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How Low Can I Stoop? |
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My husband is one of those fans, bleeding Carolina blue blood when they have a bad season. Since long-time coach Dean Smith retired a few years ago, he's had plenty of time to master the art of self control. Some times he does better at it than others. An integral requirement for having a Carolina Basketball Jones is watching most of the games no matter how poorly the Tar Heels are playing that season. My spouse does this willingly, often arranging other portions of his life around the time Carolina's playing. And that's what drove me to do what I did the other night. I took one of the off-spring somewhere and on the way back heard on the radio Carolina was playing Duke at nine that night. Somewhere in the back of my mind an evil idea sprung up. By the time I walked into the house, that evil idea had morphed into a wicked practical joke. I casually wandered into the kitchen where my hubby was and said, "Oh, by the way, if you need to do anything on the computer, you need to do it before eight o'clock." "Why?" he asked. "Because they're shutting off the cable starting at eight tonight and it won't come back up again until eight in the morning. Twelve hours," I said, wandering into the den. "Just the computers…right?" His voice, already a bit panicky, floated behind me. "Nope," I said. "The whole thing – computers and TV." There was a quiet moment as he digested this information. Then I heard a pan bang. The a cabinet slam. Then another one. *^$#*&%&^!!!!!" He shouted from the kitchen. "They're cutting off the cable right before the Carolina-Duke game! &^%#()*&^^!" Sounds of stomping, lots and lots of, um, colorful language, door slamming and pan banging made its from the kitchen to the den, where I sat trying to keep from laughing. But when I heard him growling, I figured maybe it had gone far enough. I walked back into the kitchen. "Just kidding," I said lightly. You know how the guys in Ghostbusters sucked up ghosts in their little machines? Well, that's what he did. The monster I'd let out when I told him the cable would be cut off evaporated just as quickly and completely as it had appeared. Later when Carolina dropped the ball and lost to Duke, he grumpily conceded that perhaps it would have been better if he hadn't been able to see the game at all. And when I mentioned this to the guys at work, they accused me of doing it just so I could get a newspaper column out of it. Now, I ask you: Do you really think I would I stoop to such a level?
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