Insistence

The thing is, Eric wouldn't be wrong so often (and it wouldn't be nearly so much fun pointing it out when he is), if he didn't stubbornly insist he was right over every little thing.

Tonight while we were watching ice-skating finals we were waiting for the last skater's scores. She needed a score of 138+ to medal.

"She'll get 136," Eric stated matter-of-factly.

"Really?" I countered, "I didn't think it was that good. I would guess 130-131 at the highest--maybe not even that."

"Okay," he schemed, "so if she gets a 134 or higher then I'm right and I win. If she get's a 133.9 or lower, you win." He paused for a moment before finishing with, "And I guess if she scores in between that we tie."

"Okay," I shrugged.

The score came out at 126.

"Dang it!" he lamented than begrudgingly mumbled a quick "you're right and I'm wrong."

Final skater's score above 134--busted!

* * *

Several minutes later the medal ceremony began and we laughed when the bronze medalist skated to the rear of the podium and almost mounted on the silver side before realizing her error. Then the silver medalist was announced and she glided across the floor and hugged the third-place winner before stepping up to her side of the podium.

"Huh," I observed, "she just climbed on up from the front."

"So?"

"I think usually the athletes come from the rear of the podium. Oh--but she did it too!" I exclaimed as the gold medalist also stepped up into place from the front of the podium.

"What's the difference? The sides are the same."

"Really? I thought there were steps in the back."

"Noooo," Eric said as if that was the most ludicrous suggestion he had ever heard, they just use the bronze or silver sides to step up to gold if they need to."

"Oh, okay. I don't know, I just was thinking I'd seen them step up from a step in the back."

"Let's see. If there are no steps I'm right, if there are any steps at all you're right." He spit the words out quickly, trying to set up the stakes of our game before a camera pan concluded it.

"Okay," I shrugged again.

The camera panned back revealing a nice step behind the center of the platform. "Look--a step!," I laughed.

This was too much losing in one night for Eric. "No, that's just part of the design," he grumbled. But I knew he knew.

No steps behind olympic podiums--busted!