It's Summer1994 - Most Americans are focused on World Cup Soccer or arrest of OJ Simpson for murder

[blm]

It's June/July 1994. As clearly as you can recall, were most Americans focused on World Cup Soccer and excited about the games being held in this country....

or

....were most Americans during that same time frame oblivious of the World Cup games as they were intently focused on OJ Simpson's slowspeed chase and the early preliminary trial?

And...we're talking MOST Americans and our network news organizations.

[bigwillq]

1. OJ (nt)

[EFerrari]

2. It was 24 Hour OJ.

I remember because Doug and I were writing sets and it became difficult to do topical stuff because the topic NEVER CHANGED.

[missheidi]

3. OJ!

Oh, you know almost everyone was watching OJ and the ill-fitting glove!

[blm]

8. the 'glove doesn't fit' act was much later...June/July 1994 was the beginning of the saga,

Including the preliminary trial. During World Cup.

[Sebastian Doyle]

4. Uh, well...

Yeah... that was a great game, wasn't it?

[blm]

6. actually, that evening was the OPENING CEREMONIES of World Cup ...planned for years.

Yep....who can forget the lavish spectacle of the World Cup's 1994 opening ceremonies?

[azmouse]

5. Who could forget Kato Kaelin?

One of the more annoying non-celebrities to come out of that mess.

[Warren DeMontague]

7. Personally, I was mesmerized by that comet smashing into Jupiter.

But that was just me, I guess. :shrug:

[Forkboy]

9. Hell yeah!

:)

[Skink]

11. Hale Bop

the jazz comet.

[Warren DeMontague]

37. Not to be confused with

"Chisholm/Bop"

[LibDemAlways]

10. Ron Goldman's dad lived near me. TV trucks were a common sight in

the neighborhood for a long time. OJ was THE big news.

[rug]

12. I blame OJ for the death of American soccer.

[Fuzz]

13. I was watching soccer. My wife was watching the OJ fiasco.

I remember because it was the year we married and I was afraid for our future.

;)

[Crunchy Frog]

14. That was around the time I stopped watching TV news.

[Octafish]

15. We in Pontiac, Mich., had WORLD CUP games at the Silverdome

Michigan State University created a special type of grass that grows indoors. The field was brought in and assembled from hundreds of octagonal shaped pallets. Mostly VIPs and Big Wigs and out-of-towners filled the place for a couple of games.

The place and its land just sold for less than $600,000. The town is so broke they had to take it as they couldn't afford the $2 million-plus annual upkeep. Oh year. We had O.J. too. All he did was divide the community.

As a reporter then, I met the team from Romania, including its leader, a general who opposed Ceausescu. Seeing how he had fought the NAZIs as a teen and the commies as a man, I asked him about totalitarianism. He pulled out his wallet and showed me a bullet he carried since the revolution. It was dark gray, evil looking thing that came to a very sharp point. It had gone through his cheek and lodged in his teeth on the other side of his jaw. He said there really is no difference in the mentality of the opposing totalitarians.

[blm]

16. now THAT'S A STORY...

a reporter then, eh?

[Octafish]

40. Hard-nosed and everything.

Back in the late 80s, I helped investigate the local corrupted S&L. We went through old court records to find how the mob fit in, discovering that the mild-mannered commercial loans officer had an interesting youth holding hands of late loanees in the mouths of Dobermans for expiditing repayment.

One example: The connected (GOP, DEM, IND) would show up at the S&L and ask for $6.5 million loan, using a deed with still-damp White Out covering over the actual owner's name for collateral. The phony owner'd get the money and a few weeks later declare bankruptcy. Another example: The brother of the Michigan House speaker got $4.5 million for an auto mall that never even saw a spade of dirt turned over. His business went belly-up, but there was no money for the S&L.

By then, the cash is in the Caymans and the taxpayers are on the hook. Variants on this M.O. were repeated to the tune of $92 million. We even tied the local S&L to what Pete Brewton was doing in Houston. Of course, for our trouble, the FBI was madder at us than the mob.

