Recap of the Weekend: Stressful first quarters and Bruce Springsteen., two things I can live without.

Well, folks, life is returning to normal here in NYC. The subways are running and power is back on in most of the city. Sandy's impact was felt by millions of people, some more than others, across the Tri-State area. I must say that I applaud the efforts of Mayor Bloomberg, Governor Cuomo and Governor Christie during this week. For an area that was as unprepared for a hurricane as Georgia is for a blizzard, they did a wonderful job. New Yorkers and New Jersey folks are resilient people. The press has reported the recovery and cleanup pretty much 24/7 and the above mentioned men have held press conferences to keep us up to date. During one press conference with Governor Christie, a female reporter posed the question, "Governor, Bruce Springsteen says that he is very impressed with your efforts here and he thinks you have done a fantastic job helping New Jersey get back on its feet. How do you feel about that?" Governor Christie handled it well, made a joke about it, and moved on quickly. I'll sum up his comments, non-PC style:

"Ummmmmm, cool? Good GOD, woman! I couldn't care less what that liberal jackass thinks right now. The Atlantic City boardwalk is in the %^$^$ ocean!"

I thought it was a question posed in poor taste and it was yet another "sign of the apocalypse" in terms of moronic human behavior. Amidst the utter destruction that is the Jersey Shore, we still care about the thoughts and opinions of millionaires who live in another reality. I know Springsteen is from Jersey, but my goodness. Let's call Kim Kardashian and discuss the reopening of the subway. Get Angelina on the horn, I'd like to know her opinion about when New Jersey Transit should go back fulltime. Better yet, get Snooki, I'm sure she has some really intelligent thoughts on the engineering specifications of the new dikes that will need to be constructed after the flooding. Ugh. I'm going to stop talking now before I put my head through a window.

On a lighter note, the Rebels of Ole Miss rolled into Sanford this weekend, looking to extend their SEC win streak to 3 games. A couple of weeks ago, I opined that Ole Miss would give us a hard time and we would vastly underperform. After watching the first half, my summation appeared to be correct. Then, as if some awesomely incandescent light bulb came on, our offense went on the warpath and destroyed Ole Miss. Jekyll and Hyde University, that is the best description of the team this season. We bullrushed #2 Florida into 6 turnovers, made them look pedestrian, and ruined their season. We come out against Ole Miss, whose lone SEC victories include Auburn and Arkansas, and make them look like contenders for a half. I just don't get us sometimes, but I will take a 27-point win  any day of the week.

We kick off and Ole Miss does not attempt a return, even though Blake Sailors was the only UGA player in the screen when the returner caught the ball. "Awesome, they are scared," I thought. Three plays later they are on our 25 yard line, courtesy of blown coverage. So much for them being scared. Their quarterback, Bo Wallace, is a tough cookie. I think he has transferred about 47 times but he seems to have found a home in Oxford. No, really. This guy went to Arkansas State and East Mississippi Community College before joining the Rebellion. I think there may have been a stop at Devry in there somewhere too. Anyhow, he threads the needle on a long pass and they end up with a field goal. Not the beginning I was looking for, but I was glad to hold them to three.

**Side note: I watched the Florida-Missouri.....game? It was as entertaining as watching gravel in my old driveway. I could not help but notice the empty seats in the Swamp. I guess they were too busy repainting their red wood decks to show up. Florida did its best to give Missouri the game and just completely bury themselves. Too bad for Missouri that James Franklin is absolutely terrible. Seriously, that guy could not hit a double wide if he was an F5 tornado.

We get the ball and instantly go into what I like to call "Georgia Tech" mode. That's when you suck beyond belief, can do nothing right, and cause even the hardest of diehards to question why they watch the game. Murray is sacked twice and we go three and out. The defensive end from Ole Miss abuses John Theus with aplomb and Dallas Lee does his best "Ole!!!!!" impression and Murray pops up with that damn "deer in the headlights" look. Three and out. Throwing into double coverage. False starts. It looked like an 8 and under game, I fully expected to see Kenarious Gates drawing pictures in the grass with his cleats and ask to go to the bathroom in the middle of a play. Ole Miss gets the ball and scores a touchdown on a tackle-eligible trick play to make it 10-0. The CBS announcers start with the "uh oh" talk and they show Hugh Freeze on the sidelines going nuts. I calmly walk to my bar in the apartment, pour a glass of Johnnie Walker, and stew on my couch. The Pourhouse has no power, we are losing 10-0 and I see a bunch of Florida chatter on Facebook..."Go Rebs," "Dawgs goin down," and "Over-rated!" I logged on to Delta.com to analyze whether I could fly down to Athens and get there before the game ended. I was going to re-enact a scene I saw after we lost to LSU in 2009. A drunken fan, in his anger, confronted Mike Bobo walking out of the press box and said, "why can't we just f***** beat somebody?!?" He repeated himself over and over. Bobo screamed obscenities at the man and he was removed from the stadium by police. I honestly had the same question. I was prepared to ask it after the first quarter yesterday.

The second quarter saw one of the craziest minutes of football I have ever witnessed. In a scene reminiscent of "The Longest Yard," there were four turnovers in six plays. Keith Marshall fumbles and gives it to Ole Miss in our territory. Two plays later, Ole Miss fumbles and Damian Swann runs it back to their 30. Two plays later, Todd Gurley fumbles and Ole Miss recovers. Then, Bo Wallace throws a 50 yard bomb, unfortunately for him, his receiver was 60 yards downfield and Alec Ogletree intercepts. Despite this video game action, we manage two touchdowns in the quarter to take the lead.  Murray does his best David Greene, hides the ball on a fake handoff and finds a wide open Marlon Brown for six. Then, before the half, he hits Tavares King on a forty yarder that gives us a 14-10 lead. You feel the tide turning and the Rebs seemed spent going into the locker room.  Although I felt better, the lack of urgency from the team really disturbed me. These "coming out flat" games are getting old.

Well, if the first half was flat, then the second half was a beach ball inflated to the size of Pine Log, Georgia. Murray absolutely roasted their secondary. 384 yards and it could have been more if Richt had not backed off in the fourth quarter. Malcolm Mitchell scored on a pass with about 12 minutes to go in the 3rd quarter and you could watch Ole Miss literally start packing up on the sideline. By the time the quarter ended, Ole Miss was already in Cullman, Alabama in their minds. The defense clamped down hard and Wallace ran for his life. The little screen plays that worked in the first half were snuffed out. Alec Ogletree was all over the field. He had 11 tackles and caused a safety with about a minute to go in the 3rd. Jarvis was his usual disruptive self. Damian Swann gets better each week, that guy just seems to be in the right spot all the time. Ole Miss's defense, on the other hand, was the opposite of clamped down. They were a leaky O-ring that burst and their proverbial septic tank filled their backyard, the backhoe operator called in sick and they were downwind all weekend. Zander Ogletree, Alec's twin brother, scored his first career touchdown. He has filled in for Merrit Hall nicely. Rantavious Wooten, in a moment of clarity, actually caught a pass for a touchdown. Wooten has been synonymous with dropped passes. In fact, there are only a few things I am more sure of than a Wooten drop during a UGA game:

1) Keith Richards is going to light a cigarette one day and just disappear in a cloud of smoke and methadone resin. (this also applies to Ozzy Osborne, Dickie Betts and possibly Gregg Allman)

2) Jay Cutler will frown when his kid is born and say, "Damn, took you long enough."

3) The Falcons will lose a game and everybody will fall off the bandwagon so hard that Jim Cantore will show up in Atlanta to report the earthquake.

4) I WILL NOT watch Honey Boo Boo.

5) Georgia Tech will listen to "Call Me Maybe" and have a towel fight in the shower after practice this week.

In any event, we did extremely well in the second half and any Dawg fan would have to feel optimistic about our chances to return to Atlanta. We just have to get through Auburn, who is limping through a terrible season and will likely lose 137-0 to Alabama in a few weeks. Gene Chizik was actually seen scoping properties in Charlotte so he can be closer to Cam and ride his coattails some more. Cam is having a tough time these days, so riding his coattails might be harder with people like Patrick Willis battering him into submission every week. It warms the heart, it really does.

So, we move on to the Plains soon. We will be without Marlon Brown, who tore his ACL, thereby ending his UGA career. Thanks for the memories, Marlon. Personally, I hope we slap a giant nail in the coffin of the Auburn Tigers. I don't want Richt to let up. I don't want the game to get out of hand, I want it to get of the the stratosphere. They will be upset minded but if we come out clicking on all cylinders, I expect a beatdown. Plenty of recruits will be there and they need to see that Auburn is nothing more than Clemson with a lake and a fight song they stole from us. Go Dawgs!

Other highlights:

1) I attended the first professional sports event in Brooklyn, NY since the Dodgers left. It's not often you get to be part of history, but I was. I guess this is how Auburn feels right now, they are making history for so many people right now.

2) Alabama/LSU was the bloodbath that everyone expected. McCarron showed real poise in leading the Tide down the field in 1:30 to win the game in the most hostile stadium in college football. I always enjoy when the TV cameras pan the crowd in Baton Rouge, I swear I saw one guy eating a truck tire.

3) Kansas State and Oregon have an outside shot to play for the national championship. Could you imagine? "Let's go boys, dozens of people are ready to watch the game." (+1 for League of Their Own reference) Let's hope for the sake of fans everywhere that this does not happen. That would be like a World Series between Toronto and Cleveland, people would purposefully have to do laundry every night just so they wouldn't have to watch it.

Recap of the Weekend: Full expectations, hurricanes, tornadoes and Dawgs back in the saddle.

I suppose y'all are aware of the current weather situation we are facing here in NYC. Fear not, my fellow Georgians. After dealing with 6,743 tornadoes, a blizzard, hurricanes coming out of the Gulf and people from Cassville/Adairsville/Pine Log all my life, I'm basically prepared for anything. I have canned goods, water, flashlights, candles, charged Ipads with 11,298 songs and two bottles of Gentleman Jack. In fact, I've already been singing tributes to our fair maiden approaching from the South, as her winds pick up on my street.

"Sandy, you're a fine girl, what a good wife you would be"

"Sandy, Sandy...when will those clouds disappear?"

