Madness

This may well be my favorite month of the year.  To wit:

Dogwoods, tulips and other flora have been abloom, after a winter that gave us far more snow in Georgia than I am ever willing to see again.

Spring Training is in full swing (pun, unintentional), with all the optimism and Hot Stove League chattering that goes with it.

I'll be on the golf course soon!

And, there's that little matter of that basketball tournament going on.

Ah, more about that last point:  I am fascinated with the intensity of nearly every game.  I enjoy seeing a lower-seed school knock off a powerhouse, particularly when it's a small school (rock on, Dayton, for whipping the CCUF*),  When I have no rooting stake in the outcome, which I do not, since my beloved Hoyas are sitting this one out, I pull for the better school to emerge on top (sorry, Stanford).  One of the things I learned this year is that I have severe dislike for many of the schools involved.  

I was visiting my sister and her family (Rock-chalked Jayhawks graduates and fans all) last weekend with my daughters (who proclaim there is nothing greater than being a Florida Gator).  The discussion went like this: no, not VCU, they beat Georgetown twice in the tourney.  Never Syracuse, since their coach is such a whiner.  Villanova?  Ach!  They pulled the alleged greatest upset of all time!  In fact, for nearly every team playing, I had some objection.

To keep it interesting - and to maintain a lowered blood pressure - we came up with a game.  There were so many shots of the coaches that we determined we should guess what career these men would follow, if they were not basketball coaches.  Mind you, all this was done while sober and paying homage to the final scenes of Animal House, as the camera breezed through the after-lives of the main characters.  A brief sampling:

• One is a speechwriter for a Republican Congressman, while another is that Representative.  Neither being political statements, merely what they looked like.
• Billy Donovan is a maitre'd at a restaurant.
• Rick Pitino manages a tire store; we could not determine if it is located in Bloomfield NJ or New Haven.  He's also sleeping with the cashier.
• John Calipari works for Halliburton, currently under indictment for over-charging the government billions for work either not performed or done shabbily.
• Roy Williams is the president of his condo association in Naples FL.
• Tom Izzo is a school bus driver who yells at the kids on the bus.
• Tommy Amaker is a musician.  
• We decided that some player, whose name and school we have forgotten, has a card table in Times Square, from which he sells socks.  
• Craig Sager is some sort of televangelist.  While the voice and personality may not fit, the clothes certainly do.
• Another coach, whose name and school now escape me, is a General Practitioner.

See how easy this is?  It proved to be a great distraction, so much so that I have forgotten many of the other ones we concocted.  I look forward to watching the remaining games, if for no other reason than to designate the appropriate positions for the people we see.  Chime in with your own thoughts.

*CCUF - Columbus Campus of the University of Florida, since they own them.