Much like swallowing with a sore throat, we don't realize how important some things are until they are no longer easy. Then, simple things become annoyances.
Such was life for the Minnesota Vikings, who dealt with malfunctioning clocks at Soldier Field for much of the second half in their 21-13 loss to the Chicago Bears. Who thought keeping time would be such a big deal in 2014?
"The clocks here are (expletive)," coach Mike Zimmer said following the loss, before quickly apologizing for swearing.
For most of the second half, time was kept by refs on the field and the sideline. The clocks briefly returned to power but malfunctioned again at the end of the fourth quarter when the Vikings were attempting to tie the game.
"The two in the end zone were wrong all day," Zimmer said. "The one across on the 50-yard line was accurate, so we had to go from one back to the other one. And then they shut that one off for awhile. Then they put it back on for awhile. Then they put the ones in the end zones on for awhile. It was musical clocks."
The company running the clocks, Daktronics, released a statement saying that despite having two technicians at the site they weren't able to fix the problem.
(Some Soldier Field grass expert is somewhere, smiling that at least no one is complaining how bad the turf is at the stadium, again.)
The clocks seemed to disrupt Teddy Bridgewater as he tried to drive the team for a tying score. Two-minute Teddy heaved what amounted to a Hail Mary that was picked off with 42 seconds remaining.
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