Reindeer Rally ‘07

http://pictures.thelauves.com/reindeerrally0712.html

Webster's defines "commencement" as "a beginning". If that's the case, then December 15, 2007 was a day of significant commencements, both the kind accomplished by walking across a stage and the kind brought about by running through a mall.

We left the driveway at 7:00 a.m. on Saturday in order to make Cristina's 9:00 a.m. graduation. Cristina is the last of the three Lauve kids to graduate from Texas A&M, and to say we have the drill down at this point is an understatement. Texas A&M is a great school, but unfortunately its graduation ceremony leaves a little to be desired. That's a problem with big school graduations: they feature huge numbers of people walking across the stage, and in the case of A&M, the graduation is split into three different ceremonies, which means we usually don't get the benefit of high-profile speakers. But it was a good ceremony, and Cristina did a great job getting her last name pronounced correctly.

My aunt Diana told us that after Cristina's graduation we would go back toward Houston and participate in the first ever Reindeer Rally, which none of us could quite make heads or tails of. Expecting some sort of athletic competition, I was surprised when we pulled up to Katy Mills Mall, which, for me, is not a place I prefer to go any way other than kicking and screaming.

As it turns out, the Reindeer Rally (at least the 2007 incarnation of it) is a scavenger hunt. A very involved scavenger hunt that requires collecting items, gathering information, and taking pictures throughout the giant donut-shaped outlet mall. We were split into teams (my cousin Eric was with me, Alicia was with Brandi, Cristina was with my cousin Cecilia, my dad was with Diana, and my mom was with my uncle Kyle) and given a packet of tasks that included the following:

• Get a picture taken while talking with a kiosk vendor


• Transcribe John 1:14


• Get a picture taken in a jersey from an athletic store


• Grab a free food sample


• Place pennies in the wishing well


• Operate a remote-controlled vehicle


• Play Dance Dance Revolution


• Purchase a t-shirt for a child


• Purchase a teddy bear


• Purchase a children's educational book


• Get a picture taken while getting a massage


• Purchase 1/2 pound of candy


• Find the 10th track on Bing Crosby's Christmas album


• Make a souvenir penny


• Buy some bubble gum and blow a bubble


• Play the shooting gallery

What follows are the stories of two of the five Reindeer Rally teams. They wouldn't let Brandi and me be on the same team, but that didn't keep us from posting excellent results in the soon-to-be-perennial event.

Brandi and Alicia's Team
Even before I knew what Reindeer Rally was, I knew I was going to like it. I enjoy surprises, and figured that no matter what it was, it would give me some bonding time with my new family. When Diana called out the pairings, I had a feeling that Alicia and I would do well together. In fact, I thought we had a pretty good chance of winnning. With Daniel acting as though he was non-plussed with the atmosphere, and Eric and Cecilia both going through separate phases of being too cool for reindeer games, Alicia and I were the only pairing where both teammates were eager for the challenge.

Quickly we were off, taking our positions-Alicia deciding which store we were going to go to next and me reading off the instructions for each. Alicia did a superb job at creating the charted course of the mall so that we made sure and did each task in order as the stores were found. One of our biggest mistakes was really due to my poor reading of context clues. I read, "Go to the Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World, look for the shooting gallery and take one picture of your teammate shooting a round, and another of their score" and thought it was referring to golf so we spent some good quality time looking for a driving range in Outdoor World. Sorry Alicia! It also took us several minutes to figure out to take a picture of our score so probably not our shining moment in the contest. This was also around the time where I wondered allowed if Daniel was able to put his issues with shopping behind him and enjoy the fun of Reindeer Rally.

Probably one of our best feats was bribing a smart pre-teen and her little sister to let us break in line and play Dance Dance Revolution for long enough for us to take a picture. The oldest sibling informed us that in order for us to do so, we would need to pay not only her for the game but for her sister to play too! That's where we first spotted Cristina & Cecilia. Alicia and I started to run through the mall towards the end as we could feel Cristina and Cecilia close on our heels. Imagine my surprise and our slight disappointment when we were told by our benevolent judges (Grandmommie & Aunt Dortha) that Daniel and Eric were the first to finish!

Even with that sad mement of realizing we came in 2nd, the Reindeer Ralley was truly a success. Not only did we learn about each other and enjoy the hunt, we also got to contribute a donation to Salvation Army in the end. Each of collected a shirt, teddy bear and book for a different child in need. We also celebrated the winners in all of us since everyone, even the parents, did complete the scavenger hunt. We ate dinner at the Rainforest Cafe and had the Sparkling Volcanoan Dessert! We had a really good day celebrating Cristina and her graduation and then each other in the spirit of giving! I'm very excited to see what next year's Reindeer Rally brings.

