The Goooaaaliieeee!

And as one returns to work, another takes a break.

While Chris Condon returns to analyzing financial information, but also dusting cobwebs off the YABNews Desk, it looks like someone else has taken this opportunity to maintain the global balance of phoning it in. In Brussels (Belgium, not Sprouts), a third-tier girls’ soccer team received a complete shellacking by their opponents in a weekend friendly. It all went downhill for SK Berlaar when the opening whistle blew and the coach realized his goalkeeper had blown off the game to attend a rock music festival. With a lame duck defender trying to defend the net, archrival FC Malines eeked out the victory.

Final Score: 50-1.

The article, which is linked for your convenience here, evokes a few thoughts. First, I have to think that during a practice at some point, it would have occurred to the coach to maybe train another player in the fine art of net tending? Don’t get me wrong, I like to have some bench depth for midfielders, too, but no one else was able to stop 50 goals from going in? It’s like the Mighty Drucks ripping up Trinidad and Tobago in D2 all over again.

Secondly, this article really highlights just how crucial the position of goalie is. In the employment world, we like to call this job a system-breaker. If this guy or gal takes the day off, then one can fully expect full-scale chaos to erupt. The copier will break. The memo will be misplaced. The meeting conference room table will shatter into a million pieces, rendering all attendees silent in shock and awe. No one will no what to do, and your entire operation will go down in harrowing flames.

Not exactly your TPS reports kind of gig.

I tried to brainstorm some other underappreciated roles in today’s economy that would certainly signal doom if they decided to blow off work for a European rock festival. Here’s what I came up with.

Without a doubt, if an air traffic controller decided to take five without anyone getting his back, that spells disaster, and I’m not talking about shoddy control tower coffee, either. No one could possibly expect Ricky the Copy Boy to sit down and know what to do with all those blinking LED lights ever so slowly converging towards one another! Planes are at stake! Get back to your collating, Ricky. You couldn’t possibly be trained in time.

I think the oft-underappreciated role of restaurant busboy also would cause a major rift in dining operations should he decide to stay home and play Xbox all afternoon. The busboy, to my knowledge, is responsible for the setup, delivery, and cleanup of individual booths and tables, while the waiter/waitress type is in charge of taking orders and making sure the customer gets what they want. Well, what happens without the middleman? Table don’t get cleared, new food comes out, one plate at a time, only to be placed on already used dishes, teetering a happy couple’s meal slowly into the Leaning Tower of Chaos, whereupon food spills, the waiter gets a lousy tip, and can’t afford his own tickets to the European Rock Festival. Bummer, man.

Finally, let’s not forget the job of literary proofreader. Let’s speak hypothetically, and pretend that Icarus Fallen Czar Mattias Caro is picked up by a publishing company to pen his memoirs “Chile is Very Very Good to Me.” He sets out to work quickly and gets the manuscript to his editor in record time. Equally excited, the editor sends the copy to the proofreader’s office to make sure that Mattias’ fine William and Mary education taught him how to spell. Instead, Proofreader is out hitting on the cute brunette over in Childrens’ Books, and Ricky the Copy Boy is using his computer to check his Friendster account. Before you know, the world knows Mattias Caro as “the guy who loves to end his day at his local bar with his hand wrapped around a tall, frosty bear.”

Run, Mattias, run!