Well, This Stinks

I don't really believe in luck. I don't believe that every step of our lives is determined by destiny, either. I think we make our own luck, and that we have to pay for bad decisions and whatnot.

However...I'm beginning to rethink my ideas about what shirts I wear on the days Notre Dame plays. In 2006, I wore a t-shirt with a skunk on it the day Notre Dame played Michigan, because a nickname for the wolverine is the Skunk Bear. See? Much like our fat coach, I was trying to be too cute and clever. Anyway, we know what happened that day...and in case you've forgotten, Notre Dame got beat by Michigan. Badly. Kind of derailed all shots at a National Championship and a Heisman for Brady Quinn. I attributed the loss to the shirt I wore, jokingly.

A few weeks later, I wore a t-shirt with a bear on it for the day Notre Dame played UCLA (the Bruins), and, well UCLA was leading late. Disgusted, I went upstairs and changed into a different shirt. I come back downstairs, Notre Dame scores late and wins. Coincidence? Most likely, but now suddenly I'm having second thoughts.

Then, in 2007, I decided I'd wear green shirts instead of Notre Dame shirts, just to see what would happen on game days. Well, I wore green shirts for the first 9 weeks of the season, and it was a disaster. So, I scrapped the green shirts. I scrapped them last year, too, and we struggled to mediocrity.

I say all of this because last week, I wore a green shirt. Notre Dame lost. Today, I wore my favorite shirt--a gray shirt with dark green sleeves. And, well, Notre Dame struggled mightily to pull out a victory. The defense--or the lack thereof--stunk the joint up.

This whole thing is not only a cathartic working out of the pain and suffering of yet another nail-biter of a game that Irish fans had chalked up as a win, but it's also the lead in to a fabulously awesome word I stumbled across last week while putting together the Latin lesson: mephitis.

And Notre Dame's defense has been rather mephitic these past two weeks.

Mephitis (meh-fight-is): n. 1.) a foul smell or stench, 2.) a foul-odor or poisonous gas emitted from the Earth, such as in a swamp or bog.

Mephitis is also the name of several genera of Skunks, because of the whole stink thing. Adjectival forms are mephitic or mephitical.

Mephitis is Latin in origin. Mefitis was a Roman goddess that was the personification of the noxious odors emitting from the ground, specifically from swamps and volcanic systems. The closest thing she had to a temple was at a place called Mefite (May-fee-tay), which was a part of the Vesuvian volcanic system. While marching along the Appian Way (via appia)--the most famous Roman road, stretching from Rome (around the knee of the boot) to Brundisium (on the heel of the boot)--Roman soldiers would rest at Mefite. There, they sacrificed animals to Mefitis, apparently by holding them in the areas where the poisonous gases were most concentrated so that they succumbed to Mefitis' natural aromas.

I haven't really thought of how to use this particular word, yet. However, I'm guessing that I'll be more able to use the first definition rather than the second. Hell, I'm guessing I'll be able to work mephitis into a TMI Thursday story, given the joyous fun that my bowel system, minus the gall bladder, tends to provide.

Oh, and by the way...I'm wearing a red shirt next weekend.