The End of the NCAA Tournament Fiasco

I had dug myself into an 0-5 hole, one that required steely nerves and financial resources to dig myself out of.  I just kept doubling up on my losses.  When you go 0-5, the numbers add up pretty quickly.  Thus I found myself with an outsized wager on Michigan, on a game I could have cared less about.  In fact, I couldn't even bring myself to watch the game.  That's how sure I was that I would lose this as well and find myself as one of those guys dressed in a Statue of Liberty costume outside a tax preparation outfit located in a strip plaza.  Thankfully I don't have to spend my weekends twirling a sign for cash as Michigan covered.  I can now gracefully exit the tournament with my wallet intact, but a second consecutive year of lost dignity.  As Leo P. Love once famously said, "I have learned no lesson.  I have learned NO LESSON!".

I knew damn well I didn't know anything about college basketball when I launched this foolhardy operation.  Perhaps I thought I would somehow split the games and manage to distract myself for a few hours this weekend.  If I'm being honest with myself, I was actually thinking I might catch lightning in a bottle, like a legendary 8-0 run I went on at the otherwise forgettable Paris Casino in Las Vegas in the early 2000s.  If I tear away all the protective armor away from myself, this is probably what I thought could happen.  The problem becomes when you think it will happen.   Then you end up twirling an arrow sign for Liberty Tax Preparation hoping not to meet the gaze of passing motorists.  It's hard to look happy in a costume when everyone that drives by feels sorry for you.

A friend of mine named Stacky once lost hundreds of dollars playing Pai Gow poker in the middle of the night at the Bellagio.  There were two main reasons for this.  1.  He had never played Pai Gow poker before.  2.  He didn't seem to pick up on the rules as the he played.  I think we can all agree that if you are trying to learn a casino game, the best way to learn it might not be on The Strip with Saturday Night table stakes.  Stacky though claimed he had a great deal of fun, and wound up befriending a Chinese businessman that smoked three packs of cigarettes in the time they played together.  Stacky later wound up convincing him to play Blackjack where the man introduced Stacky to the idea of yelling "Monkey!  Monkey!" when you needed a face card for blackjack.

It is important to note that neither of these two decided to venture over to the sports book and lay down action on Wofford +5 over Kentucky.  If I am being honest with myself, I am slightly more sad than Stacky playing Pai Gow at 4:15am with a new friend he couldn't understand.  I am now fully backed out of the casino and back at my room.  Maybe I will shower later and watch Celine Dion.  All I know for sure is I won't be taking Duke to cover later.  Well, I don't think I am anyway...