Daniel and Eric's Team
My less-than-rosy disposition on a mall-based scavenger hunt changed as soon as I heard the teams announced. When I thought we were going to be doing a lot of running around, I thought of this as a competition between Eric's team and my team. Now that the two top competitors (in the DL preseason power rankings) were on the same team, it was obvious what had to happen: we had to run away with this thing.

My initial thought on the contest was that it was going to be very close. I figured that the difference between first and second place would be less than a minute, which meant cutting out seconds wherever possible. The instructions gave us just one rule, that each team had to stay together, so everything else was open to interpretation. This led to our three-word mantra: "keep the change". We were supplied with envelopes filled with money for most of our stops, and we probably shaved off a couple minutes by being slightly careless with my aunt and uncle's money. The rest of it came from good old two-guys-trying-to-get-out-of-the-mall impatience. We abhorred waiting in line, and for the last half hour or so, we ran everywhere we went.

The highlight of our scavenger hunt had to be the massage. The instructions said that we had to get our picture taken while getting a massage, and the massage envelope included four quarters. Remarkably, ours was the only team that couldn't figure out that we were expected to pop four quarters into an electric massage chairs. So when we came across a massage station with real live masseuses ($15 minimum), I decided to try and negotiate a $1 massage. What we ended up agreeing to was $2 for a 15-second massage, which gave us a picture that I think was the best one from Reindeer Rally.

After frantically scrambling through the final few tasks and getting our pictures developed, we raced to the finish line and were surprised to find that we were first. When you think about it, it's kind of remarkable that the only all-male team ended up being the best at navigating the mall. For the sake of competition, I hope that next year's Reindeer Rally involves baking or painting fingernails or something like that; otherwise, it's bound to be much more lopsided than this year's.

You might be a Cardinals fan if…

...at 1:01 Central Time today, you pulled up a PDF of the Mitchell Report, typed "pujols" into the search box, and hit enter.

That's what I did, and after taking a look at some of the blogs this afternoon, that's what a lot of people did. We all registered relief when no results came back, but  it's unwise to view a player's absence from the report as evidence that he doesn't use steroids. I believe Pujols is clean---he's shown none of the steroid-type spikes associated with steroid use, he has no reason (dipping production or being on the major league margin) to use, and he strikes me as an honest, straightforward man who sincerely cares about the integrity of the game. But on this report were 86 names that somebody was certain would never, ever use steroids. And anybody who thinks that the list, which used only two sources for most of the names it generated, is comprehensive is deluded. The list could be off by an order of magnitude---the players listed are remarkably diverse in terms of team, position, and age, but the one thing they seem to have in common is their carelessness. Presumably, there is another group of players (and trainers, and doctors, and executives) that was careful enough to steer clear of the investigation.

I was not alone among St. Louis fans in being relieved that the Cardinals were not terribly hard hit by the report. What a horrible way to react---finding only a few minor players from your favorite team implicated in this awfully damning report and treating that as a silver lining---but that's unfortunately the world we live in. Steroids have arguably ruined the last decade of the game, at least in terms of statistics and comparing with other eras. I wouldn't want to be a Hall of Fame voter right now---I'd be compelled not to vote for players linked with steroids, but even that is troubling because a) many of the links are based on hearsay and b) withholding votes from steroid users is essentially tacit approval of the people you vote for as being clean players, when you actually have no idea.

As I looked through the results of the investigation, one name jumped off the page. Fernando Vina. Fernando Vina? The guy who sits in between Mark McGwire and Tony Pena as the Cardinal acquisitions in which I am most disappointed? The guy whose only recourse for getting on base was attempting to get hit by a pitch? Was he taking steroid injections into his right elbow? Did he discuss with his trainer a mix of drugs that would allow him to dangle his limbs into the strike zone? Did he develop such a super-strong elbow that he was able to deflect fastballs with it four times a game? When the steroids came in, did the side of the package say, "Side effects may include an insanely overmanicured goatee"? That Fernando Vina?

This is really depressing, and the saddest part is that it probably doesn't get any better until Major League Baseball develops and agrees on a test for human growth hormone. As has been said elsewhere, the focus is on names like Roger Clemens when it should have been squarely on two names, Bud Selig and Donald Fehr. And shame on all of us fans, too, by the way. None of the stakeholders in this thing asked enough questions or demanded enough action, and now we're paying the price for it.

In other news, the Astros traded five players for Miguel Tejada (possibly the most productive active player implicated in the report) a couple days ago. Before the 2007 season, a couple Houston friends asked what I thought the Astros should do about Roger Clemens. I said that they should pay him $3 million to go play somewhere else. The reason behind that is that signing Roger Clemens, with his ability to lift the team out of the doldrums and into the playoff hunt, awakened something (let's call it hope) that was not necessarily productive in the long term. I didn't think the Astros would ever be great again with Roger Clemens; just good enough to almost make the playoffs. And with the way they tend to give up prospects, I think their focus should be squarely on the future. They don't need Roger Clemens around to change their viewpoint on "win now" vs. "win later". Well, the Astros have proven that they don't need Roger Clemens around to help them make ill-advised short term decisions; they can do that just fine on their own. In Tejada, they get a very good player for at least (and maybe only) one year. They gave up five players, including some promising youngsters, with 27 years remaining on their combined contracts. Yikes.