"Sandy, what you gonna do, I think I could stay with you"

I always felt like tornadoes were much worse, to be honest. They are much more unpredictable and their power, while short-lived, is concentrated insanity. In the South, tornadoes are part of life. Every March and April, you have to watch the skies. If you recorded movies off the television in the 90's, I guarantee that at least half of them had a tornado warning running across the bottom of the screen. I'll never forget listening to the radio during power outages, usually 102.3 out of Rome:

"Alright y'all, we got us a report of a touchdown in the Chulio Road area, everybody down yonder needs to take cover."

We knew that it was time to go into hiding. That area was directly in line with Cassville and the whole family would pile up in a closet and hope it wasn't our turn. Honestly, that is all you can do. We did it so many times in the 90's that it became like clockwork. I would trot down the hall, "walking the mile, walking the mile." (+1 for Green Mile reference) Tornadoes get shortchanged in terms of weather notoriety, though. Why? They don't have names. Every hurricane and tropical storm gets a handle. In fact, there have been people who have complained that the names of these storms are not ethnic enough. Seriously, google it. If you have time to bitch about the racial indifference of the names of a large collection of cumulonimbus clouds in the Atlantic Ocean, then you need a hobby or need to get hit over the head by a tack hammer, because you are a moron. (+1 for Tommy Boy reference) I started naming tornadoes in 1994. No longer would I stand by and allow this injustice to permeate Southern culture. Of course, I keep them Cassville-centric in name and nature.

"You think that tornado was bad? Y'all should have seen Shane in June or Chastity in May, them storms were rough, y'all. I swear, when Dwayne blew through here last August, I thought for sure we would be getting a new deck."

I am going to ride this storm out in style. However, I know Sandy is serious for one reason, and one reason only.....Jim Cantore is here. He reported from Battery Park last night and I swear I saw drool coming out of his mouth when he described the possible damage she is going to do. Jim Cantore is the homing beacon of bad weather and when he comes to your hometown, you know bad things are about to happen. He was in Georgia last April when the tornadoes decimated parts of Bartow County. He was in Alabama. He was in New Orleans. When the Apocalypse comes, Jim Cantore will be there, telling Satan to get out of his shot of the rivers running red and the frogs raining down from the sky. 

Speaking of hurricanes, Category 5 Hurricane Jarvis blew into Jacksonville, Florida last Saturday with a vengeance. He laid waste to the Florida Gators, causing havoc and mayhem, doing damage and left the landscape completely flattened in a three hour assault of epic proportions. This storm was completely unexpected by the white trash Gainesville natives and their double wides floated down the St. John's River, along with their perfect season, their dignity, half of Jeff Driskel's brain cells, and Will Muschamp's medulla oblongata, which fell out after six post game aneurysms. Few wins have been more enjoyable. Few times have I wished harm upon opposing players more than on Saturday. Luckily, our boys obliged my bloodthirst and came at Florida unlike I had ever seen before, at least defensively.

We set the tone early, when Kosta "The Greek Streak II" Vavlas waylaid their kickoff return man on the first play. You could tell we were fired up. Florida instantly got a false start penalty, had a bad snap and went three and out. We get the ball and march right down their throats and score on a great run by Gurley. I thought to myself, "could we actually do this?" Then I remembered all the big games we had lost in the last four years and tempered myself. I remembered the beating we took from Bama in 2008. The 6-7 2010 season. Getting killed by LSU in the SEC Championship after leading at the half. We are preordained to lose this one. As Florida marched right down the field, my suspicions got confirmed with each first down. Driskel, while erratic, was doing pretty well against us and I thought, "here we go again." We force a fourth and one, however, on our 21 yard line. The Gators line up to go for it and you can tell this is one of those plays that can define a game. I just knew they would bust a 10 yarder and break our backs right there....

Shawn Williams. That name will ring forever if this season turns out to be a great one. He took the reigns earlier this week and called the defense out for being "soft." In a public interview, he lambasted our own people, some by name and others were implied. He even threw a verbal jab at the coaches for playing the wrong people. He is a senior from Damascus, Georgia with nothing to lose, so why not? Nothing he said was false. Nothing he said was embellished. All you had to do was look at our performance against Carolina and Kentucky to verify it. Well, apparently Shawn Williams struck a nerve. A big one. Not just with the entire defense, but with himself as well. On the fourth and one, Florida sweeps to the left and pitches to a receiver entrusted with the ball to get that one yard. As the play develops, you could see his hole. "Oh damn, he's going to get exactly one yard and keep this drive alive," I thought. The blockers were in place and he was headed to the marker. Suddenly, Shawn Williams shucks his blocker and darts right up to their receiver, grabs him around the neck and tackles him so violently that the Florida trainers spent the next five minutes wrapping his ribs in dressing, apparently some of them were broken. He was one inch short. He was also out for the game and another Florida lineman limped off the field on the same play. I watched the kids from the same dirt roads that I grew up on...kids from Damascus, Columbus, Keysville, Donalsonville, and Valdosta running off the field, telling Florida, "this ain't the 90's anymore." (I just got a chill typing this) Will Muschamp had a mini stroke on the sidelines and they looked panicked. Ripe for the picking.

Aaron Murray tried his best to give the game away in the first half. The defense was killing Florida, absolutely bullying them into early submission. They could do nothing. Luckily for them, #11 was playing another one of his "deer in the headlights" games and keeping them alive. Three interceptions in the first half. All terrible throws, all markers of Murray choking to death in the spotlight once again. He was 0-6 against top ten teams going into Saturday and this day was looking no different. The pass to Jay Rome was into triple coverage. The pass to Wooten was thrown 100 mph behind him. The other pass to Brown was so far over his head that the Marines launched a Harrier Jet and flew over the Stadium to assess any threats to public safety. Thank God for Todd Gurley and the offensive line, who played amazingly all night. The fact this game was even close is ALL on Murray and some ill-timed drops by the receivers. I fully expected Shawn Williams to walk up to Aaron, bite his head off ala Ozzy Osbourne, and tell Hutson Mason to go in. 

Despite the colossal failures of Murray, we still led. Driskel was getting pounded. They fumbled time and time again. Their offensive line was mauled by our defense. Rambo and Swann had huge interceptions. We had some serious fire tonight. Devin Bowman got called for a stupid personal foul and was met on the sidelines by Todd Grantham. I have rarely seen an ass chewing more animated, more frightening and more motivational than that one. Although I have questioned Richt's fire, I have never questioned Grantham's. In fact, the pregame brouhaha that CBS reported before kickoff? Grantham was going after their strength coach. I love that man. The players love him too because they know he will back them up, regardless of anything. Every challenge issued by Florida was met with force. Guys were making plays all over the field. Branden Smith, Garrison Smith and Mike Gilliard all had great performances. Jenkins and Geathers swallowed the middle whole and their rinky dink Wildcat plays were useless. Herrera and Jones teed off on Gillislee. Jordan Reed was the only Gator who was hurting us. He just kept making big catches.

In the fourth quarter, leading 10-9, I assessed the possibility of victory. Neither offense could get out of their own way. Our defense was much better than theirs. Their kicker was better than ours though. I felt sick. 12-10 Gators would just suck beyond all belief. Marshall Morgan is about as dependable as a fence built out of pool noodles. He did make one, but missed an easy one late in the game. I fully expected Shawn Williams to bitehis head off, bury him in a swamp in Kingsland, Georgia after the game and tell Jamie Lindley to kick for the rest of the season. Fortunately for us, Murray stopped making mistakes. He did not take over the game but he stopped killing us. 150 yards passing is not blowing anybody's skirt up. With 8:30 to go, Murray starts finding open men. To his defense, King, Brown and Lynch had big drops earlier. King especially was bad, he was WIDE OPEN on a third down and just flat dropped it and forced a punt. Malcom Mitchell made a catch on Purifoy, Florida's best and most talkative cover man. It was Purifoy that conned Bowman into his stupid penalty. Once again, he gets one of our guys to get emotional and the flag comes out. Mitchell costs us 15 yards and negates his gain on the play. I thought Shawn Williams was going to bite his head off, quarter him and send him to the four corners of Georgia as a warning to others. (+1 for Braveheart reference)

With 7:11 to go, Murray takes the snap and drops back and finds Mitchell, fresh off his ass chewing from Richt and Williams, who catches the ball. He spins out of Purifoy's grasp and sprints down the sideline. The Florida secondary closes the angles but Malcolm cuts to the middle, breaks two tackles, and finds the end zone for the game's second touchdown. It was one of the best plays of the season. The game is not over, but we were feeling pretty good. By "we" I mean the wonderful people I watched the game with, my family and friends from Cartersville, Georgia. I made an improptu trip to Cassville and got to watch the game with them. These are the people with who I have enjoyed the good times and suffered through the bad in terms of Georgia football. It was a celebration on Burnt Hickory Road. There was talk of jumping in a nearby creek. I volunteered to lead the way...I miss creeks.

Anyhow, Florida gets the ball with us leading 17-9. They are just simply inept with the ball. Driskel is feeling the pounding he had taken all game. Jarvis Jones had been all over him. Cornelius Washington, Alec Ogletree, Christian Robinson and the linebacking corps really closed the middle of the field. On this drive, they are gaining yards and getting too close. Gillislee finally gets a decent run. Driskel picks up a first down on a run that was slower developing than Auburn's math department. They creep into our territory and my nerves are frayed. Please God, no overtime. They pan into the stands and show the Florida "faithful" chomping away. I use "faithful" in quotes because they absolutely disappear when things go wrong for the Gators. No fanbase has a more selective memory than Florida. No fanbase backs out quicker than Florida. (except for the alumni, the Florida alums I know are very respectable people and diehards) When Jordan Reed catches the pass on the twelve and breaks the tackle, I just cringe. He is on the three and inexplicably jumps toward the end zone, as he flies through the air, Jarvis Jones tomahawks the ball right out of his hands and he fumbles into the end zone. Sanders Commings falls on the ball. The deal is sealed. One more perfect season goes own the tubes and it's not us circling the drain for a change.Gurley fittingly closed Florida out with a 16 yard run, dragging three tacklers and setting our bench off into a frenzy. 

So, here we are. We won a big game. I'm ecstatic over this victory and I'm eating crow right now with a side of hot sauce, It does not change my feelings about Richt completely, but apparently we CAN come alive and we CAN beat somebody worth beating. Will this lead to anything? Who knows? We must handle business against Ole Miss and Auburn in order to get back to Atlanta. This will take sustained intensity, which we have not been able to muster in awhile. I fully expect us to be in Atlanta, however. As a diehard, I cannot be any other way. I also fully expect to see Alabama there, so we MUST be at our best or it will be ugly. If we somehow get to Atlanta and pull off the impossible, I fully expect Shawn Williams to get the game ball regardless of anything or anyone. Take solace, though, Mr. Williams, because no matter what happens, I'm naming my next tornado after you. Go Dawgs!

