Calling broomheads
Just got my tickets for the 2006 Men's World Curling Championships in Lowell. Who's coming? 10D, you <b>promised</b>
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Each "draw" is a set of four matches going on simultaneously. There are three draws each day for a week, then playoffs. There are 12 teams, so each team plays in two draws each day. A draw lasts a little under 3 hours.
They have not announced which teams are playing which draws yet. We got tickets for two draws on the same day to guarantee seeing every team at least once.
The teams: Canada, US, Ireland, Norway, Switzerland, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Scotland, Japan, Australia, and Sweden.
Our tickets are for Sunday, April 2 (2pm and 7pm), section W, row 18, seats 16 and 17.
If you're a college hockey fan, I've always got a free ticket or two for the games there. This weekend is vs. BU and Amherst.
I may be a college hockey fan. Not this weekend though.
I'll probably just stay home and enjoy my <a href="http://www.thecurlingnews.com/calendar.html">calendar</a>.
See you there.
You can't get to here from Edinburgh.
If you try, you'll soon find why,
The Arch-Duke Ferdinand was such a churl.
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OK, that's not the anthem of Luxembourg, but this is definitely it's flag:
<img src="http://flagspot.net/images/l/lu.gif">
<img src="http://flagspot.net/images/n/nl.gif">
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Oh yeah, I also witnessed some excellent curling yesterday. Team Suisse (Hapf Schweiz!!) edged out Team Norge with a thrilling victory in the 11th end after overcoming a 1 point deficit in the 10th. The Norge Skipper caused groans to echo through cavernous Tsongas arena when he sailed the hammer just to the right of Team Suisse's most deftly placed (twice!) stone resting on the hack near the tee line.
Holy crap, you should have seen the Swedes in the 7pm draw. Well, not the team so much... they cruised to an easy victory over Australia. What was much more interesting was the 100 or so college-aged Swedish chicks chanting and singing through the whole night. Na na na na, na na na na, hey hey, Sverige!
The Canadians and Scots put on a clinic. Canada would have beat any other team on this day, but the Scots were out of control good.
Also, USA over Danmark, and Ireland over Japan.
Worst cheer I've ever heard, ever: Gimme a 'U'... Gimme an 'S'... Gimme an 'A'.... What's that spell?
Also, Andorra:
<img src="http://www.chevroncars.com/wocc/media/sho/world/FLAGS/Andorra-flag.gif" />
I take it that Ireland and Japan are duking it out place DFL in the WC of C.
1) Go to their next open house. They have two per year, and the next one will be in October (the other is January).
2) Sign up for a "provisional membership". This is $100 and allows you to curl in any number of "social" leagues for 3 months.
3) Sign up for one of the social leagues. They try to organize the teams to be well-balanced, so newcomers are put on a team with maybe a 1-year guy, a 5-year guy, and a crotchety old man from British Columbia that has been curling since WW2.
After the 3 months you can sign up for a real membership. Marna and I did not do it because of the time commitment involved. One match is 4 hours, and you play once per week per league.
<img src="http://flagspot.net/images/t/tw@oly.gif" />