Trying to think of the last time I saw an NFL game live. Must have been almost a year ago. Before leaving California for the UAE.

From then on … not one NFL game live. Not available in the hotel where we lived for two months … and we have never bothered to hook up the TV in the Teeny Apartment.

So, with a Sunday off for one of the first times since I’ve been in the country … I gratefully accepted a chance to watch the pros.  In real time.

Craig is a fun guy, a Canadian who formerly worked for The National, and he often hosts NFL viewing parties at the spacious place, near the beach, where he and his wife live.

(An aside on Canadians. Most Americans who don’t live near the border with the Great White North assume Canadians are exactly like Americans. Except with higher taxes and better health care. Then you get to know a few of them, and you realize the differences are deeper. Canadians are far more interested in international relations, and being on good terms with the world, and are a little less worried about money and a bit more interested in beer and way more interested in hockey — yes, I’m slinging generalities here — and don’t mind that the House of Windsor is still technically their ruling family. And then you get in a place where it’s Yanks, Canucks and lots of other people, and you flip back to “heck, rolling with Canadians is easy; like being home!)

So, my friend Curt, a regular at Craig’s, asked him if it would be OK for me to come over, and Craig said, “Of course!” … and there I was, early in the second quarter, with a cold beverage in my hand and the Cowboys and Bears on the big screen. Oh, wait, it’s the Titans and Steelers. No, it’s the Cowboys and Bears. No, it’s Craig banging on the remote, toggling between the two games available on his TV package.

Turns out, we had two Cowboys fans in the room. One is a guy from Texas, and he had no choice in the matter, did he? And Craig. The Canadian Cowboys fan. I asked him how he fell for the ‘Boys, and it mostly involved when they were consistently good during the Tony Dorsett/Danny White era. Early 1980s. He saw them, they were contenders, and he became a fan, and lately it’s been misery. As all Cowboys fans can attest.

Back watching the NFL … I was reminded of the breaks in the action … the extreme legalism of it (“the coach is challenging the call; the question: did he make ‘a football move’?”) … the fairly stereotypical gameplans … and the extreme violence of it.

It is slick. Teams are so well-organized they seem almost mechanical.

Every play is a close-run thing. Quarterbacks throwing into an opening about eight inches wide; running backs turning the corner by a half-stride; defensive backs getting a finger on a pass to force an incompletion. All that is impressive. It truly is a game of inches. The college game isn’t that precise, and the high schools aren’t close.

I also had not really seen up close the depth of the NFL fantasy world. Of the seven people in the room when I arrived, four are in at least one fantasy league, and every play — in every game — seemed fraught with meaning. I did fantasy football once, and didn’t like it, but it’s gotten only bigger since. Broadcasters cater to the fantasy crowd with regular graphics letting them know who the leading passer/rusher/receiver is. Oh, and it pretty much is mandatory that at least one laptop be up and running (in this case, it was two) so the gamers can find out instantly who just scored.

I was reminded that I like the Bears’ uniforms — the original black unis, before everyone started wearing black. The plain helmets with just the red C on them. I was annoyed with the Titans’ powder blue. And I have never liked the Steelers, and I wanted them to lose, and was astonished/amazed/appalled that the Titans never were really in the game even though the Steelers were down to their No. 3 quarterback. I thought Vince Young was making some sort of breakthrough, but there was Kerry Collins, at the end.

The Cowboys contrived to lose, dampening the mood a bit, because no one there was a true Cowboys hater.

East Coast afternoon games kick off at 9 p.m. in the UAE, making it almost perfect for social gatherings, though it gets a bit late if you hang on for the West Coast games (midnight kickoffs) or the night game (4 a.m. starts, in the UAE).

I got through the Cowboys-Bears and Titans-Steelers, and saw the start of the Jets and Patriots (I still loathe the Patriots) … and then it turned 1 and I decided I ought to leave. Just so I wouldn’t get on too weird a schedule. I thanked Craig for letting me come and for the beverages.

Did I mention everyone in the room was an American or a Canadian? Many of us had been there for the Vancouver Olympics gold medal hockey game.

And it turns out, that from the perspective of the UAE, Canada and the U.S. pretty much are the same country. Not so much up close, but from half a world away, and you’re watching the NFL and everyone knows the rules … hard to tell the difference, eh?