Drink from the Septic Tank of Defeat

Here’s an analogy (or metaphor or whatever):

When you imagine drinking from the chalice of victory, what does that look like? I see the happiest man on earth, drinking, no, pouring, liquid glory all over his face. It’s bright gold, almost glowing. A silky concoction that’s a cross between liquid butter and milk. It goes down smoother than water and tastes a little like a steak made from a cow that Leonardo da Vinci personally slaughtered. And brandy. All from one of those garish, diamond-encrusted pimp cups a-la Lil’ John that were popular for like 3 seconds. It’s a quick drink.

But what does losing look like?

I see a man being handed a shovel and told to dig somewhere slightly off-site from an Arkansas trailer park. He’s digging up the park’s big 2,000 gallon septic tank. Once unearthed, he is instructed to drink liquefied redneck shit until it’s empty. For the entire duration of this torture, the shit will stay at a consistent luke-warm 90 degrees Fahrenheit. It’s too heavy to lift and chug, so this man has to lay belly down on the ground and scoop raw shit directly from the tank to his mouth using his hand. It takes a long, long time to finish.

If this man lost with honor, he gets to use a dirty old Dale Earnhardt plastic cup instead of his hand.

The Washington Capitals are chowin’ down at the ol’ septic trough cup-less right now. And they've only got about 6 months to finish and put it behind them before we start this thing all over again.

Fuck did they ever lose. They lost big. On home ice. In the most important game of their lives. I’ve never seen a hockey team down 5 goals before (for my Canada-hating readers out there, most games are decided by 1, maybe 2 goals). The final score was 6-2 in favor of the smelly asshole Pittsburgh Penguins.

Being accustomed to choking is a thing every D.C. sports fan must condition themselves to, because it happens allllllllllllll the fuckinnnnnnnnnnn’ time.