Category: College Football

Same Song, Second Verse

I’ve been reading a book, Lost in Shangri-La, A True Story of Survival, Adventure, and the Most Incredible Rescue Mission of World War II by Mitchell Zuckoff

Great stuff. I would like to submit for your consideration the following passages on the aboriginal inhabitants of the Baliem Valley in New Guinea and their penchant for incessant war:

“When compared with the causes of World War II, the motives underlying the wars were difficult for outsiders to grasp. They didn’t fight for land, wealth or power. Neither side sought to repel or conquer a foreign people, to protect a way of life, or to change their enemies’ beliefs, which both sides already shared.

… Read the rest

21-0; That’s Mighty Fine Opium

For those of you still smarting and aggrieved over the fact that an “undeserving” team like the Alabama Crimson Tide was allowed into the BCS Championship Game and then, wonder of wonders, actually won the thing, making this two titles in three years (Can you say, “Cam sandwich”?), then perhaps you can take some consolation in this: It really wasn’t that much fun for me.

What with the extra hours I’ve been working lately (and the resultant fatigue), having two good friends die in the past week, and all the moaning and yakety-yak coming out of Stillwater and practically every other corner of the country over the past six weeks, I hardly took any pleasure or interest in the game up until the time that I turned on the TV Monday night.… Read the rest

Exorcising Demons

“It’s only a game!” she pleaded.

Mmmhmm. And Herman Cain was merely a harmless flirt. Eyegal was responding to the sight of me, head in hands, my team up 24-7 at halftime in this year’s Iron Bowl. You know, that annual “intrastate scrimmage” between Alabama and Auburn.

In any other universe, 24-7 at the break is reason enough for a trip to the fridge to fetch the wings and that gourmet beer you’ve been saving for a special occasion. But my stomach was churning too violently to enjoy food and drink. I wasn’t quite “Tebowing,” but almost. If 2010 had taught Crimson Tide fans anything it was that a 17 point halftime lead was never enough.… Read the rest

Pork-tentious Signs

Asheville, North Carolina and Seattle are on opposite sides of the country, but they share an unusual passion worthy of mention, even praise–pig statuary.

It was about this time last year that I spotted a memorial to an Unknown Pig in downtown Asheville on my way to the Duke v. Alabama game. That encounter launched a bacony reverie that stirred up enough favorable ju-ju for a stunning, 4th quarter come-from-behind victory for the Tide over the the Arkansas Razorbacks in Fayetteville the next week.

This year, same song, different sow. Her name is Rachel, and she’s a 550 lbs bronzed beauty of a piggy bank who serves as a mascot for the iconic Pike Place Market in downtown Seattle.… Read the rest

I Am Dr. Michael Brown, Optometrist; I Am Not @plutokiller

My name is Dr. Michael Brown, aka “Mike the Eyeguy,” and I’m an optometrist who has always loved Disney characters and small, remote planets.

I would never kill Pluto. I may be more of a Goofy Man myself, but I have no interest in dissing  Mickey Mouse’s lesser-known pet pooch. Nor have I supported demoting poor little Pluto from the status of noble, outermost outpost planet, guarding the far boundaries of our Solar System from alien invasion, to a mere member among many in the Kuiper belt, a rather shady band of steroid-enhanced asteroids and dwarf planets.

And I think I can speak for the other three Dr.… Read the rest

It’s Not Easy Being Green and Gold

The State of Alabama is not exactly known for being “libruhl.” I truly hope you were sitting down for that one.

John McCain got over 60% of the vote in the 2008 presidential election. There’s a Baptist church on three corners of every intersection and a Church of Christ on the other. Not only do we try to make buying wine difficult–especially on Sundays–we even outlaw artfully and tastefully portrayed nudity on our wine labels (There will be no joy on Sundays in this state!).

Environmentalism? Does picking up that Pabst Blue Ribbon bottle that somebody threw out at the end of your driveway and tossing it in the recycling bin count?… Read the rest

Like Wool

“Come now, let us reason together,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they are as red as crimson, they shall be like wool.”

–Isaiah 1:18

I am sending out this dispatch from Ground Zero of The End of Days, Huntsville, Alabama.

Although I have yet to whip out the measuring stick, there appears to be about 8 inches of snow on my patio. To top it all, tonight Auburn plays for the national championship in college football. It appears the Mayans were almost right, just off by a year.

We are warm and toasty.… Read the rest

If God Is An Auburn Tiger–I Quit

God is always on the side of the big battalions.

–Voltaire

A friend reminded me of this quote recently as we “tweeted” about the idea that God might actually “take sides” in a football game. Or for that matter, any of the myriad of contests, skirmishes, wars, etc. which we deem so important.

