Frustrated at my inability to watch Tiger’s run to a 14th major

I’m completely frustrated today.  I was unable to watch the 18 plus 1 hole playoff today at Torrey Pines that pitted Rocco Mediate vs. Tiger Woods.  Much like everyone else, I had to work today.  That fact wasn’t a surprise to me; work is an essential part of my life right now (until I win the lottery) and let’s face it, it happens (sometimes sporadically for me..hahaha).  Anyhow, the First Lady of Sport and I made a pact that we would DVR the round and watch it together tonight. 

I’ve tried this practice before and it always proves to be tricky and I always seem to have a mixed bag of results.  The trickiest part of doing this is not to catch word of any of the action.  This can prove to be a tough task because you can’t predict if or when someone might come up to you and say “Did you see that Tiger is up 3 with 6 to play today?” With the ever increasing presence of the internet, it is always possible to get an updated score at the snap of the right click button on your mouse.  I often sneak a peek during times like this and totally wreck the surprise of the action that I tried so hard to avoid hearing.

However, today I totally bought into the plan of DVR’ing the playoff and I would relax with the First Lady and Baby Siemens and watch all the drama unfold.  I told my colleagues about my plans and they agreed that they wouldn’t update me on what was going on the course. I set the DVR to tape the round on TSN, whose website confirmed that they would be showing the round. I left the house feeling pretty good that I would fullfill my goal of not peeking at the action.  When I got to school I logged on to TSN.ca again just to confirm what was the start time of the telecast.  It was there where I found out that TSN was going to switch their telecast to their alternate feed at 2:00, thus messing with my DVR time and wrecking my plan totally at that moment.  Great planning was trumped by bad television scheduling.

I started to panic and tried to conjure up a plan to somehow get home and change the DVR schedule.  This proved to be futile as I couldn’t get anyone to cover my class.  A stomach ache wouldn’t suffice on this day either, especially with only seven full days of school left.  I was doomed.  It was at this point I fired off an email to the First Lady to concede that our best laid plans were now doomed and we had to abort the mission and make sure that we watched the round by any means necessary on our own throughout the day.  She agreed and took off to the campus bar with some coworkers.  I was happy for her that she was able to catch some of the action. 

My plight took a totally different turn.  I had no other option but to turn to my desktop computer. I tried desperately to download the proper flash players to watch the round on live feed, but alas, I failed.  At this point, I was left to press the refresh button quite frequently, with mixed results.  I finally did a Google search and found a live blog (yeah bloggers) that kept me up to date with what Rocco and Tiger were facing with each passing shot.

Throughout the day I finally resigned to the fact that I wasn’t going to catch any of the action.  School ended and Rocco and Tiger were on the 16th hole.  At this point, I had to head to my car and my tutoring session.  While I was on the way, I turned the radio to the Fan 590, who updated the scores every 20 minutes and kept listeners informed about Tiger trying to track down Rocco coming down the stretch.  I rolled up to the tutoring session and waited outside the house while the action was recalled on the radio.  Tiger birdies the the 18th and forces a playoff.  I quickly deliver a Tiger-like fist pump and leave the car for the front door to begin my tutoring session.  DING DONG……no one is home.  Woohoo and with another Tiger fist pump I raced back into my car. 

On the way home, Bob “Cat” McCowan takes over for his Prime Time Sports segment.  He’s a pretty crass guy and I don’t always agree with his opinions, but at this point I’m absolutely giddy that he’s giving an ongoing commentary of the action. I finally got to hear that Tiger wins the championship, but the emotion of the tourney was defintely lost on me by hearing the announcement by way of the radio. 

I’m super pumped for Tiger and his 14th major.  Some folks will claim that they  aren’t huge fans of his and I can dig that.  Many will complain that he doesn’t have any real competition. That may be true, but perhaps the real truth is that his greatness defies any real competition. I think the thing that really makes me want to watch him is that I always get the feeling that something special is about to happen.  Very few athletes have been able hold that effect on me.  Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky and Bo Jackson (yes I realize they are all the athletes from Pro Stars – the cereal and the cartoon) are probably the athletes that have been able to capture my imagination like Tiger does. Hopefully The Golf Channel will carry the whole round in it’s entirety tonight.  I hope so as it would ease the edge on a very frustrating sports viewing day.  If it isn’t, perhaps a little Crown Royal will have to do.  Cheers to you, Tiger.