It’s transfer deadline night. Massive excitement at the other end of the sofa. But it’s not the Falcao coup that is firing up my lifelong Manchester United fan husband. It’s whether he got some random for his Fantasy Football team. I haven’t seen him so animated since, well, Auction Day. As I try to recall when I felt that fired up about anything, I realise the truth: I’ve got Fantasy Football envy.
I know lots of women play Fantasy Football. I’m just not one of them. I like watching a game, but rabidly scrolling through results and player news for ten months of the year – I just don’t care enough. Actually playing footie is drifting away from my husband and his mates with the onset of years, injuries and kids. But luckily for them, they have a readymade Hobby 2.0 to fill the void: Fantasy Football. All the banter, camaraderie and fun of the real thing, but without the “ooh, me knee” moments.
It’s not that I mind being a Fantasy Football widow. It’s just I wish I had something that I was so interested in I would think about it all day, every day, talk to my mates, and indeed, complete strangers, about it and engage in an ongoing, long-term friendly competition about it. Sure, I have interests. I like reading, for example, but log on to boast to my league-mates: “I’ve finished War and Peace – in your face!”? I’m into fitness too, but does Sunday night see me on tenterhooks waiting for banter on the weekend’s slogs round the park? I have lately come to enjoy a spot of gardening, but “I’ve dead-headed my rose bush – eat my mulch!” doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.
But then it came to me. I do have such a thing: sleep.
Sleep is the ultimate commodity of parents with young children. The phrase “transfer window” to me now means that precious 90 seconds you have to get the sleeping baby out of the car and up to his cot, before his next sleep cycle ticks in. Man U paid £59.7 million for Angel Di Maria; about the same, in my Fantasy Sleep League, that I would pay for nine hours’ unbroken sleep.
But that would blow my budget. I’d be left hoping for free transfers of less sought-after players, or “sleep-blocks” of a couple of hours. Would I be better to bid £5 million for a straight five-hour run, or £10 million for an eight-hour lie-time, with two intra-night get-ups? The permutations are endless, and ultimately pointless, as the moving parts are entirely subject to chance. Just like in Fantasy Football: as those who bought Olivier Giroud for £28.5 million know (ruled out injured for three months), children can, and do, wake you up whenever and however often they please.
But however dud your “team” of sleep-blocks is, it’s a talking point. Sometimes I feel it’s all I can talk about, so droopy are my eyelids. Stuck with another new-ish parent, as one so often is once one enters the world of parenthood, it’s a relief to be able to discuss how their night was, what hours their baby keeps, whether either of you will ever, EVER get a proper night’s sleep again. Even if it’s someone you’ve only just met, or haven’t seen for ages, and whether they’re male or female, you can always find common ground in comparing Night Notes. It’s funny, bedroom habits were such a taboo before we became parents; now we think nothing of asking what happened in the night, who was in who’s bed, and whether anyone got any (sleep).
Just like Fantasy Football, where the prize is usually pretty token, it’s the taking part that counts. But if you have a good week in the Fantasy Sleep League, you actually physically feel better. You just have to accept that, as in Fantasy Football, you will be temporarily despised by fellow participants as a result.
What’s your Fantasy Football equivalent?
Oh tell me about it – it is the only game that matters. And my bed tends to always be overcrowded ha xx
Ha ha brilliant analogy Jess 🙂 We are doing okish in the sleep league at the mo but it can and does often go wrong. The husband is a massive FF fan, he is annoyed as he picked his team too late and now has to spend all season catching up or something – why do they care?! x
I’m so glad my husband isn’t into football ball or fantasy football; I haven’t a clue how the latter one works!? But I love your comparison here, oh so true….. X
Love this! Pure genius! I’m also pretty confident that I now understand how fantasy football works.
Maybe your next football analogy could involve the offside rule, the I could join in all the boy talk xx