Tallahassee Rocks!

Tallahassee has got to be the greatest place in the world to be in the spring time! Cool mornings and warm afternoons. The flowers bloom in a rhapsody of spring colors. God even sneezes pollen down on to our cars every night to give them a nice Springy yellow-green coating. The legislators add comedy by trying to spend our taxpayers’ money while saying they are saving our taxpayers’ money and all the while allowing us taxpayers to enjoy the bounty of all the tax money they have spent while cutting back on our taxes. (You gotta admit that’s way funnier than Abbot and Costello’s “Who’s On First?” routine!)
But most of all this Saturday the powers that be decided to drop a football game down right here in the middle of all this spring bounty! Yep, the annual FSU spring Garnet and Gold game gives a southerner what he truly longs for, football! Ok, so now it has been moved down to not a real game but just a glorified scrimmage. But, nonetheless (I can’t believe “nonetheless” is actually one word), there will be some of the finest athletes in the country throwing around a brown sphere with a point at each end, wearing gold helmets and popping each other to the ground. Actually, that is one of my favorite parts of the Garnet and Gold game. There is not enough crowd noise to drown out the “CRACK” of a good hit, or a little trash talk between players, or even a good chewing out by a coach.
Now this year they have even gone one step farther in making it seem like real Seminole football. Yep, it will hearken back to the glory days of Saturday Night Fever when fans would release thousands of balloons into the night sky when Chief Osceola planted his spear at midfield. For those of you who don’t remember this joyful period, it was when the Seminoles weren’t good enough to be on daytime television and administrators cared about fans not having heat strokes in the September mid-day sun. Oh, and the balloons? Well the above mentioned legislators decided that some wayward gator might strangle on one of our well traveled balloons. (Lord knows we wouldn’t want to have one less gator in the world, reptile or alum.)
Yes, Springtime in Tallahassee! American by birth and Tallahasseean by the grace of God!

Are You Ready For Some Cut Throat Football

As Bing Crosby, Andy Williams, Johnny Mathis and anybody else who’s tried to hustle a Christmas album sang, “It’s the most wonderful time of the year…” Unfortunately they apparently got caught up in all that Christmas gobbledy gook and forgot that first glorious weekend in September that is truly the most wonderful time of the year. Are you ready for some football?

This year I busted out laughing when I saw the billboard promoting season tickets for the ‘Noles. It features Bobby Bowden and all the assistant coaches. No players, no diving catches, no monster hits, no touchdowns. They might as well have just put a white billboard with bold black letters saying, “Yes, we really did change our coaching staff, it’s safe to pay your money and come back to the stadium.”

In one of my more macho moments several years ago I decided I would go down to the manly-man barber shop and get a manly-man hot shave with a straight razor on opening day of football season. When I got to the barber shop all the barbers were busy. Finally some old guy dragged himself in about fifteen minutes late. I stepped up to the chair and, in my deepest voice, proclaimed, “I’d like a hot shave, please.” The barber seemed to freeze for a second and then proceeded to move around behind the chair fiddling with stuff like a third grader trying to make up a science fair project on the fly.

He finally lathered me up and got out the straight razor. As he took a few swipes of shaving cream off my face I started to notice that his hand was shaking. I had also noticed some curious smell coming from underneath his layers of Aqua Velva. Hmm… a little bit late on a Saturday morning, shaking profusely, and his pores still leaking alcohol. I believe I had just laid my head back and offered my throat up to a man with a straight razor and a hang over! Now I know how turkeys must feel around Thanksgiving. Fortunately, this wise (or at least alcoholically experienced) man had the insight to say without offering any excuses or apologies. “I’m going to have to switch to this,” as he pulled out a 39 cent plastic blue razor. I breathed a sigh of relief but thought, “Hey, they are called safety razors but I think there might be a disclaimer on those packages that say something to the effect of ‘Do not operate under the influence of alcohol (even if the alcohol intake was 7 hours ago)’.”

Monday Night Football on Labor Day, new assistant coaches, at Clemson against one of Bobby’s sons? Could it get any better than that? Actually, I do have two suggestions that could make this the perfect football storm. It should be a federal law that if your team is playing on a weeknight you automatically get the next day off. Secondly, can we please have a website that posts the name of barbers who went out drinking the night before?