So, the Champions League final, disappointingly tame in the end. Real Madrid won it on penalties, Cristiano Ronaldo – who had done approximately nothing all game – spanked home the last one after Juanfran had hit the post. And of course he took his top off.
This is his life. It’s the only true expression of joy he knows. For if people cannot see his nipples then how can he be truly happy? It’s not the achievement, it’s the opportunity to display those pecs. But look, we should be used to his rampant narcissism by now, and in a way it’s almost admirable. You would think at this point and at his age he might vary things a little but no, he sticks resolutely to his guns (see what I did there?), and ultimately he’s not the worst.
It’s not possible to be the worst when your teammate is Pepe. You could ask ‘What is he thinking?’ but I don’t think he thinks at all. Twice he writhed in agony on the ground as if he’d been hit in the face, twice nobody paid him the slightest bit of attention, but after one of them he made Mark Clattenburg do a weird tongue thing and frankly that should be enough to have both of them condemned for crimes against humanity.
Pepe, for making him doing it, and Clattenburg for making us aware that he has a tongue. I mean, of course we know he has one, but we don’t need to see it. But mostly Pepe for pretending like he’d been really hurt.
Perhaps, and this is a rather big perhaps, he has an extraordinarily sensitive face and the slightest touch cause him intense pain. However, the fact that he doesn’t have a massive beard puts paid to that theory. Imagine how agonising it would be to shave if you had that condition. It wouldn’t matter how many blades you had, how many cool lubricating strips there were, it would be sheer torture.
He would never be able to have intimate relations with anybody because a tender caress from a lover would see him stop the fruity action, writhe around on the bed clutching his features, and by the time he’d stopped the other person would have left the house. Hopefully having just set it on fire.
So the conclusion we come to is that he is, by nature, an inveterate cheat. A thoroughly unpleasant man who, apparently, stood crying throughout the penalty shoot-out. I get that football is emotional but come on. I guess most neutrals would have been up for Atletico, and I know that people can’t stand the preening of Ronaldo, and Arsenal fans may begrudge Gareth Bale the victory if they’re so inclined, but the fact that Pepe has a winners medal is absolutely the worst thing about it all.
If you have a child and their favourite player is Pepe, you have failed as a parent and ought to be ashamed of yourself. There’s still time to rectify that: to bring up a person who might be of use to society rather than a menace to it, but you better get working on it quickly because there’s already something seriously wrong with them.
I look forward to the day, after his spell in MLS, Pepe runs for President of the United States and somehow wins because nothing is impossible these days. I can see him flailing around on the ground at a G7 summit meeting because Russian Premier Arshavin kissed him on the cheek, while French President Arsene Wenger – double-jobbing as he enjoys his 35th season in charge of Arsenal – slyly kicks him in the ribs a couple of times.
This is how World Wars start. Some time in the future a new, hopefully better, civilisation will dig up and decode our digital archives and discover how we destroyed ourselves. Not climate change, not a cataclysmic event like the one that wiped out the dinosaurs, not intolerance of our fellow man based on arbitrary belief systems that cause us to needlessly slaughter each other every day.
No. Pepe. We let Pepe happen and we did nothing about it. Well, I hope you’re all happy now. He is. And isn’t that the problem?
I have to go now. I’ve had a nightmarish vision of the future that only a bacon sandwich and a dog walk can solve. Till tomorrow.