World Cup XI

The players who have inspired me in the World Cup

Goalkeepers

Paston - An amazing keeper, great at stopping shots. It seemed like quite a lot of shots came straight at him, but that's hard to stop with a ball like the jabulani.

Enyeama - Something about him seems like a lion, or a leopard. Sleek, athletic. He lefthandedly kept Messi goalless.

Defenders

Isla - Smart, quick, great attacking player from the back in the 3-3-3-1 formation for Chile. Worked really well with Sanchez.

Salcido - Likes shooting, from anywhere.

Metresacker - A big friendly man. Never gets a yellow card. Can actually pass the ball. The best German player against Spain.

Cha Du-Ri - Always left in plenty of space by the opposition. He got so much of the ball against Uruguay. I think it was on purpose. He tries so hard though.

Midfielders

Ozil - Constant craving. k d lang's had his photo as her Facebook profile picture. Quicker than you'd think he is. Doesn't hold on to the ball for a second longer than he should, puts the ball in the right place.

Alexis Sanchez - Not a dirty player at all. Direct. He doesn't see opponents, he just sees training cones. His neck bulges with veins. He loves shooting. The ball.

Mark van Bommel - Stereoscopic vision with a chip in his head that knows exactly where the cameras and ref are watching at every point in time. He can do the most vicious foul and make it seem like it was all the other guy's fault. Did not get a yellow card until the semi-final, and that was for wasting time in the 90th minute. The shortest yellow card in history.

Arjen Robben - The most handsome man in world football, when Robben smiles, the light can... it is hoped, one day make Craig Foster see teams that aren't Arsenal or Barcelona. His implied speed makes time slow around him. The most beautiful left foot in the world. You know what he's going to do but you can't stop him, aka his goal against Slovakia. The unique wobbly way he walks, kind of like a penguin.

Chung-yong Lee - The darling of Korean football, skills, trickery, great shooting. Even scored a header against Argentina. Plays for one of the brightest teams in world football, Bolton Wanderers.

Clint Dempsey - Give it to the doctor. McDreamy. He can play in midfield or as a forward. Tough, fast, texan.

Landon Donovan - Runs like he's taking lots of little steps and rolls his sleeve up, like he's going to get to work.

Milos Krasic - The worst Shane Watson look a like. My how we booed when he played Australia. It really got to him because he did absolutely nothing with the ball, missed an open goal, hit every cross into the crowd, got moved into the centre of midfield away from the crowd, and then subbed off in the second half. Serbia finished bottom of their group.

Forwards

Harry Kewell - Looked absolutely amazing playing as the lone forward against Ghana. Shame he got sent off, everything was going through him.

David Villa - He can shoot and actually looks like he might score. Unlike every other player on the Spanish team. The most defensive team ever to win the World Cup.

Georgie Welcome - Thank you. You're welcome. No, you're welcome. I'm Welcome. Georgie Welcome.

Coach

Jogi Low - That cardigan. So beautiful, baby blue. They made a wonderful couple, him and his assistant coach. It's a new Germany.

World Cup Diary - Part 1

23 June, 2010

The last trip to South Africa was more about the place. This trip has been more about the football.

It's always hard to predict World Cups so I decided to place a few bets on some long shots at the tournament. I bet on S. Kalou, S. Eto'o and Obafemi Martins to be the top scorer. All have been knocked out of the tournament, grand total of 1 goal scored between them. My tip of a Brazil - Nigeria is over as well, I think I will get it half right.

The surprise of the tournament so far was a sparkling performance by Slovenia against USMNT. They were ahead 2-0 at half-time. The first goal, a cracking left foot shot from about 20 metres out that flew past the keeper's outstretched left hand.

I was at the blackjack tables making up my losses from the previous day during half-time, and was on a pretty good run so I missed most of the second half.