Where Have You Gone, Number Fifty-One?

"You'll look around for Willie McGee one day, and he won't be around."
---Willie McGee

The prognostication that Willie McGee made late in his career about a quiet disappearance from baseball ended up not quite coming true.  But eight years later, the same unfortunately cannot be said about his charitable foundation.

The 1999 season was Willie's last with the St. Louis Cardinals, and he was sent out with a standing ovation every time he came to the plate.  Five years later, he founded a charitable organization that helped gave scholarships and other financial support to students in the Oakland, California area.

My first exposure to the Willie McGee Foundation was in 2004, when Jarvis Brown, McGee's best friend and the president of the organization, gave me a call.  Their website was just about to launch, and Jarvis, who had seen some pictures on the WillieMcGee site I developed, called to see if I had any more.  The most surreal part of the call came when Jarvis told me about the group's kickoff event, which was to include VIPs from the San Francisco area and from the baseball world.  "City councilman so-and-so is coming, and mayor whatshisname, and, oh yeah, Ozzie's coming."  Just like that, as casually as you might mention that Uncle Steve is joining us for cards this weekend, he mentioned the anticipated arrival of the most exciting baseball player I've ever seen.

I considered donating to the Willie McGee Foundation a few times in the years after that phone conversation.  I checked in on the website fairly regularly, proud to see that Willie was still giving back to some promising students and athletes in his home area.  But a few weeks ago, when I pulled up the site, it wasn't there anymore.  I can't even find a mention of what happened to the foundation or why it disappeared.

This is just a reminder that there's never a bad time to give money to a charity that you care about.  There are always plenty of worthy and needy organizations, especially at this time of year, but that shouldn't be an impediment to giving to the ones you feel are most deserving.

Thanksgiving Pictures

http://pictures.thelauves.com/thanksgiving0711.html

Brandi and I spent our first major holiday together (Halloween being a mid-major) in Houston, College Station, and Jasper. Our trip began at the Neely's (my aunt and uncle's) house, where we had a great time. We went on a run with Sarge, the Great Dane puppy with the taped-up ears, and I did well in basketball but not so great in soccer (lost 5-4 to the team of Cecilia and Brandi). On Wednesday night, we played Scrabble, watched Frequency, and ate pizza with Alicia and Cristina. Did you know that the day before Thanksgiving is one of the biggest pizza delivery days of the year (rivaling Super Bowl Sunday)? Makes sense.

Thanksgiving Day was Alicia's first to host, which means that I got to prep my first turkey. The meal was very good, even the very nontraditional dessert of cheesecake that made an appearance for my mom's birthday. On the Thanksgiving All-Star team for 2007 were the squash casserole, dressing, and the pumpkin cobbler. The Thanksgiving MVP was the gravy, a gametime decision, that ended up being pretty much the best gravy I've ever put on turkey and dressing. The turkey was remarkably moist, too.

The big day for me was Friday, where Brandi and I attended our first Texas/Texas A&M game together. Our only other college football game to attend (and Brandi's first college---or pro---football game) was last year's Texas/Baylor game, which, apart from being a Baylor game, took place somewhere other than Kyle Field. We arrived just in time to tailgate with my uncle's family, and I threw the football with Eric before we headed into the stadium, arriving just in time to sing the Spirit of Aggieland. The game was incredible, with plenty of big plays, most coming from the home team. At halftime, we were treated to the Show Band of the Southwest, which performed a tribute to super heroes (including, oddly, Robin Hood), and Brandi got to see the Fightin' Texas Aggie Band for the first time. When we arrived in Jasper, Brandi's mom had made sugar cookies, and I got to watch them all decorate them.

On Saturday we went with Brandi's parents to pick up their Christmas tree. It was rainy and cold, the closest you can get to wintry weather in late November in Southeast Texas. We spent the rest of the day decorating the tree with lights and ornaments, ate Connie's great chicken and dumplings and a wonderful peach cobbler, and watched parts of a couple of movies. On Sunday we attended mass, ate lunch out, and took inventory of Cabbage Patch Dolls and Star Wars figures. Then we got on the road. Our first holiday together was a wonderful one, and it was a great dress rehearsal for the big one, which is right around the corner.

The Nunezes in Austin

http://pictures.thelauves.com/nunez0711.html

I'm a little bit behind the curve; this is my first article to write on our new family blog as newlyweds and it's two weeks after the event I'm writing about. And I was the one who wanted us to have a blog, right Daniel?

