Oh oh, am gonna have to get out my boxing gloves, oh Yes

Concerning the World Cup soccer games, of course.....

Even Peter's 93 year old aunt watches, and mailed me about them yesterday. Uh-huh. I had to be very very polite, believe me. Because this is The Superbowl raised to the tenth power, and I am so not joking. I've never followed soccer much, but when it happens every two years, you simply can't avoid it, whether tee-vee news, or papers, or people you talk to on the street. And you must at least know what is going on.

This year, Austria is co-hosting the games with Switzerland. The Swiss already got knocked out of the games in the quarter finals, which aren't over yet. And CNN and the media in Germany were all, pooh-poohAustria is the weakest team in the league, but WTF, they're co-hosting it so wish them luck.

Not any more, hey....

Well, Germany really messed up with Croatia yesterday, and are FREAKED, I tell you, absoutely Freaked! Because they have this attitude, and a very bad superiortity complex. Or the press does, better said.... And they have to play against Austria in Vienna, of all places. On Monday. And they have to get at least one goal more than we do or they get eliminated from the games. What joy.

Peter was doing Snoopy dances in his wheelchair this morning. Schadenfreude? That is an understatement although he also never regularly follows soccer.

There is a historic context for all this. In the late Seventies we had the same situation. I hadn't paid much attention to it at the time, but walked into town one evening to go to work. It was a complete ghost town, no one on the street, but all the windows open and televisions blaring. And twice everybody started screaming, and yelling and waving out the windows, and dancing on balconies, and I thought, 'What in gawd's name is going ON here?' And there was this famous yell: 'GOAL!! GOAL!! GOAL!!! 'i werd narrisch' (I'm going crazy....) The Austrians eliminated the Germans from the quarter finals in Cordoba.

Peter had to give me a crash course in what was going on. Our place was full of Germans. It has been a never-healing wound on their soul ever since, believe me. And no, I don't think the Austrians won that year, but it's been a badge of honour for Austrian soccer players ever since.

The German news is ratcheting it up today. (Whine, whine.... Hansi Krankl said 'it's going to be like Cordoba.' They still have a phobia after so many years? ''How is it going to affect our boys, and putting on psychological pressure?' Hey, since when did the national German soccer team get Mimosa genes? Gimme a break.)

Get a backbone or something....

And just to be clear.... I don't understand soccer rules. And I hate the nationalistic thing that goes with it, all the flags and the drunken unruly mobs, and the flag waving and so on. But I so wish that our team just give them a little slap on the cheek, and put them in their place for a while.

Not to much to ask, I think. And then they can hate us for another thirty years. Snoopy dance. We'll see Monday.

Update: One of their best players got the red card yesterday, and can't play on Monday, he threw a player to the ground, purposely. Dyes his hair white-blonde, he does. I wouldn't want to have his name. Schweinberger. A Schwein is a pig. His fans call him 'Schweindi' 'piggy'. Now THAT is something to be proud of.... Or not?

I will never understand them., Nevah.

Na ja, back to bed. My head hurts, and I want to see the German journalists heads explode. That would be Sooooo nice...