Cracked Bracket March 19, 2010

I took today off, a decision made within three seconds of finishing yesterday's Masochism Marathon. Even though I'm a glutton for punishment, I go to Royals games after all, I'm not a complete dope. I actually took a picture of myself with my phone, just in case I rationalized a way to sneak in a run. Something like, "You can really run quite will with only one functioning kidney." I looked at the guy in the picture this morning while I was slipping on my Pumas. The guy looked like he ought to be on a terrorism watch list: sunken cheeks, dried mucus on his shirt, thousand-yard stare, fuse sticking out of his shorts. Gasping, I took off my Pumas and decided to do something else.

Like, fill in my NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament bracket. I didn't do too badly, for a guy who pays as much attention to college hoops, as he does to speed limit signs. I lost a couple of tough ones-Northern Iowa and Murray State beat me on last second shots, and Notre Dame beat me by missing theirs. (No carryover for Irish luck on March 18th?) I picked UTEP to beat Butler, mostly because I think UTEP is cool to say. It sounds like the name of an Egyptian pharaoh. But Butler kicked their butts all the way back to EP. I'm not even sure where Butler is? Butlerville? Are they from Canada?

The biggest hit of the day was delivered by the Bobcats of Ohio University. THE Ohio university, that is. They smote the Hoyas of Georgetown, who played so badly, they should get a loss in their first game next year, too. There is no way I would have picked this one right. A coworker did, though. She said she picked the Ohioans because she couldn't read the seedings in the paper, and just went with the one she liked better. Ohio was seeded 14th. They were just fodder to be fed to one of the Beasts of the East. Well, the Noyas choked on it, so now they have to go back to Washington D.C., and listen to arguments in the health care reform debate as their punishment.

I had a good day, all in all. My record was 11-5. Not bad for a novice whose basketball expertise goes no farther than knowing that technically, a technical foul is not really a foul, and there is no such thing as traveling.

Thanks for humoring me.