In Hindsight: This Is What Your Forefathers Fought For

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Line of the Week
Gene Rayburn: Don’t be too butch.
Charles Nelson Reilly: Don’t worry.

From ‘Match Game’, of course.

July 4 is, of course, synonymous with the United States, but this year, televised sports gave us quite the international flavour. So because I’m lazy, and I just spent the Canadian long weekend in Chicago – during which my wife managed to buy things at three Ann Taylor Outlet stores in three different states. Me, I was just looking for a Cubs mug (because it would make Romanada jealous), and I failed in that mission – you’re getting a large dose of YouTube to help me describe things.

First, there was the women’s quarterfinal matches at Wimbledon. Advancing were Amelie Mursemo (France), Justine Henin-Hardene (Belgium), Kim Clijsters (Belgium) and Maria Sharapova (Russia), all of whom are tough competitors that will (hopefully) provide us with some entertaining semifinals.

Second, there was the World Cup semifinal between Germany and Italy. A great contest capped by one of the prettiest goals you’ll see in the beautiful game:

Which of course led to Italian-Canadians flooding the streets in celebration. Note that it’s dark and that the game ended around 5:30pm EDT:

Way to create even more traffic congestion in the GTA, folks.

And finally, we have the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest. Nothing says “America” like people trying to eat as many hot dogs as they can in 12 minutes.

This year had probably the toughest competition yet. In addition to five-time champion Takeru Kobayashi, there was pint-sized Korean-American Sonya Thomas and engineering student Joey Chestnut. How did they do? Well, check out the competition:

Part 1 – Kobayashi has the orange hair, Chestnut is to his right, and Thomas is to Joey’s right.

Part 2 – With about two minutes left, both Kobayashi and Chestnut are at around 44 dogs eaten each.

IP Linkage:
Matt Basilo celebrates his first full year as a columnist by giving you a short column.

Mathan has been watching some quality television in ‘The Electric Company’.

And finally, if you read Scott Keith’s blog (and you know you do), then you’ve seen this Japanese parody of 24, complete with an appearance of Carlos Bernard. Take a look for yourself:

The Week… In Hindsight:
Monday:
‘Canadian Idol’ (CTV)
‘Treasure Hunters’ (NBC)

Tuesday:
Boobfest Breakfast at Wimbledon’ (TSN)
‘World Cup: Germany vs Italy’ (Sportsnet)
‘American Gladiators’ (ESPN Classic Canada)
‘Canadian Idol’ (CTV)

Wednesday:
‘Iron Chef America’ (Food Network Canada)
‘Good Eats’ (Food Network Canada)

That’s it for this week.

Kevin has been an Insider since 2003, writing on a variety of topics ranging from The Amazing Race to Mixed Martial Arts. His current hobbies include Fantasy Football, Sporcle, travelling, making liberal use of his DVR and wondering what the heck he's gonna do when his two daughters are old enough to date. You can follow Kevin on Twitter (@starvenger).