Another dumb-ass Subway woman, and more tennis.
written: 10:43 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 14, 2009

"What's your sandwich?"

Sorry, WHAT? I thought she was asking me which bread I wanted for my second order, so I dawdled for a bit between a normal bread and a wrap until I decided on a normal sandwich. I told her I wanted a six-inch whatever it was I ordered and she just looked at me patronisingly and repeated, "What's your sandwich?"

I was REALLY confused by now and I repeated what I told her. She repeated her weird question one more time, to which I gave her my Yelen Is Damn Confused and on the Brink of Losing It look. It apparently worked, because she finally explained to me what the fuck "what's your sandwich" meant and said, "What filling you want?"

OH MY GOD I SWEAR. The worst part was, I felt damn stupid...BUT IT WASN'T EVEN MY FAULT. I'm sorry, even though I'm not, if I can't bloody understand bad English, or English that isn't even English by virtue of the fact that the whole phrasing and usage of those words are completely wrong. It's not my fault if your standard of English is so low that I can't undertand you. It's also not my fault if you only deemed it time enough to rephrase your question after three failed attempts to ask me what I wanted in my sandwich.

It's not my fault people are so damn stupid. And I hate it when I'm made to feel stupid when you are the one with the bad English, not me. Sorry, I don't communicate with bad English, so it's either you step up, or QUIT YOUR FUCKING JOB. How can you sell sandwiches when you can't speak proper English?

To add insult to injury, the bloody auntie didn't ask me if I wanted extra cheese! She asked the two customers behind me, but not me. WHAT A BITCH.

Okay, rant over. I feel better now.

***

I was supposed to play tennis with Baoyue and Ben (JC friend) today, but at 3.05 p.m. or thereabout, I received an SMS from Baoyue telling me she overslept. At 3.30 p.m., I received another one from her, telling me she wasn't feeling well and thus wasn't coming down.

So I ended up playing two hours' worth of tennis with Ben. Ben is a guy - obviously. And because he's a guy, he's presumptively much fitter than I am (safe presumption to make about anyone against me, to be honest) and has more strength than me and therefore hits harder than me. Not only does he hit harder than me, he hits harder than anyone I've played with (Justin was too kind to me! All he did was feed me the balls haha) - which means I was running around a lot and using more strength than normal to return - attempt to return, to be more precise - his shots.

So now my hand is hurting like mad and I am positive that I will wake up tomorrow not recognising most of my body and feeling as if I'd gone through a serious beating the day before. But it's totally worth it 'cause it was fun!

Well, for the most part, that is. I was even more convinced today that the backhand is the only decent shot that I can pull off (I hit a few serves today. None of them were in. Damn sad), and the thought of hitting a backhand doesn't put me in Panic OMG What Do I Do mode the way getting ready to hit a forehand does. The majority of my backhands don't fly all over the court and actually travel back to somewhere in the centre of the court.

I can't say that about my forehand at all, and I swear, it annoys and frustrates me like you wouldn't believe. The first instinct is STILL to open racquet which makes my ball fly really high (I guess the only consolation is that at least it's still in), and for some reason I kept hitting it with the frame of the racquet. I don't think I hit even one decent forehand the entire time which makes me really depressed. (I'm not counting all the underhand serves 'cause those I can do, but I can't hit a proper forehand return.)

Okay, 'depressed' is stretching it a bit, but it's definitely frustrating. I played against the wall yesterday and save for a couple of moments in which I hit around five or six shots, the wall won. It's really sad, isn't it? I think it is, too.

***

For some odd reason, my laptop contracted strange viruses over the past few days, the most recent of which caused my C and D drives to stop responding to the double-click, i.e. I'd double-click, and the dialogue box about searching for a programme to open it with would pop up. I googled the solution and things are back to normal now, but I don't understand why my laptop's so prone to virus infections. It's scary. But I still refuse to buy a new laptop because I love My Laptop (My Laptop = my laptop's name).

***

On another note, I watched a video of Roger's winners against Richard Gasquet in one of the 2006 Wimbledon rounds on YouTube last night, and after I was done picking my jaw up from the floor, I actually felt a little bit sad.

Maybe it was the surface - grass - that made a difference. I definitely haven't seen the Now Roger play on grass since I started following him. But his movement in that match was so quick, so lithe, so agile, almost cat-like, and his shots were so precise and effortless, it was as if he could hit those shots at those exact angles and placements with his eyes closed. Lethal passing shots executed with zero effort and to utter perfection; down-the-line backhand winners, elegant and deadly; and his casual, oh-so-casual, aces down the T. He made firing an ace look like it was the easiest thing to do in the world when in fact it's anything but.

Again, maybe the surface made a difference, but nevertheless, I couldn't help but wonder how much of that Roger I've seen since I started following him. I think his showing in Melbourne was fantastic despite the eventual loss, and that the Del Potro match was Vintage Federer once again. The game has never left him; all his shot-making skills and his natural talent are in him somewhere. And this is precisely why it still kills me sometimes to remember that horrific loss to Nadal because I don't understand how someone with such graceful, natural and liquid talent can lose consistently to someone who has to work so much harder to get to the same spot. Nadal and Murray, and to a lesser extent, Gilles Simon - all backboarders with nothing on Roger in terms of talent and innate natural ability, and yet he's lost all his matches against all these three players since the later half of 2008.

