McCain’s shuffleboard superstition proves unsuccessful

PHOENIX, AZ — Every day that Americans went to vote, Barack Obama made sure to play basketball. It was a well publicized superstition that was faithfully observed Tuesday afternoon in Chicago, only hours before he was elected President of the United States.

However, every time one superstition is confirmed, another is disproved, and that was certainly the case for Obama’s opponent, John McCain, whose own sports-related superstition betrayed him Tuesday afternoon.

“As we’ve done every voting day since we heard about Sen. Obama’s basketball games, we played a rousing game of shuffleboard this afternoon,” McCain told SSNN. “It was a great game, a close match. There were a bunch of us there. Ted Stevens was there. George H.W. Bush was there. John Glenn, Bob Dole. It was a really good group. A real energetic game. We could only play for about 18 minutes before we were all exhausted, and then I took a four-hour nap.”

McCain said the superstition was not the cause of his election night loss.

“Listen, that’s why they call them superstitions,” he said. “If we knew that I could guarantee a victory by doing something, don’t you think I would have done that instead? But nothing I had done was really, you know, working, so I figured I’d give shuffleboard a shot.”

McCain says he’s been playing shuffleboard since the game was made popular in the United States in the mid 18th century. They had to travel to San Diego and board a Carnival cruise ship to play the game.

“Yeah, it was a lot of effort,” McCain said. “But I’ll do a lot for shuffleboard. I remember during the War of 1812, I once walked four miles to play a game of shuffleboard. Don’t quote me, but I’m pretty sure that’s how Missouri ended up being a state.”

McCain said the tradition had served him well every time there had been a vote.

“We love to get out there and cue some pucks around, you know,” McCain said. “Get the heartrate up to about 89. Take your mind off of things. That’s exactly what happened the other day, until stupid Bob Dole cue’d a 10-off and that was pretty much all she wrote. I keep telling him, ‘Bob, if you want to be good at shuffleboard, hold the cue with two hands!’”

It’s going to be tough for this sport to sweep any nations, but it’s still pretty frickin’ cool!