I sent Landon Donovan an e-mail a few days back with seven questions about the match with Mexico, coming up later today.

Even though he has been busy training for (and traveling to) Mexico City, and I’m on the other side of the Atlantic, he wrote back last night, presumably from his hotel room in Mexico City. He clearly was in a bit of a hurry, but I am impressed he made the effort.

I have reproduced that question-and-answer session on my Countdown to South Africa blog, and if you are a fan of Landon or U.S. soccer or the World Cup … go have a look. (Drive up the page views. Give me a reason to keep writing the thing!)

Meanwhile, the hunt for a television that will show me the match live, here in gay (but not Concacaf-crazed) Paris continues.

The state of affairs, less than six hours before kickoff:

It is clear I can watch France’s match with feeble and tiny Faroe Islands … at all manner of bars and brasseries. Or, for that matter, through someone’s kitchen window, though that could turn into a minor international incident if I am caught at it. It’s Les Bleus, of course, and I can’t fault the French for wanting to see their team — even if the match will certainly be lopsided and, eventually, probably count for nothing if France finishes second (as now seems likely) in Europe’s Group 7.

(For purposes of pairing the eight-best second-place teams in home-and-home playoffs to determine the final four Europe berths to South Africa, results against last-place teams in the six-nation groups — which are all nine of them, aside from Group 9, a five-nation group, will be disregarded. Faroe Islands almost certainly will finish last.)

It also is clear I ought to be able to find Scotland’s match at Norway. Scotland has a good chance to finish second in Group 9 and to find a place in one of the four home-and-home playoffs. But defeating the Norwegians, who have stumbled badly in qualifying so far, would be quite helpful. That match begins at 7 p.m. Paris time. (With the France match beginning at 6 p.m., here. As does as the more-significant Germany-at-Azerbaijan match.)

But the U.S.-at-Mexico match … that is proving a harder nut to crack, Over Here.

I am helped a bit in that the match has a curious kickoff time — 3 p.m. local time on a weekday in Mexico City, which is 10 p.m. here — or prime sports bar viewing time. But the match may not be available to any but the most ingenious satellite massagers.

Something called the “Great Canadian Pub” on a 6th arrondissement quay on the Rive Gauche, alleges that it will have the Yanks and Mexicans on one of its screens. One of the bar operators today insisted it would be so, though I have my doubts. The match isn’t on ESPN, which is fairly easy to find here.

So, I will make the pilgrimage over, from my spot in the Marais, crossing a pair of bridges to pass over the Ile de la Cite, and if the U.S. and Mexico show up on a television, I will have at least one bottle of Molson — if it isn’t too much more expensive than, say, 1664 — which is France’s budget-minded answer to Bud.

If it doesn’t go off, I suppose I can watch the end of the Scotland match, or even Croatia at Belarus, which begins at 8:15 local time. That match is of some import, too, in Group 6.

So, yes,  tonight is going to be about finding soccer matches in local bars when the French aren’t quite clear on the concept of a sports bar in the first place, and when the scattered other expat-oriented bars may have limited screens and fierce contention over what gets played.

I have noticed very few Americans in town, this summer — is the economy bad, or something? — so I don’t expect many allies when I call for live action from Estadio Azteca.

Maybe if I order two Molsons at a time.