What a time to be a sports fan. With the NHL and NBA playoffs, the Indy 500, and the upcoming World Cup. There are just too many excuses not to do assignments or to go outside for people like me. With that in mind, this installment has more oddities associated with the world of sports than usual. I also have covered every non-ice-covered continent with this article. All right, enough rambling, time to get onto the meat of the matter.
A monkey had recently won the mayoral election in Britain. No, NOT a real monkey, nor is it our own MonkeyMan Kenny. The "monkey" was actually a local man. He campaigned wearing a monkey suit he wore as the mascot of a local football club. Upon his election, he resigned his post as the monkey mascot. The mascot gig is not as glitzy as it seems. The club is a 3rd division side in England. He should fit in easily to politics. After all, politics is all monkey business. Then again, maybe he can shed his image as a monkeyman and become a great mayor. What will his mayoral legacy be? Only time will tell.
The fans will put the blame on everyone else when their favourite team loses (unless the team plays horribly awful). We've all heard fans blaming the opposing coaches, the referees, bad playing surface, bad weather, spoiled food, opposing fans' harassment, etc. Sometimes people blame their favourite team's failure on voodoo magic, but this is the first time I have heard of a team putting the blame of its failure on magic alone. In 1992, the national men's soccer team of Ivory Coast won the African Nations Cup (allegedly) with the help of sorcerers from a village near the capital Abidjan. The government, according to the rumours, failed to provide the sorcerers compensation for their service. Since then, the team's record had been less than stellar, according to the team's fans (granted, the Ivory Coast team had won more often than it lost over the last 10 years, what we have is a case of "beating up the weak, losing to the strong"). According to rumours, the team was once held in a military camp after a dismal showing in the ANC in 2000. The fans should look at their favourite team before pinning the blame on anyone. Even great teams stumble sometimes, give the team some slack. Of course, this shows that the saying, "whenever you receive a service, pay up or else" still holds true.
Whenever one participates in a long-distance running event, one can always find a handful of people wearing goofy costumes among the participants. We all have seen caped heroes, "identical" twins, clowns, among others in these races. How about scuba divers? No? I don't think so. A man ran the recently-held London Marathon wearing a complete scuba suit, but this is no space-age technology suit. The man wore a scuba gear from the 18th century. He wore the suit from the beginning to when he crossed the finish line ... five days after most of the participants did. He even kept his gear on for interviews. The scuba gear is said to be over 200 kg in weight (sorry, mass). You may be wondering why would someone willingly place himself in such a challenge? I suppose we all need a challenge that is different from our daily routine once in a while. Of course, one can say he did this to gain publicity, but he truly earned it by walking 42.195 km wearing such a heavy suit. Did he run the marathon like that "winner" of the New York marathon who won by taking the subway? Unlikely. It would be difficult to hide yourself among the masses in the London underground with such a distinctive display.
In Toronto, Leafs tickets are hot commodities. All Leaf fans want to get their hands onto some. Season tickets go faster than a GO train leaving a station, which brings me to the following silly story. A Leafs fan was doing his pre-game warm-up in a sports bar when someone stole his ticket to a Leafs game. The fan called the police and gave the police as much detail about the ticket as he could. When the game began, the police made their move and arrested the robber only two minutes after the game had started (real time, not game time). How did the the police catch the thief so shiftly? The holder of the ticket told the police the date of the game, and the exact seat location. There was no mention of what happened afterwards (you can blame my sources for that), but I'm sure anyone trying to steal from that fan will think twice from now on. It just shows that even mundane things such as your driver's licence number, the price of a shot at the Bomber, or QUEST passwords are worth memorizing.
Jason "the Screamer" Lau
Does this article make me look like a pervert?