Love is not a victory march...

Spring Break Column

Yeah, that starts out this entry pretty well. If patience allows, this entry will be pretty comprehensive for the last couple weeks.

March Madness. I get into it every year. I'll skim some team profiles and then make my picks based on that, and I usually hover around the mediocrity mark. I'll try to pick the right Cinderella, and while I might have them threaten to do it, they almost never pull it off.

I had a good year this year. It's not over, obviously, but I don't think I've got a chance anymore. But I got the Cinderella right in UW-Milwaukee. I also called the Vermont-Syracuse upset and the UAB-LSU game. However, my bracket pretty much bit it when I lost two Elite Eights (Kansas, Georgia Tech) and my tournament runner-up (Wake Forest) in a short period of time. I'm pretty psyched that my Austin bracket is still perfect, though. 12 for 12. And my Chicago bracket only missed two in the first round, and no Sweet Sixteens.

-----

This past week has been fantastic. It's unreal how great it was. Monday, I got an email from my editor telling me my Spring Break column was going to run Friday 'in all its' glory'. It's 1200 words long. It ran uncut. That is really, quite cool.

Tuesday saw the end of a fight my friend and I were having. Yeah, we fight occasionally, but this one was pretty bad. That's OK, though. No harm, no foul.

Wednesday was the best of all. I got to sleep until about quarter past one in the afternoon. Didn't miss any classes - my first one that day started at ten of three. That class, Natural Disasters, was comprised of ten minutes of note-taking, and then a movie about avalanches which was actually pretty cool. Oh, and it got us out half an hour early.

During that half hour, I got a phone call from Ben, my roommate for next year, saying we were supposed to pick next year's housing assignment at 5 PM. Well, I had a 4:30-5:40 class, so that wasn't going to work. I'd have skipped, but we had a test scheduled. Problem. I asked the professor if I could leave as soon as I was done with the test, and he had no problem with it. I did manage to get out after kicking the crap out of the test, but it wasn't in time:

I got another phone call as soon as I left Ryder Hall. It was Ben, and he had a room. All he needed was for me to sign off on it. It was a corner room in West Village C. Fan-freaking-tastic. I did it, not even giving it a second thought. I found Ben on my walk back from Ryder (what, did you think I was going to go back to class?) and got a few more details. Of course, while we were doing this, we were hitting up Outtakes for some food.

I get back to the dorm with Ben, who starts to look up the names of the people we're rooming with. He's looking, and I run down to the basement to check my mail. Two official-looking envelopes await. I bring them back upstairs before opening them, and they're, guess what, my Red Sox tickets. Three bleacher seats for the Friday night series opener against the Pirates in mid-June, and two Pesky's Pole field box seats for Orlando Cabrera and Lou Merloni's return to Fenway in early June. Also a series opener, and also a Friday night. Damn, I'm on a roll.

We go to dinner at Stetson West, and much to my glee, instead of the normal deli sandwich line, there's a dessert crepe line in it's place. Butterscotch mousse in the crepe, topped with warm chocolate sauce and homemade whipped cream, and then sprinkled with Heath topping. How frigging lucky can I get?

I decide to ride the wave of luck and get some scratch tickets, cashing an old one I still had for five bucks, and throwing in four of my own. While I didn't make all of the money back, I made a five dollar win on the last ticket.

Unreal.

Thursday started March Madness, and I did damn well that day. I also found out that the other group of guys landed a suite in West C, upstairs and across the hall from the room Ben and I are in. That made me quite happy, as I wasn't very confident that any of us would hang out if we were split up very far (think Willis Hall and Loftman Hall).

And Friday, until the Kansas game, produced more bracket success.

I can't believe how great a week that was. I got that test back today (the one I raced through to try and get to Housing) and got an A-. Only two people in the class of 16 did well enough that the professor isn't making us retake it on Wednesday. I also kicked the crap out of a Disasters test today, so the lucky streak continues.

---

Church stuff: I went to yesterday's Souvenir Sunday Mass at St. Clement. Nothing too surprising there, really. But this week will be a bit more interesting. I plan on going to the Holy Thursday Mass at St. Clement that night, and then heading home on Friday for Good Friday Services at St. Jeremiah. I will be the voice of God for a procession during which the sacred symbols are brought to the altar. Holy Saturday, I will not attend the marathon Mass. They moved it to St. George, and I've decided that should we be unsuccessful in our fight, I will not attend that church. I am not obligated to sing at that Mass, so I have no intention of being there. And then on Easter Sunday, I'll be back at St. Jeremiah again, hoping not to hear another anti-Appeals Committee homily.

I've walked out on one of those once, and it took fierce resolve to stop me from doing it last time. But if they do it on Easter Sunday, the holiest day in the Catholic Calendar, I will not stop. If they're going to try and win public support by trashing my committee on the day during which even the most apathetic Catholics go to Mass, I will walk out on whomever is speaking. And I won't be stopped by my own presence in the choir this time. So help me God, I will make it damn clear that I am incensed by the remarks.

Don't try me, Deacon.

----

Cory and Topanga came to life on Fourth Floor. Bonnie and Andy broke up for a few days last week, but got together again last night. Far as my memory goes to what they've said, they've been together 4 years.

I honestly didn't expect them to stay separated. Like I said, Cory and Topanga. Only it took three, four days instead of three, four episodes.