Mazel tov on your new government, Sheepie. Hey Taiga - how radically different are the rules of Canadian football vs. American football? I know Australian rules football is very different. I actually have a workmate who is from Edmonton, I should probably ask her about this. Hey, you're an Albertan, right? Gorgeous area! I've been to Calgary, Banff and Lake Louise and it was stunning. I really want to go back again someday - it was so beautiful.

Hey Taiga - how radically different are the rules of Canadian football vs. American football? I know Australian rules football is very different. Whenever I ask people what Australians and British call football, since they call soccer football, I'm told that they just don't play football. Which is absurd, so what do they call it? I have no idea what Australian rules football is but I always thought "Australian rules" was slang for "no rules except try not to die" :wink: In Bill Bryson's book on Australia he talked about how quaint it is that such a rough and tumble lot play cricket and said that if left alone for a generation, Australian cricket would turn into the players hitting each other with cricket bats "and it would be a better game for it" LOL. Okay, okay. Here is the difference between Canadian and American football. Our football fields are bigger and I've been told that our footballs are bigger too, though I'm not sure about that, and our teams have 12 players per side instead of 11. And there are a bunch of rules differences that I don't understand. Essentially, Canadian football is closer to rugby than American football is. They're not that different, and players can and have moved successfully between the CFL and NFL. The salaries, however, are MUCH different. I actually have a workmate who is from Edmonton, I should probably ask her about this. I used to live in Edmonton. Congratulations on your new government Australians, and Silja what is your other country?

Rugby and Denmark - all we need to figure out now is which answer belongs to which question.

Congratulations, Sheep! It is wonderful to hear about sanity in the world. On a more personal note: YAY!!! Mickey is dead, and I can finally go back in my room. (actually, I returned to my room after a couple of sleepless nights on the couch or with the snoring and tossing Mister. It is sad that the mouse won out in the end. I always made alot of noise before going into the room, and was told that the mouse would avoid my scent while I slept. But I was OH so thankful to see his little corpse this afternoon.)

I had a really weird dream(I haven't slept the last few days, so I just fell asleep on the couch) about an hour ago. I was playing a Sims 2 expansion pack–Criminals. There were rapists and child abusers and car theifs and bank robbers and murderers and everything. And instead of a family or romance aspiration, it was "Get out of Jail Free" and looked like a jail door.

There really aren't that many differences between Canadian and American football, and they are more similar to each other than to rugby. When I lived back east and one of my local stations showed Canadian games all the time I enjoyed them quite a bit. The slightly larger field and the 3 downs vs 4 in the Canadian version makes for a more wide open, higher scoring, and more exciting game (IMHO). Many American college players who can't make it in the NFL wind up playing in the Canadian league. Some prove themselves there and later make it in the NFL, like Warren Moon and Doug Flutie. They have rules to limit the number of Americans that can play on a Canadian team so that the far smaller number of Canadian athletes get to play. BTW, that page that Taiga linked to has at least one error I noticed, in the American game you can indeed return a missed field goal. A San Diego Charger named Cromartie just set a new NFL record a couple of weeks ago by running a missed field goal 109 yards for a TD. OK, I'll stop now. Don't mention football around me or I'll talk your ears off. Sorry. :oops:

Sheep: congratulations on having someone to vote for that you believe in. I normally end up voting for the candidate I fear the least :) dob1234: the spread offense. the future of college football? discuss. taiga: if you meant what do Australians and the British call American football, when the NFL game was played in London, the British fans called it "American football." All the talk of pie a couple pages back motivated me to use the bag of apples I bought last week. Except I'm too lazy to make pie. I just made applesauce in the crock pot. 5 apples makes 1 quart + a little left over to eat while it's still warm. Yum.

Here in Holland we call American football "American football", so I guess Australian football would be "Australian football" :lol: . Of course soccer is the only true kind of football :twisted: .

Go soccer! I was annoyed when I found out my old coach wasn't taking people for indoor soccer this year, so I'm signing up for footsol, just to be playing. The idea of not playing during the winter seems weird to me now.

Grr... why do HD stations feel they need to stretch 4:3 programs to fill the screen? 101 Dalmatians on TNT-HD makes my flat screen look curved...

Saskatchewan won the Grey Cup for the first time in 18 years. My co-workers will be thrilled. Y'know, for a football league that only has six or so teams in it 18 years is a long drought.

I think Japanese bugs are Dracula. I have this small mysterious bump on the side of my hand and it HURTS. Looks like a bug brought it on, but who knows? This country is slowly killing me.

Anyone remember me ranting a while ago about my sick cousin? She was undergoing -*test*-('") after -*test*-('") to diagnose her mysterious chronic blood loss, shuttled from doctor to doctor, a chest x-ray showed "nodules" in her lungs but her doctors just plain forgot about it, and one year more and one stomach less (removed to treat her bleeding ulcers) she was told over the phone that she had lung cancer and at most a year to live. She died today, her "year" was more like two months. Her body was so weakened from blood loss and malnutrition and trauma after having her stomach removed that the cancer just took over. She died because her doctors forgot she had lung cancer. Do you know that this is the THIRD relative of mine to die from a neglectful physician??