My name is Rob, and I can't watch recorded sports programming.Your DVR has no value to me. I know how it works. I get that it should be a significant boon – I can spend quality time with my family and then, after the little ones go to bed, I can cozy up to some recorded sports action as if it’s happening live. It appears for all the world to be a technology-assisted win-win. But I can’t use it.
The fact of the matter is that I have an advanced case of adult attention deficit disorder combined with a particularly virulent lack of personal discipline. The net result: I am constitutionally incapable of ignoring the result of a contest that’s been completed, even if I know I have it recorded for my viewing pleasure. The Olympics were a special kind of torture.
When I got my first DVR a year or so ago (after resisting it on the grounds that I’d wind up writing something exactly like this), I tried several times to record games – Red Sox here, Redskins there, maybe a college football game or two, some rhythmic gymnastics. And every single time, I saw the result before I had a chance to watch the recorded action. On purpose. Which rendered the recorded content irrelevant and past tense, because I’m also incapable of watching something once I know the result. That particular insanity isn’t limited to sports. I’m terrible at the movie quote game because I rarely watch movies more than once (Dumb n’ Dumber excepted). I haven’t seen a television rerun in years.I’m a mental patient with no perceptible ability to delay sports-score-related gratification. I freely admit it. Sure makes it easier to maintain equilibrium with the space-time continuum, though.
And now you know...the rest of the story.
Is that a pic from Boo Weekley's Sports Machine?
ReplyDeleteI share this affliction Robert. Which is why I, along with slightly more than half of those in attendance, spent the entire Nats game yesterday watching the Redskins-Cards game. It was pretty surreal. I stopped counting Skins jerseys at the game when I got to 20, and everyone was crowded around TVs and not watching the baseball.
ReplyDeletemaybe we could find a self help group. at a bar.
ReplyDeleteI cant watch sports once I know the final but I have had some success in completely avoiding outcomes and watching games completely isolated by myself. The US-Spain Basketball game was the latest example of this, though it was much easier to do based on the fact that I woke up on Sunday morning, turned my phone off and sate down to watch the game.
ReplyDeleteWhen I did this for the George Mason-UConn and Nova-Florida games a few years back, it was much much harder to accomplish.
Either way, it does feel like watching it taped takes some of the juice out of it. Its completely psychological but it makes a significant difference in the energy level I have whilst watching.
Maybe you could avoid knowing a game outcome and thereby have more incentive to watch later if you didn't check your PDA every five minutes. Just a thought.
ReplyDeleteBut rob and I must text every 5 minutes!!!
ReplyDeletebut. i. can't. stop. checking.
ReplyDeleteis it wrong to call your wife a pumpkin-pie-haircutted freak on the eve of your anniversary? because i have a quote that fits this situation.
ReplyDeleteJust get to work on "True Confessions 2: Loving My PDA"...content is king tiny.
ReplyDeleteTo answer your question, Rob. No, I dont see anything wrong with calling your wife that. Then again, I dont have a wife but it still seems cool to me.
ReplyDeleteIsn't it about time for Ian Johnson to graduate from Boise St?
ReplyDeleteAnother potential issue with avoiding the outcome: I tried to avoid any information concerning a rather significant Redskins game due to a conflicting baptism and subsequent party a couple years ago. My lovely wife along with a girlfriend of hers (who found my attempt to avoid such information charming and childish), unbeknownst to me, informed two other gentlemen (who I was not friends with) of my desire to avoid hearing anything about the game. When I made a subsequent trip to the bar the gentlemen in question followed me, stood behind me in line and had the following conversation:
ReplyDelete"Hey, I just heard one of the waiters say the Skins are down 24-0 at the half."
"Really? They suck..."
I then got bitter, lost my shit, and decided that I wasn't going to watch the game. Hilariously (depending on your perspective)...this was not remotely true...and I was eventually let off the hook.
in point of fact, teejay, i am king tiny.
ReplyDeletepunctuation, sir. it's our friend.
And capitalization is merely an acquaintance.
ReplyDeleteI have a decent record of watching taped events on my DVR. It's most effective on football Sundays if I know I can't get to a game until a couple hours after it starts. It was necessary when I had weekend classes during my part-time MBA classes a few years ago.
ReplyDeleteI found the most effective way to get through a class without hearing is to reach deep into your Jersey roots and belligerently shout to the entire class that you don't want to hear anyboby say anything about the game. It worked for me. The prof looked at me funny, the girls scowled and the geebly guys looked a bit put out. But my aggressiveness paid off.
The second time I tried this, it was two years ago when I was living in Hoboken. I made it through the whole day of class, stuck speakers on my head when I left, and got out of the train in Hoboken without any knowledge off the outcomes. But little did I know that the bar across the street from the train on the way home was a Pittsburgh Steelers bar. It was 4:30 and there were bleary-eyed Steelers fans in the street, smoking butts and waving their towels. I knew at that point that the Steelers had beaten the Colts, and that I'd be watching the game in super fast-forward due to the lack of surprise.
capitalization is a tool of the bourgeousie. power to the people! reject your tall-lettered overlords and their strictures.
ReplyDeletefollow me to freedom!
(apologies to mark if they don't teach any of these big words in gainesville.)
In general, the DVR is a good tool for the sports where the teams play a lot of games. When the Knicks were merely terrible (as opposed to being trainwrecks), I would use the DVR and zip through the game if I could only dig in after 9 PM. Same for Yanks games.
ReplyDeleteBut it it's a huge game and you're going to be out and about, you're in trouble.
