almost a Jimmercenary*

So I have never been one to really get into College or professional sports.  Despite having a husband that LOVES basketball and can effortlessly succeed at any sport he tries, I shamelessly admit, I always feel a bit disinterested and bored during most sporting games and so we rarely watch sports live or on TV.  It also may be due to the fact that we don't have cable, and never have since we've been married.  My poor husband!  He's such a good sport about lack of sports on our TV!

Once in awhile James will watch a random game on TV that comes in on our antennae.  Last week, lo and behold we actually got to watch a BYU game this way!  I have to admit- the only way I had followed BYU basketball up to this point last week was via facebook.  I could always tell when there had been a BYU game as there would be all these status updates about the game and this so-called "Jimmer".

Well, last week, I was out running a long run for the first part of the game, but when I got back, James had gathered the chillins 'round the TV set whilst passing around a bowl of popcorn (to my horror he was letting Alice eat it too- I probably need to relax, she was having the time of her life).   I ended up sitting down and watching it with them.  I admit-  the game had me glued, this Jimmer guy is amazing and BYU was playing well.  We took a short break to eat dinner, and then we raced back to the living room to watch what the rest of the game would entail.  They ended up winning Gonzaga.  And I LOVED watching that Jimmer make all those awesome shots!  Go Jimmer Go!

One funny thing about the name Jimmer- I really think it's an upstate NY thing. This nickname is actually not too foreign to our family.  James' mom calls him Jimmer all the time.  She has also called little Jimmy it quite a bit too, and when we go back to upstate NY, James will have these random people that are friends with his parents call him that.  James has told me in the past, he would get all embarrassed when his mom would call "Jimmer" in public.  I have to admit, I too thought it was just a really funny nickname that his mom made up, and would smile everytime his mom called it out loud.  Suddenly, however, it is cool to have the nickname Jimmer, thanks to Fredette's amazing basketball skills.  Even Johnny said during last week's game, "Can you call me Johnner"?

 Now for some words on March Madness,  I do make up "joke-brackets" each year.  James and I like to have some friendly spousal competition with it.  James will pour his heart and soul out over his brackets, running excel spreadsheets and researching data, making concoctions.  And then there's me.  I will just click on "random" and make a totally senseless bracket.  I honestly have no clue about the teams in the first place.   I have found that March Madness truly must be madness, as once in awhile I really do win!!!  In fact, I have a little claim to fame- about 8 years ago, when I worked at Nu Skin, there was a March Madness bracket competition at work, and I did the same thing, just put in random teams as the winners, and I actually won the jackpot!  My fellow male co-workers were dumbfounded.

 One last kind of funny story- way back in the day, James tried out for BYU basketball team.  As we were watching the game, I said something about Coach Dave Rose.  I can't remember what it was, but it jogged James memory and he shared with me how when he tried out for the BYU basketball team (this was way back in the day- before I knew him), he made a slam dunk through a "pass-through" (I think that is what James called it- I was cut from freshman high school basketball, thus am terrible with basketball terminology).  Coach Rose (who at the time, I believe was an assistant coach), after seeing James' dunk, asked "what's your name young man?" and James proudly told him "Jim Fowler", to which Coach Rose made some notes on his clip board.  James made call backs that day and continued on through the try outs the next day.  Ultimately, he didn't make the team, and I actually count my lucky stars he didn't- I told him we probably would have never met, and he'd probably be married to some blond cheerleader ;P.  But it is fun to know Coach Rose once witnessed "my Jimmer" in action too. :)

*Fun little Jimmer glossary.