WINNING!

Internets, if you'll allow me to, I'd like to add another phrase to my list of favorites. I really love to say "terrifically pleased" especially when speaking about myself. In fact, I even said it in that post about my favorite words. I love that phrase because I think it is the most apt description of how I feel--and how I know others are perceiving me. I'm not sure I can succinctly describe it, so how about I give you a prime and immediate example of what me being terrifically pleased with myself looks like?

Over the weekend I was consumed with NCAA basketball fever; I've got the madness, well, in reality I think the madness actually has me. Anyway, the New York Times is hosting brackets and I entered into a group that the Commish put together. If you know nothing about NCAA Men's basketball championship bracket, no worries, just know that apparently this year, my gut instinct is really good at picking winning teams. So good that I'm currently ranked 78th out of over 35,000 participants. That's top 0.2 percent! And at one point I was ranked 43rd! That was until Notre Dame choked. Way to NOT fight, Irish.

I am certainly pleased with myself and my ability to make arbitrary picks, however it wasn't until this morning that my self-pleasedness moved into terrific territory.

I'm sitting in my office with my door cracked open, and I can hear a gaggle of guys from the finance team white boarding their bracket results in one of the offices across the hall. Hearing them talk about how abysmal their brackets are gives my ego a little boost. They keep talking and talking and talking, and I send an instant message to AP that says something to the effect that my bracket would grab all of their brackets around the neck and give them all gigantic noogies. And they keep talking.

I've finally had enough of their chatter about their sub-par picking skills (and I needed a little restroom break), so I get up from my desk and step into the hallway, and this is where the terrific happens. Just as I'm stepping out of my office and into the hall so is AP, and Coach A is coming down the hall and is right outside both of our offices when we both emerge. Internets, that is SYNERGY! It was like the holy trinity of grrrrrrl power. I felt a surge of good feminine ju ju, spontaneously blurt out to the two of them, "Watch this!" I walk into the man cave, interrupt their conversation and say, "Um, fellas? My bracket will take all of your brackets down." They all turn my way, puzzled that the HR girl has stepped into their sacred ground, and then I tell them that my bracket will kick all of their brackets' butts, because seven of my Elite Eight picks are still alive (again, if you don't know anything about what I just said, don't worry about it, just know that LMNT was representin' on those fools).

They were impressed (maybe not as much as I was of myself, but at least a little impressed). One of them even said, "Wow, that's the best I've heard." At that point I flashed them a little grin, batted my eyes, flipped my hair and trounced back down the hall (AP and Coach A still standing in the hallway laughing). And that right there is the epitome of me being terrifically pleased with myself. Of course now that I did that, the Universe is going to hand me a nice little dose of humble pie and course corrections will be made when all of my current picks lose. Ah, but it was worth it. Terrifically so.