It is probably best that I spend little time talking about tonight's match. I should not dwell on the wasted chances, the offside-trap biting us in the ass, the tendency of opposing goalkeepers to turn into Clark Fucking Kent upon seeing Claret flashing towards them, Nathan Delfouneso's terrible hair, etc. I am still angry, I have nothing to add, and it's done with.
Here's a thing I will talk about though; stupid Americans.
Now bear with me; there are a lot of stupid Americans out there. There are plenty of stupid folks of every stripe kicking around. On any given day, stupid folks outnumber non-stupid folks by a margin of at least 1,000 : 1. In this instance I am speaking of a specific sort of stupid American; the stupid American that has absolutely no idea what space they are currently inhabiting.
Anyone residing on this side of the pond has experienced such people; the sort that doesn't understand why bottom-of-the-ninth-two outs is any different than top-of-the-third-no outs. The type that doesn't understand why this band they've never heard of is so important that they shouldn't stand in the middle of the floor in a disinterested manner. The type that doesn't understand why ordering a Coors Light in a beer bar is such a big deal.
It is an unfortunate consequence of capitalism that soccer bars tend to quite often double as "English" pubs. I mean no disrespect by those quotation marks; by all accounts, my English friends would most likely drink me under the table, find some way to build a table out of my disabled body and go to work on round two. What I mean is that "English" pubs in the US tend to be the refuge of 21-runs and boring suburban squares. We have a very narrow view of acceptable drinking here, and for whatever reason any sort of drinking that takes place in an "English" pub seems to be exempt from our Puritanical judgments.
So, on to saving my digression. Annoying people tend to populate "English" pubs. Unfortunately, this will sometimes lead them to pubs such as the George and Dragon.
The George and Dragon is almost as wonderful a place as one could expect to find in the US, at least in terms of watching soccer; two games going at all times, a staff that generally seem to love the EPL (even if they are a bunch of Liverpool fans,) decent beer and decent food. They do their Goddamndest to bill themselves as a soccer bar first and foremost, but occasionally their are breaches in the defense.
Tonight was such an occasion. Half the bar was watching the Spurs-Fulham match. The other half was not. I phrase things in this manner because the only two people that gave any sort of a rusty fuck about the Villa-Sunderland match were Kirsten and I. That's something you grow accustomed to as the fan of a less-than-glamorous side.
But tonight, we ended up with a gaggle of douchebags. It was apparent from the very beginning that despite their position right below the television that they could not have cared less about the outcome of any match being shown. They were quite easy to ignore at first, but as the shots flowed and the beers kept pace, they became increasingly annoying.
But it wasn't the incessant flash of the camera or the raised arms and the dunking of the shots that annoyed me. It was the mocking. As the match wore along, and the frustration became more apparent, their distaste for us seemed to grow. When our complaints reached a crescendo, they appeared to have reached their limit and began ironically mocking us.
It would appear as though my rebuttals were sufficient in terms of shutting them down, but my annoyance remains; there are many, many bars in the Seattle area the subscribe to the "English Pub" concept; most of them do not show soccer and of those that do only the George and Dragon shows matches such as Aston Villa-Sunderland.
I realize that I am shouting into a wind tunnel, but I cannot help but air my complaints; we have very few places that we can go and watch our team in this city, or in honesty in this hemisphere. I won't apologize if our shouts distracted you from your Irish Car Bomb.
Also, Sidwell is worthless.