Stupid or Superstitious?

I’m not stupid, y’all. Just superstitious. And the Lucky VolBurger Debacle of 2003 is but one (extreme) example. That year, my friend Jeff Como and I went to a local establishment every Friday to have a lucky VolBurger and discuss Saturday’s game. After four lucky VolBurgers, the Tennessee Vols were 4-0. And while I’m not saying the VolBurgers were the reason why, I’m not not saying that, either.

Before the fifth game, two other friends joined us, but it wasn’t the same. We all just weren’t as focused as Como and I had been in weeks prior. Predictably, we lost the next day, so Como and I decided that our friends shouldn’t join us on future lucky-VolBurger outings. So when one of them called me the following Friday to ask what time to meet, I had to break it to him.

It didn’t go well. (Something about me being an asshole.)

He’ll come around, I figured. After all, I was taking him to the game, and mad though he might have been, there was no way he’d pass up the Tennessee – Georgia game. But the next day, he screened every one of my calls. With kickoff a mere hour away, I finally reached him, but before I could get a word out, he cussed me out like no one ever has. When he was done, I apologized again for excluding him and begged for his forgiveness.

“Fuck you.”

“What am I supposed to do with your ticket?”

“Why don’t you stick it in a lucky VolBurger and shove it up Jeff Como’s ass?”

Is it cool if I just try to scalp it, instead?

But by the time I arrived at the game, I was so late I didn’t even have time to scalp the ticket. So I went directly to my seat (which was right beside the only empty one in the entire stadium), all too aware that the fuss over the lucky VolBurgers would likely cost us the game.

Or would it?

Just before halftime, we were on the one-yard line, about to score a touchdown that would have put us up 14-13 at the break. But, on a fluke play, our quarterback fumbled the ball and Georgia scooped it up and returned it the length of the field for a touchdown. Instead of being up by one, we were down by 13. We wound up getting thumped 41-14, and rightly or wrongly, I’ve pinned the loss on the fallout from the lucky VolBurger debacle.

My friends and I are fine now, but it took a while. They still think that I was a total dick. Stupid, even.

But they’re wrong. I’m not stupid. I’m just superstitious.

(No comment on being a dick.)

Image:  foxypar4 via Creative Commons