Solitaire

This is my third attempt at this column. I am throwing a petulant snit right now due to blogger being a jerk (see below ). Is it possible that this is the spirit of some great writer that is forcing my hand to write something better? Probably not. Place your money on my computer illiteracy and refusal to save midway through my work. There's a lesson here.

And we're off...

Solitaire. It's a very simple game, yet it recently held a vicious and dominating grasp on me that rivals Stalin's reign over Soviet Russia. To explain, I just ended a solitaire losing streak that went somewhere around thirty games. No joke. I'm not exaggerating. Thirty games. You know that guy in every group who drinks a little too much and always ends up wanting to fight someone by the end of the night, but every time he raises his fists he gets his lunch handed to him? Well that was me, only with solitaire. I kept going back to get another dose of abuse even though I knew I was about to dealt the business by a computer program. I felt like Marge Simpson in the episode of The Simpsons where she loses her mind playing the slots in the Springfield Casino and has to be physically restrained by her family.

(Side Note: Why don't more things from The Simpson's translate into real life? I know it sounds like a stupid question, but I have spent most of my adult life watching this show and what do I have to show for it? For example, in one episode Homer gets sent home from work, and consequently, to an insane asylum for wearing a pink shirt to his job. With this in mind, I wore a salmon/pinkish dress shirt to work today in hopes of an early dismissal. Let's be honest, I wasn't banking on anything, but the hope was there. What happened? Rather then get to go home and take a nap, I was told how nice I looked in my salmon colored dress shirt. Jerks.)

Regardless, I fought on. Why would I continue this masochist behavior? Because I had to win. And because thirty losses in a row is a dreadful, yet gaudy accomplishment that I found mildly amusing. Kind of like Sylvester Stallone's last ten years in film.

In my defense, I fought admirably. I refused to amend my game play by changing from a three-card-deal to the easier one-card-deal. Where a lesser man might have given up, I persevered. Victory tasted sweet, but I can't help but wonder what would have happened had this streak of "luck-non," as I will call it, had reared its head elsewhere? What would have happened if I were in Vegas? I mean, I know there is no wagering on solitaire, but what if my bad luck extended to all card games? Would I have been able to survive a long night at the Blackjack table? Or even worse, playing Texas Hold 'Em? What would be the over/under on me wondering off in severe debt and never being seen again? Would I have had to sell the naming rights to my first born son just to ante up for one last shot at breaking even?

I don't know, but I keep coming back to the idea that I my friends would find me three days later lying in the gutter outside the hotel, muttering to myself about some newspaper headline and wearing nothing but a worn-through jacket, an inexplicable two-week-old beard, and "crunchy" pants. Shudder.