You can't run with the Big Dawg, he's under the porch with the fleas.

Normally, when the Dawgs are off for a weekend, I peruse the Dawgvent and discuss the upcoming games and what our chances are going forward. The Vent is usually rife with diehards like me, talking recruiting, injuries, who needs the week off to recover and where to tailgate at the next away game. Other SEC games are watched and picked apart: "We could run the ball on Florida," "LSU's offense is suspect," or "Auburn is downright terrible or Ole Miss will be harder to handle than we thought." Thread after thread, anticipating the next game....asking the "what ifs" and everybody going to Stubhub and Ticketmaster to preemptively check SEC Championship ticket prices.

That did not happen this weekend. In fact, I never logged on to the Dawgvent on Saturday, nor did I watch a second of the LSU/Carolina game. I watched a few plays of the Ole Miss/Auburn game to cheer on my brother's alma mater and luckily, they were able to pull it out. Oh great, I thought, another game where we will probably struggle. The Dawgs play Ole Miss this year at home. A game that was a clear victory two weeks ago is no more. They have a mobile quarterback and quick little running back that can take it to the house at any point. They "dink and dunk" you to death.....a concept that our defense cannot seem to grasp. I'm betting money that Ole Miss gives us pure hell in Athens and the game will be another in a long line of frustrating underperformances.

Think back to West Virginia in 2005. Total disaster. Remember Mississippi State in 2009? Tennessee and Carolina in 2007? Alabama in 2008. Vandy. Kentucky. Central Florida. The god-awful loss to Tech at home in 2008. Hell, I remember one year, we beat UAB 13-10 on a late field goal at home and Middle Tennessee State was in doubt until the fourth quarter. Troy stayed right with us at home in 2007. On several occasions, I have walked out of Sanford after a win and it felt LIKE WE LOST. We get people on the ropes, pull back and let them right back in the game. This has become one of our calling cards. Our other calling card is even worse....hit us in the mouth early and we fold up like a cheap tent. Since 2005, we truthfully have had ONE season worth talking about. Anyone who refutes this is living in a dream world, works for the University or recently received a lobotomy.

Being the diehard football junkie I am, I did some research though. I know we are all quick to blame the coaches. History and statistics show that we are not totally off base on that stance. Think about Alabama in 2003-2007, buried by probation and a severe lack of talent on the field and on the coaching staff. They were awful. We crushed them in Athens in 2003, they were painfully inept and Thomas Davis almost killed Spencer Pennington that day. Nobody in their right mind would predict they would have two more national titles in 2012. Mal Moore went out and got the right man for the job and everything changed. Urban Meyer at Florida, same story. Les Miles at LSU. Sleeping giants were awakened at those schools and our giant...well....he's hit the snooze button about 25 times in the last eight years.

I examined our recruiting numbers since 2004. While doing this, I uncovered some extremely disturbing trends, foolhardy decisions, and just downright negligence on the part of our coaching staff. However, I also figured out that many players washed out on their own and no amount of coaching could have saved them. The number of players who were non-contributors over the last seven years is astounding. You do not have to wonder when and where we have gone wrong....it's like Billy told me in Cassville once, "if you can't see that, you're blinder than a bat in a coal mine." Want glaring statistic?

From 2005-2008, we had 18 offensive linemen commit. Of those 18, four of them never played a snap. One of those four was our ONLY offensive line commitment of 2005. Of the remaining fourteen, Ben Harden and Kevin Perez never saw the field other than mop up duty against Western Oklahoma Tech. AJ Harmon and Tanner Strickland transferred and retired from football, respectively. Trinton Sturdivant tore his ACL twice. Scott Haverkamp transferred back to Kansas after one year. Kiante Tripp switched to defense. That leaves seven offensive lineman for four years of recruiting that actually stayed and finished their careers at UGA: Ben Jones (success), Chris Davis (serviceable), Josh Davis (project who only caught on in his senior year), Clint Boling (success), Cordy Glenn (success), Vince Vance (a JUCO transfer who only played two years) and Justin Anderson (started but never lived up to the hype out of HS). Ouch.

Want another one?

Since 2004, we have had FORTY-ONE players leave, transfer, head to JUCO and flunk out, get dismissed or get thrown completely out of school. Many of these guys never saw the field once. I am not counting the O-linemen above, nor am I counting the guys who quit due to injury. (i.e. Bryce Ros, Quintin Banks, Antavious Coates) That's more people than Tech has fans. That's higher than an Auburn fan can count. Forty-one people who smoked, drank, rear-ended & license-suspended, punched, kicked and clawed their way right out of school. Suddenly, the slide of our program is not so far-fetched, is it? We are recruiting morons with no discipline, fools who cannot spell "shotgun" and idiots who cannot get out of their own way. While our fanbase points fingers and laughs at other programs, maybe we should look in the damn mirror. Or maybe they hide it better? Who knows? The numbers do not lie.

"The SEC is a line of scrimmage league," says Will Muschamp, the head coach of the Florida Gators. While I hate to agree with a vile traitor like Muschamp, a UGA alumnus who disparaged his alma mater when he took the Florida job, I must acknowledge the accuracy of that statement. Looking at these numbers, we are coming to the line of scrimmage completely shorthanded. It's a wonder we have won half of the games we played. Where we are not shorthanded, we have underachievers with no coaching. Remember Brandon Miller? Reshad Jones? Probably not. They were five-star recruits who drastically underachieved in their UGA career. Miller, because he was out of position and Jones, because he was not coached and an undisciplined player who was good for 2-3 personal fouls a game. However, they were ALL we had. Their backups were packing their bags to move to Alabama State or suspended for a parking ticket on their moped.

Right now, we have a true freshman starting on the offensive line. He is doing well, but he could have used a year to grow up. Our center is playing his first meaningful snaps. Our left tackle has been moved at least twice in his career and he was abused by South Carolina. We couldn't sub anyone in for him because there was nobody to take his place. We already have one redshirt freshman offensive lineman that Coach Will Friend has basically cast aside as a bust. We started the year missing two All-Americans on defense who simply cannot behave themselves, their draft stock be damned. I guess smoking grass and partying is better than $2,000,000 a year in the NFL. Where we were supposed to be strong, we are not. When we were supposed to grow up, we regressed. When we had the spotlight, we caved and the men who recruited these players stand idly by, hoping for someone else to lose so we can climb back into the race. That is no way to run a winning program in this conference, where you cannot win on talent alone.

Face it Dawg fans, we have hit the wall of complacency like a runaway Mack truck. If you are happy with 9-3 and the Capital One Bowl, then more power to you. Our rivals will raid our state, take every good player we have and bomb us back to the 90's. I wrote a pointed, yet respectful letter to our Athletic Director last season regarding these feelings. His response was essentially "get behind Richt or jump off the ship." Newsflash: I am behind my school, not a person. If they cannot understand that and we remain on this path, it's going to be a long decade, y'all. We have already lost six players from the 2010 class and five from the 2011 class. I hope and pray we turn this around soon and we go back to our winning ways. Until then I say good luck to the Dawgs....

All 37 of them.

Recap of the Weekend: The loss of hope and generic tequila makes Bradley a dull boy

Nothing hurts worse than the loss of hope. Hope is the driving force that keeps us alive. Well, that and Nutella, but I digress. Hope carries us to new heights, hope restores us on bad days and hope makes life worth living, even when it may not be. Rarely have I experienced the complete loss of hope in my life, I am one of those that hangs on forever, til the bitter end....I'd be that last guy at Pickett's Charge saying "we got this!"

**Side note: I went to Gettysburg two years ago and walked the exact path of Pickett's Charge. 600 yards of open ground with no cover, outnumbered and outgunned. It's like driving a car made of balsa wood in the wrong direction down I-75 at rush hour. Robert E. Lee had an "Auburn" moment that day, I've surmised. Just an inordinate, inexplicable amount of stupidity.

I lost hope Saturday, completely and utterly. I have been disappointed before watching UGA losses. 2002 Florida. 2004 Tennessee. 2007 Tennessee. 2008 Bama. All of those games were heartbreaking, games you look back on and want to punch random inanimate objects. This Saturday's loss however, tops them all. My hope for UGA football climbed to the top of the Empire State Building and took a header into a garbage truck owned by some morally casual Italians named Sal and Tony. Then it was compacted in said garbage truck, shipped off to the landfill in New Jersey, where two homeless guys use it for a toilet. "Wow, that's a little extreme," you might think. Well, when you see an entire team quit on national television, I don't think there is any room for anything other than extreme.

I listened to all the talk. I believed we were ready.

"Win it for Bennett!"

"Statement game."

"Coming out party."

"Gurshall for Heisman."

"Spurrier has gout, he's out for the season."

The Pourhouse was excited. People were buzzing beforehand, excited that Florida won so our big showdown with them in three weeks would be epic. One for the ages. "I can't wait to see Muschamp's face when we whup their asses!" one guy remarked. "I'm glad we got Murray and not Mettenberger!" another replied. A confidence brimming over with the $1.00 Bud Light special and a week's worth of fluff from all the sportscasters predicting that UGA's offense would win the day. I could hear Longstreet telling the doomed soldiers of Pickett's Brigade:

"Gentlemen, tomorrow is our day. Disregard their superior numbers. Disregard your lack of footwear. Disregard the lack of cover. Disregard the grapeshot coming from their cannons. Just believe."

We kickoff and you can tell Williams-Brice is absolutely erupting. They get the ball and march it right down our throats. Five plays and two and a half minutes. Our All-American brownie eater, Bacarri Rambo, had an interception stolen right out of his hands on the second play. Our line provided zero push. Their quarterback, a Georgian named Connor Shaw, had a field day against our pathetic secondary. His pass to Bruce Ellington for the first score was so wide open that Shawn Williams might has well have been standing in Athens on that play. I say to myself, "Harumph. Inauspicious beginning. We will bounce back." A sneaking suspicion told me that we would not, though.

