boxing day

I watched my first ever boxing match last night with a few of my coworkers.  I mean first ever that wasn't, you know, part of a movie or the Olympic highlights.  It was the match between Marquez and Pacquiao, which was apparently a big deal, if you follow boxing, which I don't.  (I think none of you do either because, unlike other sporting events, I didn't see a huge upswing of Facebook posts with a play by play of the action.)  And watching the match was the reason people were there!  It wasn't like we were watching a moving and then afterward, we were like - hey a boxing match is on, let's watch it.

As I'm sure you are aware by now, Marquez knocked Pacquiao out, which I found a little horrifying.  Apparently, at this level, people don't usually get knocked out - they win by the rules of hitting, or something, with judges.  I guess the thing that surprised me the most was how much blood there was.  Perhaps this shouldn't have seemed unusual to me, but since all of my boxing experience has been with movies, and movies tend to dramatize things, I wasn't expecting so much gore.  But, in this case, the movies were right.  Marquez threw his hands up in victory, literally covered in his own blood.

This leads me to a few questions, which I hope my boxing enthusiast friends (or friend? anyone?) can answer:

Question 1:  Seriously, why is this a thing?  Why is watching two guys (or girls, as the case may be these days) purposely try to hurt each other a sport?  I would say that men would know the answer to this question more than women, but last night one of the biggest fans was a woman, so this question is open to everyone.  What can make someone get into the ring, knowing they are going to get hurt?  A lot.  I can hardly stand getting blood drawn, knowing it will hurt, even though it is in a controlled and expected way.  I can't imagine wanting to get beat up in a new way every time for money.

Question 2:  What was Mitt Romney doing at the match?  He had ring side seats with his wife.  If you think about people you would expect to be at such an event, would Mitt top your list?  For me, he probably wouldn't have even made the top, say, thousand people I'd have expected to be there, but maybe those of you who know more about him can tell me.

Question 3:  Do you think we could get some of the United States congressmen to start boxing professionally?  Pacquiao is apparently a congressman in the Philippines, and I say if they can do it, we can too, right?  I still wouldn't want to watch it, but it might make politics a little more interesting.

I will wait patiently for the answers to this questions and in the mean time, I will be over here trying to remove the bloody images from my head.  Until I hear from you, perhaps this will help....