Sunday, June 5, 2011

The Weekend, Part 1



Saturday found me, along with Kayleen, Justin, Nien, Kim and a couple of Julien's friends from school, in Philly to watch Julien assistant-coach the Univ. of Texas rugby "7s" at a televised tournament. (Yvonne was at a baby shower. She missed out...)


First, a word about rugby. I don't really get it either. But it's pretty similar to what we used to call on the playground "smear the queer." Things were less politic then.


Sevens rugby is a much faster game than traditional rugby. Played by smaller, quicker guys, who still manage to destroy each other out there. And the games are only 14 minutes long, which no one could really explain, but helps keep things from getting boring. So we saw about eight matches in one afternoon, including a UT victory and a well-played loss against Arizona, one of the better teams in the nation, apparently. Two things came from all this:


1. I finally understand (mostly) how rugby is played; and

2. I've adopted Texas as my alter alma mater.


Lemme tell you, people love Texas. Tons of cats came up to talk to us in our Texas Rugby shirts, or flashed the "hook 'em" sign to us. I did not know about the love for Texas, but it's a thing. Even Yvonne knew. (?) And apparently Kayleen can't even wear UT gear in public because it gets too much attention from people on the street. Like a rock star. Anyway, I enjoyed the friendly attention, and having an alter-ego as a Longhorn. I can't wait to rock the burnt orange again.


Also, we got out drink on pretty good. Hey, it's a rugby tournament! Suffice it to say that on the way back to New York, I only made it as far as Justin's couch.

I told you Yvonne missed out.

5 comments:

Ara said...

Um I'm pretty sure that you are no longer a USC alumni the second you hook any horns and wear burnt orange.

Ara said...

Also same thing if you wear an SC shirt, you get a "fight on" wherever you go, even on a plane to Texas.

Sandy agrees, this is unacceptable behavior.

Squeen said...

As I tried to explain to the alumni fundraiser, I would be just fine with USC turning its back on me.

Ara said...

We could have made more of our time there. We were involved in next to nothing.

Yvonne said...

In defense of Dan, I have never heard one person ever utter "fight on" to him when he wears his SC cap. I'm sorry, but no one on the East Coast cares about USC.