The only bouncing I saw was the ball off Kelcy Quarles's hand on Murray's second pass, right into the waiting hands of their linebacker. Murray had an awful night, one of the worst performances I have ever seen by a three year starter. He had that look from his freshman year again. When I saw that look, I knew we were done. It's the look I mentioned last week. It's the look I have seen at least 2-3 times a season since he took over as quarterback. It's the "holy $#@# we are losing" mouth opened stare that spells disaster. He didn't get much help from his supporting cast either. Wooten dropped the 75th pass of his career. Kenarious Gates got flat out abused by Jadeveon Clowney. This guy ran his mouth all week and backed it up. Kudos to him.....the chocolate chip Kudos that tasted so good. (c'mon 90's kids, you had a box of Kudos a week. I know I did) If we are giving Kudos to Clowney, then our O-line gets Kashi. A bowl of Kashi with no milk. Kashi is a disgusting, organic concoction  that has an aftertaste like potting soil. (Believe me I know, I accidentally ate plenty of it at Cass Grocery hauling it around) Our line was physically manhandled all night. Carolina brought the heat and we wilted like a plastic bag in a campfire at Rock Creek in Blue Ridge.

Carolina scored again, quickly. Shaw found his tight end, once again, so open that he could have tweeted "I Luv My Momma #soufcrackalacky" and Moonwalked into the corner. He was also from the state of Georgia. It was 14-0 in about five minutes. Some angst reared its head in the Pourhouse. They showed the replay. Amarlo Herrera must have forgotten where he was or was worried about his Physics test on Monday, because he was about twelve steps slow on the play. Speaking of twelve steps, I think some people at the Pourhouse took their first of twelve on this night. One kid was drinking straight from the pitcher, talking about how much he was sick of Bobo, Richt, Obama, the elevator in his building, global warming, Al Gore and the price of cigarettes. I saw one group do three tequila shots a piece and then stare angrily at the bar. Usually, when Jose Cuervo introduces himself at a party, good things happen and the chances of dark secrets being made increases. Not tonight. It was angry drinking, with generic tequila and the only dark secret lingering this night was "just where on I-85 did our football get off the bus?"

We get the ball back and punt almost immediately. Bobo ran his patented "let's give us no chance to gain a first down" offense and Collin Barber came in to kick it away after about 17 seconds of offensive futility. The ball careened through the night sky into the arms of Ace Sanders. He drops it and picks it up and runs straight up the middle. A couple of walk-ons almost made the tackle and they would have, if they had been in the same zip code as Sanders. He dashed untouched for another score. Our horrendous special teams play continues and it is 21-0. The Carolina fanbase is beside themselves. ESPN is kicking themselves for picking up this debacle. UGA players are playing with themselves on the sideline and the coaching staff is standing by themselves, exposed in a garnet spotlight of unprepared, uninspired football that officially derailed our season. The rest of the game is of no consequence. They scored fourteen more. We scored a meaningless touchdown with two minutes to go. Murray overthrew everything and everyone. Our receivers could not catch a bullet in the ass during a Mexican gang fight over a brick of meth. Gurley and Marshall ran hard, but with very few holes, it was all for naught. Their offensive line "bullied" our defensive line. They held us against our locker and gave us an "Indian Rug Burn" and called us fat nerds. As far as our secondary goes, the only words that come to mind are "porous," "Swiss cheese," "cardboard cutout" and "sticky icky." All the while, Spurrier just smirked. He knew.

Why was this loss different? Why do I feel different than when Tennessee stole our national championship hopes in 2004? Or when DJ Shockley's only pass against Florida in 2002 cost us that game and another national championship shot? Because my hope is gone, it's officially broken. Back then, I would chalk it up to one thing or another and move on. Back then, I felt like we were on the brink of a great run. Flash forward to last Saturday, I realized that I can no longer, in my heart of hearts, invest any more emotion or belief that we will ever be successful under Mark Richt. We have the most favorable schedule that we've had in YEARS. We have upperclassmen everywhere. Our coaches are all seasoned veterans. All-Americans, Heisman hopefuls, freshman phenoms....and yet, we are reduced to a footnote once again by virtue of a 35-7 shellacking by a school that we used to count as a victory every season. Out-everythinged by a much tougher, better coached group of players, most of which I have never even heard of. Who the hell is DJ Swearinger? Akeem Auguste? Courtney Taylor?  6-0 is what they are. I don't know what we are.

So, we continue on to Kentucky. I've never been happier for an off week and less captivated by the remainder of a season since Ray Goff. Who cares now? We had the biggest stage in college football and the only performances I can remember that have been worse than ours are:

1) Roseanne Barr's rendition of the Star Spangled Banner
2) Keanu Reeves in "Feeling Minnesota"
3) Bill Clinton's "definition of is" rambling that reduced my brain to ashes
4) Adam Sandler movies post-2004
5) The dinner scene in Twister when everyone drops their forks when Jamie Gertz says "F5"

To quote Remember the Titans: "Attitude reflect(s) leadership, Captain." We have no leader, plain and simple. That ship has sailed. It sailed into the Bermuda Triangle and is in the Twilight Zone with Jimmy Hoffa, Ted Williams's frozen head and Christian Slater's acting career. I will never hate Coach Richt and I am thankful for what he has done. He brought us back from the worst decade in the history of our school. However, if we continue on this path, I'll be thanking the next coach for the very same thing.

Recap of the Weekend: Dawgs win by the skin of our whatchamcallit

First of all, let me apologize to my loyal readers about the lack of UGA football posts. Frankly, the games have been rather inconsequential to this point. The closest game we have had since the season started was the 41-20 beating we gave Missouri. We clobbered FAU and Vandy like they stole something, most people at the Pourhouse stopped watching those games and started talking about more important things, like the best sushi on the Lower East Side or how slow the "R" train has been during the latest construction. The FAU game was the biggest snoozer of all, in fact, I think the Pourhouse had to buy ESPN Gameplan to get it on the television. Have you ever watched a regional ESPN Gameplan broadcast? It looks like one of those old home videos my brother and I used to make in the early 90's. You get motion sickness from the awesome camera work and the announcers sound like the guys who also commentate for Smoky Mountain Wrestling.

This weekend was slightly different, however. We finally got a primetime TV slot on a big network, playing a heated rival at home. Recipe for success, right? As I walked to the Pourhouse, I walked through a "Free Palestine" protest in Union Square. One guy had a sign that said, "Take Palestine back from the baby-killing spawn of Satan" or something to that effect. It's always nice to see New Yorkers enjoying their weekends. I can think of nothing better than to get off work on Friday and tell my family, "Kids, instead of going to Central Park and playing baseball tomorrow, let's say we go down to Union Square and blatantly offend people we don't like? Yay!!!!" I swear, get over yourselves, you live in the greatest city in the world. If you want to be pissed off about something that is thousands of miles away, be mad that the moon is not made of spare ribs. (+1 for SNL reference)

We piled into the Pourhouse and realized that the bar was split in half, as Virginia Tech also calls the bar "home" for their alumni. They had a riveting matchup against Cincinnati and a capacity crowd of 22 people filled the other half of the bar. I swear I heard a mouse sneeze over there during the third quarter. Anyhow, we affixed our posteriors in our usual spot and awaited kickoff. Quentin (aka Qdoba to me) and I were discussing that if we did not turn the ball over, we would massacre the Cheeto-colored heathens from the Smoky Mountains without much trouble. For some reason, I just did not feel great about the game from the get-go. Something was amiss. Can these people, who have to go to Dollywood for fun, beat us at home? Can these people, who apparently do not get drunk enough orally, upset this whole thing for us?

Our freshman running backs decided to make this game their personal track meet. "Gurshall," to which they are affectionately being referred, made a mockery of the UT defense all day. Gurley dragged guys all over the field and Keith Marshall broke two runs that made UT's secondary look like the Falcons on Tecmo Bowl. The Falcons were always terrible on Tecmo Bowl. I always played as the Raiders and would handoff to Bo Jackson. Just run Bo to the right and hold down "A." I would win 76-0 every time. Keith did his best Bo Jackson-Tecmo Bowl impersonation on his first touchdown. He just decided he was going to score, and it was so. The safety came near him and it was like Keanu Reeves in the Matrix stopping bullets.....he held out his hand and calmly said "No." We were up big in the blink of an eye, the only glaring mistake was Murray's interception. I felt my body relax and we all toasted to the Dawgs and our apparent victory that was going to be easier than finding a funnel cake in Pigeon Forge.

Wrong. In 4:30, Tennessee scored 20 points. Four-%^$**((&*((&UJH&& minutes and thirty ^&%**&& seconds. I asked Qdoba, "did we have a stroke after that last touchdown?" First, Malcolm Mitchell misplays a punt and puts us in a hole. This is getting to be a common occurence with him. Bobo does his patented "let's telegraph what we are going to do" offensive scheme and Tennessee gets great field position. They score with relative ease. Then Murray fumbles on a sack and AJ Johnson recovers for Tennessee. Easy score. Then Marshall fumbles and they recover. Another easy score. Gurley mishandles a kickoff. Marshall Morgan proved that the crossbar in Athens does indeed have a bullseye on it. The defensive backs are getting beat repeatedly. Murray gets that freshman "what the hell is happening" face and Richt's facial expression says, "Ya know, maybe I should cut the grass tomorrow. No, I'll let Kathryn do it. Then maybe we will get ice cream. Yeah, ice cream." I was beside myself and Qdoba was worried that I was going to headbutt our table in half. In 4:30, I can do the following activities:

1) Run 4/5 of a mile.
2) Eat seven hot dogs and a whole plate of fusilli from Angelo's in Little Italy
3) Ride the subway for forty blocks
4) Try to watch the news without vomiting
5) Learn and master the "stanky leg" dance

Tennessee can apparently score three touchdowns. Chagrin and shenanigans. Luckily, Artie Lynch came up big with a huge catch and somehow, by the grace of God, Zeus, Poseidon, the Wizard of Oz and C-3PO, Marshall Morgan made a 50 yard field goal. (C3PO was a god to the Ewoks, don't act like you forgot) Halftime was 30-30 and it should have been 42-10. I grumbled and went to the restroom. I checked in on the Virginia Tech game as I went back. They were playing Monopoly and Yahtzee with mimosas in hand, so I left them alone. Seriously, I did not want my eyes scratched out by interrupting a chick who is about to buy Marvin Gardens with two hotels. You just don't want that kind of trouble. However, I cannot help but point out a great ACC moment from the day: The bar let out a roar when the score from the Georgia Tech game appeared on the screen. Beaten at home by three touchdowns by the University of Murfreesboro-West Nashville. Congratulations Middle Tennessee State, you gained about 94,000 new fans on Saturday. Tech, please keep Paul Johnson forever. Purty, please? It's like having Reggie Ball back on the Flats and he's giving us free pizza to boot.

