Nothing But Iron: Viva Viagriculture by Steven R. Lagman, M.D., C.A.S.W., Male Gardener March 27, 2009 This was forwarded to me from reader RB Kamps, who must have thought I would find it interesting: "Gardening Boosts Men’s Sex Drive: Just 30 minutes a day, five days a week, can revive a man’s flagging sex drive, say scientists. A new study done by researchers at the Medical University of Vienna says that gardening as well as other forms of moderate exercise, including dancing, cycling and jogging, can act as "natural" Viagra and reduce the risk of impotence." This explains a lot, for example, why Kelly resists my incessant efforts to expand the garden. Did I mention that some weeks I spend twenty or thirty hours in the garden? Thirty minutes a day? That’s foreplay. And, yes, it is true, I sometimes I ride my bike out to the garden, but honestly, I was unaware that cycling or gardening could be in linked in any way to virility. Perhaps I failed to make the connection because my brother Bruce is an avid mountain biker, and, well . . . I should probably stop there before I say something inflammatory, which brings me to my real motivation for forwarding this breakthrough scientific study to you: to ignite a literary retaliation from my brother, who will no doubt weigh in with the full force of his ridiculing incredulity. I will enjoy that, but first, I gotta get these carrots planted and then I am off to the dance studio. I jog there, you know. Did I mention that I am related to Gayle Creswick, who is just four points behind first-place Derek Smith-Sometimes-Rongstad in the Pride Pool? Gayle is my mom. Is it any wonder, with such an insightful and kick-butt ma like her, that I landed a career as an unpaid sportswriter? In the course of my upbringing she purposely withheld some important lessons, like the one about how to pick winners (no offense Kelly, I refer to basketball teams here), which she seems to have done for personal gain, however, on the other hand, she did teach me stuff, for example, how to avoid excesive commas and run on sentences. She also taught me that I can accomplish anything if I set my mind to it, so next year or the year after that or in 2019, I will win my own dogdam pool, and I will be hard to live with for about 6 months afterward, and I will write a screenplay called Suburbdog Pride Pool Winner. It is written. You can see that since I just wrote it. My friend Mike Randolph looks to challenge both Ma and Derek. After tonight he moved up to third and, best of all for him, he has the entire Elite Eight correct. Check that, best of all, his alma mater is Missouri. He hopes to ride his relative dark horse to the F4, which is not so far-fetched now, after his Tigers rained a furious hundred on Memphis, a team highly touted for its defense. For Ma it all comes down to Louisville. For Derek it’s about Pitt. Winner takes all. Actually winner takes nothing. Point of interest: Ma is the second-most chronologically mature player in the contest and Derek may well be the youngest, so this battle spans a couple generations. We should probably not discount the Beckers, Mike and Rachel, who hold the next two spots, respectively. I cannot refute rumors that Mike Becker teased his daughter, making her cry, when he passed her in the standings, but I can tell you I will tease my sons if I should happen to pass them. Keep an eye on wife Kelly, who snuck into 10th place almost unnoticed. She has 7 of the Elite 8 correct and an intact Final Four. Moreover, she is the only one in the pool with an Oklahoma champion and one of few with Mizzou in the F4. If Missouri and Oklahoma advance this weekend, she could be hard to live with for about 6 months. Hey, who says this year’s tournament lacks drama? Footnote: I watched Kelly do her picks on the day before the first round. It took her 8 minutes, during which she also fielded two phones, applied lip balm, answered an e-mail, paid the utility bill and posted a video on her Facebook page. After Thursday’s games I was tied with Patrick and 2 points behind Connor, not that anyone else cares because we rank in the 30's, which is better than last place, which is occupied–much in the way a saguaro cactus occupies the desert–by my brother Bruce, who is also shorter than I am. Bruce lost his champion Thursday when Memphis fell. "I am so done," he wrote from his Blackberry® smartphone with SprintSpeed. "Skewer me with a John McCain fork." My other brother Mike had Syracuse to win it all–a gutsy