World Cup: Brazil 2014

For years, Hyrum has been talking about going to the World Cup.  Talking and talking and talking; it drove me crazy. Time passed, and the conversation went through stages.

It started with me saying, "No guarantees" because  there were too many unknown variables to agree to it.  How much would it cost?  Where would we be living?  Would he be deployed?  Would we have kids?  Could he get that much time off work?  He took that to mean "no" and wasn't very happy.

At one point I banned the words "world", "cup" or "Brazil" in our house because it never led anywhere good.  [His solution was to sing some Caribbean music every time he wanted to refer to the games.]
   

Then as deployment got closer, and he thought he'd be home in April 2014, my answer changed to, "Fine, you can go, but I'm not going, so figure it out yourself."  I didn't want to worry about all the details, but if he wanted to, fine.  I have had to explain multiple times why I wasn't going with him: 

with our replica world cup

1. cost
2. I don't like soccer
3. I don't like crowds
4. I don't want to travel that far with a baby
5. Especially with the change in time zones

So Hyrum got used to that idea, and was initially looking for other people he could go with.  Then he decided he could just go by himself.  

The next challenge was getting tickets to the games.  Starting about a year out, fifa.com held 3 lotteries to get tickets.  There were no other channels to buy tickets.  He kept entering the lotteries, and getting a rejection email.  The conversations turned to, "What are you going to do if you don't get tickets?.... is it still worth it?.... wouldn't you rather wait for a World Cup when you can get tickets?.... think of all the places we could go on vacation in Europe instead!"

During the third [and final] lottery, Hyrum finally got tickets!  

And a few days ago we took the plunge and bought a plane ticket to Brazil.  There's no going back now.  No clue where Hyrum will sleep... maybe the street...?  But he'll figure it out because that was our deal, and this is his dream come true.

I am now the best wife in the world.  And at any point in the future when I want to do something, I'm going to use this to persuade Hyrum in my favor.