24 Horrible Horrible Horrible Hours

So I leave my home here in Pittsburgh about 6 ish Saturday night to go see the Pens play the Rangers at Mellon Arena. At the time, PSU was up on MSU 31-21 in the 4th qtr, and I was about to see one of the most exciting teams in hockey play in person. I was a happy dude. So I stop at the 7-11 to get some cash and a drink on my way - and notice that there's a flat on my Kia. Shit. Gametime is in an hour. I've never changed a flat before. It's about 40 degrees and raining simultaneously. Mood starts to drop. So I grab my owner's manual and begin to figure out the process, and its making progress, when I get a text message from Penn State (who I thought was only supposed to send me these things when school was cancelled). "PSU loses season finale to MSU 35-31." WHAT THE F***! I guess Justin King and Scirotto just stood around with their thumbs up their asses in the 4th qtr and the Spartans came back, and the Ford Taurus (Morelli) didn't exactly come through under pressure. Whatever, we're mediocre anyways, I don't care, I was disgusted with that team win or lose. So I finally fix the tire, and it's 7:30, time for the opening faceoff. So I rush to the arena, only it's hard to rush WHEN YOU'RE ON A FREAKIN DONUT!! I have the game on the radio, and you guessed it: the Pens score 2 goals before I get there to go up 2-0. All of my hard earned money spent on these tickets, and it's still Mike Lange telling me when Crosby scores. So I get there during intermission, and find my seats. At least I'm gonna get to see a win, and hopefully they can put up a couple more goals. 49 seconds, 49 MOTHER ***** SECONDS into the 2nd period, goal Rangers. By Michael freakin Rosival (sp?). Michael Rosival played for the Penguins for many years, and uh NEVER SCORED. The Rangers would go on to score twice more in the period (including another by Rosival &%&***%^&$%^**$) and take a 3-2 lead. We would manage to tie it in the third, only to lose it in overtime 4-3. Essentially I had paid $100 for a 4-1 loss. So it was a horrible day, both in sports and real life, but I could sleep on it and tomorrow would be a new one, right?

I'm very superstitious when it comes to the Steelers. This is the ideal situation, when all these conditions are satisfied, they never lose:

1) I go over my friend Eric's (not E, a different Eric) and watch on his monstrous HD television, him on the couch to the left of the TV, me on the couch to the right.

2) I wear one of my jerseys, either 7 Roethlisberger for games against AFC teams or 83 Miller for games against NFC teams.

3) Coke is being consumed at the beginning of the game. Not Pepsi, not Diet Coke, COKE.

I'm sure you're laughing now and being like, that can't have any effect on how they play on the field, let me present this evidence from the 2007 season:

Week 1: All 3 conditions satisfied; Steelers 34, Browns 7.
Week 2: All 3 conditions satisfied; Steelers 26, Bills 3.
Week 3: All 3 conditions satisfied; Steelers 37, Niners 16.
Week 4: 0 of 3 conditions satisfied; Cardinals 21, Steelers 14.
Week 5: All 3 conditions satisfied; Steelers 21, Seahawks 0.
Week 6: Bye
Week 7: 1 of 3 conditions satisfied; Broncos 31, Steelers 28.
Week 8: All 3 conditions satisfied; Steelers 24, Bengals 13.
Week 9: All 3 condtions satisfied; Steelers 38, Ravens 7.
Week 10: 1.5 of 3 conditions satisfied; Steelers 31, Browns 28 (Started drinking Coke after kickoff, and the Steelers responded by waiting till the second half to come back).

Which brings us to Week 11, against the one win Jets. 2 out of 3 conditions were already out the window, as I am in Pittsburgh now and can't go to Eric's, and I forgot to pack either of my jerseys. But the season has shown that as long as I am watching and I have the coke, it should be okay, just not very pretty (see Browns game). That's where the problem came. The plan for Sunday was to go out for dinner with my mom, stepdad, grandpap, and his FWB. The geniuses made dinner reservations for 4 PM. The Steelers game started at 4 pm. I really had no choice, as I want to show some maturity around my family at the age of 22 and not seem like some crazed lunatic fan (which I am). At least Max & Erma's served Coke products, but it didn't do any good, as I begin getting angry text messages from Eric about how we're down by 10 and it's all my fault. It's actually 10-7 when we leave the restaurant, so we go home. If I start drinking coke now everything should be fine. No Coke in the fridge at home. I go to run out and get Coke, except that my car is blocked in the driveway by my mom's caravan. I ask her to move it so I can go get Coke, and she basically says I'm crazy and I need to let go of my superstitions. And she is kinda right. So I sit in my living room and watch helplessly as we lose to the freakin Jets in OT. Yes, there are other reasons we lost. We couldn't tackle anybody and had some incredibly awful conservative play calling. But those things happened because I was unable to follow my superstitions. No one will ever convince me otherwise.

So in the span of 24 hours, all 3 of my teams lost close games to teams that either wore green or were from New York - or both. All 3 we had leads in, all 3 we gave up. 2 went to overtime, the other was decided in the final minutes. Yuck yuck yuck.