Auburn v Alabama 2007 Video Clip

Like any other year, the Iron Bowl was the most significant game of the season for Auburn and Alabama... teams and fans. A win for Alabama means they can gloat all year long about how they dominate Auburn. A win for Auburn means they don't have to listen to Alabama fans gloat all year long about how they dominate Auburn. Despite what you've heard - Michigan/Ohio State, Florida/Florida State, UCLA/USC, Texas/Oklahoma, Republicans/Democrats - nothing and I mean nothing matches the intense rivalry between Auburn and Alabama. You don't believe me... just go one year. You will have never seen anything like it.
This year was extra special though. Neither team is in the national title hunt. Neither has a shot at a BCS bowl bid. Auburn entered the game 7-4 while Alabama limped in at 6-5 and on a 3-game skid. A victory in the Iron Bowl salvages the season for the winner. But for Auburn, who has won the last five meetings, going for #6 would be setting a new school record for consecutive Iron Bowl wins.

As usual, the game was a defensive battle all the way, with Auburn delivering just a little more than 'bama. Auburn won its 6th straight against the Tide 17-10. At the time this entry posted, it's been 2200 days, 12 hours and 53 minutes since Alabama last beat Auburn.

Following is a clip of Quentin Groves leading the Auburn band in their own version of Alabama's RammerJammer.



Man, that's gotta hurt!
War Eagle!

2000+ HITS

On May 17, 2007 I installed ClusterMaps, a hit counter that accurately shows the locations of all visitors to this site on a thumbnail map embedded in my page. You may have noticed it at the bottom of the right-hand column of my page. While I can't tell who visited my blog, I can tell where they were when they looked at it.

As of today, I've had 2,016 hits. That's around 335 hits per month. It's kind of weird to think that that many people have accessed my thoughts, opinions and perspectives. It's also kinda' cool.

Buy Nothing Day

No Purchase Necessary: A 24 Hour Moratorium on Consumer Spending - Participate by Not Participating

In America, everyone knows that the biggest shopping day of the year is the Friday after Thanksgiving - the first day of the Christmas season. This is the day consumer capitalism shines brightest and the day retail stores across the country look forward to all year long. Today is Buy Nothing Day in North America (it's tomorrow internationally).

Everything we buy has an impact on our planet. Buy Nothing Day highlights the environmental and ethical consequences of consumerism. Developing countries - only 20% of the world's population - are consuming 80% of the earth's natural resources, causing a disproportionate level of environmental damage and unfair distribution of wealth.

This year Buy Nothing Day will be the largest 24-hour moratorium against consumerism ever as the annual event serves as a communal 'detox from consumerism,' which insists no purchase is necessary.

If you need gas, get it Sunday. Groceries? Make do with what you have... and if you don't have much, consider fasting. After all, one-third of the world's population is technically starving to death.

Buy Nothing Day is an opportunity for consumers to take a break from shopping, either as an experiment or a public statement, and enjoy life outside of the shopping mall.

PAUSE LIFE - SPEND A DAY WITHOUT SPENDING - SPEND LESS LIVE MORE

BUY NOTHING DAY

A Unique and Intrapersonal Encounter with Bono

Taking a Trip Down Memory Lane

I found these awesome pictures from a 1977 JCPenney catalog online and just had to post and share them. The origin of the story is that a guy found this catalog while doing some work for his parents in their attic.

For those of you that remember the days of the 3-inch-thick Sears, Best & JCPenney catalogs, this should be a special treat for you.

Here is the cover of the catalog these pictures came from:

The clothes are fantastic!

Here's how to get the crap beat out of you in elementary school:

Just look at that belt. It's like a boob-job for your pants. He probably needed help just to lift it into place. The belt loops have to be three inches long, for the love. And this kid's bellybutton must be below the belt buckle. Way to go Sargent High-Waste!

Here's how to get the crap beat out of you in high school:

This kid looks like he's pretending to be David Soul, who is pretending to be a cop who is pretending to be a pimp that everyone knows is really an undercover cop. Who is pretending to be 15.

Here's how to get the crap beat out of you on the golf course:

This "all purpose jumpsuit" is, according to the description, equally appropriate for playing golf or simply relaxing around the house. Personally, I can't see wearing this unless you happen to be relaxing around your cell in D-block. Even then, the only reason you should put this thing on is because the warden forced you to at gunpoint.

Here's how to get the crap beat out of you pretty much anywhere:

I'll bet these guys do ok with the ladies. If you look at that picture quickly, it looks like Mr. Bob "No-pants" Saget has his hand in the other guy's pocket. In this case, he doesn't, although you can tell just by looking at them that it's happened - or if it hasn't happened it will. Oh yes. It will. As soon as he puts down his color-coordinated coffee cup.

Here's how to get the crap beat out of you at the beach:

He looks like he's reaching for a gun, but you know it's probably just a bottle of suntan lotion in a holster. Isn't that The Fall Guy's sidekick?

Here's how to get the crap beat out of you in a meeting:

If you wear this suit and don't sell used cars for a living, I believe you can be fined and face serious repercussions, up to and including termination. Or imprisonment, in which case you'd be forced to wear that orange jumpsuit; which, frankly, is a step up.

Here's how to get the crap beat out of you everyday, up to and including, St. Patrick's Day:

Dear god in heaven, I don't believe that color exists in nature. There is NO excuse for wearing either of these ensembles unless you're working as a body guard for the head coach of Notre Dame.