Two weeks ago my Mom called to see what we were up to and it ended up working out just right for her and my Dad to come to Austin for the weekend. They came in on Friday night and we immediately went for Mexican food & margaritas (Dad's favorite!) at Chuy's.

On Saturday morning I got up early to have coffee with Mom & Dad, which is special for me. Daniel doesn't drink coffee (and sleeps later), and I rarely drink it unless I'm with my parents or it's a Starbucks kinda day, which I try not to make a habit of. I had made a few notes of some things to do, and one was definitely Town Lake. My Dad is a runner and the reason why I began jogging. I still work hard at it as it doesn't come naturally to me, but somehow that makes me love it even more.

We all enjoyed Town Lake in our own way, walking and/or running, and it ended with a twist because we sort of lost Dad--don't worry, we found him! Afterwards we went to Whole Foods on 6th Street to shop and eat an early lunch. The choices there are amazing and we all chose something different after tasting a lot!

We had a fun trip to Wurstfest--there was lots of sausage, beer and German fun to be had. In fact, there was even a little b-ball for Daniel. No, he did not win the humongous purple dog for me, but I didn't see anyone win anything from the basketball shooting booth. Some (Daniel) would say that the hoops were smaller than regulation and that he would have made two of the three shots he took on a normal rim. Among the highlights was the large hall where we listened (and did the Chicken Dance) to the Seven Dutchmen Orchestra and watched some semi-talented cloggers. That's also where I took a picture of the crest that was the closest match (Reininger) to our German friends' last name, Reinig. We looked for you, Jane & Fritz!

On Sunday we went to church and to took my parents on another, very different, food adventure. We went to eat Thai food at Titaya's on North Lamar. I knew it was going to be a tough sell to my Cajun dad, but I just kept saying, "but you like rice and gravy!" and it worked. It was fun, and I think Mom really liked it. The Tom Yum soup was extra good as always and the only very small disappointment was that mango is not in season and therefore we had to have our sticky rice with custard instead. Which was delicious but if you go and they have mango, get the mango and let me know what you think!

Mom and I went shopping lunch while the guys watched the Cowboys vs. Giants. I had previously made plans to go to the Ladies of the 80's sing-along at the new Alamo Drafthouse, so I did that Sunday night. Then Daniel, Mom, and Dad met me downtown after I enjoyed the sing along with some old and current (but both dear) coworkers. The four of us went to Cork & Company, a wine bar, and ordered a couple of flights of wine and had some good conversation over these couples cards. It was fun, and my favorite question was "Does your significant other act differently around their parents? How?"

Mom and Dad left early Monday morning for home after a great weekend. We enjoyed you and look forward to another weekend of adventures with the parents!

Works in more places, like Interschizophreneography

If, during the upcoming winter, we experience an uptick in traffic accidents, it won't be because of people talking on their cell phones, it won't be because of inebriated holiday drivers, and it won't even be because of ice on the roads. It will all be because of the linguistic monstrosity that is the new AT&T billboards.

I was driving along a slightly busy road the first time I saw one, and I have to admit that it was a little intriguing. A nonsense word, a globe fashioned out of the AT&T logo, and a few things sticking out of the globe. It took sitting through a red light before I got the entire message: the nonsense word was an amalgamation of China, London, and Moscow, and the things sticking out of the globe were the Great Wall, Big Ben, and Red Square. (It took me a while to figure out that Chi was China, not Chicago, and that Big Ben was not, as it appeared at a distance through less than 20/20 vision, the Sears Tower.)

Which hits at the major problem with any billboard that doubles as a puzzle--you really shouldn't need more than a second or two to figure it out. View the AT&T billboard during bumper-to-bumper traffic and you've got a chance; try to decipher it at 75 miles per hour, and you're likely to end up crashing your Pontiacuraccord and getting treated for a dislocussion at St. Bartholomatthewenceslaus. Different advertising media have different strengths and weaknesses--billboards have great reach and can be effective with a simple, straightforward message. But for some reason AT&T has seen fit to use basically the exact same (convoluted) ad for TV (directed by Wes Anderson), web, print, and billboard. Talk about your monotonoredundantising!

From a positioning standpoint, the AT&T campaign doesn't make much sense either. Stripped down to its essence, the ads boil down to the following message: We have a big network. Isn't that exactly what Verizon has been saying for about five years? And while AT&T showcases fictional customers who require coverage in an unlikely (and often exotic) combination of locales, Verizon focuses on the omnipresence of the network without dwelling on specific places. And that's leaving aside the focus of many bloggers who have written on the subject of the new ad campaign (as I discovered when I Googled "Chilondoscow"), that the claim of a network that is reliable in myriad places is simply not true. My favorite, which I can no longer find, says, "Works in Maybe-over-by-the-window-but-not-in-your-cube-istan."