As I devoured the calamari ordered by Qdoba, I contemplated the second half. I thought about the fight between Cole Trickle and Harry Hogge on Days of Thunder. Randy Quaid said one of the best lines ever, which cannot be repeated here, but it sums up my feelings about the second quarter. The defense needed to step up and special teams had to wake up. As we trotted back out, I felt a little better. Murray had a determined look and Grantham appeared as if he had just eaten a truck tire with chains on it, so I knew we would be fired up. The offense was superb and Murray was finding guys everywhere. Bennett. Brown. Rome. King. Catch after catch they made in traffic, wide open, slanting, posting, hooking, flagging, Riverdancing......you name it. I have to point out King's effort in the first quarter when he dragged AJ Johnson four yards and almost scored. That was an NFL play right there. In the second half, we looked so crisp. Marshall and Gurley ripped UT's heart out with run after run, just abusing their linebackers and secondary. Michael Bennett caught two awesome passes for touchdowns. Our defensive line was the weak point on this day. John Jenkins, Abry Jones, Kwame Geathers and Cornelius Washington were no-shows. UT's linemen blew them up all game, we got no push and Bray can throw the damn football. That guy is scary and I'm glad he's gone after this year. Neal, their subpar running back, did his best Reggie Cobb impression. (90's Dawg fans will remember this guy. He KILLED us every time we played.) Our linebackers played fair but it seemed as if they were a step slow. Luckily for us, Sanders Commings and Damian Swann came to play. Three turnovers by Tennessee doomed them, just as three turnovers by us let their sorry butts back in the game. It does not matter how fast and talented you are, if you put the ball on the ground and you cannot kick, you can lose to anyone. Just ask Tech. (except Tech is not talented, fast, good, smart, athletic, worthwhile or relevant.)

Now we draw Carolina, an away game against a 6-0 opponent who had to come back to beat Kentucky and almost lost to Vandy. See? Anybody can have an off day. We had ours and we survived. Let's leave it at that and prepare for a bloodbath against the impostor, SEC coattail-riding Lamecocks. A team that has accomplished next to nothing in their history. A school that has one conference championship in their ENTIRE history: the 1969 ACC Championship. A school that is most famous for hosting a fake football team, the ESU Wolves, in their stadium. (+1 for The Program reference) I can see Jarvis Jones in the film room now:

Coach: "Jarvis, what do you do on this play?"

Jarvis: "Hit the tight end so hard his girlfriend dies."

Go Dawgs.

Character in Cassville: We may not have good pizza, but we know a good spark plug when we see one

I was paid the ultimate compliment this week. A friend of mine from Cassville sent a message to me on Facebook asking about how I enjoyed my legal career. After discusssing my daily duties, she replied, "I was shocked to know you became a lawyer. Not because it's hard, but because every lawyer I know is a whiny, whimpy, lying jerk, and none of those words describe you at all." Totally flattered, I thanked her. Sadly, I could not disagree with her indictment of my profession, as I see many lawyers every day that fit that bill. The chances of the average person running into a lawyer that is a "whiny, whimpy, lying jerk" increase every day, as law schools keep churning them out left and right to a world with limited jobs, where the premium shifts from service to the client over to "I gotta get mine." I've often asked myself, after meeting one of these types, "this guy passed the same Bar I did?" Yep, he sure as hell did. So, I see it as my duty to prove to the world that some of us still have decorum, still care about our fellow man, and understood our Oath to mean more than just a license to don silk stockings and ride the elevator of self-importance .

Frankly, every profession, every religion, race, and creed has extreme negative sides. Take this week for example. I had my first encounter with a Hare Krishna member. He started handing me trinkets and a card that said "Peace" with an illustration of Krishna, he blessed me over and over, telling me that he prayed for peace in my life, blah blah blah. I say "blah blah blah" because he immediately asked for a donation, and I replied that I only had a credit card, which was true. His smile disappeared, he jerked his trinkets out of my hand and darted away quickly, ready to con the next person. I tried to let it go, but I could not. In New York, I have learned that confrontation is warranted at a moment like this. You know why I was mad? I was listening to a live version of "Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd, enjoying it immensely, when this little ripoff artist accosted me. I said, "Don't interrupt David Gilmour ever again." Like I said, some things just cannot be ignored. Plus, they wear Tennessee orange colored robes, so they automatically join my s**t list just by existing.

There are so many types of people here and I have become immune to the "different" folks that call New York home. A guy wearing an orange mohawk and a tattoo on his face? Not a second look. Yesterday, a woman was walking topless next to Grand Central wearing nothing but jeans and a cowboy hat. I paid her about as much attention as a pigeon pecking at the horse feed next to Central Park. She actually stopped next to a phone booth and adjusted her hat in her reflection off the glass. I guess if you are wearing half of a birthday suit, you want to look your best for your eventual jail visit. Two days ago, one block from my apartment, I watched a homeless man absolutely "dog cuss" (a great Southern term) the padlocked door on the UPS store. I actually stopped for this one, because he was using combinations of foul language that I had never heard in my life and I thought that maybe God actually could strike him dead. He would start walking away, then come back and rip into this padlocked door like it just stolen his Iphone. (Homeless people have Iphones here, no kidding) This procession continued for five minutes until he realized he had more pressing business uptown and walked off for good. As I walked by that door, I almost overheard it talking smack, I swear. You never know in this city.

Cassville has about 8.99 million less people than New York. If you wear an orange mohawk, people will probably stare at you. You will probably be accused of being an atheist, or worse, a Democrat. We have precisely five restaurants and only one that is not located in a truck stop. There are no cabs for hire riding around, you have to call them. Then they show up in a busted 1994 Ford Aerostar, looking half dead and telling you that they don't go past Fairmount. Pizza is not our thing and Papa John's refuses to go past Mac Johnson Road, cutting us off almost completely. Street vendors don't sell pashminas or knock off Louis Vuitton purses, they sell autographed Dale Earnhardt Jr. helmets out of their front yard. The closest version of Times Square? Exit 296 with its truck stops, three hotels (one condemned) and the adult book store. You can see the lights all the way from Adairsville. You want to run through our Central Park and get a taste of history? There's a patch of grass next to Cass Grocery that you could run around about 2,754 times, it has a monument to Lewis Cass for whom the town is named.

However, what we lack in nightlife and activity, we make up for with character. For example:

1) We know what WD-40 can do, it's value is second only to duct tape. How many door hinges, engine parts and bicycle chains did I grease back home? Countless. Plus, you can make an awesome flamethrower with it. God help any fire ants that built a nest in the parking lot at Cass Grocery. We are talking Hiroshima-like conditions for these poor insects while my brother and I danced around them like fools. Why burn just one with a magnifying glass? That's inefficient. People here probably think it's something you file with your taxes.

2) We know Briggs & Stratton, Smith & Wesson, and Allis-Chalmers. We know Dean Durham, Shaw Grigsby and Denny Brauer. People here probably think these are all law firms. I cannot count how many Briggs & Stratton spark plugs I sold at the store and I would run back to the TV because Bill Dance was coming on and I did not want to miss the bloopers.

3) We can talk about pouring concrete, installing drywall, working on a car or hanging shingles for hours. In fact, we can make it into a dramatization. Forget Broadway. Imagine one man in front of Cass Grocery talking to 6 other men drinking coffee.

"So, there's Lamar, he's got the manifold in his hand. He tells Bobby to put the air filter back in, but Bobby can't find it. They get to fightin.." ("get to fightin" is a great Southern term)

The group all looks at each other with an understanding glance, fighting over an air filter....totally worth it. Some of them grumble about the price of air filters, there's a sidebar discussion of Advance Auto, Autozone, and Cass Grocery prices. They all decide they would rather buy from us because they like us, take a sip of coffee and the story continues.

"So, Bobby goes to lookin. He can't find the air filter nowhere. Y'all know how dumb he is. All over the shop, he tears up everything, lookin for this air filter. Sure enough, the damn dog took it and it was tore up all over the yard. Lamar had to go all the way back to Cartersville (4 miles) to get another one."

During this riveting exchange, nobody takes their eyes off the storyteller. They laugh uncontrollably at Lamar's expense, then somebody tells a story about sheetrock falling off the wall at a job. Like old man river, it never stops. (side note: having to go to Cartersville for anything is equivalent to going to Spain. If you have to go outside the county, it might as well be Antartica.)

4) We don't have a homeless problem. Everybody lives somewhere, by God. Since we all claim 5th and 6th cousins and are all 1/32 Cherokee, it's like one big happy family...we just pile into a single wide on Cedar Creek Road, stick a mailbox in the dirt and call it home. I knew one family on Mostellar's Mill Road, on the Cassville/Adairsville/Folsom border, that must have had 56 people living in their house. How do I know? They all wrote me bad checks and had the same address.

5) We don't have a pile of newspapers influencing our political decisions in Cassville. In New York, there's the Daily News, The Times, The Post, The Wall Street Journal, and the AM Metro (and that's just off the top of my head). The Upper West Side is an undesignated area with no real boundaries, yet it has its own weekly newspaper. For you Bartow natives, that's like Rydal having a newspaper. Nobody knows how or when you get to Rydal, you just sort of materialize there. The only magazines that anyone ever asked for at Cass Gorcery were the latest Auto Trader or Georgia Outdoor News. I guess we cared more about the biggest buck taken in Early County and what it scored on the Pope & Young (also not a law firm) rather than what some politician felt about the latest SPLOST proposal.

So there you have it, the 30123 may not have the bright lights, it may not have any restaurants that can get higher than a 73 on the Health Inspection, and we may not be able to get pizza other than DiGiorno from Ingles, but we definitely have a way of life unique to us. I've told New Yorkers, who are in disbelief at the size and quiet nature of my hometown, that we were never bored. Seriously, who would not be entertained by a story about fence staples? Who would not want to watch me burn a cockroach with a WD-40 fueled flamethrower? Who does not want to see a picture of the biggest bream caught in Polk County? As for the homeless guy cussing the padlocked door, if he did that in Cassville, he would be dealt with as nonchalantly as he was on the streets of New York. I could hear them at the store now:

"I bet that sumbitch is from Fairmount."

Recap of the Weekend: Don't Cry Over Spilled Bud Light, Cry Over Sloppy Second Quarters

Well, boys and girls, it's here. The air smells fresher, my coffee tastes just a little better and I walk around with extra pep in my step. I am just a little more patient with others, more forgiving and just in an all around better mood. After the long months of waiting, all the pregame talk, the rankings, the "what ifs" and the praying for no injuries, it is finally here. I'm talking about the US Open being played over in Queens. The alpha and omega of American tennis. The single greatest spectacle.....zzzzzzzz.

