Pretend today was yesterday...

Actually, the previous post was posted yesterday - before Zidane's announcement - but due to some gremlin issues, the blog service did not post it. So, just pretend you're reading it yesterday.

Today of course, all hell is breaking loose with the Zidane-Materazzi fiasco. FIFA announced that it's beginning an investigation of what Marco Materazzi said to Zidane on the pitch. Meanwhile, Materazzi opined that Zidane deserved the Golden Ball award. Of course, Zidane apologized to the children (and that's really all that matters; the kids...) but pointedly left Materazzi out. Still BBC thinks the jury is out.

Newsweek's Ron Borges weighs in to share his shocking levels of ignorance with the world. Yup, the fact that international soccer has not quite sunk to the trashtalking low of NBA streetball basketbrawl, or NFL football, is a condemnation of one of the world's great soccer players. By the way, while Zidane was dumb to overeact, let's face facts. If Materazzi was indeed trashing Zizou's mom and sis, he deserved to be bitch-slapped (or dome-bashed as the case may be) and put to the turf like the bad dog he is. This is the sort of reaction that serves as a reminder to trashtalkers that there are lines best not crossed.

Frankly, I'm beginning to grow weary of this headbutt affair. Let's move on and find out what's going to happen to all the cheating Italians. I'm beginning to think that the whole thing is a well orchestrated provocation by Materazzi and certain other unnamed Italians to distract the world from the fact that Italian soccer is slightly less scrupulous and well-managed than the Bush Administration.

What is this?! Celtic lost to DC United 4-0?? OMG. Even worse, the DC boys were resting several of their starters. Celtic looked to have most of their regular lads on the pitch and certainly should've shown better against the MLS side.

Franck Ribery's agent denies an Arsenal bid. Marseille tell Man United to keep away from the little midfielder. What does this all mean? He'll end up a Gunner for sure. Certainly, Thierry Henry has warned him of the evils of being a Red Devil.

Oh, and I took the kids to see Pirates of the Carribean 2 Electric Boogalo (kidding about the last part). I loved the first movie. Unfortunately, everything that made the first flick work was missing from the sequel (surprise!). The movie was overlong by half, contained too many plot threads with little connecting material, a minimum of character development, and a host of other sins. The thing that amazes me when I see movies this bad is that people made incredibly good sums of money creating a colossal dump heap of celluloid.

Could this be the sign of the impending Apocalypse? Be afraid, very afraid.