Top 10 Things The World Cup Taught Me

I'm catching some flack for my comments on FUT-ball. Seems it really is the greatest game in the world, like brussel sprouts is the greatest vegetable and roadkill is the greatest source of free protein (and not half-bad with garlic mashed potatoes and a slice of pie). But in fairness, there are some things I learned from the World Cup.

1) Paraguay doesn't mean 2 Guays

2) Nobody does a fist pump or a V (peace sign) for victory. When players get excited, they either rip off their shirts, slide to their knees and cry, or they throw both arms in the air and look around at every human within eyeshot, with a "How can you do this to me?" look on their face. Neither option seems particularly manly. Brandy Chastain has done both and looked WAY better doing it.

3) Unlike the NFL, you never hear anyone chanting "DEE-Fense!" Good Golly Moses, if there's one thing this sport could not possibly handle, it's more defense.

4) Goalies have the hardest job in soccer: staying awake when they only face about a shot an hour. Makes you appreciate what NHL hockey goalies go through, by a mile.

5) Soccer uniforms have somehow found a way to make small men look smaller. We're used to tough-guy colors like silver-and-black of the Oakland Raiders. Steelers' black-and-gold. Yankee Pinstripes. Cool uniforms! I mean, these guys in the World Cup -- how tough can you look wearing pink, puce, lime or fluorescent orange? Those guys looked more like scoops of Italian Gelato than star athletes.

6) People in the stands don't give a rat's you-know-what about the game going on. It's very similar to going to a Carolina Panthers game, actually.

7) Some countries should be combined. Slovenia and Slovakia. Just make them Slovaknia. Paraguay, Uraguay, I'm-aguay, We're-all-aguay. Maybe I was right after all, they should combine the teams and call them 2 Guays (reminiscent of 5 Guays Pizza). Both Koreas should be made to play nice for a change, unite on the field, and if it takes making Kim Jung Il the coach, so be it.

8) When a "free kick" is called, nobody on either team has the slightest idea what to do. They jockey around endlessly, trying to form some kind of Rube Goldberg crooked line, pointing at each other while the goalie screams instructions that nobody listens to, and eventually somebody gets tired of it all and kicks the ball 50 yards out of bounds. FABULOUS!

9) No soccer analyst or commentator has ever, at any point in his life, smiled.

10) Shakespeare wrote "All the world's a stage" and with this being the largest and most visible stage possible, FIFA decided to do a live theatrical version of Plan 9 From Outer Space. Next time this Grand Event rolls around, you can find me tuned in to the Knitting Channel.

Kathy Myers, age 41 of Niles, Michigan recently found herself out of work and uninsured, like too many Americans out there. She had been suffering from an increasingly painful shoulder injury, but had been turned away from the emergency room time after time, because of her uninsured status and the condition itself not being considered life-threatening. At the end of June, and at the end of her rope, Ms. Myers took a gun and shot herself in the shoulder, hoping that would finally get her into the E.R. for treatment. Apparently she could have used some shooting lessons from the NRA, as her self-inflicted gunshot missed all major arteries and bones. She was briefly seen, but again sent home, this time with some bandages and antibacterial ointment, in more excruciating pain than before. Hopefully she won't try severing a limb, as she'd likely get a Monty Python and the Holy Grail response:

"It's only a flesh wound!"