So last year around this time we were chatting about some important issue of the day, and then somebody said Look! Horsies!, and then we thought, well, this might be interesting, and then we wondered what the hell happened, it was over so fast.

Which is as good excuse as anything to declare it a tradition.

And so with no point other than the joy of inventing legends on the fly, we welcome you to the Second Annual Kentucky Derby Open Thread/Existential Crisis, in which we spend an hour anticipating a moment that will pass faster than a pinball game.

Hey, could be worse. Could be NASCAR.

We used to be one of Them. “Deranged idiots”, UCLA’s Gene Bartow called us, which we immediately reified for personal use. Front row, McArthur Court, Eugene, Oregon. The Pit.

We were crazy, but we were polite. “Siddown, Gene!” we would chant when the opposing coach stood up. And when Gene sat down, one of us, who today produces wan fratboy humor for an upstart politics blog, shouted “Thank you!” That was immediately incorporated into the chant, and we were impressed with our awesome power to move masses. World revolution followed.

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Bye Brett.

So sorry, A-Fraud.  No all-time home run record for you.

[Certain people have questioned whether steroids are really, truly evil.  All I know is this: Alex Rodriguez is a New York Yankee.  This shall suffice for me.]

Oh well … Cards could have won with a break or two, but teh Football Gods sez no.

five yards, please.

I was going for a picture of a cheerleader to put in here, and it struck me: have I ever seen a Steeler cheerleader?  Visit to the official website, Yahoo image search engine?  Nothing.

I’m sold.  On account of the lack of cheerleaders, the pick is Pittsburgh to beat the spread.  It’s a 10,000 STAR LOCK.

Liveish commentary follows.  Your contributions will be (a) inevitably better than mine, and (b) therefore welcome.

1755 (ET): One deep, trauma-inducing emotion, expressed off-hand earlier today: five-hour pregame shows which are half-filled with self-promotional free advertising for your corporate master (Universal, News Corp., Disney, Viacom) MAKES BABY JESUS CRY.  For Pete’s sake — keep it to two hours and talk about football only or GTFO.

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My cousin the Jets-hating Steelers fan mocks me with this:

I am not amused.