Great Sports Day

I DON'T GET many great sports days in France. A great sports day is when there are multiple 'big time' sporting events to watch and each lives up to -- or exceeds -- expectations. Just this weekend I was saying to Kerri that I don't have many opportunities to get excited about watching sports in this country. Not because there aren't great sporting events on television but because...well...actually, yeah, it is because there aren't a lot of great sporting events on television. Oh, there are some -- the Champion's League is fantastic; Six Nations is kind of fun -- but they are few and far between and it is rare that I say to myself, 'I can't wait to see this game.' People who know me know that great sports days are something I miss.

But yesterday we decided to spend the day at home (with a brief detour to an all-you-can-eat Indian buffet for lunch -- yummy!) and that meant that I got to spend some time watching a bit of television. I watched three sporting events and each was great:

• Australian Open Final: can I just go on the record right now as saying I will never tire of Federer vs. Nadal. Yesterday's final was Wimbledon, but it was great.
• Handball World Championship Final: don't laugh, but I actually watched a bit of this (only because France was playing) and it was actually a great game and France ended up defeating Croatia to become World Champions.
• The Super Bowl: I watched the first half at a friends house (thanks, Justus) and the second half from my bed. It was a terrifically entertaining game -- even if the team I was rooting for lost.

It wasn't quite like watching an NFL game in the afternoon and a World Series game at night (we can do that in October) or Opening Day in the afternoon and the NCAA Finals at night (we can do that in April), but yesterday I watched a lot of sports...and it was a lot of fun.

CJS