I thought about writing a somewhat serious column here like I normally do, but then Saturday happened and everything changed. What a day. Seriously. Outrageously good.

It started off great when my 8-week old-son decided to sleep from 11:30 p.m. to 6:30 a.m., have a quick feed, and went back to sleep till 9 a.m. So both Mommy and Daddy were able to sleep a lot. Huge win for my family, especially because I got to sleep till 11 a.m.

I got up to help volunteer for the Daily’s “Stuff the Bus” event to help out the Mid-Iowa Community Action. It went pretty well. Thanks to everyone who helped out and donated stuff. Pretty cool considering we’re still in an iffy economy.

Quick side story. When I got an e-mail requesting volunteers, my heart was certainly not in it. I thought, “Man, why do I have to do this?” and other similarly selfish thoughts. It’s even worse considering MICA helps my family out with the WIC program.

Note: If you’re a mom expecting or with child, you should check out WIC at www.micaonline.org. It’s legit, and something like 60 percent of American families qualify.

But once I committed and actually helped out, I thought, “You know, that was a good thing to do. I can be such a selfish idiot sometimes.” Moral of the story: If you’re asked to volunteer for a good cause, it’s probably worth committing to.

Anyway, during volunteering, I had been getting periodic score updates on the Iowa State-Texas game. It was surreal. Iowa State was beating Texas. In football!

I had felt that Texas was kind of beatable after the Longhorns lost to UCLA 34-12, but come on, we’re Iowa State. Lightning doesn’t strike twice like that for a team like Texas. Especially not after it beat Nebraska and after Iowa State, well, got smashed two weeks in a row.

But there I was tuning into the game and John Walters is telling me we’re up 28-14 in the fourth quarter. Ridiculous!

So I get home and the game gets closer. 28-21. By now, this game is reminding me of the Nebraska game last year. I remember sitting on the couch with my wife listening to the game with our hearts in our throats.

It was a little different this time with my son trying to talk to me. A little hard to interact with him when my heart is about to stop.

When Texas got the ball back with a minute to go, I was yelling, “Get a sack,” and my wife was hoping for an interception. Lo and behold, Jacob Lattimer gets a sack. YES! Four plays later, game over! Epic win!

Text my cell phone contacts the glorious news. Talk excitedly to my child. Make a happy Facebook news feed statement. Check the scores. Navy beat Notre Dame! Hurrah!

Cheering for the service academies is a fun form of patriotism. On the flip side, I think cheering for Notre Dame is a major part of some folks Catholicism.

Things just kept getting better as the day went on, too. Iowa lost to Wisconsin by an extra point. Well, and a horrible decision on timeouts at the end of the game by Iowa. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer school. HA!

Baylor won another game and is bowl eligible. Outstanding! That’s kinda like cheering for Iowa State in a way.

My other favorite team, Illinois, won and is two wins away from bowl eligibility. Fun fact: Illinois and Iowa State have only gone to bowl games in the same year once, the 2001-02 season. Not easy to be a football fan of either team most of the time.

The night ended on an even higher note. The Giants won the pennant! The Giants won the pennant! The Giants won the pennant!

I cannot believe we will be having a Giants-Rangers World Series. I’m not sure the World Series has had such tortured franchises face each other like this. And I, for one, couldn’t be happier.

I remember being a Giants fan in the early ’90s, especially 1993, when I lived in the Bay Area. It was such torture to keep missing the playoffs at the hands of the Braves.

I think that’s why I became an As fan when we moved to Illinois in November of ‘94. It was better to be a fan of a crappy team and have no expectations than to constantly keep having your heart torn out.

Then you have the Rangers who had never won a playoff game in the entire existence of their franchise thanks to the Yankees. Very sweet to watch them beat the Evil Empire.

Plus that poser of a team called Oklahoma lost to Mizzou, capping a dominant performance by the Big 12 North for the day. Moves Boise St. that much closer to a BCS title game. Boise! Boise! Boise!

What a fantastic Saturday. As announcer Ian Darke said after Landon Donovan scored the game-winning goal against Algeria in the World Cup, “You could not write a script like this.”