The best $70 I've spent in a while

Georgia has quite a few rivals when it comes to football, but few are more bitter than the one with Georgia Tech. For my money, the only rivalry that is more bitter is the one with Florida, but Tech is different. They're not in our conference, and aside from national poll rankings, the only things at stake in the game are pride and bragging rights.

For those of you that are unaware (and judging by the people that frequent my blog, it's not many) the rivalry has earned the title "Clean, old-fashioned hate." And it always lives up to its billing.

This year was a little different for me. It was the first game I was going to attend without a Redcoat uniform, and it was the first time I was actually going to buy a ticket.

My brother had actually bought a packet of three tickets at the beginning of the season, mostly because of this game, but also because rising receiving star Calvin Johnson went to our high school and played with my brother, so it's always nice to see a former teammate succeeding.

I, however, was not so forward-thinking and actually showed up at the stadium without a ticket or even a clue as to where to get one. So, after parking (another thing I've never had to worry about at a football game) my brother and I wandered the Tech campus looking for a ticket scalper that looked slightly less-seedy than the others. After laughing in the face of a guy asking for $125, we found a guy that asked me to name my price.

Thinking I might get lucky, I started off at $40 (ha!). As expected, the scalper was noticeably underwhelmed. Long story short, we settled on $70, though I’m pretty sure I could’ve gotten it for $65.

I was mostly concerned about getting a ticket on the lower level in hopes that I could finagle my way over to the band before kick off and do a little visiting before the usher kindly asked to see my ticket and made me go to my proper section.

Well, I was right about the first part. I was able to finagle my way to the Redcoats, but there was no usher and I was never asked to return to my section. All the better.

Several of my old friends and former comrades seemed genuinely happy to see me, which I needed more than I realized. It’s always nice to know that you meant enough to people and made enough of an impression that it would brighten their day to see you again. Speaking of which, I have pictures.

Here’s Robin and me. Yes, we’re standing on the same step. She’s just tiny. That’s my brother in the background, looking bored and confused, as usual.



Here I am with Matt and Floyd. If Floyd looks a little too excited, he probably is. But that’s his natural state.



Hey it’s 'Manda.



As I said before, I was never asked to return to my seat, and thus decided to set up shop right in the middle of the Tech student section, along with about four other UGA fans. It’s quite an odd feeling to be surrounded by so many people that have nothing but disdain for you, but we dealt with it.

Being a mostly math and science institution, Tech students, for the most part, aren’t exactly wordsmiths. This was no more evident than in their attempts at trash-talking. One such exchange went thusly:

Random, rather imbibed Tech student: I wish I went to UGA, that way I could [have sexual intercourse with] my mom, and not feel bad about it.

Me: Wait, so you [have sexual intercourse with] your mom, but you feel bad about it?

Random, rather imbibed Tech student: Buh...no, but you...uh...man, shut up.

Tech students also like to make fun of the fact that the University of Georgia offers a poultry science major. Now, I know this is a foreign concept to students from a four year trade school, but at a real college, a variety of majors is offered. While students at UGA can indeed major in poultry science if they like, they may also major in cellular biology, physics and astronomy, genetics, and several other fields that don’t end in “engineering.” But I digress.

I find that Tech students aren’t exactly proficient at communication in general. Many of the students around me were quite displeased that the UGA band was in such close vicinity, and the most common means of expressing said displeasure was to extend the middle finger...for the entire game. These guys really stuck with it:



Such class.

Another popular method of expressing distaste was to hurl various projectiles at the band, including but not limited to ice, souvenir cups, hats (?), and entire drinks. This year, however, it seemed that there was less tolerance than in years past. In previous years, we’d be pelted with various objects, and it was annoying and if we could identify who did it, we’d notify security and maybe it’d get dealt with, but for the most part, we just ignored it.

This year, not so much. This year, the band staff would handle it. This classy gentleman was throwing ice at the woodwinds:



The staff handled it. Way to lay the smackdown, Jav.

The game itself was pretty exciting, but any of you that care about it already know what happened, so I’ll save you the recap.





I was just pleased to learn that due to the use of ineligible players, the three wins Tech had over us in the late 90’s had to be negated, so our streak was actually extended to 12 years in a row. So that’s nice. Now, if we could just use some of that mojo against Florida.