Never park in Cherry Garage. There is no more useless structure on campus (at least not until the Alumni Plaza is finished). It's like M.C. Escher and the Marquis de Sade had a few drinks together and decided to design a parking garage.

Also, make fun of women's basketball all you want; this game was great to watch. You can't beat walking in late and sitting in an eighth-row seat to watch Arizona beat Stanford. The Cardinal's Nicole Powell - an amazing basketball player, regardless of gender - trades punches with Arizona's scrappy, opportunistic offense in a fight for the Pac-10 lead. UA's Natalie Jones hits every free throw down the stretch and Dee-Dee Wheeler banks in a circus shot in traffic to seal the win. The game even sets an attendance record. Afterward, some call it the biggest win in the program's history.

The UA men could learn something from the women. Instead of fighting in the post and getting to the free throw line, like their female counterparts, the men settle for jumpers and allow Cal to dominate down low en route to an unsurprising loss. The day ends on a sour note; it's a sign of things to come.

This game taught a two-fold lesson: Choose your sporting music carefully, and never doubt the Arizona media relations staff. I show up late after a work meeting, with the score tied 4-4 in the top of the seventh. As I enter the press box, the scoreboard guys bust out "Highway to the Danger Zone." On cue, Riverside plates a run to go ahead.

Bottom of the ninth, same score, Cats have the tying run on first in freshman Jordan Brown. Pat Reilly comes in to pinch hit. As he takes his warm-up cuts, "Don't Stop Believing" comes on. He rips a double down the line, and Brown makes the Journey all the way home to tie it up. Bring on extra innings.

In the bottom of the 11th, just as I'm starting to worry about missing the softball team's 5 p.m. tilt with New Mexico altogether, Arizona baseball media relations liaison Matt Rector says the magic words: "Walk-off." I'm skeptical; the second baseman, Moises Duran, is at the plate, and the Bat Cats haven't hit a ball hard since I've been there.

Outside fastball, deep drive to right-center - ballgame. Cats win. Matt turns to the awed media in the press box: "Bad news, boys. I've got a feeling Nick Robinson will hit a 35-foot runner to beat Arizona tomorrow," he says, tipping his cap and walking out.

OK, so he didn't really say that last part. But I bet he was thinking it.

Again, a two-fold lesson. The first is to dress accordingly. I'm wearing a T-shirt and freezing, while most of the crowd is wearing the official uniform of old people in cold weather: ill-fitting jeans, anything knitted and wrinkles.

This is what they should pitch in the Sun City commercials, instead of all those desert vistas and golf courses: Retire to Arizona, where you can spend your children's inheritance on season softball tickets and heckle 19-year-old girls. When an unfortunate Lobo strikes out after fouling off roughly 17 pitches, a gaggle of fogies to my right chants "K, K, K, K, K, K." It's like Cocoon meets Mississippi Burning on a softball diamond.

Lesson two: When watching softball, don't expect it to make sense in baseball terms. Case in point: The Lobos are trailing by 12 in the bottom of the fifth. They're three outs from the mercy rule. The Pepsi Classic is running an hour behind schedule, it's 40 degrees, and 90 percent of the crowd is out past its bedtime. What does the UNM coach decide to do? The only logical thing - have his team bunt its way back into the game. Drag bunt, no less.

Here's a little trivia: They have cheerleaders at gymnastics meets. That's right, a bunch of girls do jumps and flips and cheers to encourage a bunch of girls who are doing jumps and flips while their teammates cheer. Ponder that for a while.

Gymnastics meets are surprisingly underrated. I was in the third row on the sidelines of McKale and did nothing but sit and look at girls for two hours. Now I know what it's like to be one of those rich old men who check out the cheerleaders at the basketball games.

Seriously, though, these girls are pretty amazing. And not only for their athletic ability; they're tough, too. At one point, a Gymcat, who will remain nameless, lost her grip on the bar and fell flat on her face from 8 feet in the air. The poor girl literally bounced. With hardly a flinch, she got up, chalked her hands and got back on the bar.

This game never happened. But if it did, and it was on TV, I wonder if the broadcast would have mentioned that Tiger Woods was at the game. Or if Brent Musburger would have finally called out Dick Vitale for having a "love affair" with Duke.

Walking in to Estevan Park, I pass a homeless couple sleeping on a mattress in a ditch. Behind the bleachers, a player is relieving himself. That pretty much sums up the atmosphere of a rugby game. They're a lot of fun, even when the team loses, as it unfortunately did twice this weekend.

I'd like to be able to say something about how more people should go watch UA men's tennis matches. I really would. But the seating capacity of Robson Tennis Center is probably 65, so I don't want to be held responsible when huge throngs of rabid fans start trampling each other in a rush to get good seats. They won - let's leave it at that.

-Justin St. Germain is senior majoring in creative writing and English. He can be reached at sports@wildcat.arizona.edu.