In Eckleburg's Eyes - 11/24/2008, Part 1

On Friday night, I had planned on watching a UT sporting event. I inadvertently watched two.

MPW and I had planned on watching the Tennessee basketball team play at MTSU on CSS. We had actually contemplated driving to Murfreesboro for the game but on Monday the cheapest seats online to the sold out contest were being scalped for $73. We opted to watch at home.

So I picked up a pizza from Little Caesars and headed to MPW’s condo to watch the game. I arrived early and CSS was airing the Lady Vols narrow 66-63 victory over Chattanooga. Unfortunately the game went along. Instead of switching over to the men’s game, the station aired the women’s contest in its entirety. This may be the biggest sports programming error since the infamous Heidi Bowl.

The game seemed to never end, especially the final minute. It was 8:50 pm when the game ended. The men’s game tipped off at 8:30 pm. By the time the telecast began, Tennessee was leading MTSU 13-12 with 13:54 remaining in the first half.

Tennessee eventually defeated the Blue Raiders 76-66 to improve to 3-0. It was the Vols’ first road game of the season. Tyler Smith led the Vols in points (18), rebounds (10), assists (4), and steals (1). MPW noted that advantage of not going to the game was that we did not have to sit through the halftime "entertainment".

Due to the late game, I did not go to Applebees with the crew on Friday night. It was unfortunate as JTH committed an unintentional faux pas. Amy was the waitress and she is going through a divorce. She lamented that there was no hope for a divorcee with children. JTH agreed! He misunderstood her. He thought she claimed there was hope. She exercised her right to refuse JTH service and he felt horrible about the incident for days.

Finally, on Friday, for the first time ever I was first on the waiting list to get shots at the Allergy, Asthma, & Sinus Center. It was good to be first at something.