en cee double whatever

There are very few tasks in the universe for which I am less qualified than filling out one of these brackets. Tightrope walking across the Grand Canyon, perhaps, or orthodontic surgery, but that’s about it.

My supreme ineptitude stems in part from the fact that I have not watched even twenty seconds of any game this season, nor could I tell you the name of a single current college basketball player, NCAA or otherwise.

My MIL picks her teams by school colors/mascots, which is something I would totally make fun of under normal circumstances except that under this circumstance I'm forced to admire that she knows even that much.

The main thing I know about basketball is that it takes a reeeally long time because they keep stopping the clock for all sorts of stupid things. So when the clock says there’s thirty seconds left, it really means thirty seconds of play plus six cumulative minutes of everyone’s remaining time outs plus a bunch of intentional fouls and subsequent free-throws. So like ten minutes or something. If you’re lucky.

(That’s one of the two things I learned while cheering in college, the other being that I cannot tumble to save my or anyone else's life. So if, say, we’re standing in line at the supermarket together and we’re held up by masked gunmen who demand that someone does a round-off back-hand-spring full down the produce aisle or else everyone dies, don’t look at me.)(Really. It's all on you.)(But I can totally do a somersault-cartwheel for bonus points.)

Nonetheless, I dutifully complete one of these brackets every year to participate in the Owens family competition. It's rather a win-win situation for me (or reallywin-don'texactlylose situation, to be more precise). Everyone has incredibly and appropriately low expectations for my standing, so if I happen to luck out, I look amazing (or lucky). And if I end up somewhere in the region of last place, well, it's what we all expected anyway.

I completed my online bracket last night and I already forget who I picked to win it all, but if they happen to win, I will totally gloat about it here.

Right. We'll never speak of this again.