Well, I was going to leave this one to the side, but so many of you have been writing and asking who won the World Cup contest that you've left me no choice. And the winner is . . . .
ME!
Yup! Go back and look through the comments yourselves, not that you would ever doubt the integrity of such a fine, literary location as this blog! I not only picked the correct overall winner (Spain), but also picked the the Netherlands to finish top 3. No one else who picked the winner got another top 3 pick correct, and those who picked more than one of the top 3 didn't manage to get the correct winner.
Thanks to everyone for participating! It was truly an eventful and exciting World Cup, and it was made even better by matching wits with all three of you readers out there! :)
Stay tuned for four years from now when we will re-run the competition and give you another shot! (Now, if I could just figure out what to do with this autographed copy of my own book . . . .)