Gloating into the emptiness of the internet

I used to follow college basketball long long ago. I was a true fan and attended games and knew my favorite teams and all their players and stats. Well, maybe I didn't know their stats. But I did know their colors. And I wore the appropriate colors on the appropriate days. That was way way back, back when I knew. Back when I used to be cool. And when my team used to win.

(*Ahem*)

Sometime since leaving grad school and settling the West, I stopped finding time to watch basketball. This year I have not watched a single college basketball game.

(*Gasp*)

What -- you are going to keep reading? Even after that confession?

Ok then. We continue.

Yet when my ginormous family sent out the email invitation to enter the family college basketball pool this week, I signed up. I used my highly scientific methods, my ability to analyze and consider and reason, and above all my highly developed intuition. And I picked my teams. I picked my teams.

Tonight, I am sitting in the emptiness of my living room. My child is in bed. My husband is away, finally taking his Christmas vacation days that were stripped away from him in December (stupid deadlines ... stupid high tech company ... and above all stupid employer who doesn't give me a spring break). My dishes are in the dishwasher. My laundry is in the washing machine. My homework assignments are graded. Even my blogs and news sites have been read. That only leaves my writing project. What can I do to avoid the writing project?

Oh! I'll see how my bracket is doing!

So I log in, click on my bracket, notice the games I've picked wrong, and click to compare with my siblings and their spouses... and ...

(*Dramatic pause*) ...

I am at the TOP of the TOP! AND I have more possible points remaining than ANYONE else in the pool. Wow. That is a 3 exclamation mark sentence, but it only came out with a period. I'd better rewrite it.

AND I have more possible points remaining than ANYONE else in the pool!!!

This, my faithful readers, is why families are so important. Here in March, my family offers me something that no one else can offer. The chance to GLOAT! IN YOUR FACE! HA HA HA HA!

Only ... there's no one here to gloat to.

(*Shiver*)

And no one I can call.

(*Silent tear runs down her pale cheek*)

Bryan and Kristen are in Peru. Deborah lives in the eastern time zone, where it is nearly midnight. And though I am tempted to call anyway, I suppose I probably shouldn't wake her little ones. Probably.

And my husband, whom I married for better or worse, thick or thin, sickness and health and all that, including mainly the chance to gloat over important things like brackets, is away. Partying. Out late into the night (well, at least past 8:30 pm now in his time zone). Oblivious.

Eventually he will return to his nice fancy hotel and crawl into bed without even reading this important post. Because he is too cheap to pay for internet access. (Stupid hotel ... no free wireless.)

So, alone, in the silence of the night, I cry out to you! Oh internet. I am at the top, internet. The top! The top of my pool.

***

Postscript. Holy cow, Cleveland State? Wisconsin? So much for the top.