In case you're interested, the obscene amount of orange in the new AT&T ads is a result of the recent merger with Cingular. It is apparently the only part of the old Cingular logo that has survived the merger.

Dressing Up in October

http://pictures.thelauves.com/dressup0710.html

On October 13, Brandi's cousin Teresa threw an 80s-themed birthday/housewarming party. Brandi was decked out in an authentic-looking pink ensemble, including a "SMILE" t-shirt, side pony tail, striped socks, and rolled up jeans. Daniel, displaying what can best be described as questionable devotion to the party's theme, went as Willie McGee in his rookie year. The party was a lot of fun--check out some of the other 80s archetypes that made an appearance.

Then for Halloween, Brandi and some of her coworkers did a Brady Bunch parody at work, so she dressed as a Brady. Doesn't she look the part?

A Sports Silver Taps

Let's face it, Aggies.  That cute little 113-year experiment we like to call the football program has come to a sad end.  It's time to lay it to rest and come to terms with what we really are: a basketball school. 

If I had known there would be this much excitement to be had watching the basketball team right now, I would have deferred my enrollment by a decade.  Before I started at Texas A&M, I had run as many March Madness pools (2) as I had attended college football games. But I quickly bought into the prospect of Aggie football. 

The A&M teams of the 1990s were definitely cool, in a slightly uncool (running and defense) sort of way.  Head coach R.C. Slocum was so boring that his secret e-mail newsletter was cancelled after three weeks because, as it turns out, boosters were not interested in finding out whether R.C. would be having oatmeal or cream of wheat for his pregame breakfast.  But as predictable and conservative as he and his teams were, they won, especially at home and especially in November.  Players like Dat Nguyen and Dante Hall brought their own brand of excitement, as well as conference championships in 1991, 1992, 1993, and 1998.  Fittingly, the last time the Aggies have finished in the top 25 in a final AP poll was 1999. 

Since then, the team has been plagued by poor play, substandard recruiting, and secret newsletters.  Most importantly, they've had to face some real competition.  Not from Texas Tech or Oklahoma or even Texas, but from a little sports team just a couple blocks down the street.  We're talking about a team that doesn't wear cleats, doesn't play for sixty minutes, and whose field the Aggie band can't even fit on!  And they don't even really play on a field!

I'm speaking, of course, about the juggernaut that is the Fightin' Texas Aggie Basketball Team.  Once the doormats of the Big 12, the 2007 Ags came from out of nowhere to capture their first Sweet 16 in twenty-five years.  What's more remarkable is that over this (one-year) stretch of Sweet 16 berths, the Aggie basketball factory has produced more NBA lottery picks (1) than Duke, UCLA, UConn, Arizona, and Kentucky combined.

The 2007/2008 basketball team, ranked #14 in the preseason, rolled past Emporia State in its preseason opener.  It should be another exciting year for the basketball team, further cementing the sea change at the once football-crazed school.  Yes, the experiment we call "Texas A&M as a football school" has clearly run its course.  It's time to bury the Aggie football program--don't worry, we'll make sure that wherever we put it, it'll have a good view of the Reed Arena scoreboard.

New York Pictures

http://pictures.thelauves.com/nyc0710.html

With the St. Thomas sand barely shaken from our shoes, we headed off to the Big Apple for Laura Beth and Ben's wedding. We arrived on Friday just in time to eat lunch at an honest-to-goodness New York pizzeria before heading to the rehearsal. The rehearsal dinner was great, with fried chicken, asparagus, and some incredible cornbread, all in the beautiful setting of Ben's office which doubles as the home of his manager. Their ceremony was beautiful, with lots of personal touches and Irish traditions. We had a great time meeting Laura Beth and Ben's friends but also truly enjoyed the time we spent with the Browns and Jeff & Julie Boneau. On Sunday, October 7, we attended mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral and Brandi lit a candle in honor of her Dad's birthday that day. We then saw two great Broadway shows (Spring Awakening and Spamalot), and visited one of Brandi's old haunts, Scruffy Duffy's, where we watched the Yankees' only postseason win. We ended the night walking through Times Square and stopping to share another slice of pizza. On Monday, Brandi spent some time shopping on Fifth Avenue, while Daniel made a purchase from Rupert Gee, ate a street gyro, and watched the Columbus Day parade. Then we took the subway to Central Park and spent some time at the Natural History Museum. Stegosaurus is Daniel's favorite dinosaur, but Brandi can't be too far behind. After the museum, we went to Italian restaurant that was surprisingly expensive (and probably once hosted a meeting of the Five Families) and then headed to the airport. It was very important for us to make it to New York, because it holds a very special place in Brandi's heart. Next stop on our Take Your Spouse to Your Favorite Places Tour? Washington, D.C.!