In this next one, Your Search For VALUE Ends At Penneys.

As does your search for chest hair.

And this one... seriously, there are no words:

Oh wait, it turns out there are words after all, and those words are What. The. #%@$! I'm guessing the snap front gives you quick access to the chest hair. I think the little tie must be the pull tab. If you look really closely, it says, "In case of chest hair emergency, pull tab quickly and back away."

Also, judging by the sheer amount of matching his/hers outfits, in 1977 it was apparently considered pretty stylish for couples to dress alike. These couples look happy, don't they?

And nothing showcases your everlasting love more than the commitment of matching bathing suits. That, and an amused blonde with a look on her face that says, "Do you have any idea how ridiculous you look in that bathing suit?"

Then, after the lovin', you can relax in your one-piece matching terry cloth jumpsuits:

I could go on, but I'm tired, and my eyes hurt from this trip back in time. I think it's the colors. I will leave you with these tasteful little numbers:

Man, that's sexy!

The Natural World: A Far Off Place

I'm not going to insult full-blown "tree-huggers," by suggesting that I am an environmentalist, but recently I find myself with a growing appreciation for Creation. I'm a part of an environmentally conscious group called F.O.R.K. (Friends of the River Kelvin), that participates in monthly clean-up parties in the west end of Glasgow; recycling has become almost a compulsive hobby of mine; we don't own a car so we walk or take public transportation EVERYWHERE; I walk through our flat turning off lights, and conserve energy by trying to wash clothes and dishes during off-peak hours. All in all, our carbon footprint is pretty darn low.

I must make a distinction though. While I love Creation, I'm not such a big fan of the great outdoors. By that, I mean that I thoroughly enjoy being in nature, but more often than not, when I participate in outdoor activities, I end up losing whatever battle I'm in. I get little joy or feelings of accomplishment when I hike a big hill; I'm usually pretty miserable on long bike rides.; and don't even get me started on kayaking. About the only things I find relaxing/rewarding in nature are surfing and snowboarding - two activities I rarely ever do anymore.

The important thing, however, is that I've come to realize that being environmentally conscious is no longer a lifestyle or a statement. You don't have to be hygienically challenged, or listen to The Grateful Dead and Phish to be an environmentalist anymore. You just need to look around and realize that, regardless of the statistics that we're fed, the Earth is changing. And more importantly, we've changed.

The generations alive today - who cannot recognize an edible mushroom in the forest or start a fire without matches - are the first to have had their lives shaped almost entirely by the electronic mass media environment. If you observe some of the stages that we as a people are going through - denial, anger, depression, bargaining - you'll recognize that they closely mimic the stages of grief. It's as if we're adjusting to a loss. And in a way we are. The loss of our natural selves.

We find ourselves adrift at a historically significant time. The last couple of centuries have marked a radical transition in human lifestyle. We've gone from living in a natural world to living in a manufactured one. For thousands of years our personalities and cultures were shaped by creation. But now, most of us find ourselves completely detached from the natural world. We can scarcely remember the last time we drank from a stream or saw the stars from a dark remove, away from the city. We can't remember the last time we spent an evening telling stories, instead of having Oprah or Jerry tell stories to us. We can't identify three kinds of trees, but we know all about Britney's custody battles and Paris' fender-benders.

This detachment from nature might not seem like much of a problem, but it is. In fact, it's tragic. In her 1995 book Bird by Bird, Christian writer Anne Lamott reflects on a California vineyard in early fall. It is "about as voluptuous a place as you can find on earth: the sense of lushness and abundance; the fullness of the clumps of grapes that hang, mammarian, and give off an ancient autumnal smell, semiprotected from the sun by their leaves. The grapes are so incredibly beautiful that you can't help but be thrilled. If you aren't - if you only see someone's profit or that in another month there will be rotten fruit all over the ground - someone has gotten inside your brain and really f***ed you up."

See, I believe that we were created to engage the natural world - to enjoy it, to be active in it, and to marvel at its wonder. Rediscovering the natural world ought not be difficult. It ought to be an instinctive act. If the Earth felt less like something out there, and more like an extension of who we are, we'd care for it like kin. We'd pull in the direction of global survival not because we felt duty-bound to do so, but because it felt right and good.

Our rampant, oblivious consumption; our spending with careless abandon, assuming an eternal supply at the expense of the planet is nothing more than a sickness - like mental disorders or addiction - it's just too new of a phenomenon for psychologists to have given it much consideration. Maybe I've come to this conclusion after living in an urban context for the past four years, but I think we're in a state of separation anxiety from nature. We're bombarded these days with analyses of failed relationships/marriages, of the psychological havoc that breakups wreak. The psychological fallout from our breakup with Creation is like that. When you cut off arterial blood to an organ, the organ dies. When you cut the flow of nature into people's lives, their spirit dies. It's that simple.

Occasionally, you'll bump into an outsider bearing tales of that other environment, the one you may have known. When an Inuit elder is asked to draw a picture of the local coastline, he will close his eyes and listen to the sound of the waves on the shore. Such stories seem vaguely ludicrous. Who could be that attuned to the land? More to the point, who'd want to be? Where's the value in denying yourselves civilized amenities when you don't have to?
Once you start asking questions like this, you are, of course, in real trouble. The moment you fail to understand why the natural world may have any relevance in the day-to-day lives of human beings, you become, what a golfer might call, "a lost ball in the high rough."

Abandon nature and you lose track of who you are. But more than that, you abandon your sense of the Divine.