially attached to one another. We also have started streaming the US-Slovenia World Cup game via CBC.ca.

11:20 - Things are starting to take shape now, both sides have been added. That being said, we are still a ways away from being done. In other news, it seems that the US are now down 0-1 to Slovenia.

11:28 - We just popped the top on. I think we will soon need to flip the unit over to add the structural cardboard to the back.

11:40 - Neil is now putting the nails into the structural cardboard on the back of the unit. We will need to pound in about 40 nails in total. I guess once we are done with this step we will have to flip it over again and then add the front doors and a few more shelves. I guess if I am hopeful and optimistic I might suggest that the end is in sight.

11:44 - Slovenia just scored a second goal, really putting the US in a tough spot. Oh, and Neil is still pounding away at the structural cardboard nails.

12:13 - The doors have been attached and the unit is now upright, though not quite in position. Hopefully the door hinges won't require much adjustment as I think that it won't be particularly straightforward to adjust these doors.

12:18 - Neil is now in the midst of attaching the unit to the wall to take advantage of the included fall arrest system.

12:20 - Neil is emitting some strange grunting sounds during the fall arrest construction process. Pretty graphic if you ask me.

12:22 - The handles are now on the doors.

12:29 - We just adjusted the doors, which was a little uncomfortable and unpleasant but not too bad.

12:33 - I think that we are basically done, though eventually a few more shelves will be inserted. I think that this likely won't be done until Rebecca returns and can be consulted on shelf arrangement and what exactly will be placed on the shelves. So I guess that is the end of this live-blogging experience.



Here is the unit in its almost final form.