Long road up

It is but a tragedy that life's sharp turns can leave you facing a road so steep downhill that you would wish that you never had had to take that last turn. I am not sure if it is quite the appropriate word in this case, but irony is what seems to me apt to describe how downhill paths are far easier to traverse than uphill ones.
You might think that sharp turns are the best place to overtake people ahead of you. A happy thought. However, upon careful introspection, one may note that the ability to manoeuvre such turns is not one that everybody receives from Him on their birthday( i.e. the actual day of birth). There is a very high chance that the bunch of bratpackers right behind will chomp your heels off if you so much as perform an accidental tap-dance piece. So wear your Nike Air-soled Wellingtons, and wear them well. Of course, those who have their sights balanced well on the centre of the path, don't really need to buy new boots that often. It's they, who fall for the temptations of the picturesque side(sight)seeings, that, more often than not, need to plaster those pretty hues of pain.
Enough said of sharp turns. Let us now peek down that steep slope down, and contemplate. As I was saying, it is extremely irritating to find that what you are destined for, apparently, will make you huff and puff all the way to the hilltop instead of being at the end of a frolicksome, happy, downward slope which makes you feel that there is some invisible force leading you to your destiny(Mr. Isaac Newton might have something to say about that). So, what happens to a select group of dreamers is that they are too high in the spirit of imagination and follow, what seems to them , bread crumbs dropped by a certain Han(d)sel of Fate. Unfortunately Gretel and Co. don't quite show up to amuse and appease them. Instead, long before they've fully realised it, these minions of Unconsructive Happiness, are so far away from that grand, palatial structure on top of the hill, that even the bread crumbs that they leave behind them, become untraceable if only they were to look behind.
All said and done, don't for once think that those at the bottom of the hill are now in the act of living unhappily ever after. Ah, no. They have watched the beautiful countryside from the cliffs above. They now believe that that is where they are right now. So, they are at peace and in incomplete happiness as well. Why incomplete? Because this from where the sight of the heavenly appariton of a palace, is most vivid.

Uefa Champions' League Final 2009

Rome. The city of Gods, the eternal city. The Champions' League final - a fitting event for a divine venue. So, it would only be appropriate that the best be allowed to compete on such a stage. And so, the best they were. The champions of England and the champions of Spain. The foremost teams from the two best football leagues in the world: the Premier League and the Primera Liga. On a night when the Gods themselves seemed to be spectating it would have been a shame to not give one's all and everything, to buckle under pressure, to lean back and try to weather away the opponents blows. However, that is exactly what Manchester United FC did and so invited the wrath of the Gods of fortune.

Football can be played successfully in two ways: efficiently and beautifully. But who said that there can't be a third way by combining both these attributes? There can and there is. FC Barcelona proved just so. It had been a rising notion that England's Premier League was the best league in the world, and this was only cemented by the all-English final of last year and perhaps this notion would have been well and truly cemented as a fact had the same two teams from last year met again this year, in Rome. But it was not to be so. The Gods were tired of this inhumane method of completing tasks efficiently. After all, God created humans because they wanted to observe the beauty which sets them apart from other living forms on this earth. And so, the team which had once again shown Europe the beauty that is the game of football, struck their first shot on target in 90 minutes right at the last, but did so successfully. Thus was paved the path to Rome. The Catalonians were back in Rome, Catalonia having been a part of the Roman Empire before. The champions of England stood before them and the ultimate prize in European club football. Oddly enough, the opponents were called the Red Devils, as if waiting to be slayed by the team weaved by Gods.

(this post is incomplete)