Soccer Players Are Wimps

The Stanley Cup playoffs are almost here! (Go Habs Go!) And in honour of Canada's national winter sport, I'm going to address one of my least favourite hockey player cliches: Chirping soccer players.

These are a few reasons why I think it makes you sound like a complete ijit when calling soccer players wimpy (Or whatever new slang hockey players have come up with. Hockey slang words deserve their own post because they are THE WORST):

• Soccer players are wearing less padding. They basically have styrofoam plates strapped to their shins and that's it. Give them a break, okay?
• There's spikes on those shoes! It's not the same as sliding around on a knife like hockey players do, but it has to be pretty painful, especially on bare skin. Hockey players are pretty much wearing suits of armour.
• In hockey, you can't make a big deal about it or you get chirped forever and called dumb hockey cliche names like *Insert whatever slang word is in style right now. I don't even know.* It's actually ruthless and wild. And most of the chirping comes from overweight hockey fans who tweet about how weak a player is for crying while their mom does their laundry for them in the next room, probably.
• You don't think that every hockey player who gets hit in the face with a puck DOESN'T secretly wish he could go curl up in his mommy's arms, do you? Because if that's what you think then I fear you are terribly wrong. I guarantee Crosby called up his mom and grunted lots of whiny things to her after he got hit in the face with that puck. Can you imagine if a hockey player cried? He would actually have to quit playing.

Anyway, the fact remains, that soccer (or football as it's known basically everywhere except Canada and the US. It doesn't even make sense to call American Football "football" because only a tiny percentage of the game involves touching the ball with your foot.) is the most popular sport in the world. Hockey is only most popular in Canada and Finland. Have you ever seen a German football game? People are setting stuff on fire, and storming onto the pitch. It's complete madness. In hockey, fans just blow those stupid plastic horns people hand out when you walk into the arena. So, clearly, regardless of how "wimpy" soccer is, there must be something exciting about it.

That being said, I hate watching soccer and I love watching hockey. But shut up with the "hockey players are the toughest athletes." Your sport is one fancy spin away from being figure skating, just remember that.

Buuut, I don't play either sport, so perhaps I should shut up.

I Don't Skate

So, I don't know if you noticed or not, but I'm scared of a lot of things. I spend more time worrying about what could happen if I do something than I actually spend doing things. I'm pretty sure I've been this way forever, and it can get really frustrating when my brain says everything is going to be fine but then some little crazy person who also lives in my head reminds me of the 4050 reasons that it might not be fine.

Yeah, I'm terrified of dying in a car accident or falling and breaking my leg getting off the bus. But so is everyone else. The weirdest thing about me is that it's not necessarily the death or the broken bones which terrify me (okay, that's super scary stuff, but just bear with me). The worst part about all of that is that then people would see me, notice me, have to help me, etc. and for some reason that's the scariest thing in the world to me. I just want to go about my business, blending in to the crowd and looking like a perfectly normal human. I don't want to make a scene. I don't want to be different.

Normal. That's the important thing. This is why when people ask me this one particular, no-big-deal-for-most-Canadians question, I have a tiny panic attack. "Want to go skating?"

No, I don't want to go skating. Why? Because I can't. Except I never tell people I "can't" skate. I say, "I don't skate," as if it's something comparable to "I don't drink" or "I don't hunt humans for sport." When someone says they "don't" do something, it implies that they're making a choice not to do it, but they could do it if they wanted to. But it you put me on a pair of skates, I would end up on my butt in a matter of seconds. Because it's not that I don't skate. It's that I can't.*

I always say it's because I'm afraid of falling and damaging my coccyx or smashing my head or getting my throat slit by someone else who goes skating by, which is partially true. You should see me walk across icy sidewalks. I'm sure it's hilarious and it definitely takes me an unreasonable amount of time to get places. So, yes, part of it is fear of falling and looking like an idiot.

But in reality, I'm mostly scared of failing. And people seeing me fail. It's the same reason it took me a long time to learn how to tie my shoes. The same reason most of my basketball playing career was spent terrified of handling the ball. If I don't try, then I can't fail. And at this point, learning to skate would be a whole lot of me falling and looking dumb and people seeing me do it (because there's no way I'm going out on the ice with blades strapped to my shoes by myself).

