[M&M Guy]

Juulie - don't forget your shoes and whistle.

This is kind of enlightening to me, because I thought I was one of the few with this "sickness". I usually pack my bag in the morning, before I leave for work. Sometime during the day, I'm contacting partners for the game coming up in a few days. I've been checking MapQuest quite a bit this year, because it seems like I'm going to a bunch of new schools. I check this place daily for the latest in smart-a$$ comments. Most of the time I leave right from work to go to the game site, so I'm meeting a partner or two for the ride, or I'll turn on my XM in the car. (This may seem like a commercial, but to me satellite radio is the greatest invention sinced sliced bread. No matter what I'm in the mood to listen to, they have it. And I don't have to keep finding the local stations in the area I'm in.) If I have a partner with me, we'll go over some the ordinary "life" topics, but at some point it turns to basketball. We'll go over strange plays, quiz questions, etc. Then when I/we get to the game site, there's usually enought time to relax, catch our breath, get dressed, and have a decent pre-game. I try to stretch some during pre-game, so I'm ready to go when we get out there. Depending on the game and partners, the pre-game could be just discussing plays and situations for familiar partners, to a full-blown, item-by-item pre-game if I haven't worked with my partners before.

Basketball does kinda become consuming, doesn't it?