Sorry, my mind has been demolitioned and been renovated into a fort of college football knowledge. Some guy asked me, "what if you see Roger Federer?" I replied, "what's his 40 time?" Yes, it is that drastic. I swear, I ran a post pattern through Times Square dodging 35 Europeans taking pictures of a manhole cover. I am experiencing this season in a new light. Since I am in New York, I obviously cannot make the 795 mile trip to Athens, so I have to settle for a UGA alumni bar here in the city. In fact, on football Saturdays, the city is abuzz with alumni of every school imaginable taking the subway or a cab to "their" bar. I think Devry has a bar in New York City somewhere.

The UGA alumni bar here is called the "Village Pourhouse." It is located near NYU on 3rd Avenue and it is owned by Joba Chamberlain, the Yankee relief pitcher. This place gets packed on gamedays, full of ex-patriates from the South, coming to share our love for the Dawgs and Athens-like drink specials. People walk in a scream, "Go Dawgs!" and the crowd responds. You high five people you don't really know, but they recently became your friend because you came to the Pourhouse. I can almost transport myself back to 2001 and see myself standing at Boar's Head in Athens with the same people. If you cannot have a good time at the Pourhouse during a Georgia game, then you should head over to Queens, I hear there is a riveting match between Andre Retrieeenrvich and Jorge Breaiahsiudhnski going on.

The Pourhouse was especially crowded on this opening weekend. My folks came to visit so Dad and I wedged ourselves in the midst of NYC Dawgnation and ordered the biggest plate of nachos in the history of mankind. Kickoff was in twenty minutes and I needed a calorie fest to get me through the nervousness.....I know it was Buffalo but it does not matter who we play. My nerves are more frayed and frazzled than Auburn's O-line during a pop quiz in Advanced Toilet Scrubbing 102: Applying the Comet and Using the Brush. This recap is brought to you by Guinness, Starbucks coffee with nonfat milk (because I was too busy checking my phone for scores to notice my mistake), the Steve Miller Band (Abracadabra is a vastly underrated song) and veal papardelle, courtesy of Angelo's on Mulberry in Little Italy. Amo Questo Ristorante. (Translation: I love this restaurant....I'm learning Italian.)

We kicked off to Buffalo, who looked so much like Kentucky that I did a triple take. A perpetually unimpressive squad and a lamb to the slaughter, I thought. They did nothing with the ball and punted to us. I could not help but notice that our defense looked a step slow, however. Guys just seemed to be going through the motions and there were "hands on hips" really quickly in this game. The Dawgvent had been awash in a sea of anger earlier this week when players were "tweeting" at 2 AM from bars in Athens. While I do not subscribe to this incessant prying into the lives of people who were born when I was in middle school, I still wonder if those angry keyboard cops weren't on to something. We get the ball back and Murray is flinging the ball all over the field, some accurately and others looked as if he was throwing clay targets for a skeet shooting contest. He has not matured like I hoped he would, to be honest. He overthrew a wide open Tavarres King on a sixty yard post that was a sure touchdown. Not just out of his reach either.  In fact, I think that ball actually landed in Brookhaven. Luckily, there was a man wearing a #3 jersey....a man from Tarboro, North Carolina.....a man who eats arm tackles for a light snack before slamming your soul into a blender and hitting "puree." That man is Todd Gurley.

The dreadlocked freshman phenom scored the first touchdown of the season on a ten yard run reminiscent of Richard Samuel against Florida last year. Futile Buffalo tackle attempts were stomped out like a Basic Light 100 cigarette in a Cassville trailer park. The Pourhouse went crazy, Dad and I high fived strangers, and the first of twenty pitchers of beer was spilled all over the floor when an overzealous Dawg's kneecap struck the underside of their table. We kick off to Buffalo and they start picking apart our defense, courtesy of Mike Zordich, their long haired quarterback. Dink and dunk, quarterback draw, tight end across the middle and they score in the corner on a twenty yard route where Shawn Williams looked like he was running in a pile of gravel. To be fair, there was a MAJOR hold on that play where the Buffalo left tackle brutally raped Jordan Jenkins, our true freshman defensive end. The referee was close enough to count Jordan's mustache hairs, but completely blew the call. Grumbles filled the air of the Pourhouse. Comments were made: "Man, Gilliard looks lost. Herrera is out of position." My drink went flat. The lack of intensity was palpable. Our defense looked like a hungover fraternity flag football team.

Buffalo boots one to the goal line and Todd Gurley receives it. He sprints to his left, shoots the gap and dashes 100 yards to the end zone, as the Pourhouse faithful erupts in ecstasy. Three customers vow to name their first child "Todd." His Heisman campaign was planned over another spilled Bud Light pitcher:

"Todd ain't no Gurley-man."

"Gurley is the new manly."

"The Smokin Marlboro from Tarboro." (canned for political incorrectness, references to tobacco and the fact that 99.9% of America has no clue where Tarboro is.)

The first quarter ended and we all started taking note of the Sanford Stadium crowd, which was less than capacity. First game of the season and the upper deck is as empty as the girl's dorm at Georgia Tech. I imagined Michael Adams, sitting in his Skybox sipping a Diet 7-Up, surveying his "Harvard in the Pines" vision coming true. Yes, you truly HAVE killed the gameday experience for so many people. Anyhow, the second quarter arrived and thus began one of the most painstaking quarters of Georgia football that I have surveyed in my entire life. Buffalo scored ten points and ran the ball right down our throats. Branden Oliver gashed our defensive line over and over. A team of nobodies with 1/4 of the talent, but ten times more heart. Murray finally connected on a long bomb to King for a touchdown. Marshall Morgan did make his first field goal on his second try. The first attempt was earlier in the game and it was so far to the right that I actually thought he was kidding. It was so far right that the Christian Coalition asked Marshall to be their next guest speaker. Halftime score was 24-16 and Dad and I said about three words at halftime....."another beer, please."

The halftime speech must have resembled the first fifteen minutes of Full Metal Jacket because the defense locked down tighter than a snare drum. Murray calmed down and threw two beautiful touchdowns to Rantavious Wooten and Michael Bennett. I am renaming Bennett, "Whitey Tightey" because that dude just makes plays in tough situations. Oliver and Zordich were contained and basically did nothing for the remainder of the game, scoring only when the game was no longer in doubt. To put an exclamation point on an already amazing day, Todd Gurley scored once again on a 55 yard sprint where he dipped and dodged through their secondary, causing the Pourhouse to implode and three more Bud Light pitchers to hit the floor. People from places like Blackshear, Tifton and Macon were embracing people from Brooklyn and the Bronx like old friends. The clock ticked away and everyone relaxed. The Buffalo faithful who joined us at the Pourhouse were complimentary and glad to get the $975,000 check for showing up in Athens. However, the angst from the earlier quarters had not been forgotten. Why was our defense so sluggish? Why is Murray continually overthrowing receivers as a third year starter? Why do we consistently open every season slowly with so many kinks in the hose?

Next week is at Missouri. Their first SEC game ever and you know their place will be rocking. Frankly, I do not know much about Missouri other than they are a typical Big 12 team, a high powered offense and almost no defense. They seem confident that they can beat us and honestly, they have nothing to lose by talking trash. One of their players said that we play "old man football." Here's my rendition of trash:

What in the hell has Missouri ever done? I'm not just talking about the football team. The state of Missouri, what has ever happened there? Being from Missouri is like coming in 93rd in a marathon. Being from Missouri is like being the backup waterboy on a minor league soccer team. We are going to show these midwestern corn hustlers how it's done in the red clay. We will wake up and massacre these mumbling morons from Missouri. (A little alliteration for y'all on this Labor Day.)

Other events taking place this weekend:

1) Alabama crushed Michigan in a violent and overpowering fashion, rendering ESPN speechless after their constant puffing of Michigan's abilities, and causing Denard Robinson to disappear faster than Joe Paterno's statue. Bama was exponentially better in every facet of the game, I think they even ran to the locker room at halftime faster than Michigan. Is SEC speed a myth? I think not.

2) Ohio beat Penn State in the first game since the Sandusky scandal. It's going to be a LONG year in Happy Valley. People in the Pourhouse cheered for Ohio and I thought this was poignant, it proved that Penn State will forever be linked to this disaster and it will take years to recover, if ever. They did not care that these players were in middle school when Sandusky was molesting these kids, all they see is the indifference of the institution. Sad.

3) USC began the year at #1 and mutilated Hawaii. They have the schedule where they could easily run the table and play for a national championship. Just four years ago, they were put on double secret probation, their coach bailed on them for the NFL and their best player in the last decade was stripped of his Heisman. This is like killing somebody and being put in prison......in Trump Tower. The NCAA proves once again that if you have enough money and enough history, probation, as Kenny Wayne Shepherd once said, is about like "blue on black."

Top O the Morning to Ya and Cheers.....Back from Across the Pond, Boyo

New York is a town full of tourists. It is something that I have gotten used to over the last couple of months. They are a major source of income for this city and Mayor Bloomberg has gone out of his way to make the city a welcome place for travelers. There are a few absolutions you can count on in this town when it comes to tourists:

1) They all WILL be in Times Square. As sure as I'm sitting here, as sure as Georgia Tech is going to suck this season, as sure as the Waffle House has the best hash browns in the universe. (God, how I miss them.)

2) Eastern Europeans WILL stop in the middle of the sidewalk to take pictures of nothing. All natives grumble as they try not to sideswipe Helga, Ernst and their three kids, Bjorn, Maria and Gunther as they stand there snapping an Iphone picture of a street vendor. They will also have a ridiculous amount of gear accompanying them that takes up at least a square mile when they stop.

3) Asians WILL eat at the Hard Rock. I guess Hard Rock Cafe is seen as an American institution, which baffles me. You are in New York City. We have the best food selection ON THE PLANET.....and you eat at a chain store where the best selling item is a t-shirt.

4) American tourists WILL also eat at Hard Rock and/or Bubba Gump Shrimp Company. Now, they have an Olive Garden in Times Square. This place is packed every night. Again, you are in New York City, yet you choose to eat chain ITALIAN food in a city with two sections called "Little Italy." Amazing. That is like going to Beijing and eating at Panda Express. That is like going to Cassville and looking for a Huddle House. It's borderline sacrilege.

