Bella Italia!!!

I watch and watch and watch college basketball for four months. I watch such games at ODU vs. VCU. I watch Championship Week and Pre-Championship week and Bracket Busters and everything else faithfully. More faithfully than I watch my favorite shows (though, I am pretty good about catching up with Mike Rowe's latest trip through disgustingness on Dirty Jobs), I might add. I consider myself to be somewhat of a knowledgable person about college basketball.

This year, in the office pool, I got no teams in the final four and finished in the bottom ten of the entire thing.

I'm marginally familiar with World Cup soccer (I do love to watch and root for the underdogs, just like in any sport). I know the strategies, the rules, the appeal of the sport. It's great. I love soccer (or football, just so I don't upset anyone). However, I'm far from an expert in the field (I do know which teams have actually won the cup...but not when all their championships were). I know a lot of the names (moreso for the American team) but, I wouldn't say that if Michael Owen walked up to me on the street and asked for a fag if I would know him. Until three days ago, I didn't even know that South Africa was hosting the next cup. I'm not a soccer fanatic, but it's fun and I do get emotionally invested in these games (though I refuse to feel shame for the American team's poor showing this time 'round. They still made it. Where was Canada's team? Or Belgium's? Huh? Right. In Canada and Belgium, that's where).

This, of course, means that I have won the office pool for the world cup. In fact, I've got such a commanding lead on the next guy that, even if my team (Italy) loses, I still win.

Now, normally, I root for the U.S. And after the U.S., I root for the British teams. I always pull for England (I pull for us over England, thankyouverymuch) and if Scotland and/or Ireland manage to make it in (a la 1994) then I pull for them. I also pull for Spain because they always seem to get shafted in some way. Come Sunday, though, I'll be pulling for good ole Italia. That's right. Those dark-skinned, dark-haired angels of beauty have raked me in somwhere around $200. I've declared a moratorium on Italian jokes, the words "whop" and "daygo". I'll even drink a glass of chianti (but hold the fava beans, please) if they so desire me to. For you see, I'm easy. Give me $200 and I'll root for your team (this includes you, Jim Hendry). And yes, I do realize I won the office pool because les francais upset Brasilia, thus knocking out most of the competition.

Maybe I should use that money to buy Bruce Arena a clue as to how to play defense against the Czechs...