It's the little things, really.

I was watching football this evening.  With every snap taken by Robert Griffin III, my blood inched a little closer to its boiling point.  I'm sure that Mr. Griffin is a gentleman and a scholar and a breeder of fine horses.  I'm also sure that he's an inexperienced young man who should not be left to decide when he has crossed the line from helping his team to hurting his team.  That decision should rest squarely on the coaching staff.  And here's a quick tip to the Redskins' coaching staff → a one-legged quarterback is not helping your fucking team.  You pissed away a golden opportunity to advance to the next round because you were too fucking stupid to realize that you were on your way to scoring a big fat fucking goose egg in the second half, while your fucking quarterback could neither run nor throw.  (Maybe my blood actually did reach its boiling point.  It's hard to say.)

So, after that debacle, I was left to do what any red-blooded American would do on a Sunday night.  I went bowling.  There's a place in Livonia that has a Sunday night special - $4.95 for three games - so that's where my brother and I went.  There weren't a ton of people around when we got there, but the place was a little busy.  As some of you in cold weather climates may know, the first few frames with frozen bowling balls don't tend to go very well.  After that though, the balls started to warm up and the scores started to improve.

What didn't improve was the music.  I like rap music... when it's good.  I don't like unintelligible bullshit about boats and hoes and whatever the hell else the modern degenerates like to discuss.  So yeah, the music was awful.  I saw that the jukebox was one of those fancy TouchTunes deals and my mind went to work.  I have an application on my cell phone called My TouchTunes.  It allows me to play songs on the jukebox via the internet.  This could be fun...

After a brief consultation with my brother, followed by a review of my account, a strategy began to take shape.  I had $5 left over from a previous use of the application.  I transferred the $5 into my 'active' location and started looking for something to play.  What would this motley collection of white suburban kids really hate?  Since they were listening to an embarrassing assortment of garbage that wouldn't even pass for ghetto music, I had a hunch that I knew what would get a reaction.  I found some old Irish folk music from the Dubliners and spent the extra credit to have my song played next.  Then the laughs began.

One girl looked terrified by the peaceful melody.  She ran to the jukebox and slipped in a dollar.  Then a guy (maybe her boyfriend, I don't know) joined her and tried to find something "better."  Then another girl, and another guy, and so on...  There wound up being six of these idiots huddled around the jukebox, desperately trying to find something that would get this hideous Irish music off the air.  It was one of those times when you just wish you had thought to start recording video.  Alas, it hadn't occurred to me, so you'll have to take my word for it.  This was some funny shit.

So the wannabe hoodlums decided on a sequence of songs and went back to their respective lanes.  And that's when I busted out the 'play next' option.  As those poor saps started swaying in unison to whatever dumbassed song they had decided to play, I instructed the jukebox to play 99 Luftballons - next.  They had paid for whatever, five songs or so.  After their first song, an awful German pop number came blasting from the speakers.  The reaction was priceless.  I was doing this from a cell phone app, keep in mind, so nobody had actually gone to the jukebox.  Those dumb kids had no idea what was happening.  They had just lined up whatever they wanted to hear and my cell phone was dictating otherwise.

My brother and I enjoyed a hearty chuckle and then waited for another song to start.  It was the next in the list of hip-hop wannabe crap that the kids had played.  They started to bob their heads and make those hand gestures that white kids make when they don't realize how white they look.  The time was right.  Of the twelve people that I could see on the neighboring lanes, four were wearing some kind of Michigan attire and a fifth was wearing a Michigan State cap.  Next on the playlist - the Notre Dame Victory March... three times in a row.  Holy shit, was that funny.  We all have our insecurities, but the insecurity of Michigan fans when it comes to Notre Dame is truly something special.  Those dorks were visibly shaken.

It went on for a little while longer.  I know that I got The Macarena and Barbie Girl in there.  Some other songs I don't recall.  You would think that these youngsters would know about the cell phone app and figure out that the two dudes in Notre Dame caps were the ones messing with them.  They never seemed to figure it out though.  And it was funny.  And I averaged 190, having not touched a bowling ball since last summer.  Not too shabby.

It's the little things, really.

Apparently the pep rally was tonight

Depending on who is providing the estimate, we're talking about anywhere from 15,000 to 25,000 Notre Dame fans in attendance.  Say whatever you like, but that is simply stunning.  If I traveled all the way from [insert location here] to Miami, you can bet I'd find some other kind of diversion on a Saturday night.  Either our fans are the most dedicated anywhere or they are the most boring anywhere.  Maybe it's a combination of the two.  In any case, wow...

Even though I have no hope of traveling to Florida and I've never been one to get fired up about a pep rally, I'm officially ready for this game.  You'll note that my prediction for the Cotton Bowl was laughably wrong, in keeping with tradition.  How anybody can watch as much college football as I do, but be as clueless as I am when it comes to predicting games, is anybody's guess.  I'm pretty nervous about Notre Dame's chances though, so things are looking good.

After all, you can put us down and keep us out but we'll come back again...

It's really getting close now, isn't it?

In four days we'll know.  Until then, we're reduced to waiting and chuckling as the (allegedly) invincible SEC teams continue to look rather pedestrian against non-SEC competition.  When Oklahoma blows out Texas A&M tomorrow, assuming my projection is accurate, it will be high time for the gamblers of the world to revisit that point spread for Monday night.

The point spread is right where we like it though, to tell the truth.  The Notre Dame gang aren't really very good at handling success.  They tend to get high on the smell of their own farts and then, as sure as the sun rises in the east, lose a game that they should have won.  When the whole world disrespects them, on the other hand, they play as well as they can play.  Sometimes 'as well as they can play' simply isn't good enough, but we can live with that.  It's the unmotivated bullshit that we can't stand to see.  With those degenerates from Alabama favored by 10, there should be no lack of motivation for the players and coaches this time around.

Which brings us to the topic of motivating the fans.  That's sometimes a more tricky proposition.  A certain degree of cynicism has been woven into the fabric of Notre Dame football over the last twenty years.  Since the voters screwed the Irish out of their rightful national title following the 1993 season, there hasn't been a whole lot to cheer about.  Sure there have been good games and decent seasons.  But lots of teams play good games and have decent seasons every year.  The loyal sons of Notre Dame aren't going to be very inspired by that.  So, for the fans of the Irish, motivation is a little tougher to produce.

Quite a few of us who follow the Fighting Irish are, in a manner of speaking, Irish.  We're not Irish in the sense of having been born in Ireland.  By that measure we're purely American and damned proud of it.  Yet we have some weird fondness for the land that our grandparents left behind, many years before we were born.  As you're likely aware, I had the chance to visit Ireland for a week last year and it certainly was a magical vacation.  This post is directed at people like me - Irish-Americans who happen to live and die with the Fighting Irish.  There will be a follow-up post before the game, but for now we'll just listen to the Wolfe Tones and get our blood pumping.

How big is your screen?

Big enough to contain this one?

[Graphic courtesy of zerohedge.com]

That's like saying I have $16,000 in credit card debt, a minimum wage job, and a house in foreclosure - but I got a $62 coupon to spend on a new $1,089 television that I otherwise couldn't afford.  So, you see, I'm making progress.  I'm still putting that TV on my credit card, and it still costs me $1,027, but I couldn't possibly try to control my spending.  What sense would that make?

I swear... these morons... and WE the people who elect them...  I swear.