June 04, 2006

Countdown To World Cup Begins

Countdown has begun, my friends... The last one week leading up to the World Cup:

Monday (T-minus 4)
Go out and buy all the ‘special edition’ magazines and newspaper football pull-outs on the World Cup. Then spend the whole day reading and re-reading the outdated articles on tournament, write-up on the teams (where they always give their conservative predictions), obligatory star player focus, centre spread with the scorecard and standings.

Tuesday (T-minus 3)
During your lunch hour, rush down to the supermarket and stock up on the essentials – Indomie, Coke 1.25litre, Twisties Jumbo pack, Nescafe 3-1 instant coffee mix (for the 12am games), Nescafe 2-1 instant black coffee mix (for the 2.30am games)…

Wednesday (T-minus 2)
Set your alarm clock to 2.30am, wake up in the middle of the night, come downstairs, switch on the lights and your TV, and for 2 hours watch whatever crappy rerun show on the telly. The reason? Dry-run for the real thing. You need the training, plus you need to get use to the lack of sleep throughout the day.

Plus, also practice the ‘deep concentration’ look in front of the PC at the office, while actually sleeping.

Thursday (T-minus 1)
Spend the whole day surfing the football websites (including the world famous Hantubola) and forums and read all the 23,439 articles and postings on whether Rooney is fit or not, whether Brazil will win or not, etc.

Afternoon: still not to late to place a few bets with your friends for the opening round matches…

Friday (T-minus 0)
Early morning – call in sick (‘stomach cramps’) to prepare for the important day. Spend the rest of the day in semi-vegetable state lying in bed in your underwear (‘to conserve energy’). Make sure your electricity and Astro bills are fully paid up (take no chances), read through magazines again, surf the footie websites again…

10pm – set your yourselves in front of the TV, make sure the couch is the right distance from the TV, toilet and refrigerator, cola, remote and chips within easy reach…

11pm – spend 5 minutes fiddling with the extra features and special channels on Astro.

11.25pm – spend RM53 on those pointless football SMS games they keep spamming you with.

11.49pm – drink your 14th cup of coffee. Your hands are already shaking due to the excitement. Not to mention your pee smells like coffee.

11.58pm – Slight drizzle outside causes a near heart attack as your Astro is temporarily disabled. After some frantic phone calls to every friend you have in the 2km radius, service is back on after 12 seconds…

12.00am – GAME ON!!!!

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