The Nashville Excursion

This past weekend was fall break at Rice so I decided to make what will likely be my final excursion for a while into Nashville. It just so happened to also be fall break for LSU, and Vanderbilt was playing LSU in football, so Banecker and some of his LSU friends were going up for the game and we made plans to meet up. Then about a week ago I got two phone calls: one from Melanie and one from Brad Ploeger, both informing me that they too were going to be in Nashville. Add to that the fact that Collazzi, Meredith, and Bradley and Lori are still in the Nashville area, and all the pieces were in place for a great weekend.

And sure enough, it was, with a few notable exceptions:

• Encounters with Mississippi policemen (see earlier post)
  
• Certain aspects of the LSU game, such as getting spit on by LSU fans before the game started, and the entire fourth quarter.
  
• The Slant production computer going down after the layout was 90% done. (Fortunately, they managed to recover somehow after Collazzi and I left.)
  
• Bradley was out of town, and I couldn't get in touch with Lori.
  

But fortunately, and not unexpectedly, the few lowlights were trumped by a large number of highlights, which were, in order:

• Mark's whole 21st birthday party, most notably:
  
  
  
  • Banecker, in his infinite good taste, insisting on Killian's for the keg.
    
  • Collazzi's little brother challenging Banecker and Collazzi to a game of beer pong, and the sudden simultaneous laughter that erupted from all present immediately thereafter. (Naturally, Banecker and Collazzi won even though they were off their game.)
    
  • Subsequent beer pong games - I never won, but they served their purpose.
    
  • A random 2 AM trip to Wendy's afterward.
    
  
  
• Meeting (though not actually being introduced to) Rachel.
  
• Barbecue with Banecker and Ploeger (wish you could have stayed through Sunday, guys).
  
• The first three quarters of the Vandy-LSU game, in which our defense kept things closer than they should have been and we clung to the dim hope of winning.
  
• Hanging out at good ol' Sportsman's Grill.
  
• Meredith's new hair color, which looks great. (Get it? Her hair color is among the "highlights"? Haha, I kill me.)
  
• Jesus as a fetus (don't ask).
  
• An in-depth discussion of the greatest "Simpsons" episodes ever, most notably "Cape Feare", the unanimous choice.
  
• Fido rendezvous with Melanie, and the dog with good taste.
  
• Catching up with David Sims over drinks at the Flying Saucer.
  
• Finally getting to meet the infamous Ceaf, the latest in an illustrious line of Slant Editors-in-Chief.
  
• Ken's Sushi with Melanie. (Man, I really miss that.)
  
• Hanging out with Ceaf, Dinsmore, Tim, Richie and the rest of The Slant crowd at production.
  
• Richie quietly and proudly informing me of his newfound love of drinking.
  
• Repeated viewings of the "Bat Dad" episode of "South Park".
  
• Ali's new football sex scheme (to replace the old insufficient baseball one), and Melanie's request for me to write a book about guys. I'll get on it eventually.
  

In short, I had a lot of fun reliving the glory days and seeing a lot of people I hadn't gotten to hang out with in a long time. Everyone seems to be doing really well, and it's good to see that you've all stayed cool, or if possible, gotten even cooler. Thanks for a great weekend everyone!

Song lyric of the day:
"And on the streets tonight, an old man plays
With newspaper cuttings from his glory days"
- Manic Street Preachers, If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next