Helping

I'm a sports fan; primarily a Detroit sports fan, which means while I have to cheer for the Lions and the Tigers, I also get to root for the Pistons and Red Wings. I also cheer for the home team, which for the last three years has made me a Houston fan.

Anyway, the Pistons were on TV today, a rare television appearance for the team here in TX. Apparently being one of teh two best teams in the league for the last three years is less important than having a player named Shaq, Kobe, or Le Bron on TV.

Detroit got off to a slow start, they were down by as much as 17, and were trailing by 14 at the half. So I changed the channels a lot. I change channels during breaks when my team isn't doing well. I do this because I figure their luck needs a change, and if I flip the right combination, then the team will do better. It didn't work, until about halfway through the third quarter, where I picked the right combination of channel changes, and Detroit hit its stride. They ended up trailing by only three at the end of the third quarter, so I stopped flipping channels - I didn't want to change their luck. Sure enough, it worked, and Detroitended up winning. Sure the players did their part, but I know - it was me and my remote control that did it.

I'm superstitious with a lot of sports. When I bowl, if I get a strike, I repeat whatever actions I did prior to that frame, and continue to do so until I no longer get a strike. I also won't look at my score while I'm running a mark streak.

For racquetball, I always bounce the ball off my racket one time before I dropp for the serve - ditto tennis (back when I played these two sports). When I play baseball or softball, I always have to spin the bat like a propellor at least once before I am ready for a pitch, and I won't step on chalk or a base when going to or from the field. With chess, I always have to listen to Van Halen's "You really got me" and drink a vanilla coke before each game.

I'm most proud of how I help other people excel at sports via channel changing or hope rays (little dotted lines that are invisible to the naked eye, yet can change the course of a game by sheer concentration by the fan. I first learned about them in a Dave Barry book).