There is definitely a contagious electricity to watching competition. You pick a side, you root for it; and you find you can't stop. It definitely consumes you. Yes, that's right. My closet Boston Red Sox fan is out. I'm a die-hard Mariners fan, but the charged air was too contagious. I couldn't help but root for the one everyone here wants to win. I'm still acting out that final count...Derek Lowe...Terrence Long...3-2, two outs, bases loaded...that crooked pitch...how beautiful. And as that suspenseful moment passed, the white knuckles of Shannon, and my neighbors, and hundreds of thousands of people breathed with me as I heard decibels of screams pouring from the campus streets. Cowboy Up is fuckin' right. Who cares what the hell it means? It means victory, and a surely raucous Beantown.