Gonzaga Karma, or, How I Got My Ticket to the USC-Notre Dame Game

I find it somewhat ironic that, now that I'm back living in LA and could theoretically go to every USC home game, the first game I'll be going to this season will be... back in the Midwest. Despite the best of intentions, a stressful job and lack of cable have conspired to keep me relatively in the dark when it comes to, well, current events of any sort (Supreme Court, what? Is that like a new Taco Bell menu item or something?) and the life and times of Pete Carroll in particular. I never know if games are home or away, if we're playing someone who might be worth paying attention to or not. And the quality of my trash talk when it comes to Pac-10 rival coworkers has suffered considerably. Comebacks now uniformly consist of a very forceful "So?!"

But no matter; I'm headed for Chicago next weekend, and will attend the USC-Notre Dame game all decked out in my USC gear, along with Brendan and Becky... the three of us will make a nice-sized red target in the green and yellow Irish student section. (I'll show you team spirit.)

Next week's brush with death comes courtesy of what I'm convinced is Gonzaga karma. Brendan has been a fan of Gonzaga's basketball team for years (and I have to admit that I would be too if I cared at all about basketball... I picked them to make it into the Elite Eight in a random pool back in high school because I thought they had a funny name: that was the year they won). And thus he has his share of Gonzaga gear to show his support, and asked me to pick him up something from the school, if I had the chance, while I was passing through Spokane on my way back to LA from Chicago back in May. And I did, and had planned to give it to Brendan next time I saw him. Am glad I didn't get him a t-shirt, because he already has one--at the beginning of this school year he became friends with an ND 1-L who was a Gonzaga alumna because she saw him in the t-shirt. And it turns out that she's the one I'm getting my ticket from.

Next weekend promises to be a good one (if I can stay awake for it--am taking the red eye on Thursday night and it includes a 4-hour layover in Vegas). I'll be at the Notre Dame game (and ESPN College Gameday, if the rumors are true), I'll see my friend Meredith's brand new baby, Roxanne Helen (the Helen is in homage to fellow Trojans Doug and Meredith's alma mater... if it was a boy he was was going to have Troy as a middle name), I'll get to see some of my grad school friends and I'll be back in my favorite city in the world.

...That is, if my roommate doesn't kill me when she gets back from her weekend climbing trip and sees the mess I made of our apartment in my attempt to paint my bedroom. (Am considering just leaving the primer and calling it a day.) DIY my ass.