Insightful Sports Commentary from a True Sportster

In my twenties I did reckless things like collect cardigans and blog from a ridiculous persona named Princess TruffleFluff. Princess TruffleFluff was insane, and I had to get rid of her when I turned 30. Now I am a crotchety old woman who shakes a bony finger at rowdy youths, but I still enjoy reflecting on some of my Princess shenanigans. Please enjoy this insightful sports commentary I wrote in 2014 during the World Cup.

Because Princess owns about 17 pairs of Nike shorts, played at least 5 years of recreational basketball at her church, and once won a golf trophy, she is well-versed in anything “sporty.” Since the World Cup is going on, Princess thought many of her constituents could use a refresher on two very confusing sports, futbol and football.

The first thing you need to do is accept that nothing with these sports makes any sense. Once you’ve accepted this fact, you’ll need to know the difference between futbol and football. Futbol is also called soccer, and you kick the ball with your giant spiky FUT. Football is just called football, like it doesn’t have any other secret names, but the thing is that even though the name says so, you DON’T kick the ball with your foot, except for one guy, and he’s not as big as the other guys and people yell at him a lot because he only has one job to do, and sometimes he ruins the game for everyone. That’s sad.

In futbol, which we’ll just call soccer because it’s less confusing, you CANNOT touch the ball with your hands except one guy. He’s a GOALIE and he’s bigger than everyone and he’s got ONE JOB TO DO (keep the ball from getting in the goal), except sometimes he ruins everything for everyone. They also make him wear a different shirt than everyone else, and it’s really sad. But Princess' brother tells her that he's usually yelling at everyone else like "I AM YOUR LEADER STOP MAKING ME LOOK BAD YOU PEASANTS," so that's cool.

In soccer the guys work together to kick the ball all the way to the other team’s goalie, but it’s really depressing because sometimes one of the other guys will kick the ball ALLLLL the way back to where it was originally, and the guys are like “UGH we just did all that work for nothing.” It’s pretty inefficient, but basically that’s what happens back and forth for forever until finally the striped shirt guys are like “you guys are done come get some juice boxes and orange slices!” and the guys are like “FINALLY these long socks are so itchy!”

In football it’s kind of the same except so much slower that you will probably get really bored. You’ll need to go to the concession stand about fifteen times because these games last about four hours even though the clock says 20 minutes or something. Princess usually just eats hotdogs and cheers when everyone around her cheers. (But this backfires if you didn’t realize that your seats are in the enemy section. Then you may get a mean look from your husband who just realized he has the worst wife ever. Or something.)

Anyway it’s like snail soccer except, again, DON’T USE YOUR FEET UNLESS YOU’RE THAT ONE GUY. (You do not want to be that guy.) Everyone gets in a line and hunches over, and then one guy will throw the ball under his legs to the quarterback. The quarterback is the boss and he yells out some codes and probably has a really hot girlfriend. Then the quarterback will hold the ball for a second and look around. Sometimes he’ll run and everyone is like “whoa whoa whoa” and sometimes he’ll throw it, but then the guy who he’s throwing it to needs to LOOK OUT because he is about to get jumped on by some really giant dudes. If the guy drops the ball, it’s called a FUMBLE and then whoever jumps on the ball first wins and gets to keep it. (But not forever because then the game would be over, and to be clear, the game is NEVER OVER.) If he catches it, he can run until the big dudes jump on him, and then they line up again and yell more codes. The goal is to get past those yellow lines that only show up on TV until they get all the way to the end of the field, and then the other team does that whole thing going the other way. This goes on forever until you die, and then it’s only half time, but GOOD NEWS there is a show with sparkly baton girls and tuba players.

So that’s pretty much it. If you have any questions regarding football, futbol, or general sporty-ness, Princess is your girl.

Editor's note: If you would like further context for this picture, we thought it would be funny to have crazy hair for our team photo. I am wearing hoop earrings, inexplicably. My dad was my coach every year, and he is the real hero here, because he had to put up with a lot of nonsense. He patiently taught us the same plays every year, and I never remembered them because I am terrible. SORRY, DAD.