Las Vegas Weekly

March 29, 2012 · 5:09 PM

Feeling the madness (in basketball and life)

By Justice

I picked the Louisville Cardinals to win that whole March Madness thing. Their mascot looks like the red bird from Angry Birds, and I love that game so I think they'd do well in basketball, too. It looks like that was a sound decision. They've won all their games so far. That's pretty neat. Maybe I'll win some money. The glory of sweet victory would probably be the best part of winning. Well, actually it's the money, but glory would be nice, too.

I don't know a thing about basketball or any other sport for that matter. I was just saying today that it is beyond bizarre that I'm voluntarily writing about sports. It's difficult to understand why there is such a high level of emotional passion possessed by sports fans. Beyond money, why does the outcome of a game even matter? I suppose if you perceive a team to be representative of your identity group, the people of your current city, hometown or university, you might, perhaps, just take great pride in their athletic prowess.

But I don't know sports. I don't understand sports fans, and I don't care for gambling. It's particularly strange that I ended up with a March Madness bracket, and it's really weird that I can discuss with men (customers, even) the events that occurred during a basketball game. What lead to this was that my ex, the poker guy, bought me into a March Madness pool and put a bracket in front of me to be filled out. We're still friends.

Presented with a challenge resulting in no real consequences to me, I chose to have fun with my picks. My bracket selection method, unbeknownst to me, was not entirely flawless. The rest of my team picks, beyond Louisville's Angry Birds, were also decided by a variety of arbitrary factors. Which teams' home citizens would win in a knife fight? Long Beach versus New Mexico? Obviously, Long Beach would win because they are more gangsta and are skilled in knife fights, or so I reasoned. If there were a fight between the opponents' mascots, who would be more likely to annihilate the other one? I thought a Wolverine would beat basically anything, but that turned out to be a bad pick. Land creatures beat sky creatures, which beat water creatures, but water creatures beat land creatures. Simple guidelines for bracket picks. But when you get a particularly badass animal, it overrides the basic rules.

Also, I picked UNLV because I'm an alumna of the place, so why not? In my bracket, I had them going against Notre Dame, because their mascot has a beard and so does UNLV's. Both of their mascots are adult males. So I thought it would be an interesting battle. But UNLV lost immediately so that battle never happened. I won't say we saw that coming, but we kind of did. Okay, I said it. Oh well.

So besides being the lowest scoring person in my March Madness pool of 17 people, I've been keeping myself busy with work. This time of year is the most insanely busy time, and I am really feeling the madness. My purse is jammed with money, but my feet feel like I have been walking on razor blades. Every muscle aches; my liver is shot; and my patience is at capacity. I took a few days off to watch Star Trek marathons with the poker guy and recover. I go back to work tomorrow, and I think I might be ready for it. That is if no one says anything bad about Louisville.

In other strip club news, two strip club employees died recently. One actually died at the club while on duty. I wanted to joke about her, but it was too soon. (Is it ever "too soon" or should you jump on a joke while it's still relevant?) When I heard that she died, my first thought was, "Sometimes when I'm at work I wish I would die spontaneously." She doesn't work at a strip club anymore, on the bright side. I'll share more about the other death on the next blog. That death scares me a little to talk about.

Share This