PlazaJen: Passion Knit

So, this whole bracket-schmacket schtick has me actually paying ATTENTION to the various games, if only to immediately go to cbs sportsline and check my standings in the office pool. (Currently tied for third, slipped out of a first-place tie tonight and let's just all keep our fingers crossed for a Georgetown upset!)

The problem is, I don't ever watch the games all the way through. And I don't know the "lingo" fluently. Unlike football, I actually knew a little bit about basketball from way-back-when, because we played it in school. (I use the verb "play" extremely loosely. My most distinct memory of playing basketball was having to pull one of the most hideous vests ever created on earth out of a barrel in the appropriate color (usually maroon), made from netting that seemed to retain the sweat and odor of every student before me, stretching back fifty years. Add to that a veritable tackiness in the netting, similar to a rug-gripper you might put down to keep an accent rug in place, so it was vaguely sticky on top of being gross. I pretty much spent most of my time trying not to touch the vest that designated which team I was on. I wasn't exactly what you'd call "rough-and-tumble". "Princessey" has always been a better fit.)

So I know what "dribble" and "travel" and "points" are. But for some reason all my football skills escape me & don't transfer over - two nights ago I stated to my knitting peeps, "Kansas is up by one. I can't follow this flashback they're showing right now." Yes, it's not a REPLAY but a flashback. Tonight JWo started quizzing me. "Do you know what 'traveling' is?" ....mmmm, yeah, I think so, it means you run without bouncing the ball. (I got clarification: two steps without dribbling.) "Do you know what an up-down is?" (When they run up and down the court? No.) There were more, but I can't remember them right now. Rules of the shot clock, whatnot. Suffice it to say, I'll feel a general sense of relief when football rolls back around. HOLDING! That's my favorite.

I think the main reason I'm not sucked in to watching the games? It's STRESSFUL! The scores rocket around and unlike football (usually), these games go right up to the very wire of the second clock, racing down. Talk about nail biters. I might as well take up Home Bomb Disarmament correspondence courses and have less stress in my life. Now, I must confess, I looked at my stats the other day & who was reading my blog? And my little post about the bomb threat at my grade school back in 1976 somehow flagged me for some sort of Terror Filter site. I've now mentioned the word "bomb" twice in one week, so hopefully my next post won't be from Guantanamo Bay. Is that a trigger word too? I'm a little nervous, what with the Patriot Act and all. I have a new business presentation next week, I can't ship out to Cuba! Not to mention monitoring my bracket status.

My hope is for a KU/Ohio State matchup, and the only reason I picked Ohio to win it is because half the office picked KU and frankly, I was hedging my bets. Here's to hoping my picks do a lot of that up-down thing and score a lot of points. Try not to be confused by the flashbacks.

Labels: sports