Of course, if you don't try you won't succeed at anything either. But I'd rather be a non-succeeder than a failure. Go about my life in mediocrity and stuff like that. (I'm just kidding. No one wants that.)

And I know that everyone went through this. Everyone was four years old and falling down and looking dumb. But clearly even as a young child I was insecure enough to be aware that I didn't want people to look at me and see me falling down. Because what if I was terrible at it? What if I never got good? I'm guessing it was just easier for little Alene to give up, because that way she was only "bad" at it because she hadn't really tried.

One time my class went on a field trip to go skating and I stayed behind. When my classmates returned, we all had to write a journal entry about our day on the ice. Oh, wait, except for me. I wrote about my day spent sitting in the library probably reading Berenstain Bear books and hoping that people didn't notice that I had stayed behind. And then of course we had to read them out loud. The worst part of the day though, came when one of my classmates came up and told me that she was discussing with our teacher and they're both pretty sure that I didn't go because I don't know how to skate. I don't know if she said it in a mocking way or if she was trying to be sympathetic, but I do remember being unbelievably angry and upset. I denied not being able to and was probably kind of mean to her about it. But that moment has always stuck with me.

You wouldn't think something as unimportant as this would cause someone so much stress. But it did. And it still does now. You're probably thinking, "Just go and learn to skate and stop whining." It's not that easy. Plus, really, I've gone this long in my life without it, I think I'll live. And, seriously, I'm a bit higher off the ground now than I was when I was four. Do you really think I'm going to enjoy falling at this point?

This shouldn't be a big deal because I'm sure the majority of the world can't skate since the majority of the world's population doesn't have access to ice or even shoes for that matter so why would they own skates? I'm definitely not the minority when it comes to the entire planet, but I am the minority when it comes to Canada, and since I don't hang out in Africa a lot, I think it's kind of a bigger deal.

It has only been extremely recently that I've been able to admit this to anyone. I dated someone for three years and never told him. I just made up excuse after excuse as to why I couldn't go. I honestly don't know why it's such a big deal. To my friends, I tried to act like I could but I just didn't want to. I don't know that my pathetic attempts really fooled anyone, but I do know that most of them don't ask me to go skating anymore.

So, I guess what this is is just me getting this off my chest. And hopefully it will feel good, because at this point, I'm panicking a bit about it.

Wait, I forgot to tell you the part that makes the entire thing 10000x worse for me. The reasons I never took up skating are the exact same reasons that you'll never see me riding a bike anywhere. I feel like it would be easier if it were one or the other, but it's both.

I guess I'm hoping that I'll get some feedback and people will tell me A. That I'm not alone. Which I know I'm not, it's just good to see real live people who are in the same boat and B. That I'm not crazy and these are rational feelings. Which I know they are because I read about it in a textbook. But again, it's nice when real live people share your problems, isn't it?

*Please don't tell me to "never say never" or some nonsense. I'm aware that I'm physically capable if I just set my mind to it and did it. Please just enjoy that paragraph because it was kind of funny and move on.

Professional Athletes

So the NHL lockout is over. I guess I'm happy? I don't really care. I mean I enjoy watching hockey but I don't think I actually missed it. When you think about it, professional sports are possibly the biggest joke in western society.

Here's a reminder to pro athletes: Your job is to PLAY A GAME. Settle down. Some people sit in their basements and dominate at World of Warcraft every day. These people are called "losers" even though who says that WoW is any less legit than hockey or baseball? Someone could pay them to do it and broadcast their quests on live TV. That would be the EXACT same thing. There's still a certain amount of skill involved and you're still getting paid to contribute absolutely nothing to society.

Here's my other big issue with professional athletics. If you're truly an amazing player, you should be able to take the most simple, least technologically advanced equipment, and play with it. Having these Ultra-flex FX-7000 Super-Mega Hockey Sticks is, in my opinion, pretty much cheating. It's like when Harry got the Nimbus 2000 and everyone else was riding around on Cleansweeps. Not fair. Because not everyone can afford the best of everything. I'm talking about the kids who are trying to get into the NHL or MLB or NBA (although I kind of feel like there's only so much you can do with a pair of b-ball shoes to make them better than another pair of b-ball shoes.) If this fancy equipment really makes SUCH a difference, it shouldn't be allowed.
Maybe we should wonder then if it really makes a difference at all or if it's all in your head because those shoes are SUPPOSED to make you jump 17 ft. in the air so CLEARLY that's how high you must be jumping right now. If one hockey stick is worth three times as much as another hockey stick, I'm expecting something kind of more like a rocket launcher that shoots pucks at 200mph.

