Bringing the Drama

Last night’s Clemson game hurt. I haven’t been that upset after a game since last year’s Bama game. It just hurt to watch GT on the last drive, and it hurt for Clemson to fail on 4th and 1 with 30 seconds remaining. It hurt for CJ Spiller to have such an amazing game and be named MVP, but to lose in the end in excruciatingly painful fashion. Yuck. However, today somewhat made up for it and made me feel a little better.

Tonight was my project team’s final presentation. I caught up on watching class videos before the Saints game this morning, to make sure nothing was talked about in a lecture that would be useful for the presentation, and also to catch up because I was two lecture videos behind. Once the Saints game started, I took a break.

The Saints game didn’t exactly start off that well. The offense was being frustrated by the Redskins D, and the Saints D was not able to get much pressure on Jason Campbell. Weird stuff was happening, like this TD near the end of the first half. Seriously, when have you seen something like that happen? (linky link) A rough transcript of the play from me as the play happened, then as the play was reviewed and confirmed on the field: “oh come on, he didn’t intercept it! It hit the ground! Go Meachem! GO MEACHEM! TOUCHDOWN! No, he did intercept it! He wasn’t down! That is a touchdown!….YES! YES! WHO DAT!”

At halftime I went back to watching video, and had the audio of the game going on in the background. At the beginning of the 4th quarter I went back to watching the game. What happened at the end is still unexplainable to me. The Redskins were driving up 30-23, and got inside the 10 yard line. They went to kick the FG with 2 min to play, and I thought the Saints were dead to rights. The only way they could win now would be to block the FG. I thought this was how it was going to end, and they would have to hope the Vikings would lose tonight to maintain being #1 overall in the NFC. The dream was over. Then it happened. The Redskins missed a 23 yard FG! The Saints took over with no timeouts, and ended up scoring a TD with a little over a minute to play to tie the game at 30. WHAT? They got an INT, then had a chance to win with a 58 yard FG, but missed, and the game went to overtime. The Redskins won the toss, got the ball first, but then there was a fumble and the Saints recovered. They went down and kicked an 18 yard FG and won the game in overtime 33-30. I still cannot believe how it all ended.

Then I had to come down off the high of seeing such a miraculous finish and concentrate on my team’s final presentation. We had met as a team on Wednesday last week to do a rehearsal, and I tripped over my words. It was crazy and very embarrassing. This evening before the meeting, I wrote out what I would say for each slide I was supposed to talk, so I wouldn’t mess anything up. We all logged in for the meeting and the professor joined in shortly after. We did our thing and everything came out great. I was really happy with everything. I had asked our mentor a couple of weeks ago to be really picky with our presentation, because I wanted to make sure we’d be prepared for any questions our professor could think of. I think his questions prepared us for tonight, and we were able to answer our prof’s questions with flying colors. All that is left for me in that class is the final and then I’ll be done, and based on how well I did on the midterm, I feel good about that.

So this fake company I’m CEO of in my grad school class is coming together. We give the final presentation next week, so tonight was the 2nd of two weeks where we did run-throughs for the presentation and our mentor guy critiqued. I asked him last week to really grill us this week and hold nothing back. We met this evening and he put us on the spot a few times, which was good. I don’t know how our prof is going to play his role next week, so I want my team to be prepared as much as possible. We were missing one of our team members though, so we’re going to have to meet during the week this week to get our timing down before next week. I’m really proud of the team though, and I feel good about our presentation next week. I definitely will be glad when it’s over though.

After the meeting, I tuned in to the end of the Clemson/Butler basketball game. I was yelling pretty loud at my laptop, and was on the edge of my chair as the game went back and forth. Clemson had some defensive lapses and was down 5 or 7 with about 3 minutes left. Then they finally changed defenses and buckled down and created opportunities and clawed back into the game. They had the final possession it seemed down 1. I was yelling “get a good shot! drive to the basket!” Then it happened, the PG drove to the basket, missed the shot but got fouled. Two FTs upcoming, for a guy who was up until that point 0-2. He made BOTH free throws. Clemson had the lead with 3 seconds to play. Butler inbounded but Trevor Booker blocked the first shot, then they inbounded again but it got tipped away. It was a HUGE resumé win for the team. Nobody is going to remember that they fought hard in March, only that they won.

