Saturday, June 24, 2006

Random Observations that Don't Merit Full Entries of Their Own

1. A tall cup of coffee costs $1.59, which means that when someone hands me $2.00, they get a quarter, a dime, a nickel, and a penny as change.

2. The espresso shot to steamed milk ratio is the highest in a grande latte (1:7 vs. 1:11 in a tall and 1:9 in a venti).

3. If you place a one-pound bag of French Roast beans next to a one-pound bag of Breakfast Blend beans, it will be a couple inches taller (the beans are lighter, so it takes more to make a pound).

4. If you think I'm a geek, you should see the kinds of conversations my friends have. I love my geek friends.

5. Americans pretend to like soccer, but no one watches when it's not the World Cup. They really just like cheering for the USA against other countries. That's probably why there are so many wars.

6. Day camp employees are one of the few groups of people who will look at the weather forecast and say, "Oh, good! The thunderstorms are going to hold off until the weekend. I hope it will rain all weekend and be nice again for Monday!"

7. Kids get really excited about being allowed to ride the golf cart. Aw, who am I kidding, so do adults.

8. There is nothing like a sprinkler on a hot day.

9. As much fun as the Bollywood videos on channel 35 are, the commercials for online matrimonial services are even cooler.

P.S. My father-in-law saw a video online the other day in which a soccer player jumped in the air, flipped over, scissor-kicked in mid-air, and kicked the ball into the net behind him, scoring a goal. When he told us about it, we spent like an hour trying to find it again, but to no avail. Reward offered to the first person to find it for me.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

lol, well i'm not taking offense at #5 per se, but i thought i'd call you on your generalization...I'm an American and I've loved soccer ever since the summer between my third and fourth grade years, when I started playing in the Holland Youth League. So, I ended up playing in that league for seven years, when I aged out of it, and then was a referee for that league a few years later. I also played in the Elma Marilla Wales youth league from the fall of my fifth grade year until I was a sophomore in high school and also had my first paying job as a referee in that league for four years. I played on the Boys Modified Soccer Team and then the Girls Modified Soccer Team for my public Middle School, and while i got cut from the Junior Varsity soccer team at Holland I played on the Holland U-16 & U-18 travel teams, as well as the Holland Indoor Soccer League and also played goalie with at an indoor tournament with the Varsity Team. I also played with the Houghton JV team for two years, my sophomore and Senior years. I've been trying to watch as much of the cup as possible, and I'd follow Arsenal of the English Premiership if I could, but I just can't afford to get the cable networks that carry it...However one of my best friends grew up in Holland & Amherst, NY and after spending a year in Ireland, his favorite team is Leicester City and he keeps me pretty informed of all the European football teams, but especially how they relate to his team. I've also been watching the games in a coffee bar in Buffalo with quite a few other fans who enjoy the sport and do cheer for other teams besides America--and some of these people actually got up at two am to watch games from the last Cup...I'm sorry if this post sounds snarky and obsessive, (well that's prolly because i AM obsessing over the Cup), but i'm soooo sick of hearing people talk about American's ignorance about football and saying that Americans hate football. And maybe i'm just alittle touchy about how much our teams sucks, lol...anyway...Go Germany!! =)
~Marlene

Kate said...

My turn to be snarky about #5, only the other part of it. I can understand your comment about wars if you are saying that most wars are over stupid non-issues based on artificial nationalistic feelings, but if you're saying Americans cheering for the home team is a sign of arrogant war-mongering, please remember that most other countries do the same thing, often to a greater extent. I mean, have you seen videos of the massive crowds of Koreans all in the same red shirt cheering for these games?

Novac said...

Well, since you didn't give any details, it could have been one of many clips. Here are some:
Here's a textbook scissor kick (from central defender Cahill, nonetheless)
Perfect Placement
Giuly gol
Standard scissor kick

I've always preferred bicycle kicks, so here are some of those:
Bicycle Kick 1
Bicycle Kick 2

And if you think we're geeks, you should know that 90% of the YouTube videos for scissor kicks were video game captures that people have posted. Quite annoying, especially since the quality of the video game and poor quality of the videos makes it difficult to determine if it's real or not. (Search YouTube for "pes5" and prepared to be frightened.)

Let me also disagree with your #5, but for different reasons. As for Americans . . . I don't know any Americans who pretend to like soccer. Most Americans just DON'T like soccer and don't pretend. Most of my co-workers who see me watching the World Cup complain about the sport. Of course, the World Cup and Olympics are the only time we get to root for our country in soccer. It's also the only time we can consistently see televised soccer on the networks. Of course, FSW has plenty of soccer on.

Christine said...

The movie is the intro of the Pink Panther.

Anonymous said...

Well, Honduras and El Salvador actually did go to war over a football match.

Anonymous said...

For the full story... on a real war started over soccer,

http://www.onwar.com/aced/data/sierra/soccer1969.htm

Christine said...

Do you get educated on different types of tea at Starbucks as well as coffee?