George Mason!

George Mason! Madness!

Spent last night in Brookline and hit every bar in Allston twice with Gary. I have no idea why. Three most shameful memories: paying a cover at The Avenue, doing a shot we didn't need at Our House, and c*ck-blocking a guy with a ponytail just because he had a ponytail. What am I, 22?

Inside of five weeks until married life. Excited, but not loving verbs tonight.

New fishies

Pam, Orlando Cabrera, and Philip Seymour Hoffman have been joined in our aquarium by two scumsucking autocats named Hoover and Herbert, and two Rosy Tetras named Cady and Bradley or Pittsburgh, depending on the result of tomorrow's second round NCAA Tournament game.

Jill and I celebrated our Irishness with the earliest car bombs of our lives at Pepperoncini's yesterday, between cheap Killians' and glimpses of our brackets crumbling on flat-screen TVs. Then we napped and watched Bradley knock off Kansas and stake a claim to our fish's name.

Viva Mexico!

Sure, this is the best day of the year because of college basketball, but it sure doesn't hurt that Mexico just knocked off Cl*mens and the US in the World Baseball Classic. Sure, they would have been knocked out earlier if not for some shaky officiating in the Japan game (from what I hear- I haven't watched a pitch), and that shakiness was reprised tonight when a clear Mexico homerun was called a ground-rule double for some reason, but the Yankericans are out now and that's what matters. Roger, I hope you find a post-retirement job testing corrosive acids with your face.

In other news, I got 54 people into this year's pool, a personal best, and at least 23 people can come to the wedding.

Happy St. Patrick's Day (and much more importantly, day two of the Madness).

'Tis the season

Selection Sunday has come and gone, but the fun is just beginning. I'm predicting record participation in this year's pool, my tenth annual. If you have any interest in getting in, but didn't get an email from me this morning, send an email to bmoconline@gmail.com and I'll get you a bracket and a rule sheet.

Meanwhile, jeers to the classless Jim Nantz and Billy Packer, who berated selection committee chairman Craig Littlepage in a nationally televised interview last night using irrelevant and misleading statistics to suggest that the committee's inclusion of teams like Air Force and George Mason was unfair. The two pompous asses went so far as to interrupt Mr. Littlepage's attempt to congratulate all the teams that qualified for the tournament, to repeatedly refute the chairman's well-substantiated claims. I certainly can't boycott CBS this time of year, but I'll do whatever I can to avoid listening to these two basketball elitists.

In my somewhat humble opinion, the committee's mistakes were limited to:

-seeding Tennessee 2nd in the DC region, when at least 10 teams were more deserving of a 2 seed
-letting George Washington slip to an 8 seed after finishing with the best record in the country

Jill and I prepped for Selection Sunday with a trip to Newport on Friday night and a jaunt to Saratoga and Queensbury on Saturday night. We saw several friends, all of our nieces and nephews, and most of our siblings, drank car bombs and European beers, and talked weddings and movies for hours on end as if Selection Sunday were weeks away.

Let the games begin.

god bless you, Stubby Clapp

That's right, a guy named Stubby Clapp scored the first run today when Team Canada knocked off Cl*mens, J*ter, AR*d, D*mon and co in the World Baseball Classic today. One more loss (though it would have to be against South Africa) and the US doesn't even make the second round.

More importantly, three days left until my Christmas, Selection Sunday, at which point my life serves no purpose other than running the World's Greatest NCAA Tournament Pool (can I get that trademarked?). My other Christmas? December 25.

In non-sports news, Jill and I finished watching the entire BBC version of The Office this week. I'd like to take a little more time to compare it to the American version, so I'll save that for its own post. For anyone who doesn't own it yet, the complete series DVD is a must-buy.

Witches jumpin' ship?

If America, as a society, and Hollywood, as a sort-of microcosm of that society, have come so far that a song called "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp" can win an Oscar, why is it that we still have to censor the word "bitches" when said song is performed on TV at 10:30 on a Sunday night, especially when such censorship results in the phrase "there's a whole lotta witches jumpin' ship"?

It's March. Anyone else feeling mad?