The Bengals beat the Chiefs 28-6 on Sunday. That's two in a row. E-mail from my dad, Sunday evening: "You have altered Bengals reality." No further message.

There are probably other explanations, but I accept that one. By observing the Bengals' situation in order to mock it, I've changed it. Basic quantum mechanics at work.

We'll come back to this in a minute. Or maybe we won't. Instead of going to the bar this weekend, I watch football at Werner Heisenberg's house. Werner Heisenberg promises to put the Bengals game on one of the TVs if it gets close, but it never does. I follow the Bengals' neat dismantling of the Chiefs on my phone while ping-ponging my eyes back and forth between Packers-Lions and Jets-Rams and eating everything in a bag of Jack Link's that is not explicitly labeled DO NOT EAT. The life of kings.

The Bengals win and increasingly I don't know who I am anymore. Afterward I shoot free throws in the yard and I'm almost relieved to learn that I still suck at basketball.