5) At least one family member WILL buy an "I Love NY" or an "FDNY/NYPD" t-shirt. This is the badge of honor that proves that you indeed were in the Concrete Jungle. Any trip is incomplete without such and nobody will believe that you were here.....unless you have a Hard Rock shirt or a picture of a street hustler selling knock off Louis Vuitton bags on Broadway.

Speaking of tourism, in a fit of spontaneity and with the whim of a UGA freshman going to Boar's Head for the first time, I took my talents to England and Ireland for a week. (+1 for comparing myself to Lebron James. We have a lot in common.) This was my first excursion across the pond, so I really had not the first clue what to expect. I knew only what I heard and the stories from friends who had ventured to the Old World before. I used a travel agency that was very helpful and booked my flights and hotels for me.

My first flight was from LaGuardia to Charlotte, North Carolina, which was my first visit back to Dixie since I left two months ago. This was going to be a quick flight and connection to London, where it would take 8 hours across the Atlantic. However, it was not to be on this day. The US Airways staff, lead by Mikesha, who only spoke in grunts and hand motions, caused an hour delay. Mikesha climbed my personal hate ladder with the dexterity of a three-toed sloth on fire. By the time I arrived in Charlotte, my London flight was over Bermuda. Since there is only one flight per day to the UK, it was a lost day in Charlotte...or so I thought.

My hotel in Charlotte was three blocks from the NASCAR Hall of Fame. What self-respecting, tire-squealin, dirt road navigatin' Cassvillian would be that close and not go? It was three hours of tributes to moonshiners, Junior Johnson/Richard Petty/Dale Earnhardt/Bill France, and rife with actual race cars, paraphernalia and videos of great races and finishes. While it glorified the globalization of the brand, it paid more attention to its roots......the Southern United States and the men from the South who made the sport what it is. We need to take this sport back because it is not the same. We need more Davey Allisons (Greatest mullet ever, possibly. They also had his deer hunting bow on display, does it get any better than that?) and less Jimmie Johnsons. We need more Neil Bonnetts, Harry Gants, and Dale Jarretts, guys who wore their 1983 Daytona 500 Champion belt buckle with pride and were sponsored by at least three vices (Alcohol, Cigarettes and Chewing Tobacco).

"I'd like to thank my crew and my sponsors: Marlboro, Levi Garrett, and Old Milwaukee. Kids, nothing makes me feel better after a race than a good chew on pit road."

Anyhow, I finally made the voyage to jolly old England the next day. The land of Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, the Beatles, fish n chips,  and the Queen (in order of importance). I climbed off the plane and instantly the song "Norwegian Wood" popped into my head:

"Iiiiiiiii once hahd a guhl..." ("I once had a girl" for you Beatles illiterates)

The rest of my stay in England was littered with random extremely British songs: "Mrs. Brown, You've Got a Lovely Daughter," "Daydream Believer," and "Bloody Well Right" pretty much dominated my internal jukebox. The subway took me to the West End and with each stop, the train conductor tells you to "mind the gap," which means to be careful of the gap between the train and the platform. Apparently, if you fall in the gap, you will disappear like Artax the horse in the Swamp of Sadness. (+1 for Neverending Story reference. 90's kids, you know you cried when Artax died. )

From there, I trekked to Big Ben, Buckingham Palace and Westminster Abbey. I saw the grave of King Edward I, who passed away in 1296. In Cassville, Georgia, when somebody says, "Man, that's old" they are usually referring to the following:

1) A 1971 Dodge Charger
2) A two week old can of Skoal
3) A rusty bandsaw
4) Yet another minie ball from the Civil War found in Kingston
5) A vinyl Charley Pride record

From there, I went to Soho and Mayfair. (Insert Werewolves of London line right here) I walked down Savile Row, where the Beatles held their final live concert in 1969. I saw the awesome St. Paul's Cathedral and the Tate Modern Art Museum. I've tried to understand "modern" art and glean some inspiration from the paintings and sculptures, but it eludes me. It's kind of like Tennessee football, a cacophony of randomness that only speaks to the severely intoxicated or falsely enlightened. As I passed through Southwark (pronounced Suth-ick), a small pub caught my eye. This place, called Tipperary, had stood since 1605 and survived the fire that nearly destroyed London years ago. The tattooed female bartender, noticing my accent, says, "And just what tree did you fall out of, love?" Hook, line and sinker. I stayed for an hour. She told me of the other old bars in Southwark and the City, so I completed a mini pub crawl at institutions such as Lyceum Tavern, Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese and Ye Olde Cock Tavern (complete with a huge rooster sign). Englishmen love to drink cider, of which I am not a fan. I tried one called "Sweet Rosie" that tasted like Mountain Dew with a handle of butterscotch schnapps dumped in it. I left after I recovered from my diabetic coma in the bathroom. I settled for a hamburger for dinner.

I cannot discuss England without mentioning the food, or lack thereof. Traditional English food is interesting. I think the guy who decided what food is "English" is the same guy who invented grammar rules, white noise for TVs and back-up warning beepers for large trucks. Horrendous. Thank God for hamburgers and the huge Italian presence in London. There was one day where I only ate one meal, and for those of you who know me well, this is almost impossible. The next day, I walked five miles along the Thames to the Imperial War Museum, where I saw the actual tank that Montgomery used in North Africa during WWII and a shell from the biggest cannon ever constructed in the history of the earth. I thought of Cassville: "Shoot, I'd kill my three year limit with that damn thing." I stopped for a hamburger near the Globe Theater. The coolest part of the day was the "Jack the Ripper" tour at night in East London, where I was taken to where the still at-large criminal killed and mutilated five prostitutes in three months....or they would say back home, "he done kilt five whores down nar and cut them girls all to pieces." I went back to the hotel, ate ANOTHER hamburger and called it a night.

The early morning flight to Dublin was a treat. You get on an Aer Lingus (Irish airline) plane and U2 is blaring over the speakers, seriously. I smiled, masking my eternal utter disdain for that group and their lead singer. Cliches abound, as the flight attendant, named Brendan, offered an Irish coffee to me at 8:00 AM. I took the bus from the airport into Dublin, known to the Gaelic population as "Baile Atha Cliath." One thing that overtakes you in Dublin is the overt "Irishness" of the people. They are damn proud to be Irish. I asked one Irishman how to get to Finglas Road or "Bothar Fhionnghlaise." He replied with, "Tiyien%4&& YIOWJENMS NMIDIkdsi17627." So, I nodded a few times and I just got on the first bus to Finglas or Albuquerque, whichever one came first.

Dublin is old, y'all. The tallest building is only seven stories high, I think. That is the Guinness Storehouse, where I imbibed in the finest non-craft beer I have ever tasted. Irishmen are proud of this accomplishment and they should be. The only drawback was that I had to share my experience with a tour group from Michigan, whose accents nearly turned my beer back into yeast before I could drink it. "Bahb, Bahb, take my picture next to this freakin beer glee-ass right here. Bahb! Bahb!" I saw the original St. Patrick's Cathedral, Christchurch and St. Aldouen's Church, which has stood since 1193. I did not go into St. Patrick's because they charge you to enter the grounds. Whoever heard of that? If I wanted to pay to go to church, I'd just call Jimmy Swaggart and tell him set up a tent in Acworth. The Irish Archaeology Museum was the biggest pleasant surprise of the trip. They had Viking relics, medieval swords, early Christian art and five actual bodies of men who had lived in 800-900 BC. They had been found in mineral rich bogs, which cover rural Ireland and operate as a preservative if something is buried within it. I also saw the Irish National Gallery, complete with original Rembrandts, Van Goghs, Monets and an actual Michelangelo. Now, THAT is inspiring.

If you want the original pub experience, then Dublin is your place. Stereotypes are alive and well here, but it is worth it. Places like Kehoe's, The Dawson Lounge, The Temple Bar, Bruxelle's and The Palace Bar keep the spirit alive, when they are not covered up with tourists. Then, I encountered the bar called Sin E, pronounced "Shin-Ay." Nothing compared to Sin E. (Yes, I went there, sue me.) It was operated by an Italian who told me to called him "Jump" and served the cheapest Guinness in Dublin. I sat next to a Jewish Frenchman from Normandy, whose grandfather was a member of the French Resistance and assisted the Americans with information and sabotaged Nazi supply lines during WWII. His great grandfather was murdered at Auschwitz. We talked for a long time. I told him of my grandfather and his landing on Omaha Beach, and he replies in broken English, "we are eternally grateful for men like him," and raised his glass. I raised mine to his grandfather as well. As some stereotypes lived on in Ireland, others died with the clinking of two glasses in memory of two heroes.

Overall, I am extremely pleased with my decision to go on this trip. Most of my fellow Americans flying back from Ireland, donned in loud, green sweatshirts from The Blarney Inn or their new tam 'o-shanter caps, would agree. Americans love Irish culture. They want to be Irish so bad, they can taste it. As for me, I only bought two Guinness glasses. I'm not a souvenir collector, I'm more of a memory maker. I'm glad to be back in the States because football season is around the corner, and I don't mean soccer. UGA vs. Buffalo in 9 days, y'all. Jarvis Jones is going to have 32 sacks in this game. A word to the Buffalo QB, as only Warren Zevon can put it:

"You better stay away from him,
  He'll rip your lungs out, Jim."

Go Dawgs.

Kudzu Hill, Applied Studies & Subway Trains: Connected, consequently.

I had a great memory come to mind about a week ago. Back in 2000-2001, UGA baseball was playing very well and my fraternity brothers and I made it a point to go to every game we could. Baseball did not have the following of the football team, but there was a small, very dedicated student fanbase. We were not hard to find at game time. We never sat in the stadium of Foley Field, not once. There was a hill behind right field, covered in kudzu (affectionately called "Kudzu Hill"), and at the base of the hill was a 1.5 acre flat piece of dirt where we parked our posteriors for nine innings. Donned in our best un-ironed, Febrezed Polo and New Balances that looked like they had been thrown into a hay bailer, we would fire up our grills and start the harassment of the opposing team's right fielder and first baseman.

