I tend to be an optimist, about pretty much everything. However, sometimes this creates a situation where everything flies in the face of you being optimistic, like when your team you thought was good at football loses four consecutive games.
It leaves me with a decision: a) admit that I misconstrued how good of a team Northwestern would be or b) come up with completely incorrect excuses for why Northwestern is performing badly instead of performing goodly.
Which do you think I chose? Clearly, something is jinxing NU. The question is finding out what it is.
My first thought was that it was me arriving on campus. Then I remembered that I attended NU's last win over Eastern Illinois just a day after showing up in Chicago for school. So it's not that. But I have a lot of other ideas:
Me writing for Wildcat Report: I've worn a lot of hats in my day: I've written for the Daily, I've done Sippin' on Purple, and I also had this really cool aviator hat that was really fluffy on the inside and leather on the outside but I lost it, I have a neon DM hat that I wear pretty much every day to the point that I think people on campus recognize me as "the idiot with the douchey hat" and I got a bunch of texts saying "I see your hat!" while I was on Randy Walker Terrace for the Michigan game, but on the downside, this girl stole my neon Kappa hat at the Keg one time and I still haven't forgiven her. I forgot what I was talking about, but I like hats. Oh yeah, my first story for Wildcat Report was about how NU was preparing for Army's different game plan. NU went on to lose the game. Perhaps my reporting for WR is so insightful that opposing coaches are able to tweak their game plans for success solely based on reading my articles. Either that or my presence at practice is distracting.
Classes: We all know that everybody at Northwestern is a huge nerd, including me and probably you if you go or went here. For example, yesterday, instead of socializing, I wrote a study guide for my Sociology final since it's only seven weeks away. The football team is no different. Classes started the week after the Army game, but surely even before that game, they were busy buying their textbooks and preparing for the first day of classes. Since, it's been terrible: they've been skipping practice to make index cards and go to TA's office hours.
Freshmen: NU went 2-0 against BC and Eastern Illinois. Then, the next week was Wildcat Welcome week. Overcome with how depressing it is that the Class of 2015 is on campus, NU went out and lost their next four games. Or they were just playing tiny-sized hoops.
Occupy Wall Street: In addition to correctly accusing us of all being nerds, NU haters are also accurate in describing us as the 1%. Isn't that right, Winston? No, Winston, that wasn't dictation. I was asking you a question. You see, Winston is my butler who painstakingly types all my posts for me from dictation while I lie nude in this bubble bath. Anyway, as I was saying, Although BHGP is insulting by implying we'd ever wear Armani - I'm not a low-class guido, I wear straight Vineyard Vines, son! Winston, remember to put the exclamation point after "son", and also bring me my loofah. Also, this is the worst caviar I've had all day! Why would you even bring me this, dick? I can replace the help, you know. Does the British government even know you're here? Are you illegal? I'll report you, Winston. Paragraph break.
Anyway, the Occupy Wall Street protests began on September 17, the same day NU lost to Army. Remember to link to the Wikipedia article for that one, you snivelling excuse for a butler, you. Clearly, the football team, who unlike me, are upper-middle class riff-raff, are scared for their financial well-being while those protesting scum try unsuccessfully to take my lifestyle away from me. (This is Winston. He makes me re-read his posts word for word but never actually looks at them, so I think I'm safe. Although my duty bounds me to him, I cannot sustain this lifestyle of labor any further. If you're reading this, help.)
Dan Persa: Dan Persa was hypothetically ready to play against Army and has played in NU's subsequent three losses. It's clear his presence in uniform makes everybody else on edge and leaves them unable to perform. Fire Dan Persa
Any other excuses?