We won the biggest award in local journo, the Medallion of the then-Detroit Press Club. So, as a reward, they made me night cops guy until I quit the paper. I went on to the big bucks and heartbreak of a professional shil. My partner also ended up quitting the business entirely and is now a back-to-nature woodworker fellah.

And now that there are so many jobs in journalism, I have to turn down job offers. Not.

[nonconformist]

44. I was born and raised in Pontiac.

:hi:

[mzteris]

17. ok so what the hell was I watching in summer of 93?

I'm having a senior moment or something.

[Codeine]

18. OJ was arrested on June 17, 1994.

The jurors were seated in October 1994.

[mzteris]

21. just changed my post

I'm thoroughly confused now.

I know I watched every bit of the oj simpson trial. I distinctly remember being pregnant - and my son was born in Nov 93. Was their some other trial on in summer of 93 and I watched all the oj stuff after the baby was born the next summer?

The images don't match up in my head - we moved in spring of 94. I "remember" watching the trial in the old house, not the new one at all.

The mind plays funny tricks sometimes.

I've been saying for years that I watched the trial while I was pregnant. I'm sooooooooooooooo confused!!! :crazy:

[Codeine]

22. The memory is a weird ol' thing.

I remember watching the Waco Branch Davidian event go down at home, but I also remember seeing it while on vacation in London. Checking the dates shows I was in London. Why the HELL do I distinctly remember seeing that shit in my old apartment?! :crazy:

[blm]

29. Waco standoff lasted well over a month before the final confrontation.

.

[csziggy]

34. My memory is pretty precise for Waco

But kind of fuzzy for the OJ trial.

The day the Waco compound caught fire was the last day my sister was able to verbalize at all. She was going in for her second (or was it her third?) operation to take out as much of her brain cancer as possible. The previous operation(s) had impaired her speech, but she could still verbalize some though she had trouble retrieving the exact words she wanted.

We had gone in to the hospital to see her before the operation. The TV was on and while we were talking, she pointed to the TV and called out about the fire. We talked some about the standoff, then the nurse came in and we had to leave. When she recovered from that operation, she was completely non-verbal and the doctors told us that the cancer had invaded so much of her brain, there was nothing more they could do. She passed away a little over a month later.

The rest of 1993 was no better. My dog died, we also lost four of our six cats. I got smacked on the eyebrow ridge and was temporarily blind in the right eye, got badly kicked on the thigh (because I was showing a horse and could not see what he was doing to my right), damn near got my left arm ripped off on Halloween. That is why the next spring and summer is a blur - I was loaded on pain killer, in pain despite them. Got my left shoulder completely rebuilt in a six hour operation and had to go through extensive therapy for nine months.

I spent much of 1994 vegging out in front of the TV and the OJ trial was dominating the airways. Overall it was a really bad time.

[blm]

38. tough year....

.

[tammywammy]

42. I remember Waco.

I was in 6th grade. My parents watched the news every night, I knew about the standoff. For some reason the science teacher had a tv in his class room, this was back when the whole "open floor plan" was a big deal, the whole grade only had these bookshelves that separated the class rooms. Mr. Gilbert had been down in the social studies teacher's class room chatting with her, she also had a tv in there, and I remember him walking quickly down the hallway to tell the other teachers "Waco's burning." I remember after school let out, I said something to another student about it burning and they had no clue what I was talking about.

[blm]

24. Preliminary trial was rushed thru end of June, ended July7 or 8, iirc. There were court hearings

aplenty before the actual trial got underway.

[Richard Steele]

19. Ridiculous 'false choice' question; No real Americans have EVER been focused on "World Cup Soccer"

Seriously, you think SOCCER compared to the OJ trial?
Dude, what the fuck are you smoking?

COMPARISON FAIL.

EPIC Comparison Fail.

I feel embarrassed for both of us. Please sit down.