I had a slight sense that the Roger playing against Gasquet in 2006 won't be the Roger that I will be watching anymore. I wish I'd been around during his heyday so that I'd know what it's like watching him win everything in sight in real time; I can't even begin to imagine being able to sit down to watch a Roger Federer final and not worry, even the slightest bit, that he might lose. That was what he gave to his fans between 2004-2007, especially 2006. That was the way I felt even when I first started following him during the US Open, and I still remember the first time I ever saw him lose (against Andy Murray in Madrid), I didn't expect at all that it was even possible for him to lose.

Now I know better, and I still wish he'd go back to his invincible self, but even if he doesn't win everything in sight, even if he's just winning most of everything in sight, there's just something completely inexplicable about him and his tennis that gets to me on a deeply emotional level that makes me unable to turn and walk away. Even when he loses matches that he shouldn't have lost, even when he mentally blanks out and gives up a match, even when he's playing way below his level - I can't give up on him. When I'm disappointed at a loss, I'm disappointed for him, not in him (barring that horrendous loss to Murray at Qatar, but that's the only exception), and even after watching so many matches and looking at so many pictures of him in action, the pure unbridled and uncensored beauty of his tennis, the mere idea that a man can transcend the boundaries of a sport while playing a sport, the mere idea that he can create art, still amazes and touches me, every single time.

I have no idea why or how I became so emotionally invested in an athlete when prior to this I wasn't even an avid sports watcher. But Roger's more than an athlete to me; the reason I was able to care so much about him is also the reason I could never care so much about a basketball team. He's a human being. He's not a logo, he's not an entity; he's a person. He's writing the last few chapters of his story and I want to - need to - know how it ends, and I care about how it ends. Because once it ends, there won't be another Roger Federer, while the Sacramento Kings continues to be the Sacramento Kings even after Peja Stojakovic leaves. I found it impossible to care about the Kings after my favourite player, also known as the only reason I cared about the Kings in the first place, was no longer there, and getting to know another team from scratch was way too much of a hassle and I just couldn't make myself do it. I just couldn't care. And when I can't care and am not emotionally invested, I don't find a reason to follow. I don't watch things over an extended period of time casually, especially not sports, since I'm not naturally a sports fan. It's only when there's something for me to care about and latch on to that I become quite obsessed.

I'm pretty much obsessed with tennis now, both watching and playing, and this is all because I started caring about one person: Roger Federer. He'd be quite proud to know this, I think; he's always been keen on promoting his sport. I don't think there's anyone in the top 20 that loves tennis as much as he does. Nadal said he loves winning and Roger said he loves tennis - QED, right? I think so too.

***

Anyway, I'm really sad that Mario Ancic played such a horrible match against Andy Murray tonight. I'd never seen Ancic play and what he did today made me not want to watch him ever again. He lost 1-6, 2-6, and he lost against a Murray who was struggling with some problem with his ankle. Ancic only started waking up and getting aggressive when he was 0-4 down in the second set, but clearly, it was too little, too late. Even if he'd broken Murray when the latter was serving at 5-1, Ancic would still have been down a break - and breaking Murray is like trying to hit through a wall. Seriously.

I still don't like Murray, but I'd take watching him over Nadal any day. I actually quite like that weird thing he does where he kind of hops a little on his right foot when hitting a forehand. It's kind of cute. I can't name even ONE thing I like about Nadal's game and style of playing. Besides, Murray's serve is way better than Nadal's, as his ability to find angles and hit winners. Nadal generally seems content to defend at the baseline. He occasionally creeps towards the net and apparently his net game has improved a lot, but he's still largely a baseliner and I find baseliners utterly boring.

I was really sad to find out that Jo-Wilfried Tsonga eventually lost to Nadal. I watched the last few games of the second set, and Tsonga played a magnificent tie-break, despite losing three set points. But oh my god, the way he converted the fourth set point was just superb: an ace on the second serve, one of the most gutsy and high-risk-high-reward moves I've seen. He could've double-faulted with that serve but he went for it and he made it. Tsonga's definitely one of the players I rather enjoy watching: he's very agile and lively, and this may sound racist considering his ethnicity but I seriously can't help but think of tribal dancers and dances when I watch him play. He has that sort of raw, even wild movement which I find utterly fascinating, not to mention he's quite the all-court player and it's just wonderful to see a tennis player make full use of the entire court.

Too bad he lost. He deserves to go much higher in the rankings than he's had; he deserves to break the top 5. He's #14 now after losing in the Australian Open before reaching the final (lost points from last year when he made the final but lost to Djokovic, omg). I hope he wins some tournaments and rises in the ranking, and keeps himself injury-free. He's probably my #3 player, after Roger and Nalbandian. He may overtake Nalbandian if Nalby continues to be Fat Dave and not work out and not take tennis seriously.

Lastly, for the sake of my sadistic desire to see Nadal and Murray, two amazing backboarders, backboard each other to death on the court, I hope Nadal goes through tonight against Gael Monfils. I like Monfils and all but he's already deprived me of my sadistic pleasure once in Qatar; please don't do so again. I really want to watch them kill each other because I can't think of anything funnier than that.

before sunrise // before sunset

Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010