On Basketball at Christmas

None of the fans yell, except for us.

Stearns knits and yells sarcastic and embarrassing comments at the refs ("It's because she's black. He called a foul because he's a racist"; "Sir: she can't help that she's tall; the other girl just bounced off of her"). It doesn't matter if the call is right or wrong--Stearns ridicules it.

Ilana plays--she's the one we're watching. She is absolutely intense--guarding her man while the ball is at the other end of the court. But at least she guards her man, unlike three quarters of the rest of her team.

My dad repeats the same command: "Take it from them, take it from them, take the ball from them" (when do you not want to take the ball from the other team?). And giving the players comments on every action ("You've got to box out"; "You've got to rebound").

My mom cheers very loudly. She calls the girl everyone knows as "Snooty," her real name, Frances, because she doesn't feel right using nicknames. And she cheers very loudly.

I am less interesting (I generally just tell the rest of them to stop embarrassing our family while being absolutely amused by it all). But tonight I had no voice and couldn't stop myself from talking or cheering so my whole voice went away while hoarsely yelling.