Footy and my Foolish Dutch Sleeping Disorder

Ahoy. In direct defiance to the listed title that I have just created, I am going to jump ahead to the second, more pertinent topic of note. I have not slept in about 27 hours. The fact that I am still functional right now can be attributed to my batshit insane sleeping schedule, and the energy that I've stored within the fat reserves in my upper thighs (like a walrus). Additionally, my internal clock is operated by a foolish Dutchman by the name of Johanne, whose idea of a good time happens to involve tricking me into being a doofish nap-mongrel. The Dutch aside, I've had a rather stressful week. I'll use bullets to describe these events in a way that will be both engaging and lethal.

• sunday: struggled with beginning my Australian literature/film paper on how nationalistic myth has driven Australia's tenuous anthropological history from the nation's cultural mythos. (bedtime: 4:15am)
  
• monday: seduced into attending ultimate frisbee practice and movie night (intensely violent and irish!), followed by further attempts to attack the aforementioned paper. (bedtime 4:30am)
• tuesday: woke up at 9, got back from class at 10, checked email, got rejected from Ogilvy (grrrrrRRR), fell into an anger-induced 6 hour nap (thanks a lot Johanne), woke up extremely disoriented, and managed to finish my essay. (bedtime: 4:45am)
• wednesday: woke up at 2:30, worked on my abnormal psychology essay on OCD, which I've actually diagnosed Mike with, for almost... 18 straight hours? yeah. (bedtime: n/a)

I sit before you battered, bruised and sleep-deprived. The good news is that my essays are done and that I can now devote time to my favorite past-time of huddling into a small sleep-ball and dreaming of dinosaurs. Something of note: I think that the only reason I made it through this vicious half-week from hell was because of some excellent new/old music, namely Phoenix (new album), Andrew Bird (new album), Bon Iver (not very new), Of Montreal (the old stuff), and my rediscovery of Simon and Garfunkel's soothing power.


Alright, since you're probably all sitting there saying "shut up Kevin, we don't want to hear about how stressed out and sleepy you've been lately, we all know that you're just a lazy curmudgeon," (who uses that word, seriously?) "what about the Australian culture? have you learned anything interesting lately? Seriously Kevin we need to know!! Blearghdasfkjl!!!!"

The answer is yes. Yes I have. And take it easy, please. No need to get all crazypants on me. I recently attended a match of Australian rules football (Footy), which is sort of a mix between soccer, rugby, quidditch, and Calvinball. Basically, you punch/kick the ball to your teammates and try to kick it through the middle of these big poles at the ends of an oval-shaped field. It's the most popular sport in Australia, just ahead of "Synchronized Throwing of a Boomerang in the General Direction of a Wombat." Aside from quarter and halftime breaks, there was almost no stop in gameplay, which is something I respect in a sport and its players. The West Coast Eagles won! They were the team that we were supposed to be for. Oh! Australian culture! In Australia, you don't "root" for a team, because "to root" literally means "to f***." Instead, you "barrack" for your team. I got some weird looks in the beginning of the game, before I remembered this.

(Wikipedia can give you a super good better explanation if you're really interested.)


Next monday I will be taking a road trip down South to some of Western Australia's nicest beaches and wineries. In the absence of the guides that kept me down during my Northwest trip, I think I will finally be able to conquer the Australian wilderness like I've always wanted. Look out, kangaroos. I'm coming. To ride you.


No worries,
Kevin