pick, but still way wrong. I sent a text asking Mike if he had Syracuse to win over Oklahoma. His reply: "What’s your point?" My point was that I already knew he had Syracuse, and he knew that I knew, and I said it anyway because I deserve to have a little fun since my bracket is such a joke, and because he will still finish ahead of me in my own pool. Terry Hart is worth mentioning because he held third place after Thursday’s games, but then dropped to seventh. At least he was able to see all of his losses, because he has Direct TV’s NCAA March Madness packet, which allows him access to every game with the touch of a cumbersome remote control, meaning Terry is single-handedly responsible for the nation’s decrease in work productivity during the tournament. Speaking of that (expert segue that I learned in amateur journalist school), I had mixed feelings about Michigan State’s win over Kansas. I did kinda sorta wanted the last-gasp, face-saver Big Ten entry to advance since it gives my team slight credibility by association, but I would have been thrilled to see the Spartans go down, just because I always get such a warm feeling when I see that. I predict this was MSU’s last win of the season, but as you know from my pool standing, predicting is as much a strength for me as figure skating or judo or knitting. I also predict that State’s premature departure will be due to poor recruiting, as it was for Wisconsin. And Marquette. And Purdue. And Minnesota. And Xavier. And Wake Forest. Oh, and Duke! Don’t the coaches of these teams realize there are thousands of burger-joint-sponsored 6-8 lightning-quick point guards with 25-foot shooting range, practically jumping over each other–which they can easily do with their 46-inch verticals–to play at schools desperately in need of athleticism (which didn’t used to be a skin color)? All they have to do is recruit these kids and they will enroll immediately and national championships will flow like federal dollars into AIG bank accounts. Kalin Lucas is one such player who could have come to Wisconsin and elsewhere, had Bo Ryan and Elsewhere’s coaches thought to recruit him. O.K., he’s not 6-8, but he’s tall enough and a bonafide big-time guard. Whiney coach Tom Izzo got him because, as the story goes, Izzo said to himself, "I really need to start recruiting better players." And then he did. And look what happened! Unfortunately for us MSU-dislikers (it’s close, but I am not a hater) Lucas is just a sophomore, so we have to put up with him for another year, which won’t be pretty, unless of course Bo Ryan wakes up and copies Izzo’s strategy of recruiting phenoms. Well, at least we have (sportswriter) Mike Lucas. And speaking of recruiting, I was impressed by Kansas. Sure the defending champs were ousted, but this was not a bad run for such a young team. It is hard to imagine why anyone would want to play at Kansas. It’s not like the Jayhawks have tradition to sell. The only thing I can come up with is that Bill Self, so the story goes, said to himself . . . well, you know the rest. It could be quite a weekend of regional finals. I look forward to the heavyweight bouts–I am ready to see some One Shining Moment footage, you know, the real buzzer-beater stuff that will make me laugh or cry or shout or at least shift my weight so I don’t get a couch-induced blood clot. For future reference maybe we should bring back the old unfair NCAA Selection Committee with its crappy computers that were eventually sold to the BCS (and continue to be in use today). If Pitt and Louisville–or even Missouri–had been 9 seeds, we would have some real inspiration on our hands, not to mention a classic music video to run after the post-championship game Viagra commercials. ______________ Nothing But Iron is an amateur sports column. The author acknowledges that gardening is not a sport. But who really cares? Viagra® is a sponsor of the NCAA Tournament, but not of NBI, which is a free-standing publication that does not require support, so to speak. Viagraculture is not a registered trademark but it is copyrighted according to really scary copyright laws. Use of the word viagraculture as an original thought, without written permission of NBI and DrTM Enterprises, is prohibited and will invite the wrath or at least the ridiculing incredulity of the NBI legal team. ©2009 DrTM Enterprises. All rights reserved, including the right to shut the hell up and just appreciate the many recent-enough successes of the Wisconsin Badgers.