I woke up this morning excited to watch the Clemson-south carolina game. Even though Clemson has looked great the past 6 games, I told someone last week, I keep waiting for the fall. I’ve been accustomed to some kind of bad game just when you think everything is going well. Last week they won the division, but this week was the rivalry game. I HATE south carolina. My freshman year they won at Clemson and I vividly remember standing on the hill watching the team jump up and down on the Tiger Paw. How dare they! Clemson doesn’t lose that often to south carolina, so to most people it’s not that big of a rivalry, but I know better.

Today I wasn’t that nervous about the game, but I wasn’t as confident as I was last week. CJ Spiller returned the opening kickoff for a TD, and it was great! However, all that joy faded quickly as I watched the offense sputter and the defense not capitalize on fumbles by south carolina. I didn’t give up hope until the onside kick when it was 27-17 ended up giving the ball to south carolina at the 6 or something. ARGH!

I tried explaining the rivalry last night. When south carolina wins, it’s like a punch in the gut. Sure, they don’t win that often, but it still sucks when they do. I guess in the big picture it shouldn’t be that big of a deal since Clemson’s playing in the ACC title game next week, but I was still bummed this afternoon. I went for a run and felt a little better. They still finished 8-4, all is not lost.

I immediately started looking ahead to the Saints/Pats game on MNF. They must have had 1000 promos for the game during the Clemson game today, one time with the wrong team logos. Since I’m on the Saints season ticket waiting list, I get emails from them every so often about the upcoming game. For the MNF game this week, the email talked about how they want fans to arrive as early as possible and be in their seats with plenty of time. To encourage this, they are opening a few of the parking lots at 6 am. SIX IN THE MORNING! I’m not sure how much I’ll be able to concentrate at work on Monday. It’s going to be like those commercials, I’ll have to deal with characters like BO Guy and KCOG, but I’ll keep telling myself “Don’t worry about all these guys. Tonight’s just for me!”

So last year when Clemson hired Dabo Swinney as the football head coach, I was happy with the decision. I was not completely 100% behind it, but more excited for the possibility of it being a good hire. I was totally behind Dabo, but I had some reservations. The beginning of this year when the team started 2-3, I started questioning what was going on. The offense looked bad, and the coaching staff was completely outmatched against Georgia Tech. I had seen them play in person against TCU and thought they had some grit to them, but they lost. After the loss to Maryland, I really was wondering what was going on. I know Dabo talks a good game, but it’s another thing to see it on the field. Still, the results were not very inspiring. Then they strung together a few wins, and won impressively over BC and Wake. The win against Miami was huge IMO. The game against FSU might have started off shaky, but they finished strong.

All this week the talk has been about finishing strong. The team would lock up the division with a BC loss OR a Clemson win, but Dabo was focused on the Clemson win. “We want to do what champions do and that’s take care of business.” I loved hearing that. My friend Scott called me this morning and asked me how I felt about the game today. I told him there was no way they’d lose. The way they have played the past few weeks has shown me that they’re completely capable of ‘taking care of business’.

I was able to watch the game today and they were a little shaky when UVa was running a lot of trick plays. I guess it’ll be good to play against that kind of stuff in preparation for the rematch with GT. Spiller didn’t have HUGE game like I was hoping, but I still think he deserves a chance to go to NYC for the Heisman ceremony. Clemson ended up winning rather easily, which is the most important thing. ‘Rather easily’ in that it wasn’t really in doubt, but there was some doubt and it could have gone the other way. The rematch with GT should be a good game, hopefully there won’t be any horrible coaching breakdowns like back in September.

Today ESPN has a 24 hour block of college basketball that they started last night with a game in California. I found it cool at first, but then the closer it got I thought it was a little insane. There was game in New Jersey tipping off at 6 am this morning. SIX IN THE MORNING! Why? So some network fat cats could sell advertising? As much as the NCAA says they are protecting student athletes, they allow this kind of thing to happen, but then suspend a WR for an entire season, effectively ending his college career, for lying.

Anyway, my beloved Clemson Tigers were playing Liberty at 10 am. A ridiculous time for everyone involved. I saw on the Liberty webpage last night, that each student was going to be able to get a stamp on their way out of the arena and be excused from class. Unfortunately for them, Clemson rolled Liberty by 40 points and according to their rules, they had to sit through the entire thing. It was 42-19 at halftime. Not only did the teams miss class and have their schedules thrown off, but the students attending the game too. I thought about it last night if I was still at Clemson, and they had a game tipoff at 6 am would I go. I probably would, just like I went to that Hornets game that started at 8:30. Still though, I thought it was crazy to make players and fans go through that.

