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Thursday, November 29, 2007

Friday morning after Thanksgiving we got up and on the road to go to the Ole Miss game. This year it was in Starkville. Ken has refused to ever again go to a game at Ole Miss, so they come to my house for Thanksgiving in years the game is a home game for us and go to his mother's in years when the game is at Ole Miss.

This game was one of the 11:30 am Lincoln Financial games. Not bad for us as we have a very good record on those 11:30 games.

We stopped in Selmer at Hardee's for breakfast. This is a big deal for the kids as we always stop there on the way down. They enjoy the traditions we have with games in Starkville, and insist on our doing things the same way every game. As usual I ordered two sausage and biscuits, ate one which filled me up, and then tried to give away the other.

Traveling with kids has changed a lot since I had little ones. They have their nintendos to play games on. Then they have the television in the ceiling of the SUV. The boys like to watch more action films. Emma will watch those, too. The problem came when Emma wanted to watch Barbie or American Girl doll films. The boys hated that. So now Emma has her own portable DVD player so she can watch whatever she wants and the boys can at the same time watch something else.

I don't know what the hangup is in West Point but it always takes too long to go through. Friday it took 25 minutes.

At State we park in the Technology center parking lots and then take a free bus to the stadium. Since this was a Friday and a work day we were not allowed to park in the lots but we parked on the ring road around it.

There were no Ole Miss fans on the bus. There were not nearly as many Ole Miss people there as usual. (That was a plus to me.)

Anne and Ken have four tickets in the upper deck. The Sky Deck it is called and they love it up there. I have two lower level tickets on the forty yard line on the same side. At each game one child sits with me. Adam had chosen long ago to sit with me at this game. He is the best one for that as he watches the game more than the others. George is beginning to watch the game; five minutes into the game Emma asks if it is half-time.

Adam and I went into the stadium and when we were in the aisle the fence to my right, which separates the student section, looked too close. I decided we were in the wrong aisle so we went across in front of people to get to the right aisle. Or what I thought would be the right aisle. When we got over there, I found we were at about the 25 yard line. That was wrong. So we went out and went in at the original entrance which was the right one. I should do better than that; I have had these same seats for 25 years. One problem is that the women from Tupelo that sit in front of me were all bundled up and I could not see their red hair. That is always my goal.

The game started and we could do nothing. Ole Miss scored a touchdown and I think we only got one first down the entire first half.

At the half Adam and I went to get food. We usually eat Papa John's pizza at halftime but they were sold out! We stood in line forever to get food. Usually we sit down and eat under the stands but this time the game had started and was 6 minutes into the third quarter before we got our food. It was just as well since Ole Miss had scored another touchdown. We continued to play very poorly.

Then in the middle of the fourth quarter Ole Miss had a fourth down on their own 49 yard line. Inexplicably Orgeron decided to go for it. They did not come close. They turned the ball over to us and we scored on a pass from QB Wesley Carroll to Anthony Dixon. Later on they punted to us and Derek Pegues ran it back all the way for a touchdown. The score was then 14-14. Then with 18 seconds to go Adam Carlson kicked a 47 yard field goal to put us ahead 17-14.

We kicked off to Ole Miss and the receiver was tackled immediately. The next and final play Brent Schaeffer, the Ole Miss quarterback, was sacked for the last play of the game.

We had played a lousy game for three and a half quarters but found a way to win. Needless to say we were all going crazy. Coach Croom got the big State flag and ran around the field with it. A glorious game. It was great to see the players carrying around the Golden Egg trophy. It is called the Egg and the game is the Egg Bowl because the trophy has a golden football on it that looks like an egg. Over the years it has changed as they have added bottoms to have room to carve the score from each game on it. We have played Ole Miss 104 times.

On Monday Ole Miss "croomed" their head coach Ed Orgeron. To be croomed means to be fired after losing to State. Alabama and Florida did that in previous years.

Back at the game, we had another tradition to fulfill. We always go over to the dairy department and get MSU ice cream. They have unusual flavors but the kids get chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry anyway. That is just like their mother. When she was little, Anne would spend a long time picking out her flavor of ice cream, then in the end she would ask for vanilla. I usually get muscadine. (Spellcheck doesn't like muscadine. It wants me to change it to mescalin, not likely for me! Evidently this is not a Southern spellchecker.)

But this time I decided to go to the bookstore. I figured the dairy would be a mad house. I went to the bookstore where it was a mad house anyway. The MSU basketball game from California was on the TV at the cafe. I bought a new book, The Egg Bowl. I bought this as a reference book but found it fascinating so I have read it like a novel.

Walking back to the bus stop, I saw little kids walking on three long rows of MSU drink cups. I asked and they let me have one. They said they had 307 cups. I needed one to send to my niece's husband in Savannah, GA, an Ole Miss fan who sent me an Ole Miss cup after last year's game.

Then it was to the bus to the Tech center then to The Lodge, which sells MSU gear. I bought three cowbells for the kids as a Christmas gift. There were more cowbells at the Ole Miss game than I have heard in years. Technically they are forbidden at the games. They aren't checking purses, etc, anymore. I would like to take my cowbell but I can't take a chance on it getting confiscated. George Rodney bought this bell the first day he was on the MSU campus in 1961.


Back on the road we listened to the overtime of the LSU-Arkansas game and I was very disappointed that LSU lost.

What a great day it was! And I have been able to relive it as I have watched the replay on Tv three times. Also there are some good clips on Youtube. My favorite is the goodbye to Orgeron one, which shows the highlights of the game, while Elvis sings I Did It My Way. I watch that a lot.

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