"France won in a shootout"

Monday July 10, 2006: A series of conversations...I do hope you can keep up...

4:35 AM:
Me (rather groggily): Kody, did you stay for the whole game last night?
Kody (Again, rather groggy): Yeah
Me: Who won?
Kody: France, in a shootout...they played both overtimes and no one scored, so then they went into a shootout and France won.
Me: Really?! Darn!!
(Explanation: The night before (Sunday July 9) a group of us had decided to sacrifice some small amount of sleep in order to enjoy the World Cup final. A small group of us had visited the Kibbutz pub a few nights earlier when there was a World Cup game and enjoyed it immensely. Who could pass up 5 sheckel (the exchange rate is about 4.5 sheckels = One Dollar) beers and hamburgers?! It was quite a deal, and really a lot of fun. So, continuing with the story, Jessica and I are both former soccer players and I had been watching just about as many World Cup games as I possibly could while I was still at home, so it seemed like an appropriate thing to do. It was quite an experience sitting there watching a soccer game in a foreign country with a group of not only Israelis but Polish folks as well. How many people can truly say they've done that? Not many, I'm sure. Fast forwarding a bit, regulation time came and went with France and Italy tied. Some of the American contingent had already started to scatter, and by the time the game was over we all (minus Kody) decided to leave as well. Kody joined a group from the Haifa team and, as evidenced by the conversation above, stayed for the whole game.)

5:00 AM - Waiting for the bus...
Me: France won...
Andrea: Really? That stinks, you were cheering for Italy, right?
Me: Yeah...I think a lot of the people there last night were...
(the bus showed up and we got on)

5:30 AM
President Holst: So, some of the students went to the World Cup Final last night...I didn't hear who won...
Dr. Chambers: Yeah, I haven't heard either...
Me: I didn't stay for the whole game, but I heard that France won...

6:00 AM - On the Dig...
I overheard Eva, one of the women from the Polish team who was helping with the mosaic, say "Italy won last night, it was a good game..."
Me: Hey Marc, did you watch the rest of the soccer game last night?
Marc H: No...
Me: Oh...did you happen to hear who won?
Marc H: Yeah, Italy...
Me: Hmmmm, it seems we have contradicting stories going around the North East Church...

This is pretty much how the day went. As I was lifting and sifting buckets from the cistern I was constantly wondering who had won the game. When we finally got down the mountain I found out the truth. Italy had won in a shootout, not the other way around. I have since forgiven Kody for his grave miscalculation, but I must say that it led to some unrest on the digsite that day...The greatest example coming from Dr. Michael Patella who was routing for Italy and was quite dissapointed at first hearing they lost.

Picture of the day:














Attention: No Canadians were harmed in the taking of this photograph...

Food for Thought:
Are you the Mythbuster?