the thin line between optimism and delusion…

Football season  is exhilarating.  Yesterday my mom and I bought all the red solo cups and plates that target had to offer in anticipation of the tailgating.  We reasoned that by the time we actually need the cups and plates, they will all be gone and we will be left with yellow and blue solo cups and plates.  This is unacceptable.  Christy told me the other day that I was an over the top individual, and that this was my most attractive quality.  If this is the case, then I must be damn attractive during football season. 

Things I love about football weekend

1.  Worrying about what I am going to wear.  I spend all year looking for clothes I MIGHT want to wear to Georgia games, and all clothing that MIGHT be acceptable must be bought, even if it is January and deep down I know I’m going to want something different in August.  But when I find the perfect piece, it gets worn for years. 

2.  Spending  hours in deep thought about the logistics of the stadium, where I’ll be sitting, where my parents will be sitting, where my friends will be sitting, where the tailgates I must visit are in relation to where I’ll be sitting, which gate is the best one for me to enter, how early I need to enter the game, etc. 

3.  Eating dinner at the Last Resort EVERY friday night before a home football game.  This involves getting to the Resort around 6:30 on Friday night and sitting at the bar for two hours while waiting for a table.  This is fun because the whole state of Georgia has recently descended on the town and the first stop for 45% of them is the Resort.  While waiting, I have a hard time not getting a little drunk, and THEN I’m required to get the filet so the room will stop spinning, which leaves me very full and makes me tired, and then I have to rally because going to bed at 11 pm friday night during football season is unacceptable. 

4.  When I mentioned that sitting at the bar leaves me a little drunk, I want to stress how much this is not my fault.  Especially the first couple of games.  Now that all my friends from college are in the real world making money and not living in Athens, they sit around in their offices and dream and dream about football season and save their money for football weekends.  When football season actually gets here, they are so pumped about being back in athens and seeing everyone that they haven’t seen in years they feel that they MUST buy you a drink and you WILL drink it.  The good time feelings that go along with game weekend leaves everyone feeling generous and benevolent.  It is awesome – everyone in the bar is your best friend, and the bar is just a big party of old friends whose sentimental feelings about East West and North Campus overpower their senses and make them drunker than the miller light and jaeger ever could.  (this phenomenon wears off mid season – but while it lasts it is to be reveled in). 

5.  My parents stay at the same hotel every weekend, and it is the university hotel – which operates a little differently than other hotels.  For instance, my parents are always in the same room.  Even if they stay there in the spring time, they are still in the same room.  And apparently this is the way the hotel works, because my parent’s room is down the hall from Uga’s room.  So sometimes, if we are lucky, we get to ride down the elevator with Uga before the game.

6.  Kick-off.  GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO DAAAAAAWWWWWGGGSS!!  Sic Em – Woof, Woof, Woof, Woof. 

7.  My precious little flask.  He is so cute and little (just enough for one drink at the game, for the atmosphere, not to get wasted – anyway, I like beer when I’m tailgating), and awesome.  I bought him in Italy, and he only holds bourbon.  He used to hold Jim Beam, but my mom told me that I was too old to drink rot gut liquor, and that she would give me ten extra dollars for me to buy Makers Mark, so now he only holds Makers.  I just found my bottle of Makers at my apartment the other day – my flask is so little it lasts for a long time. 

8.  Sarah Salter and all my albany friends.  My amazing friend Say-Rah comes into town for all the football games, rain or shine, and I love seeing her.  She always has the cutest clothes and fun jewelry, and I love her sweetheart Wes, and all his crazy friends.  Some of my happiest memories of all time are of sitting on the toolbox in the bed of Clint’s truck in the KA parking lot, after a victorious football game, drinking a cold miller light and listening loud music as dusk takes over Athens and ends a perfect day and leaves me grinning in the dark as Wes tries to make Sarah dance with him.  I want for nothing at such times. 

9. Waking up on Saturday morning, feeling like I didn’t get enough sleep, and that I didn’t need that last beer friday night, but laying in the bed and yelling – GAME DAY!!!!!  GAME DAY!!!!  WOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOO!  (This tradition was started by Maggie and Lauren when we lived in the dorm and were woken up by our dates to the game calling to tell us that they just finished cleaning up the house from the band party and that they were going back to russell to take a shower and that we better be ready in 45 minutes). 

10.  The moment when the trumpet solo starts with that long note and the whole city goes silent and collectively catches it breath in the fall sunshine and my eyes fill up with tears and as I exhale into my $4 bourbon and coke the entire band joins the trumpeter into the Battle Hymn of the Republic / Glory, Glory to Ol’ Georgia  (which is the song sung at all real bulldog’s funerals and weddings), the greatest song in the WORLD.