Honeymoon Pictures

http://pictures.thelauves.com/honeymoon.html

"Our flight tomorrow? It's at 8:00 in the morning," said the newlyweds to anyone who would listen on the day after their wedding.

There was a lot happening on Sunday, so much that we forgot to pack (or even check our flight itinerary) until about 8:00 that evening. When we finally checked on our flight, we discovered that it left at 6:00 in the morning. We packed until about 2:00 Monday morning, set an alarm for 3:30, and were like zombies the rest of the day. We played the newlywed card to gain entrance to the American Airlines Admiral's Club (rather than surrender 60,000 frequent flyer miles), and we slept for about four hours of our six-hour DFW layover. We arrived in St. Thomas late Monday evening.

We awoke Tuesday to an absolute paradise, and we immediately went parasailing, had a nice swim, and just generally took it easy. We went shopping, made a trip over to St. John's (including some time on the world's 10th most beautiful beach), had an incredible snorkeling excursion, and went on a sunset cruise on our final night. All in all, it was a wonderful honeymoon, and it was a little tough to get back to the real world.

Banff Pictures

http://pictures.thelauves.com/banff.html

We jetted off to Calgary for a stay in Banff National Park on December 1, 2006. Brandi went first through the metal detector, and when we both were through it she turned around to me and said, "You didn't beep?" Little did she know that I was deathly afraid of setting off the alarm and someone finding out what I was hiding in my pocket. From the sled dog adventure to an amazing fondue dinner to the proposal, this was the perfect start to our engagement.

Welcome to our new blog!

This is the first post of what will hopefully be many posts by Brandi and me. You may notice the presence of several older posts already on here--those are from my old SportsHistory blog. I want to make it clear to the two readers of the SportsHistory blog that the semi-regular entries you have grown to love will not be going away; they will just be supplemented by the occasional travel journal, some pictures, and whatever Brandi would like to post about, presumably her frustration with trying to go clothes shopping with Daniel. (In my defense, I missed all of the Texas game and half the A&M game, so I think that justifies a little orneriness.)

In setting up this blog, I've had to migrate everything over to WordPress from Movable Type, so expect there to be some growing pains, and I should customize things a little better once I get used to the new digs. For those of you thinking the header image is a bad Photoshop job, you're wrong, only because I didn't use Photoshop at all. I used Paint, which I wouldn't recommend. The image of the two of us is taken from a very nice image from our sunset cruise in St. Thomas--a great picture, but unfortunately not good for a banner image. So I did my best to find a similar ocean sunset. We both do actually have faces, but we'll keep you in suspense for just a little bit longer.

The War on God Bless You

It's that time of year again. The time when we all strive for peace, love, and good health, though the forces of evil sit right around the corner. It's allergy season. And though most of us see this as a time to spread good wishes, the forces of secularism are out to ruin it once again.

Since the Middle Ages, "God bless you" has been an effective means for not only warding off disease, but also for letting everyone in your vicinity know whose side you stood on, eternally speaking. But somewhere along the way, we have gone from "God bless you" to just "Bless you." Apparently, being relatively free of bubonic plague for the last few centuries has emboldened us to the point where we no longer feel the need to invoke the source of all our blessings. "Bless you" is hardly a blessing at all; it's a sentence without a subject. And it's also a way of surreptitiously shutting out those of us who oppose the secularization of sneeze acknowledgments. Consider the following:

In Minot, ND, a kindergarten teacher said "God bless you" after a five-year-old girl sneezed in class. That girl's mother petitioned the school board, and the teacher was put on a 30-day probation.

In Cleveland, OH, Wal-Mart employees have been instructed to give a two-word response to anyone spreading germs on store premises: "Bless you." The employee handbook has been amended to read, "If any employee hears another person in the store, whether co-employee or guest, issue an audible sneeze, he or she is to respond with a polite but unmistakable '[censored] bless you.'"

In Ontario, CA, a family of ear, nose, and throat specialists placed a giant sign reading "God Bless You" in their front yard. The sign was repeatedly vandalized, and several attempts were made to steal it. The neighborhood home owner's association took no action.

What's worse, many religious leaders seem to be turning a blind eye to this phenomenon, even, in some cases, leading their flocks in the wrong direction. Bill O'Reilly, well-known pundit and talk show host, recounts a story in which he realized the severity of the problem. "I'm sitting on an airplane, and I've got a minister sitting next to me. I sneeze, and he says, 'Bless you.' That's it. Not even a 'G'bless you.' Nothing. It pains me to think about this man standing in front of a congregation every Sunday and sermonizing on moral issues."

Some allergy season in the not-too-distant future, it will be possible to sneeze without inviting others to display a paradoxical indifference toward their creator. Until then, just hold it in.