I’ve written on the relationship between college football and religion many times before, most recently here. The key to understanding that last post is that it was intended as pure, 100%, unadulterated parody, designed to poke fun at the very idea that God is a Crimson Tide fan or that God and football mix together in any sort of significant way.… Read the rest

Count Your Blessings

“Name them one by one,”  the song says. So here goes:

1. I’m running, not far or fast, but pain-free for the first time in quite a while. I’ve shifted my foot strike from my heel, which is where it’s been since fourth grade, to my forefoot. “Barefooting” as it’s sometimes called. I don’t exactly run barefoot on asphalt (ouch!), but I do use a “minimalist” training shoe, the Nike Free. This is supposed to be more “natural,” the way you were meant to run back in the day when your survival meant eluding a predator such as a saber-toothed tiger or that annoying herd of mastodons that lived over in the next valley.… Read the rest

On This Night, No “Rammer Jammer”

In the end, there was no “Rammer Jammer,” only a circle of prayer.

Such was the scene at the fifty yard line in the middle of the field of battle surrounded by the towering expanse of Bryant Denny, the Temple of All Things Tide. Crimson clad warriors kneeling with maroon and white gladiators, shoulder-to-shoulder, gloved hand-in-gloved hand, pausing to grieve over and remember one of their own who had fallen, a victim caught up and devoured in the cruel maw of contingency and circumstance.

If there was one thing that world of college football needed after the 24/7 melodrama of Cecil and Cam Newton it was perspective.… Read the rest

My Villa Appalaccia

The Purveyor eyed me warily as I walked into his shop, located on a charming, picturesque side street just off of Main in historic downtown Lexington, Virginia. I apparently didn’t strike him as fellow traveler on the wine tasting circuit. Perhaps his nose was finely attuned to sniffing out “Who’s Who” in the world of high-brow alcoholic beverages.

Maybe he simply smelled the moonshine in my blood.

“So, which of the Villa Appalaccia wines do you like best?” I asked him. Eyegal and I had veered off the beaten path coming up from Alabama for my 30th high school reunion and driven down to Meadows of Dan.… Read the rest

I Dream of Sausage (and BACON!!)

All day long I dream of sausage (and BACON!!). I just can’t help it.

It started last Friday on the drive from Huntsville to Durham, North Carolina where we witnessed a Man (as in Saban)-made disaster: a towering tsunami sweeping over and flooding the horseshoe-shaped bowl of Wallace Wade Stadium, turning it into a mini-Bryant Denny for a day and coloring it all houndstooth and crimson.

I should have been focusing on the game at hand, but I couldn’t avoid looking ahead after I spied those bronze memorials of a mama pig and her little piglets in the plaza in downtown Asheville.… Read the rest

Crazy and Crimson on 9/11/10

I was finishing up my charting on the last patient of the day last Friday afternoon when DU, a friend from Harding and a longtime blog reader and commenter, left me a message: “Eyeguy, call me when you have a minute. Thanks. RTR!”

DU is a Bama man, born and bred, and I could tell by the excitement in his voice that college football fever was eating up his bones. I’m a relative late-comer to the party, but after reading Warren St. John’s Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer, the fundamentalist bible of fanatical Bama fandom, a few years ago, I repented of my childhood allegiances to Virginia Tech and Notre Dame and was washed beneath the Crimson Flood.… Read the rest

Good Geezer, Bad Geezer

I’ve been thinking a lot this week about my impending geezerhood.

Actually, I think a lot about it every week since the majority of my patients are on the far side of fifty and serve as a “sneak preview” of the doctor visits, pills, surgeries and saggy body parts which are waiting for me just up the road around the next bend–if I’m lucky. Each day I stare mortality in the face, and it stares right back at me, sticks out its tongue, and proceeds to regal me with stories of blurry vision, “itchy-burny” eyes and prostrate problems.

Yes, apparently spending inordinate amounts of time stretched out with one’s face to the ground in the universal posture of adoration or submission is something that all of us guys have to look forward to.… Read the rest

I Watch Football AND Support the Arts

It’s a very busy day in the Deep South as the OMG! beautiful weather and the opening weekend of college football clash like two high pressure systems and create the perfect storm of God-given delight.

And while I’m sporting the new Nike Pro-Game Day La-Z-Boy Bama uni and fixin’ to head out for some eats and Crimson Tide football at a local culinary establishment, I’ve still managed to to hang out with some fellow wannabe writer types over at Elizabeth Esther’s uber-cool Saturday Evening Blog Post.

Maybe you should, too. After the games are over. Roll Tide.… Read the rest