Sleepless in Medford

It’s 2 am, Thursday morning. My fingers feel like slugs sliming across the sidewalk. My brain’s filled with cotton balls. My eyes sting because… they’re open. Later today I have one of those “procedures” I don’t usually discuss. Preparation for the testing requires me to be sleep deprived for my 12:30 appointment. By then I’ll be a zombie, bouncing off the hospital walls like a slow motion pinball.

The night is long so thought I’d watch some movies, search the web, run a few miles in my hooded sweatshirt. Probably not a good idea to be running through neighborhoods at 2 am in a hooded sweatshirt.

I turned to something easy. The TV. No wonder we sleep at night, there’s nothing on except paid programming, meaning hour long commercials selling products to the sleep deprived. I flicked through the TV listings provided by the Direct TV guide. Lots of these paid programs. I didn’t bother to look what the content of the program was so I drew my own conclusions from the titles. For example:

Magic Jack I thought was a story about an illusionist that makes your money disappear.

There were a few shows on babies; “Your Baby Can Read.” I think there was a recent article on this, declaring the commercial to be deceptive. Why do you want a baby to read? Don’t understand that one. If you have a problem with that there was the listing that was too long for the TV grid. It only stated, “Baby Bullet.” I was shocked at this one but discovered it’s an appliance that can make baby food. Why make parents whip up baby food? If baby can read have him review the instructions and puree the fruit and veggies.

Other programs taught “Kill Germs with Steam.” Steam works on ants too. I’ve done this one before. I could “Quit Smoking Today,” “Quit Your Job,” or have “Wealth Without Risk.

I could be instructed on “Cleaning Made Easy.” The “Spinning & Weight Loss” program was interesting. I wondered how twirling in circles in the living room can shed some poundage . I tried this. I only got dizzy.

I thought about developing brain functions by watching “New Math, New Mind” followed by “Stop Memory Loss.” I wanted to watch this one but couldn’t remember what channel it was on.

Personal communication problems can be resolved instantly by watching “1 Minute Miracle Make Up.” I can use this. If groveling for forgiveness can be done in only a minute I’m all for it.

I didn’t need to watch “Easy Hair Removal.” Think I got that one figured out.

I got winded reading listings for “Zumba Dance.” “Turbo Fire Workout” where your pants are torched and you jump around trying to extinguish the flames. It may prove interesting exercising with crazies during the “Insanity Workout.” Then there was “Carving Abs in Bed.” No comment.

There were shows that preyed on our physical self-esteem issues: “Summer Sexy Abs,” “Sexy Swimsuit Body,” and “Look Sexy in Jeans.” This was appropriately followed by “Stop Your Anxiety and Depression.”

The last program offered “Free Slippers.” That reminded me I was sleep deprived. I want a doughnut.

We’re All Losers

Each March our family loves putting our brackets together for the NCAA Basketball Tournament. We trash talk, boast in our prognosticating abilities, and our overall college basketball savvy. That’s the boys anyway. An occasional “I told you so” outburst from one of the Smith family women folk goes viral after the men all chose a loser and she correctly named a winner on her bracket. Some of us read scouting reports, follow team stars and one of us even let a computer pick his list (who’s in your final four now, Jordan?) Some of us make several brackets; some of us more honorable only make one.

Now the final games haven’t been played yet. I believe the winner will come down to the score of the final game. (Mom. What were you thinking? 89 combined points is on the low side.) But usually the top winners in our pool are those who know the least about each team.

However, I take consolation that we aren’t the only ones who fail on choosing the final four and the ultimate winner.

An article reported that 99.9% of bracket makers worldwide had fallen out of the competition after the final eight teams played. Of the nearly 6 million who filled out brackets using ESPN’s Tournament Challenge only two picked all four teams playing in the finals. Of nearly 3 million who used Yahoo’s brackets only one- a school librarian chose the final quartet.

She’s from Salem, Oregon. This is her picking process. She likes the numbers seven and eleven so she leaned toward teams with that seed. She looked at mascots, the states the teams hailed from (some states she likes, others leave her underwhelmed.)

For the winner of the final four she likes UCONN because she and her boyfriend both had huskies as mascots at their respective alma maters. She also thinks UConn’s Huskie mascot resembles her 13 year old. I feel sorry for that kid.

Next year I’m revamping my selection method. Here’s a few of those things that will sway me in choosing one team over another:

I’ll take a look at the team’s cheerleaders. (I swear, Jan, this is for analytical purposes only.)

I’ll do a little research on the nationalities of the players on the teams and read to see if something is happening in their homeland that can cause distractions.

If players who were injured during the season and now sit in street clothes on the bench wearing white shirts and ties, I’ll give the team an edge.

I’ll choose letters from the Scrabble racks and see how many team names I can make. These will be favored.

And, if the school’s band has more tubas than trumpets I’ll lean towards them. Tubas are cool.

So, now’s the time to determine your winners for the 2012 tournament. You don’t even have to wait until those invited into the tournament are chosen. The only thing important in choosing a winner is not to include Ohio State in your final four. For some reason a Buckeye is not a team name that will win. On the other hand I’ll go with Delaware’s Blue Hens on any bracket.