Posts Tagged ‘watching sports’
Sports Watching
Somehow, while I wasn’t paying attention, it has become December the sixth. I blame the World Cup. It feels weird to be watching it in the winter. No matter what else I should be doing each day, chunks of the morning and afternoon have been consumed with hours of sports spectating.
On Sunday, I made accommodations for viewing a little simultaneous NFL Minnesota Vikings during the England v Senegal match.
Yesterday, the laundry was folded while Japan and Croatia were on the telly.
Beyond the Cup viewing, I wake up and head to the barn to serve breakfast for the horses. I need to go back at noon because two of our horses need an extra serving of feed. Then I return at 4:00 p.m. to serve their dinner. With Cyndie now spending a bit of time in the kitchen, I get sent downstairs to fetch needed supplies and then wash dishes when she is done.
When needed, I hop outside to clear snow off the front steps and walkway. Cyndie has done a lot of online shopping and we are receiving package deliveries daily. I don’t want the drivers to think we aren’t expecting anyone to show up.
The days are just disappearing in a blink. I’ve got about a month and a half of this routine left until Cyndie’s follow-up appointment with the trauma surgeon to find out if she will be cleared to put weight on her repaired ankle.
Once she’s back to walking, we can split the time spent tending to the horses and she will be able to drive herself to appointments. I’ll have more time for watching sports just when the NFL conference playoffs will be happening.
I’m not doing that well with living in the moment since I’ve got my sights set on weeks from now when she regains the ability to walk. I guess I’d rather not think about the current situation. It’s a bit depressing. Not thinking about the here and now is how days appear to fly past quickly.
Works for me, except it has squashed my holiday spirit down to almost nothing. We’ll be getting ready for Valentine’s Day by the time things return to the usual routine around here. That is, assuming returning to usual is a given. None of us knows what future events might occur that could permanently change what is considered normal.
Makes me think of life for the people of Ukraine right now. Caring for a spouse who broke her ankle doesn’t seem like such an onerous task compared to being bombed by a foreign country day in and day out.
Given that, my routine isn’t nearly as bad as I tend to make it out to be. I mean, heck, I’m still able to make time to watch the World Cup.
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Good Things
There is frost on several of our double-pane windows this morning, revealing which ones have been compromised by the ravages of time. Our thermometer read -21°(F) when Cyndie took Delilah out for a walk and to check on how the chickens fared overnight. She reported the heaters were holding the coop temperature to 1° which we consider a win.
If any eggs laid today don’t freeze before we find and collect them, it will be a double win.
It is the morning before the big NFL championship game and there’s an incredible matchup of two quarterbacks on opposite phases of their careers. I wonder how those two guys are coping with their Sunday morning before the game. I would be a nervous psychological mess.
Happily, I get to sit on my easy chair, snack on special treats Cyndie will serve up, and witness the real-time drama of professional athletes battling each other and their own nerves in the biggest game of the season.
The sun is out, as it almost always is on the coldest winter days, and it looks almost inviting outside. Since we have the luxury of a warm house for protection from the harsh elements, it isn’t scary to step outside for short jaunts. This morning, first thing, I spotted three squirrels frolicking in the high branches of our trees.
If they can deal with extreme cold, certainly we can, too.
I like to think about the good things that result from cold winter days. There are no annoying mosquitos. I will not be surprised by the sudden slithering of a garden snake. I don’t have to slather my arms and legs with sunscreen lotion.
I don’t feel guilty about staying inside to watch other people getting exercise in a sports competition while I consume unnecessary calories in the comfort of my warm abode.
Happy Superbowl Sunday!
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Sports Binge
I went on a day-long TV spectator sports binge yesterday, in large part because, well… I could. At home, the only television signal we have is our antenna for free broadcasts from the Twin Cities. At Cyndie’s parents’ house, there were satellite channels for more sports than I could count.
This allowed me to catch the Golden Gophers college football game and the men’s US Open tennis final that wouldn’t have been available to me at home. Luckily, Fred was wise enough to record the Gopher game, as they were playing at Fresno State on the west coast and the game didn’t start until late Saturday night.
That meant we didn’t watch it until yesterday morning. I had peeked at the result already, so I knew the game was worth seeing. What a fantastic finish with the highlight-reel catch in the deepest possible corner of the endzone on 4th and 13 to tie the game with less than a minute left, and then the surprising interception in the second overtime to claim the win.
We followed that excitement with the NFL Vikings strong win over the Falcons in the opening game of the season. I’ll take it.
Next, there was a quick check of the MLB Twins to find they were trailing Cleveland. That game was usurped by the championship tennis match on ESPN.
Rafael Nadal outlasted a strong challenge from Daniil Medvedev in an epic four-hour-fifty-one-minute 5-set match. Those guys battled for almost five hours, one on one, no substitutions. No wonder Rafa collapsed after the final point.
I was ready to collapse. By the end of the day, I had watched so many athletes exhaust themselves, it wore me out.
Bingeing (I had to check that spelling) is not as easy as one might assume.
It will be good for me to get back home later today after work and return to my (almost) usual routine. This week will be another one spent without Cyndie at home. She is flying to Florida this morning to spend time with Dunia, who will be visiting from Guatemala.
I’ll go back to reading about sports outcomes in the paper, a day after they happen, for my fix of athletic adventures.
It’s kind of a “slow binge” on spectator sports, don’tcha know.
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Relative Something 