Let’s Talk Loyalty

News of Billy Gillespie's departure hit me like a kick to the stomach. I guess I should know better--I thought that A&M's announcement of an agreement on a new contract was meaningful, but I've seen this movie too many times before, and I should have known that when a bigger program comes calling, that takes precedence over whatever niceties have been said on behalf of the current program. Not that the niceties are insincere, it's just that money tends to have more of an effect than you would think. At least that's what I would think happens, because big time coaches and athletes have proven themselves time and time again to be mercenaries, talking over and over again about how they want to stay put, and leaving at the drop of a hat when a little more money comes calling.

It seems, however, that loyalty is a one-way street nowadays. For 80% of the Aggie basketball fans, the philosophy has been, Put a winning team on the court and I'll show up. I think that's natural, up to a point, but it always sounded a little contradictory from a student body that considers itself the greatest, classiest, most loyal sports (read: football) fans in the country. It's easy to talk loyalty when there's no cost involved, when you're talking about how loyal someone else should be to you.

All of a sudden we have an opportunity to show some real loyalty. So A&M is not a basketball program that can outattract the most successful college basketball program of all time--that's not exactly a shock. But I still have no idea how good a program we have; that will be demonstrated over the next few years. Because all we've had so far is a coach who decided to use the program as a stepping stone, and a group of fans who decided to ride the wave of success. The school is committed, I believe, to building a winner. But it's going to take more than that to have a consistently successful program.

Sweet Sixteen…anything else is gravy

I think one of the most regrettable things to witness in sports is the level of expectation we have for the teams we support and, much too often, live vicariously through. Once this year's crop of New York Yankees fails to win the World Series, as they almost certainly will, a couple million fans will whine and complain, talk about how they've been let down, and phone up sports talk stations to call for the head of Joe Torre. It's even more unfortunate to see a team that's been down on its luck for some time enjoy some success, and all of a sudden the fans, who once begged for just a winning season, now view a championship as a birthright. Think of the Dallas Mavericks pre- and post-Mark Cuban: fans used to hope not to finish last, then for a playoff spot, then for an NBA Finals appearance. This year fans will be very disappointed if the team falls short of winnning a championship.

So let me get this out there before What Have You Done For Me Lately Syndrome sets in among the Aggie basketball fans: the first Sweet 16 appearance in 27 years is an absolute joy, and if it ends here, then that's fine by me.

This Aggie team is really something to behold. Today they played Louisville in a pretty hostile environment, in a game marred by foul trouble on both sides. They gutted out a victory, erasing a late 6-point deficit and executing down the stretch to win maybe the most tense game I've ever seen. Of course that's nothing new for this team, which always seems to do whatever is needed to win. Saying that Acie Law leads this team is true but also an oversimplification. Law is great, and he was once again clutch down the stretch, but the Aggies also get often underappreciated contributions from Jones, Carter, Kavaliauskas, Kirk, and others. (p.s. Dominique Kirk is now officially my second favorite Aggie basketball player of all time, after Mr. Jerald Brown.)

This is kind of a funny year for me as an Aggie basketball fan--the most successful year by far of the last 12 years, but the only year in which I haven't been to a game. Even if I had tried to get tickets, there's a good chance I wouldn't have been able to--the tickets for every home game were sold out starting just after the Kansas game. That's a far cry from the Reed Arena I knew as a student, in which you could get your ticket a couple minutes before tip time and sit pretty much wherever you want. Those days, the basketball team ranked below the football team's band (oh wait, it still does), and it was a commonly believed (though ludicrous) legend that the basketball team would sometimes go play at the student Rec Center...and lose.

Ten years ago, things like Selection Sunday and March Madness didn't get much attention in College Station. I was a college basketball fan before I was an A&M basketball fan, and it was always a little weird for me to have to celebrate the two separately. For the four years I was at A&M, the Aggies simply were not part of the college basketball universe. They never won a Big 12 Tournament game between 1996 and 2005, and they were often ranked last in the league. At that time, anyone who followed the team would have given an arm and a leg for a tournament appearance. I kept thinking, maybe they play well in the first round of the Big 12 Tournament, then they get lucky in the second round, then a couple of the favorites fall and somehow they could end up with an automatic bid. Enter the tournament as a 14 seed and get clobbered on the first day, but at least you're there. Instead, the Ags are one of a handful of teams considered capable of winning it all, which unfortunately brings with it the possibility that anything less will be considered disappointing.

I really hate to admit this, but this sudden basketball windfall is sort of bittersweet. I've enjoyed all of the success of the team, and it's been fun seeing the campus raise its basketball IQ, but at the same time I wonder how much of a decline it would take for the university to forget once again that basketball exists. This has been an amazing year, but I think that building an elite program requires having fans that show up and give you a home court advantage even when you're not necessarily headed for a title. I hope that Aggies have become the type of basketball fans who will fill the arena even if the team's not getting tons of national coverage. If not, at least I'll have a place to sit.