[Codeine]

20. Still not sure why anti-soccer humor is still considerd funny or clever.

Ranks right up there with French Surrender jokes. :eyes:

[Richard Steele]

23. It's not HUMOR. No one in the USA gives a rat's ass about SOCCER.

The TV-Propaganda-Artists who've easily convinced 1/3rd of the USA
that Sarah Palin is a viable Presidential candidate
have been trying to shove SOCCER into our living rooms for
almost 20 years now, and they've FAILED.

The average US citizen would rather vote for Palin than watch soccer.
That's not a joke, it's a stone-cold FACT.

[EFerrari]

26. Um, out here in Latinoland, there's a lot of giving a rat's ass about soccer.

[Richard Steele]

32. I stand corrected. I used to know that. I guess my social isolation is taking a toll.

I'm so far from any semblance of CIVILIZATION,
I haven't spoken to a person of the Latino persuasion
in almost 2 years.

Dear Lord, but this area SUCKS ASS!! :banghead:

That being said, soccer still has ZERO appeal to the average
TV-watching Caucasian-American.

[EFerrari]

33. I'm sorry, Richard!

I had to move here for now to help out but the reward is I'm surrounded by a huge Latino community.

You're right, though. Soccer isn't mainstream here and won't be until we take over the world in 2040. lol

:hi:

[Richard Steele]

35. You wanna know how far from civilization I am? You'll think I'm kidding.

Last year, I ran into a grown woman who didn't know how
to pronounce "fajita".
I was a supper guest, and she asked how many 'fah-GY-tuhs'
I wanted.
I laughed, because I thought she was making a joke.
She wasn't. Everyone stared at me.

Seriously, it was 9 years into the fucking 21st century,
and I was surrounded by people who think "fajita"
is pronounced 'fah-GY-tuh'.

And now it's 2010 and I'm actually getting USED to this place.
I have just GOT to get the fuck out of here.
The STUPID is infectious.

[EFerrari]

36. That reminds me of an old commercial.

It was a cartoon, and a lady's voice said, "Look, Harvey -- Mexican Ta-Males!"

It really is true that we adapt. :scared:

[nonconformist]

45. I'm starting to think we might live in the same place.

One of my kids told me that the school lunchlady pronounced "quesadillas" as 'case-a-DIL-as'.

We all laughed. Then felt really depressed...

I do, however, speak to Latinos regularly, as I'm related to several. They don't live near me, though.

[alcibiades_mystery]

39. Silly, Latinos are not REAL Americans, is what Richard Steele really meant

Neither are Middle Easterners, recent immigrants from Africa and the Caribbean, second and third generation children of Germans, Italians, Albanians, Slovaks, and Serbs (and the list goes on), or any of those weirdos in the major cities. No REAL Americans watch soccer, silly. Just all those folks.

:sarcasm:

:rofl:

[Name removed]

30. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Renew Deal]

43. I give a rats ass about soccer.

And I am not "Latino." So you are obviously wrong.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

27. I know quite a few Americans who are. What makes then "not real"?

[blm]

28. fo

fo

fum

[nadinbrzezinski]

25. Was there a world cup in 1994?

(For the record my keychain is from THAT world cup and I followed it, but hey I was a rare bird. I STILL have my soccer ball from that cup... bought it at the local mall... haven't had much luck finding Soccer stuff at the mall this time)

[kwassa]

31. I used to see OJ at my bank.

We used the same branch of California First on San Vicente. Nicole's safe deposit box was there. The restaurant that Ron Goldman worked at was within a couple of blocks.

I had learned that if I went to a bank branch in a posh neighborhood, I would be treated much better. This branch had free valet parking. The other close branch had linoleum, guards, and security cameras.

OJ was a very public celebrity who liked being out in the public and recognized. On another occasion, I was stuck in gridlock traffic behind an outrageous sports car, a Ferrari Testarossa. I said to myself "Who can afford a car like this?" I managed to eventually pull alongside, the windows were down, in a very un-LA like manner, and of course, it was OJ. No blacked-out windows for him!

If you are nice, I will tell you about Wilt Chamberlain's Lamborghini .... he was too big to fit in the driver's seat and ...

[fishbulb703]

41. Most Americans and World Cup don't really compute, nt