In the 2nd half of my college experience, back when I was young and naive, I bought cds like they were going out of style. I probably spent half of my intern money on cds after my first intern semester. I sometimes would drive up to Greenville, SC just to go to the record shop when I was working in Greenwood, SC. Not every visit netted something important, but I did happen to score a vinyl copy of the Pearl Jam live album, which apparently is out of print and worth more than the $12 I paid for it. My 5th year when I had an on-campus job, I probably still spent way too much on cds.

The year I was living in Clemson being a bum, (aka believing a headhunter really did have an ‘in’ for a job for me and was just working things out) I went to the local music store a lot. The owner gave me the inside scoop on new bands, and I was always a sucker for albums that were $6.99 and $7.99, no matter who they were. If someone recommended them, I’d buy them. I found John Mayer this way before ‘No Such Thing’ broke. Yeah, I am that cool. I also found this guy, Pete Yorn. His first album is still one of my favorites. My friend Marika and I called him the mimbo. It used to be ‘smoldering mimbo’, but now I think it’s just mimbo. I may be the only person still using the nickname. Anyway, he had a song on his 2nd album called ‘Burrito’ that Marika and I would laugh about. I saw him live in 2003, and he played Burrito that night. It was one of the highlights of the show.

I had seen Pete Yorn listed for a NOLA tour stop a couple of weeks ago, but seeing how it was on a Tuesday was going to make it difficult to find a concert friend. With friends being married and maybe with kids now, they somehow don’t have time anymore for weeknight concerts. Anyway, so I was talking to my friend Jacob last week and he asked me if I wanted to go see Pete Yorn. We’re going Tuesday, and we’ll both have beards because Jacob’s in Whiskerino again and I’m growing mine out again. If time permits, I’ll get a picture. Word.

Since today’s Saints game wasn’t until 3 pm today, I was able to get some stuff done around the house. I set out to cut my back yard for the first time in weeks. I got about 3/4 of it done before my lawnmower had had enough. I then took out my edger and did some detail work. While I was outside with the edger, I saw one of the sons (I’m guessing) of the old lady that lives behind me. That tree that fell a few months ago, it’s still there. He rode the riding lawnmower around the tree as if it’s another obstacle. It’s ridiculous and sad. At 3 pm, I finished up outside and watched the Saints game. The yard still needs to be cut, but I took care of a lot of the back yard, and also took care of a couple of ant problems around my house. Seeing the ants try to come up for air only to find more poison made me evilly laugh. I still have a ways to go, but with the HALF MARATHON over, I have found I have more time to do things, which is awesome.

My fake company meeting tonight even went well, and we finished up early, which was great. I’m much more comfortable with steering the meetings, which helps keep us focused, and helps the meetings flow much better. We should have our project wrapped up next week and then we have to present it at the end of the month. We’re on track, and our mentor gave us props this evening for our progress.

It was a good football weekend again. I didn’t think LSU would be Alabama, so I wasn’t surprised at the result. I was disappointed with HOW it happened, because I thought for sure LSU had an INT that the refs completely missed. Clemson took care of FSU and moved closer to an ACC title game appearance. My favorite part was when the Clemson safety threw a shoulder into the FSU QB who was trying to prevent an INT return for a TD. It is still weird for me to see Clemson beat FSU, even though it’s happened 5 out of the past 7 times. It will never get old.

This past weekend was so great, that in order to tell you about it, I’m going to break it up into two parts. Blog friend Mandy will appreciate this also as she is wont for something to read while she gets back into being at work, and not on vacation anymore. SaturDAY I went over to my sister’s to borrow her iPod so I could go run. I went for 7 miles in preparation for the HALF MARATHON next week. Everything went fine, and the weather was perfect. It’ll be great if the weather is like that for next Saturday.

After the run, I went and returned my sister’s iPod, and then went to the gas station closest to my house for a couple of bags of ice. My friend Megan has told me ice baths are awesome after a long run. I did try one after the TEN MILE run a couple of weeks ago but had only gotten one bag of ice. One bag didn’t really feel that cold, so Saturday I was getting two. I got out of my car and was checking the big cooler out front to make sure they had bags of ice. I hear “Hey neighbor!” and turn and see this guy who I didn’t recognize. I looked around at his car and it was the white truck that lives at the house around the corner from me. The guy always has Saints stuff out front on Sundays, and he keeps his yard really nice. I always pass and think the house is cool. I shook his hand with vigor going “oh yeah, you live in the house with all the Saints stuff!” He laughed and said “yeah man. You know, you never can tell how tall someone is if all you ever see them in is their car.” He was a little taller than me, but not much. We laughed, and he went inside. I went inside and bought my two bags of ice, and went back outside to grab them out of the cooler. My new neighbor friend was also getting ice, so after I put the bags in my car, I went back and introduced myself. He said his name was Marlon, and I mentioned the Saints stuff again, and he explained how he’s part of a group of 7 houses that rotate Saints parties every Sunday. This weekend it was at his house. So I told him that was cool, and we went our separate ways.

