heywoodu

Here the cake for tomorrow morning is in the oven (my dad usually makes one with my sister, but she's working these days, so I helped him a little ), after lunch we'll move on to the final parts of tonight's dinner. There's already a whole bowl of meat (deer) marinating in the fridge since yesterday and the smell coming out of the fridge is super promising After lunch (just a regular lunch) we'll prepare that and the side dishes and such for tonight Tomorrow we're at family all day, no idea what the menu will be then. Although afterwards we go eat with my sister and her boyfriend, with one of these sets 26 December is entirely free for us this year, no appointments/obligations or anything

But something about someone who was a superstar when my age was still in the single digits in a sport I've never cared for, or that one about Serena & Venus' dad, both players I've never really been interested in? Not talking bad about it at all by the way, it just doesn't have my interest, I prefer to watch the actual sports

No I'm not generally very interested in sports movies or documentaries, oddly enough

The biggest of all 'end of year traditions' in the Netherlands, the Top 2000 Really happy Roller Coaster pulled off the rare feat of becoming a new mainstay in the top-10 in recent years, fantastic song. On the other hand, much to my disbelief, I realized a song that this year became one of my favourite all-time songs isn't even in the entire list (and only was around position 1000 in the three years it was in the list) I can hardly think of better songs than Family of the Year's Hero. Absolutely beautiful.

Hard to already have a full plan, but the mountainbike World Cup in Valkenburg is definitely on the list (in the spring)

Or a bronze medal being gone and Latvia getting a surprise weightlifting bronze

As always it's a bit of a puzzle who celebrates Christmas on which days (or not at all) on such a diverse online place as Totallympics, but I'm pretty sure nobody celebrates it on 23 December already. Considering it's Friday and for a large portion of people this is probably the last working day before the holidays, it seems like as good a moment as ever to wish everyone Merry Christmas! Whether you celebrate only 24 December at night, only 25 December, 25 and 26 December or any other random combination...have a good time everyone!

I see Emiliano Martinez is still going on with the fake news things about Van Gaal? It's interesting how apparently, somehow media in Argentina came with things like "Van Gaal criticized Di Maria" and "Van Gaal said NED would easily win the penalties" and everyone seems to believe it (When he was actually complimenting Di Maria, despite Di Maria apparently calling him 'his worst coach ever', and he actually said he believed to have an advantage in the penalties because of the preparations, not 'we will easily win it' or something ) Oh well, it's the age of fake news for a reason, and the imagined quotes and such did work to get the players all aggressive. So that tactic worked out well at least

That's not cool news at all

Why are the best not allowed to try and qualify for the Olympics?

Right, the 15th consecutive year in which I'm thinking "gosh, next year I'm really going to write down big moments and such when I notice them, so at the end of the year I can more easily participate in the discussions!".

You can definitely nominate both Duplantis and a Van der Poel

Ivorian rugby player Max Brito has passed away. Sadly he's mostly remembered for a tragic incident at the 1995 World Cup match against Tonga, where after a few minutes of play he got a very unfortunate hit which left him being unable to move anything but his head, torso and one arm.

4.4 million TV viewers for the final here, and 2.8 million 'streaming starts' from 1.6 million people. Best-viewed match was of course NED - ARG, with 5.6 million TV viewers and 3 million times a stream was started on the NOS site or app (by 1.6 million people).

Meanwhile in the Netherlands, one of the biggest 'short political debates' we've had in recent years will come to a halt in 15 minutes or so: prime minister Mark Rutte will make a speech about the slavery past, and is more or less expected to apologize (not in his own name of course, he didn't do anything, but in name of the state as a whole). It's already been announced that apologies will not be accepted everywhere* (especially from Suriname there has been a four-week storm of criticism since the date was leaked), so who knows whether or not he'll actually go through with it (although I'd say the chance is 99%). *which doesn't really seem to depend on apologies, which nobody really seems to care about on both sides, but of course money Edit: and there are the official apologies, anyhow a historical moment.

People do seem to be making a bigger deal out of it than it is, judging by Twitter's own text. "We will remove accounts created solely for the purpose of promoting other social platforms and content that contains links or usernames" Shouldn't be much trouble if your account isn't created solely for that. People make it sound like saying "Facebook" on Twitter will now get you banned forever.

Someone says something fairly neutral about a player: whole team gets angry because saying something is 'provoking' Player from angry team: goes with some provoking move or so and now it's funny Yeah, he better stays with keeping balls out of his goal

Awesome! Congratulations

At least the one for best goalkeeper is definitely deserved when looking at penalties. What a beast.

I didn't watch the ceremony or check the awards, but Messi is in the tournament, so Messi definitely will have gotten the top player award

We have a whole branch of family in Argentina, but other than the name of my granddad's brother (who moved there) I have no idea who they are I know there's a Pablo. So yeah, I guess I'll celebrate after all.

When will the player of the tournament be known? It should probably be Mbappe (considering they're going to choose an attacker anyway), since he was basically the only one to really rise above the mediocrity in the entire tournament.

Not more than MVP Di Maria or so.

And also Dutch TV ignoring everything that's not Messi and making it the Big Messi Show (like I assume TV in every country is doing) You win the world title in a team with Messi, and nobody will remember who you are

At least it was a final to never forget, whoever you cheered for this will always stay in memory Definitely the best I have ever seen.