made of Gods and win.

what i didn't do today: any studying.
what i did do today: go to Toys 'R' Us.

what i didn't acquire today: any knowledge about legal ethics.
what i did acquire today: two stuffed penguins and a recorder!

i am officially the most awesome person at the Washington University School of Law, because i'm the only one who is playing a recorder in the lounge.

now THAT was in bad taste.

it's a tradition as old as television: at the end of a sports season, someone always runs ads on television selling useless tchotchkes touting a team that won a championship. this industry has been dominated by Sports Illustrated pairing its commemorative books, posters, balls, and other useless objects with yearlong subscriptions to their magazine. however, occasionally an independent company will occasionally jump into the fray.

let's go back to part of that first sentence: "at the end of a sports season."

as last i checked, the college football season is not over yet. the bowl bids have been given out, but not a single bowl has been played. the dust hasn't settled, and no team has been given a large, shiny national championship trophy.

last night on espn, i saw an ad encouraging people to fork over ninety-nine bucks for a Mizzou commemorative football.

there is so much wrong with that. first of all, the season isn't over. no one should sell memorabilia to commemorate an entire season that isn't over yet!

second of all, Mizzou didn't win the national championship--there is no way they will win the national championship. hawking memorabilia for a team that has not won a significant championship is just tacky. the only championship Mizzou won was the Big 12 North--not even the entire Big 12, just the North subdivision. do you ever see television ads hawking hokey display footballs when Nebraska or K-State wins the Big 12 North? even selling them for a conference championship would betray an inferiority complex--i have a funny feeling that no one in Norman is putting up with ads for Sooners commemorative footballs.

if the television ad was not pathetic enough, the press release is. although i didn't see the ad until last night, the press release clearly was written before the bowl bids came out. in discussing how momentous this season has been for Mizzou, the press release proclaims:

Regardless of the outcome against Oklahoma on December 1, the Mizzou Tigers are now guaranteed of going to a major BCS bowl.

try as i might, i can't re-arrange the letters C, O, T, T, O, and N to spell out the name of any BCS bowl. if you manage to do this, or you know something about the BCS that i have somehow missed, i'm all ears.

also priceless is the last sentence of the order page, after noting that the footballs would have the scores of the big 12 championship game and the team's bowl game printed on them after they happened:

"Please allow 6- 8 weeks after Championship game for delivery."

what may have been unbridled optimism last week now seems like an insane delusion, a severe case of denial.

farces like this are really not how to express pride in your Local Sports Team. stuff like this makes me happy that my sentiments lie on the right side of the border war.