Thursday, March 20, 2008

The Real Reason For The Season

Taking a break from the comfy chair in front of the HDTV that is showing nothing but college hoops all day, I have a chance to review my brackets.

So far, so good--I'm 7 for 7. But so is the rest of the universe, I suspect. My opening-day four-team parlay, however, isn't looking so good since Temple +7 was part of the mix (they lost by 11). Oh well. There's always tomorrow.

Anyhow, as far as my bracket picks go, I'm all about the chalk, baby! I've got Carolina, Kansas, Texas, and UCLA going to the Final Four, with Carolina winning the whole enchilada over UCLA in the final game.

As usual, I'm rooting for a Winthrop upset in the first round--I've been on their bandwagon for ten years now, ever since I met that one redheaded gal who was a grad student there and we spent basically spent four days straight in bed, doing nothing but listening to music and drinking wine. It was a pretty good week, and ever since then I've been a big fan of the Winthrop Eagles.

One of these days they're going to get out of the first round--and I'll be the first guy at the window cashing that ticket, saying See--I called this upset! to anybody who will listen. Of course, I've been calling for it for the past ten years or so, and have yet to cash in. I could've two years ago, when they covered against Tennessee in the first round, coming a last-second basket away from the upset, but no, my drunk ass didn't get out of bed in time to make a bet that morning, so I missed the opportunity.

And speaking of drunk asses and March Madness, I picked up Steve B from DC at the airport last night--he's in town for the first two rounds. He got in around 11:00, and afterwards we went to the Peppermill for our traditional Kick-Off-The-Madness chicken fried steak breakfast. Of course it was excellent, and of course I didn't come anywhere near finishing it, but it was great nonetheless. I also had a Bailey's & Coffee, but they used that new caramel-infused Bailey's, and that shiat is so thick that it won't mix with coffee--you can stir all day and in the tall glass coffee cups that they use at the Peppermill, you can see it--it remains in two layers no matter what you do. We called it a Tan & More Tan. And it's so thick that it's like trying to drink maple syrup. Not good at all.

But not only was the food great, but the company was a lot of fun, too. ATCMurph joined us, although I only learned recently that 'Murph' was a chick, and her real name is Ilene. I told her that if she insists on people calling her Murph, they're gonna think that she's a dump truck driver from Queens, instead of an air-traffic controller from Indy. Oh well, she took in stride. But the three of us had a lot of laughs over our late-night breakfast.

Once we gave up on trying to finish breakfast, we made our way downtown to Main Street Station. Steve did a quick check-in, and we made a visit up to his suite on his private elevator--really nice--so he could toss his bags and we could all use the facilities. After that, it was back down to the Triple Seven brewpub where we sat for a couple of hours drinking beers and talking about basketball and music.

Around 3:00 am or so, I hit the wall. We said goodnight to Steve, and I drove Murph back to the Flaming-O, and I came home and went to bed, where I remained until almost noon today. Since then, it's been nothing but college hoops and Michelob Light. But now I'm back to bottled water and maybe a quick nap--I've got to work tonight, and do five more nights at the casino before my vacation starts.

This week is gonna drag...

Mikey

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