World Cup 2010

So it has started, I missed the opening ceremony due to work but made most of the matches. And apart from an absolute stinker of the French-Uruguay game, most of them have been good so far. As I type Algeria v Slovenia are determined to bore me into a football based coma. But it did get me thinking.

Every four years I go into a state of near delirium because of the feast of football, the amazing players on display, the irrational and unbridled optimism of being English, the wall charts, the BBC and ITV opening credits, Eamon Dunphy hating a certain player for reasons that defy logical explanation, the controversy and the inevitable blunders (thanks a million Robert Green). For me, this is brilliant - if I could I would take four weeks of work and watch every minute of it. Plus the analysis and the highlights. Then in September the qualifying for the European Championships start and two years later the tournament itself. I am spoilt by all this football, it makes me forget the torrid season I have just endured and the worries I have over the managerial choices made by the board of my team.

However, for some. This is not a good time. For those that dislike football then every channel, every newspaper and every conversation is about the thing they dislike. Football saturates everything as they are easy ratings to be made, easy units to shift and easy money to be made. The average non-football fan must endure this, and they have my sympathies. Honestly, they do. I may not agree with your opinion but I'll fight to the death for you right to express (to paraphrase someone). I can find a similar case, well two at least.

These are the programmes that I dislike and do not understand but the whole god damn world seems to love. I am talking about 'The X Factor' and 'Britain's Got Talent' (and 'Glee' but more of that in a later post). These shows exist to make Simon Cowell richer than God and to make the music industry more tedious and to make stars of desperate nobodies. When they are on everything becomes about them, and I feel alienated and bored of it all. Just like, I imagine, the
non-football fan.

The problem I have with both these shows is that they are always the same. Every series, every episode. They sing the same songs, do the same key change three quarters through and have the same sob stories. The fact that the judges on these shows include totally ridiculous choices as Danni Minouge - she is only interesting as she has bigger breasts than her much more famous, talented and prettier sister. Plus Kylie is a trooper. She has not had a really good pop career so what the feck does she know? About anything? At all. Her best song was 'Put the Needle on it' and that's only because it is a rubbish innuendo.

In BGT as it is known in text speak or by the retarded they have that other one, Amanda Holden, I mean she, again, is a mind boggling choice. Her only talent was lying underneath Niel Morrissey enough times to send Les Dennis mental on Celebrity Big Brother.

Since I live near Lucan I cannot go too far without seeing something related to Jedward. I have never seen them sing, but they are almost everywhere. I resent the fact that I know who they are when I have tried my best to avoid anything X Factor related. I once said that they would be pretty high up on my list of people I would like to see pulled apart with Horses and Chains . And I stand by it, I would even volunteer to drive the horses.

So even though I do love the World Cup I understand if you do not and I can sympathise with your boredom. Now, if you don't like the World Cup or X Factor/ BGT then you are boned!