These days, less fortunate kids, no matter how naturally talented they are, have almost NO chance of getting anywhere in sports because they can't pay to play. That's the kind of crushing heartbreak that ruins a person's life and makes them miserable in whatever job they do find. There's no such thing as kids being discovered in back alleyways by tough-but-kind coaches. That only happens in movies like The Mighty Ducks, not real life. (I know. The Blind Side was a movie about the true story of a kid who got taken off the streets and made it to the NFL. First rule of life: There are exceptions to every rule.)

In closing, my fellow people, it's all just a giant money grab, right? They get paid millions to play a game while the less-significant members of the population pay for tickets, t-shirts, jerseys, beer and chicken wings and watch the games. Sure, there are people making a living off of it, and we're all just trying to make it any way we can, right? But the people who are making the money off of pro sports are rarely making any reasonable amount. They're like Scrooge McDuck rich and they're not sharing it with ANYONE.
I don't really have a conclusion or a suggestion or a plan or anything. And I've been begging my father all morning to buy me Habs vs. Sens tickets. So this feels like a perfect place to stop so that you can have a chance to think about what I said and write a comment about how the NHL is fuelling something rather in the economy and bread tastes way better when Sydney Crosby is on the packaging and blah blah blah.

Note: This whole thing can be applied to movie stars and musicians in a way.

s(NO)w

No one likes the cold. Argue all you want, Northern people (myself included I guess.) But I know that you're only saying you love the cold and the snow so that the rest of the world can't tell you that you're a complete idiot for choosing to live in cold places. Yes, I live in Canada. I was born here, so this isn't my fault (Hey, did you know not all of Canada gets tons of snow?!?) Okay, YES, I moved to stupid Ottawa where it's freezing and snows like crazy. That is my fault. But I will happily admit to you that snow is the devil's confetti and I HATE it.

Okay, so there are some good things about snow. Including (and limited to) snow forts, snowmen, snow globes and being able to follow the trail of the polar bear that stole your baby. Oh! And when you're thirsty at recess a nice handful of snow is super refreshing (note: at this time in human's pollution of the earth, this may result in superpowers or death.)

So, there are the good things. Now it's time for the bad. Here are a some reasons (not all the reasons) that snow sucks.

- Driving. Going 40 in a 100? Not my favourite thing. Having to guess if you're in the correct lane or not? Even farther from my favourite thing. Car chases in the snow? Google Canadian Police Chase.

- Digging your car out of the driveway. People are going to say "Oh, I have a garage, you're an idiot for not having a garage." Shut up.

- Wet feet. Snow melts, you guys. It melts and becomes water. Snow gets in your boots (or shoes because I try to avoid boots. Okay, I see where this one is partially my fault.) Snow melts in your boots and then it takes approximately 48 hours for your feet to be not freezing. And that's only if you don't have to go outside again in that time.

- Running away from enemies. Running through deep snow is very difficult. And try hiding from someone when they can follow your tracks exactly. Yeah, that's what I thought.

- Dropping money. ~$2,367,832.23 CDN is lost annually in the snow.

- Danger from above. Snow falling off branches, ledges, windowsills. And avalanches, duh.

- It's GODDAMN COLD.

And et cetera. Let me repeat: No one ACTUALLY likes the cold. No one wants their face to be so numb that they can't even feel the snot running down their chins. No one wants their fingers to turn black and fall off. And no one wants to see their backyard covered in disgusting sparkly white stuff while they sit toasty and warm with a cup of hot chocolate by the fire. NO ONE. If you say you like it, you are a liar. (Pants on FIRE. The opposite of snow. There's a joke here somewhere. Let me know if you find it.)

And STOP WRITING IT'S SNOWING STATI. God, Facebook ruins everything.

In conclusion, there's SNOW way I will ever like winter. You can sCOLD me all you want for being so grumpy about it. But it isn't nICE. (Note: I should be PUNished because those were the worst jokes that have ever been written.)