Now, where are we on that Jerald Brown statue?

Super Bowl Winners and Losers

I'm not much of a fan of Super Bowl commercials. But since my pick for greatest commercial ever has descended into serial commercial territory, I took this year as an opportunity to look for something new. And while I think this year's offering was once again largely forgettable, there were a couple big losers and one big winner.

The clear loser, in my opinion, is Bud Light, for about the tenth year in a row. Whatever ad agency Bud Light uses has eschewed its creative department in favor of a recycling department. For as long as I can remember, Bud Light commercials have all been variations on one of four themes:
1) I will kick you in the crotch if you try to get my Bud Light
2) I will kick you in the crotch to get your Bud Light
3) Given the choice between drinking a Bud Light and dating a supermodel, I would take the Bud Light
4) In order to attain or retain a Bud Light, I will endure anything, including (but not limited to) getting kicked in the crotch

When you go to business school, the first thing you learn is that the best, most sustainable way to create brand equity is to establish a preference for your brand in the consumer's mind over his crotch and his friend's crotch. Bud Light has mastered this, and they've hammered the point home with flatulent horses, tumbling port-a-potties, and parachuteless parachutists.

Another notable loser is SalesGenie. Okay, so you created an ad for the largest audience on the planet, promoting a product that no more than 5% of them can actually use. Congratulations, you're officially a dot com, following in the proud tradition of all those trailblazing commercials that we saw five years ago. The only difference is that it's 2007, and you should know better.

On the other hand, maybe it does belong on Super Sunday. Based on the commercial, if you use SalesGenie, you will become more attractive to the opposite sex, you will drive a better car, and you will be envied by all of the men you hang around with. Sounds like a beer/soda commercial if I ever heard one.

The best ads were the ones for Coke, which for a long time has been conceding the Super Bowl spotlight to Pepsi. But where the Pepsi ads tend to be funny and try to be hip, Coke's latest ads are iconic, the perfect offering from a brand that knows it's #1. Coke knows that all they have to do is show you a silhouette of the bottle, and half their work is done (the bottle was actually the main character in two commercials).

Advertisers should take note of what Coke did, which is not to say that they should mimic Coke. The great thing about advertising is that it allows all kinds of brands to make all kinds of impressions, each according to what makes it special in the eyes of consumers. And yes, in some cases that means being irreverent. Pepsi, Frito Lay, and, yes, Bud Light are some brands that might do well trying to be funny. Nationwide, as near as I can tell, would be foolish to do the same, and yet they played the game too this year, giving us a Kevin Federline ad that made us chuckle (and that's it). It's said that when you're a hammer everything looks like a nail. The corrolary to that, apparently, is that if you're doing a Super Bowl ad everything looks like a potential pratfall or punch line.

The Ethics of the Exit Row Lean-Back

As any air traveler taller than five feet, one half inch knows, it's not a whole lot of fun to fly coach. What is slightly less fun is sitting coach in the row immediately behind the exit row, tantalizingly close to a precious few extra inches of leg room. And even less fun than that is sitting in the row behind the exit row and having the person in front of you flaunt his extra space by leaning his seat as far back as possible, the tray table threatening to jab you in the stomach. The exit row lean-back is quite a slap in the face, but is it unethical?

When I travel, I try to keep from leaning back because I know how it feels to have someone leaning back in to me. I guess you could say that I try to live by rules that I feel should apply universal to everyone, a concept called the categorical imperative. Though some people would like to lean back, that represents an intrusion to others, so the best thing is for everyone to keep his fingers off the recline button.

Of course, many arguments can be made for a universal lean-back allowance. The value gained by the leaner is greater than the loss suffered by the leanee, so leaning back makes a lot of sense from a utilitarian (the greatest good for the greatest number) standpoint, so long as you're not in the very back row. A consequentialist would argue that you can lean back as long as the person behind you is not exceptionally tall. But how does all of this affect the exit row?

I think a lot of the exit row lean-back mentality depends on how you believe you landed in the exit row, as well as how long you plan to stay there. If you see it as a lottery, a mechanism that more or less randomly assigns the exit row and can take it away just as easily, I can see how you would be content with all of your extra space and won't try to grab any more. ("There but for the grace of Sabre go I.") If, on the other hand, you view your placement as a result of early purchasing, high airline miles, and years of hard work, you might be less sympathetic to those who have yet to pay their dues.

If the lean-back decision is an ethical choice, it isn't much of one (which is to say that it is not very consequential), but I do think that our airline behavior serves as one obvious example of how poorly we can behave when we are around people we never expect to see again. So the next time you're flying, don't tie up too much of everyone else's time wedging a too big carry-on into the overhead, don't clog the area leading to the jetway if your group hasn't yet been called, and, if you find yourself in an exit row and see my smiling face immediately behind you, please resist the temptation to grab some superfluous space.