Oh yeah, "bourgeousie". I'm completely lost. If only I had gone to college in a town with one bar...
ReplyDeleteThree bars, assface.
ReplyDeleteOkay...one bar...and two "dellys."
The degenerates at Mama Mias feel left out. They'll still take your action on Jets/Chargers tonight though.
ReplyDeleteDon't forget Mamma Mia's. That makes 1 bar and 3 dellys.
ReplyDeleteAnd what about Seasons and the other places in the colonial area. Cuz there ain't no party like a Colonial Williamsburg party...
and a plethora of period performers. nothing says 'college party' like a pack of tri-cornerned hats getting crunk.
ReplyDeleteAnd Chanello's brief "large pie and a dime bag for $30" deal in 1998 was lie altering...for a select group of Unit M inhabitants.
ReplyDelete'cornerned' is not a word. nor, as far as i'm using it, is crunk.
ReplyDeleteThat should read "life altering"...or should it?
ReplyDeleteSal's By Victor and the Library Tavern were both great spots for spirits and below average cuisine.
My bad...didn't mean to leave those dellys out. I went to one with Greg once and it was...underwhelming.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to throw Library Tavern a vote...
ReplyDeleteFuck you, Mark. Unless it was Mama Mias...you take that back.
ReplyDeletelibrary tavern is a perfect name for a william & mary bar.
ReplyDeleteThis is the most pub Mamma Mia's has receiveed, well, ever.
ReplyDeleteW&M needed hard alcohol in the worst way to make the ladies less gross. Too bad that the Leafe was all you had...
ReplyDeleteI believe it was the College Delly. I guess it wasn't that bad. I mean, they took my fake id (I was 19) and served me pretty much all night.
ReplyDeleteI remember a certain misinformation campaign about Mamma Mia's "Junior Night" with "$1 pitchers".
ReplyDeleteI also remember said campaign. It was a rousing success...for some...
ReplyDeleteClub Z?
ReplyDeleteRon Jaworski just described a Brett Favre pass as "almost Favre-like". What ESPN is doing with the MNF booth . . . I'm not seeing it.
ReplyDeletesooo, you're saying i shouldn't have bet all that money on team gtb's selections this week?
ReplyDeleteThe only thing on the TV that's worse than the Jets is Fernando Vina's goatee. It's beyond horrendous.
ReplyDeleteRob, if you had made said wager, you'd be out hunting for "Cash for Gold" stores right now.
ReplyDeleteRhyme-O talked me into taking the Jets this week with his "there's no way they lose by more than 9" diatribe. Thanks fuckface.
ReplyDeleteI obviously can't pick any winners on G:TB, but I did manage to go 10-6 for the week in our Yahoo league. Hooray me.
ReplyDeleteI again was only able to correctly pick 6 games out of 16 correctly, but for this competition I went 2-1.
ReplyDeleteWell, if it makes you feel any better, Swint probably lost a grand this weekend.
ReplyDeleteGlad I could help Geoff!
ReplyDeleteThe Jets offense seems to be digressing. Their pass rush is non-existent, they lost their big-money free agent nose tackle and their first round draft pick can't learn the defense. And we cut our punter before realizing there was nobody better out there, forcing us to re-sign him.
You KNOW Favre had a few of those "what the hell am I still doing out here" thoughts last night.
Courtesy of Deadspin (and Roll Call), Heath Shuler is the 35th richest member of Congress.
ReplyDeleteIf I actually want to watch a MNF game on my big TV, I'll just Tivo it and watch Fox's Monday night lineup, then blow through the fluff of MNF on Tivo. I watched last weeks game in about 90 minutes. It was pretty great.
ReplyDeleteSo, just to clarify, even though we've been told roughly a dozen times in the last two weeks that he is fired or will be fired any second, Lane Kiffin still has a job? Should I check back at 3pm to make absolutely sure?
ReplyDeleteScene: Jerry's apartment. Jerry is watching TV]
ReplyDeleteJERRY: [The phone rings. He picks it up and says:] If you know what happened in the Mets-game, don't say anything, I taped it, hello... Yeah, no, I'm sorry, you have the wrong number...Yeah, no [somebody knocks at the door] Yeah? [to the door, while still at the phone]
KRAMER: [enters] Are you up?
JERRY: [To Kramer] Yeah...[in the phone] Yeah, people do move! Have you ever seen the big trucks out on the street? Yeah, no problem [hangs up the phone].
KRAMER: Boy, the Mets blew it tonight, huh?
JERRY: [upset] Ooohhhh, what are you doing? Kramer, it's a tape! I taped the game, it's one o'clock in the morning! I avoided human contact all night to watch this.
KRAMER: Hey, I'm sorry, I...ya know, I, I thought you knew...[takes two loaves of bread out of his pockets] You got any meat?
From the "No Shit, Sherlock" file:
ReplyDeleteSyracuse athletics director Dr. Daryl Gross said Monday that the Orange football team has yet to show the "obvious progress" necessary for Greg Robinson to remain as football coach beyond this season.
"It isn't working out," Gross said of Robinson. "It's very disappointing ... He has some work to do out in front of him."
Who wants to harass the Arizona Cardinals?
ReplyDeleteIf you see Kurt Warner at the Tyson's Corner Center mall today, tomorrow, or any day this week, don't do a double-take. The Cards, with a game yesterday at FedEx and this week at the Meadowlands against the Jets, are staying on the East Coast in a Tyson's Corner hotel through Saturday morning, practicing at Catholic University in D.C. Wednesday through Friday, then taking the train north to Newark on Saturday for the game in New Jersey Sunday.