Football and other Signs of Spring

Today marks the first day of spring in the southern hemisphere.  And unlike on the first day of fall, mother nature did not get the memo this time.  Spring limped in like a lamb with a cool, overcast Monday in Buenos Aires.  Which is too bad.  Luckily, Anne, Mark and HBomb took advantage of the spring-like temps over the weekend.

On Saturday, the embassies of the countries of Southeast Asia put on a cultural festival in a park not far from where Anne, Mark and HBomb live.  The festival promised (and delivered) tasty Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese and other cuisine.  The festival also features several dance troupes and at least one group of shirtless martial arts guys doing a demonstration, so we are going to chalk it up as a cultural event rather than a food event.

So that's a strong start to the weekend.  But it gets better from there.  On Sunday, Mark and his buddy found a bar that was showing the NFL games.  It wasn't exactly BW3s, but it was as close as we could find to it.  I mean they had wings, beer and several TVs of different size, resolution and pointing in different directions - so it was kind of like being at BW3s....

...if only we could have come up with that extra detail to make it feel more like home...

Ahhh, there it is.  Bring your own sauce and it is starting to feel like the real thing.

 In case anyone was wondering, the clientele of the bar on this particular day was almost exclusively Americans.  Mark spoke with fans of the Bears (poor guy), the Browns (seriously, they have fans) and the Patriots.  Mark spent a little time talking to a couple sitting at the next table who were trying very hard to understand football but were having trouble understanding the basics - tackling, scoring, and the very concept of "the playoffs."  After a few minutes, the couple felt comfortable enough to admit that they are Lions fans (I guess that explains why they don't understand the concept of "the playoffs.")