It would start with simple barbs, "hey, number 4, you suck!" "Hey Nineteen! Sharpton gonna get you with three straight fastballs!" (+1 for unintentional Steely Dan reference). Bill Sharpton was our ace back then. He was from Vidalia, Georgia and when it was Bill's turn to pitch, the PA would blast "Vidalia" by Sammy Kershaw before the game. As the game progressed and our friends, Anheuser-Busch and Miller High Life joined the fracas, the words would become more pointed and creative. "Hey! 4! Your girlfriend is up here! Damn, they grow em big at Bama don't they?!" We absolutely killed the first baseman from Georgia Tech. We mercilessly assaulted this man on everything from his throwing style, "you look like my sister throwing left handed with a broken arm!" to the way he walked, "Yep! I guess Tech is like prison, no chicks allowed!" Hot dog flavored smoke wafted onto Foley Field. Don Henley's "Boys of Summer," The Romantic's  "What I Like About You," and Tom Petty's "Runnin Down a Dream" blasted over the PA between innings. We would discuss if we were going to "go out" after the game. Somebody would remark, "it's Tuesday."

Mack Williams, the cartoonist for the Red and Black would decide to break out his megaphone and proceed to destroy everyone on the opposing team. You could hear this megaphone in South Carolina. In his infinite wisdom, he would get on the Internet and research their roster, print it out and bring it to right field. He knew their middle names. He knew their majors. He knew their parents names. A strikeout? An error? Better run and hide, especially if you had questionable middle name or an inexplicable major. "Hey, 4! Good thing you are majoring in....(pause to read the printout)....Tourism Management. Really? Tourism Management?? My God. Well, I guess you gotta major in something." You could hear people laughing in the stadium. Auburn and LSU had some really creative majors. I swear one guy from Auburn majored in Birdhouse Construction. Oh well, whatever you gotta do to get the talent to finish third in the SEC West, you do it.

Riding the 1 Train yesterday, listening to "Policy of Truth" by Depeche Mode, I began to notice the advertisements that adorn the inside of the cars.

"1-800-BANKRUPTCY"

"Dr. So and So can rid your face of pimples in two weeks, guaranteed!"

"Don't surf the train or you will be wiped out forever."

"The LIRR will be going to SI ASAP, with transfers to the N, Q, R, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6."

Ok, I made that last one up. However, there was another advertisement that caught my eye. It was one of the many advocating the matriculation of subway riders at a local college that offered majors in "applied studies." Without researching what this means, I instantly became amused. Remember in school when a classmate would have to give a presentation and it was clear he/she did not prepare? They would begin to use SAT words and three syllable adverbs to try to cover up the complete bulls**t they were sputtering. "Applied Studies" harkened back to those times. I imagined the class schedule for Applied Studies in my head:

8:00-8:50: Waking Up 101: The Movement of the Body Out of the Rest Area and the Ambulation of Your Leg Appendages to the Restroom

9:00-9:50: Laptop Skills 302 (Honors): Extinguishing the Power Source to the Laptop During a Computer Freeze

10:00 - 10:50: Mailing Letters 508 (Seniors Only): Envelopes Exceed Minimum Weight Requirements for the Forty-Four Cent Stamp: Procedures, Postulations and Theories

11:00 - 2:00: Lunch: State mandated four hour lunch break

2:30 - 3:20: Cash Register 701 (Advanced): The Reciprocation of Currency in the Event of a Malfunction in which the Register Cannot Calculate the Correct Return Currency Automatically. (Dropped mid-semester due to difficulty)

3:30 - 4:20: Student Loan Repayment 102: How to Whine to Your Congressman Effectively When You Get Fired and Can No Longer Afford to Pay Back Your Loans

I looked up Applied Studies when I got home. You should do the same. It makes me realize a couple of things: 1) now, I know where state "customer service" employees come from and 2) I am in the wrong business. It makes for some interesting reading while you light your degree on fire, realizing that it was just cheapened a little more. I thought about the Auburn player majoring in Birdhouse Construction. I hope it all worked out for him and he is building sweet pigeon condos in Dothan, Alabama.

It is funny how things come full circle in your life. I ran into Mack Williams last week in Brooklyn. Apparently, he lives here now too. We had a good laugh about the right field days, the megaphone and all the fun we used to have. The crowd at the NCAA regionals against Florida State in 2001 was epic. The right field crazies were in full regalia that Saturday and when the Dawgs pulled it out, we felt like a part of it as they celebrated in a Dawgpile on the infield. The team actually tipped their hats to us after the game ended. Alas, it is no more. President Adams incited his "No Fun of Any Kind" policy to the UGA campus after we left and the right field area is now fenced off, charges admission and does not allow grills or alcohol. Another great tradition blown away with the stroke of a pen and a few bow tie wearing cronies with nothing better to do. Luckily, Adams is gone after this year. I hope his next job is teaching "Water Filter Replacement" in an Applied Studies program.

Oh yeah....the Georgia Tech first baseman that we lambasted mercilessly......Mark Teixeira, currently starting at first base for the New York Yankees. Who knew?

City At Night....but this ain't LA Woman.

One of the proudest moments I have had in New York City happened yesterday. I was strolling down Amsterdam Avenue on the Upper West Side, listening to "Hello Stranger" by Barbara Lewis (a great forgotten hit, by the way) and wearing my old Georgia basketball t-shirt ca. 1999. The shirt has seen better days. It is faded, the shoulder has a hole about the size of a penny, and the stitching in the sleeves unravels more and more each time I wear. But, by God, it is one of my favorite shirts and I will wear it until it falls apart, then I will use it for a kitchen rag.

Anyhow, I ambled past St. James Gate, an Irish pub near my apartment. An elderly man was outside taking a cigarette break. It was about 7:30 PM and he had clearly been a patron of the bar since lunch time. He drags on the cigarette and studies my shirt closely. His head moves up and he makes eye contact, and in an Irish brogue assisted by no telling how many pints of Guinness, he says, "Georgia Bulldogs?" I remove the headphones, now playing "Crossroader" by Mountain, and say, "Yes sir. Born and bred." The Irishman smiles and "Go Dawgs. And to HELL with Georgia Tech." He grins and goes back to his stool at the bar. See? Even Irishmen hate Tech. It warms the heart, it really does. Erin Go Bragh.

I love Irish pubs in this city. You know why? Because most of them are actually Irish, rather than a gimmick. That was always my complaint with Atlanta, nothing was authentic to me. It was like a group got together, formed a bullcrap LLC, and decided to open a bar. One day, they had a meeting and one guy said, "so, what kind of bar we gonna have?" After 2.7 seconds of thought, one guy throws out the original suggestion, "Irish?" So they go out, buy every Guinness, Smithwick's and Bass bar sign they can find, splatter them all over the walls and call it "O'Shaughnessy's." It would be just like Dublin, except you are in a strip mall next to a tanning salon and Chinese take-out. I'm not saying these places are a bad idea, they just have no allure to me. In this city, if you found a bar called "O'Shaughnessy's," it is probably because some guy named O'Shaughnessy opened it in 1934 because Prohibition ended and he needed to make money.

I think that is what people enjoyed about Cass Grocery: our authenticity. It kept the place novel, rather than run of the mill. When was the last time you heard the following statement in your life?

"Man, I love the new Pilot truck stop on I-75. There's nothing like fighting 63 tourists from Michigan to get a Diet Sierra Mist from the fountain."

Never. Nobody gives a damn about that place. Nobody darkening the doors of that place remembers a thing about it. They might brag that the fountain has 76 flavors or that gas is fifty cents cheaper than everyone else, but that is the extent of their discussion. They had nowhere for locals to drink coffee, no fruit for sale purchased from Henry Stephens (no relation), they could not tell you how much a post hole digger costs, nor could they offer to show you how many Nightcrawlers were in the newest delivery of live worms. Nobody could remember the time the cat pooped on my uncle's arm on the front. Or the time that the Stanley brothers, after witnessing a rude customer threaten yours truly, inform him, "you touch that boy and you won't walk outta here." You won't hear me and Gary Gray singing "After the Thrill is Gone" by The Eagles while putting up sweet feed.

We did not have Diet Sierra Mist, in fact, we only had six flavors: Coke, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, Diet Dr. Pepper, Sprite and Mello Yello. Our coffee maker had two pots, all caffeinated, all day. You want sugar free, Godiva chocolate creamer with a lemon twist? Sorry. We ain't got it. Neither do we have sleeves for the cups or lids that open conveniently. We drink coffee as God intended in the 30123 and if it burns your hands, then we made it right. There are no Bose speakers installed in the ceiling playing Kenny G. We have an old Panasonic radio and it will probably be playing Tracy Lawrence, Tracy Byrd, or Travis Tritt. The TV will be on Denny Brauer fishing in Lake Okeechobee, not showing a camera image of you walking down an aisle. Nobody would ever return to the Pilot at night, just to sit on the front and watch cars go by. I used to do that when I was 17. I would take a Coke and a Snickers and just sit there. It would be so quiet for minutes and then headlights would appear. The horn honks, "BOY! What you doin' out here? Ain't you had enough of this place?!?" I raised my glass bottle Coke in a toast as they pull away. Nope, never, I said to myself.  Then it's just me and the crickets. There is truly nothing like Cassville at night.

The Dublin Tap Room, which is located about one block from my apartment here, has an awesome bartender who calls me "lad" when I stop by. When I order a Guinness, he says, "You mean Mother's Milk, lad." His accent is so thick I can barely understand him. Women are welcome, but this is a man's bar. One television has the Yankees channel and the other has European soccer, both watched equally by the patrons. Almost every man over 50 orders a shot of Jameson's with his beer. I'm nowhere near to that point, I'm more of a "one and done after work" customer. They have some signs on the wall, but most are advertisments for local bands or framed newspaper articles about Irish soccer teams. No frills. No gimmicks. No Cee-Lo blaring out of the speakers. Just a quiet place to reflect, watch sports, and people watch out the window to 79th Street.

There is something almost religious about it when the sun goes down. They have a blinking neon sign hanging over the door, a mix-hued conglomeration of red, green and yellow. The colors blink separately, so the sidewalk and the passers-by change color as the sign changes. One night, Glenn Miller's "Moonlight Serenade" was playing over the speakers and I just sat there and watched people walk by. Young white teenagers, adorned by the red flash, laughing and horsing around. A black man in a suit, lit up by the yellow flash, talks on his cell phone as he walks home. An Asian couple pushes their child in a stroller, brought to light by the green. The bartender talks quietly and expediently with other Irishmen and goes out to smoke. Cabs fly by toward Riverside Avenue and New Jersey. The day has gone to bed, but the everybody and everything moves on. "Same dances in the same old shoes," said Glenn Frey. I almost can hear the crickets. There is truly nothing like New York City at night.