It all started when he hit me back.

-
-
I could watch this all day.

At the end, the announcer yells, "Mais pourquoi? Mais pourquoi?" Which means "But why? But why?" Yes, France lost all hope of winning the World Cup when Zidane lost his patience after being illegally and literally held back (via a bear hug directly before this moment) for two hours. But, as my friend Josh said on his blog, imagine how much abuse it must have taken to get a Frenchman to retaliate. (Yes, yes, we know that it's not PC. But it's funny. So deal.)

The Italians played for a shoot-out, after their tieing (sp?) goal. They ran Theirry Henry and the-guy-whose-name-I-can't-remember-but-it-starts-with-an-R into the ground, forcing the selecteur (not coach. He selects the team members, and chooses who starts and who trades in/out, but he doesn't "coach.") to pull them out for fresh players. And then the Italians abused and injured Zidane until he cracked and earned himself a redcard, since they knew there was no way that he was going to be pulled out of his last game.

So, when it came time for a shoot-out, France's three best forwards were out, and they were playing their 2nd team. They Italians were wily, but not very sporting. At least they didn't pull a bunch of drama queen nonsense.

I hope I'm not letting down my fans with my minimalistic commentary, but--other than the clip above--my (distant) 2nd favorite part of the evening was playing with the dogs at the party. And the people...the people were nice too. :)