The Sun City complex was pretty good to watch the game on the big screen. We bumped into Australian royalty. Robbie Slater. It also turned out we were sitting next to Eugene Galekovich's sister. Lovely person, really down to earh, bit surprising that the FFA don't pay for her accommodation.

It's always a weird feeling when you are on holiday because you think that you didn't come thousands of kilometres just to hang out with Australians. Maybe it is the natural tendency just to stick to what you are familiar with.

We stayed at Kedar Hotel. Unfortunately, Ray discovered there was no hot water only after getting in the shower. I usually test the water before going in. The bathroom even had a bath tub, there is not much better.

Rustenburg means place of rest. The daily routine was pretty perfect. I think it's much better than my normal routine. A day went something like -

• Wake up sometime between 7 and 9
• Put the television on and catch up on the news and action you missed
• Have a nice hot shower
• Stroll down to breakfast
• Sit at any table you like (the table at the juice bar is the best) Juice comes in tiny glasses, not sure why

It was on this trip that I realised that breakfast should be a 3 course meal

1. First course is bacon, with a fried egg, beans. Have a slice of toast if you feel the need to impress people
2. Second course is pancakes or pikelets. The serving I was previously familiar with was three pancakes. Why stop there. I really think six is a lot better. I still need to figure out how to get even syrup distribution across the stack.
3. Third course is a bowl of plain yoghurt with a sprinkling of sugar. This cleanses the palate.
4. The fourth course is then a serving of fruit salad.
5. The fifth course is then a mini muffin or a croissant.

The beauty of a buffet breakfast is that you do not feel like a pig because there's so much that you didn't eat. I realise that you can sometimes feel full, but it's more like you are just over it. Like you wouldn't really want more bacon and eggs, but definitely a bit of fruit salad.

• Have a nap
• Wake up
• Head out to lunch, and eat while watching the first game
• Then watch the second game
• Come back to hotel
• Have buffet dinner
• Go to room and try and watch third game

Contentment.

I love food

Some offices are great, trusting organisations that care for the welfare and nourishment of their employees. My office provides toast, cereal, milk, cutlery. Even so, some of our richer employees bring their own food in, gourmet cereals. The kind that are lightly toasted muesli made in Switzerland.

Labelling is important. People like to know what they are getting into. And who they are. Usually a name will do.

The label for the food was a yellow post-it, 'I love food'. We don't really have anyone named that, so I was happily eating the lightly toasted, muesli. It was pretty damn good. A few other people started eating it too.

I asked them if they love food. They were so enthusiastic in their agreement. When I said I'm meh to food, they were astounded, flabbergasted. I love so many things more than food, like music, soccer, good conversations with friends, staring at the wall. Maybe that's weird because it seems like food is the best thing in the world to most people.

There is nothing cooler than professing your love for food, and talking about great new places to eat. I guess maybe we should all be a bit preoccupied with food, because there is an epidemic of obesity, people are getting taller, people are trying to eat better.

There are even slow cookers out there, which you can just set to cook before you leave for work and then come back and eat it! Outstanding. I nearly burnt down my office making waffles... slow cooking does sound like fun.

Sponsored time

Diseases can do it. So can facial hair, in partnership with a disease. How do we decide who sponsors the time? We can have World Cocktail week, Movember. The length of time doesn't seem to relate to the importance. I always felt like a woman with great cleavage during Movember... people would just talk to my mo. I'm up here!

The Earth only got one hour. Then again, what has the Earth done for me lately?

I was at a party recently, and I didn't realise that it was Earth Hour. The party was split right down the middle. The people outside wanted the air conditioning off, because they wanted to have the doors open, to move in and out. The people inside wanted the air conditioning on because it was really hot.

The people outside asked if we could have the TV off, or at least the lights off and switch to candles. The Swans are always on during Earth Hour, but who knows how long AFL goes for?

