Last Monday morning was, by all accounts, not one of my best showings. I stayed up until the wee hours of the morning Sunday night following the traditional marathon editing session at the Sun, and by the time my 10:10 Intro to Sociology course rolled around, I was in a near-zombie state.

This column almost didn’t happen. I almost chickened out, lost my nerve. I almost was — gasp — a wump (my own neologism for a combination of wuss and wimp.) And I really don’t like wumps. But the thought of writing what will be my last column as an Assistant Sports Editor was starting to give me hives. Either that, or my nickel allergy is flaring up again. Either way, there is a really concerning rash starting to form on the back of my neck, and true to Sports Section tradition, I am going to blame it on The Sun.

As I was making my daily trek up the Hill to my office at Helen Newman Hall I became distracted by a slight bulging apparent on my right moccasin. Slightly concerned, I removed my shoe (or “slipper,” as my boss prefers to call them) and was deeply chagrined to discover that the entire right half of the lovely faux-something (Leather? Suede? Very unclear) had separated from the sole. Truly tragic.

Far, far, far above Cayuga’s waters there is a brick and wooden building known as the Africana Center. To get there you must first journey over the bridge connecting North Campus to the rest of the world, past the collection of freshman dorms, up past sorority houses, Jessup soccer fields and then, just when you think you must have gone too far, taken a wrong turn, something, you see the sign welcoming you to the Village of Cayuga Heights. Now go past that sign, and there, on your left, stands your destination.

I was going to start this column differently. I was going to start this column with a GO BIG RED! With a happy exclamation and gold stars all around. And then, predictably, just when I had readied the celebratory poppers and had the Krug Grande Cuvée on ice, (Which wasn’t cheap, by the way. I blew $350 on that bottle, and I highly doubt I’m going to be able to return it!) a certain Big Red sports team lost! Ouch. It took some time, but I feel I have now recovered sufficiently, with a little help from my friends Krug and Cuvée, of course and I will now attempt to transcribe from memory the column I was going to run before Saturday, aka “the Big Red Disappointment.”

I’m sure my loyal fans have started to notice the gradual shortening of my lovely bi-weekly columns. And for my next trick, I will make this column disappear!

But today I have a message of hope to my loyal fans — I flatly refuse to allow my column be choked out. No, I will continue to write meandering, sometimes funny, always ridiculous streams of consciousness until Editor in Chief Emily Cohn ’10 (who is required to read my column, ha! Did someone say No. 1 fan?) pries the keyboard from my spastic, over-caffeinated fingers ... lagging ad sales be damned!

On that note, I did have something I wanted to write about today with my remaining 300 words. Thanks to everyone who is still reading at this point, by the way. Ten points.

The walls of volleyball head coach Deitre Collins-Parker’s corner office were mostly bare Monday when I knocked on the halfway opened door. Deitre was obviously in the process of packing up the last of her stuff — a dejected black mini-fridge stood, unplugged, in front of her desk, and piles of office paraphernalia lay in haphazard heaps. In front of the dark monitor, a row of unopened Slimfast shakes stood quietly. It was their last day too, after all.

Now, I don’t want anyone to take this the wrong way, but I love, love, LOVE Jeomi Maduka. Yes, Jeomi, you are pretty much my hero. I think you’re the next FloJo, Lisa Leslie and Marion Jones, all wrapped up in one slightly shorter, steroid-free, highly-educated package. In fact, last semester, I wrote the story about you when you were selected by The Sun as 2008’s Athlete of the Year. I see you around campus, walking with your friends between classes or on your way to a workout, and all I want to do is run up to you and ask you to sign my snow boots.

But I don’t.

I woke up yesterday morning and sat bolt upright from the cushy, puke-green sofa in my living room I had fallen asleep on earlier that night (morning?). Something was definitely not right. I pulled the notes I was using to write a rather fabulous English essay (due in approximately three hours) from my face and took stock of my emotions.

What was this sick feeling in the pit of my stomach? Could it be that third helping of my Jersey cousins’ stuffing from Saturday afternoon, rising ominously up from the depths? Perhaps it was the caffeine pills — I mean tic-tacs — I’d been popping like an addict for the past nine hours?