She Beat Me

It was all going as planned. My little experiment of picking the NCAA Men's College Basketball Tournament, aka March Madness against Dawn (my girlfriend). My bracket was getting torched in the newspaper and in the standings. But it was okay, cause I was still beating her.

I sat there and watched as she quickly ran through her picks the day before the tournament. She took about 5 minutes to pick teams with pretty names, nice mascots, and lord knows what else. Her Final 4 were Georgetown, Vanderbilt, Marquette, and Duke. No sweat right? I got this.

After the first round we are tied at 20 points a piece. 2nd round, I pull a head by 2 points. But I lose my National Champion pick in Kansas. Uh oh. Third round I score 20. She manages 12 points. This is where the men seperate from the girls. But she has Duke as her National Champion. And they are steamrolling the competition. All Dawn is concerned about is how Duke is doing. I have them in my Final 4. But not in the title game.

My bracket starts to make a comeback. I start my climb into the top 10 of the J-Borhood March Madness Extravaganza. Dawn wallows in second to last place. Beating only the guy who didn't fill out his bracket. Perfect. But Duke keeps on winning.

I tell Dawn that Duke could have a tough time beating Baylor to get to the Final 4. She aint hearing it. Duke is winning it. End of story. I am told I am not allowed to cheer for any team but Duke. This does not sit well with me. But neither does losing to the person that watched 0 minutes of college basketball not named the University of Hawai'i Rainbow Warriors this season. And that wasn't even on purpose.

Duke makes the Final 4. My picks for my bracket are toast. I notify Dave Reardon of the Honolulu Star Bulletin, who was keeping tabs on my bracket for a chance to be a Bracketologist Supreme, that I am not fit to be a lifeguard in his pool. I will go back to the kiddie area. I might look like an idiot in the paper but goshdarnit I can still beat my non college hoops watching girlfriend right?

Wrong. As the Final 4 begins in Indianapolis Dawn holds a 70-64 lead over me. Her bracket is climbing the charts like the new Justin Bieber single and lies just outside of the top 10. I am done scoring points. I share the incredible story of Butler and how their campus is just 4 miles from where they are playing the games. Cinderella has a chance to crash the party in it's own backyard and slay Goliath! Dawn is not interested. She starts walking around the house saying these phrases, "Duke" or "Duke Baby". Screw this, my daddy taught me to root for the underdog. Butler is the pick for me.

I'm done scoring points. My Final 4 of Kansas, Kansas State, Kentucky, and Duke has me down. I got some points for Duke being there, but no more as I had Kentucky vs. Kansas in the title game. I finally get some picks right in the newspaper. But it's way too little, way too late. I picked Duke and Butler, with Duke winning it all. But I'm so far down in the Star Bulletin Bracketologist Pool, that my picks are reduced to a 4 sentence blurb in smaller font at the bottom of the article. The other two guys get to share their complete analysis in heaping paragraphs. Dave says he did worse than me. I'm terrified to see his bracket. Oh well.

Duke beats Butler in the title game. I get home in time to watch the last shot clank off the rim for Butler. Duke wins. Dawn wins. I want to kill myself. Dawn ends up with 102 points and good for 2nd place in the hood extravawhatever. I end up in 13th place with (sigh) 64 points.

I try to rationalize how this has happened. I want to jump out of the window. My ego, just like my bracket, is broken. Making matters worse is that I have run out of Girl Scout Cookies. Even after being replenished by Dawn's mom a couple of days earlier. But I run out again. It is no coincidence that I have run out of Girl Scout Cookies and lost to Dawn in the bracket challenge in the same day. God is punishing me for some reason. But why?

Dawn notifies me that she is not sharing her Thin Mints, as she is rationing hers like a soldier in the trenches at Normandy in Worl War II. I know that she enjoys eating those delicious Thin Mints right infront of me. I am haunted by her still full boxes that greet me every time I open the freezer for no apparent reason 5-to-10 times a day. I talk about how we are a team and how we should share. She aint going for it. I have slowly lost my sanity. One NCAA bracket round and Thin Mint sleeveat a time. Is this rock bottom?

Dicky V is going crazy. I keep asking myself how does this happen? I know hoops right? I've been watching college b-ball since I discovered Big Monday when I was a sophomore back in 199...something in high school. She does not watch basketball. I'm insulted and feel dumb. There must be a rational explanation to all that is wrong in my world right now.

Dawn asks me to pull up the group standings of the Jborhood when she gets home. She looks at the final standings as she utters the phrase that has become all too familiar to me, "That's right, DUKE BABY!" I realize that the names of our entries are very apropo. My entry is called "Bracket Busta" and hers "The Madness". Which is the way I come to terms with her beating me. It's simply madness. I tell Dawn she is not allowed to play in my fantasy football league this fall. She asks "Why not?" My ego couldn't take it. But just as I secretly rooted for Butler in the Championship Game, don't tell her that.

I never found more Girl Scout Cookies. I had to settle for a cheap immitation that Oreo created. Creme Mint something or other. Dawn was nice enough to let me have 2 Thin Mints as I was eating these knockoffs of the dleiciousness know as Girl Scout Cookies. They need to put a label on the box or something. GSC-Thin Mints, more addictive than crack (cocaine).

But she beat me. And not only that, she has better cookies than me. Life, like my daddy told me, aint always fair. The madness is over. My depression, not so much. lol