I got home and did the ice bath thing, and I’m not sure even two bags was cold enough. I keep reading about how it’s supposed to hurt by being so cold, so I think maybe I’m not getting the water cold enough. I might try 3 on Saturday after the HALF MARATHON. Anyway, I started watching the Clemson/Miami game and it was great, at first. I was watching and saw Miami score to make it 10-7 with less than a minute to play in the first half. When that happens, you’re always kind of going “you know, it’d be really cool if they returned the kickoff for a TD.” That’s exactly what happened! CJ Spiller returned the kick for a TD and Clemson had the lead with 40 something seconds left. Crazy.

The second half started, and then I started making dinner. I was watching the game in my bedroom, and walking back and forth to the kitchen. I started noticing when I’d be watching the game, something bad would happen. When I’d come back from being out of the room, they’d be showing a replay of a good play for Clemson. This happened 2 or 3 times, so after Kyle Parker threw the INT in the end zone when Clemson was almost assured a FG to tie the game in the 4th quarter, I had had enough. Obviously by me watching the game live, something was happening to the team. I had to stop watching, I couldn’t take it anymore. I left the room and went back to the kitchen, then got on the computer and didn’t keep track of the game. After a while I figured it might be over, so I went to check and saw the game was going into OT. I left the room again and hoped they’d find a way to win in OT. About 5 or 10 minutes later my dad called and says “How about that game???” I told him I had quit watching it, the whole story about me thinking I was bad luck. He told me they won in OT with a TD pass. Awesome. I felt a little validated.

I was able to watch the end of the game more than a few times on ESPN360 before I started watching the LSU/Auburn game. I couldn’t believe it. I had thought Clemson had a shot at winning the game before, but they were so inconsistent I had no idea what would happen. I knew Clemson had the players to matchup with Miami, but had no idea if they’d actually make the plays. I realized also after the game that I’d get to email my friend Nick (from work, who now lives in FL) who went to the U, who had trash talked after Clemson lost to GT. I told him just wait until October 24th and we’ll see. We did see. I emailed him this morning.

I talked to my friend Bill after the game too, and told him about the superstitious activity of the 2nd half. I also told him that I’m glad I ended up not going to the game, because obviously being in the stadium would have been the ultimate jinx and Clemson would have lost 52-7 or something. Being down in Miami for the Clemson game and then the Saints game the next day would have been awesome, but not having anyone to go with and it being expensive made the decision not to go rather easy (and a little sad in retrospect). C’est la vie!

I’m going up to Clemson in the morning to go to my first home game since 2006. I sent a couple of FB messages to friends who still live up there to ask about parking, etc. It got me thinking about the old times, when things were simpler. I liked when my biggest decisions revolved around how many times during the week I’d eat Easy Mac.

Also getting me thinking about stuff that happened a while back, was listening to the new David Crowder Band album at work today. Listening to that got me thinking of the night my sister and I went and saw them two months after Katrina. That night pulled us through a lot of angst we had been feeling about the world and each other. I’ll never forget it. I really love the new album, I was getting stuck on a couple of songs today, and hearing a couple of them made me tear up a bit. I’ve been going through a lot of church stuff lately. A small church plant that started off really awesome has now become frustrating. It seems the group just lost focus on what we were there for, building life together as a group. My small group that was so important to me unofficially ended a few months ago, but now there are flickers we might bring it back, only different. I’ve felt lost the past few months with wanting to become part of a church body and being let down. Working with the youth group was awesome, until the youth group fractured and some kids stopped coming. Between work and school and YG being canceled a lot over the summer, I haven’t been back in a while. When I heard about the drama a couple of months ago, it hurt to hear about how adults unintentionally (i hope!) messed up the YG. Can’t anyone just focus on what’s important? Back to the DCB, hearing “oh how He loves us” over and over again, it was like I was Will Hunting and Sean was saying it wasn’t my fault. I know I knew all of that before today, but things lately just have made it hard to see.