Some people may think this doesn't make sense. Why should people outside complain and ask those inside to turn the air conditioning off? It doesn't really have any effect on them does it? Why, it's just like the US and other developed countries telling China, India, and the developing nations to not burn fossil fuels and so on. Or maybe it's just that the Hour itself doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things. The future is not going to be one where we have to conserve energy like we conserve water, only switching our lights on every other day. We might be better off just getting better light bulbs and keeping them on all the time.

I guess it doesn't really matter. What's one hour out of your whole year? We could go our whole lives thinking like that.

Gagasm

Watching the latest video clip by Lady Gaga, I was contemplating why she went to prison. Apparently it was because she'd been very bad.

Then I read that Lady Gaga can give herself orgasms, just through the power of her mind. That can't be bad?

It really could be. What if the secret got out, through her music and videos, or even through her clothes and pop icon status? What if we lived in a world where everyone could do that?

It's a power that not everyone should have. A pop star like the Gaga has evolved this ability out of necessity. She has repeatedly mentioned in interviews how she just doesn't have the time for relationships and dating. Not to mention, she is often travelling long distances, or trapped in public areas for long times so she just doesn't have the access to the necessary equipment/men. And by doing it all mentally, even though it does seem a bit lazy, and a bit selfish, it probably is the cleanest way to go about it.

If everybody could have this power, would anyone really bother with relationships? Wouldn't self loving just lead to more egotistical idiots going around?

This may well be the case. An alternative would be that with everyone having access to a gagasm (be it through mental means, or just an alleged anatomical perk), it really just removes the need for sex. That way, you wouldn't have to wonder about 'meaningless sex', because each relationship would just be out of choice, about truly wanting to be with someone.

I'm a romantic.

The Oldest Person in the World

There is a new oldest person ever.  It's a woman (of course).  I can't believe she's Georgian.  I would have thought that she'd be Japanese, or Mediterranean, not from a former Soviet Republic, that is in the middle of Asia/Europe and right near Kazakhstan.

I'm a big fan of old people.  I can't wait until I'm old.  The beauty of being old is that people have to listen to what you say, even if it's the most inappropriate thing ever.  Old people can do whatever they want, really, because they've lived through it all.  Of course, the bad thing is becoming senile, and not really knowing what's going on.  

I think I'd be senile too.  I can imagine when Mrs Oldestwomanintheworldvilli was a kid, and hearing about the latest craze, the next new thing that was going to change the world.  Smoking whale blubber, the crazy fur hat, tattoos of countries on your head.  She's seen it all.  It's hard to get excited about an iPod when you're 129.  It's even harder to get excited about an iPod app.

She's earned the respect.  I just think it's a little too long, I wouldn't really want to live past 80.  

There is one thing I wonder.  What happens when she laughs inappropriately?  When she pulls a prank on an unsuspecting person?  What happens when she does something really stupid?  Do people tell her to 'act her age'? 

Life is defined by definition

Ever since I've gotten HD television, I've been exposed to a new clarity. It's more real than real life.
When I'm watching sport, I can see the blades of grass. I can see the people's faces. There is no way in reality I could ever get that clarity. Hyper-real.
I've started dreaming in HD too. It's vivid. Powerful. It's like being too close to a TV screen.
It's starting to transfer into real life. After a big night out, I wake up, and everything is in standard definition. Sometimes it's even in that television that was twenty years ago, the fuzzy screens when you'd watch SBS late at night.
Sometimes, I reach the zone. Mind at peace. And the world is in crystal clear HD. It never existed before. So I thank Mr HD.
It's hard to think that it could get any better. It will though. 3D. I am really looking forward to being able to dream in 3D. The problem I see with 3D tv, is that TV is really a social experience sometimes. I remember being in the cinemas and trying to have a chat while Avatar was on. I couldn't really, because my depth perception was all messed up. People are hard to understand when they are wearing 3D glasses as well. They seem like they are from the future, or from an alien world. I really can't imagine in the future that I'm going to be sitting around in my lounge room, 3d glasses on, chilling with my mates and watching football.