Life In Central Time, And Other Moments Of Joy In a Lost Season

Central Time is God's time. Just spending time in the comfortable daylight where early isn't so bad and dark loses just a touch of its edge makes me feel like a more balanced soul. It's proof that the Lord resides somewhere in the strip of America between Chicago and New Orleans, riding his circuit in an '86 Fleetwood Fiesta with blue Astroturf flooring and a peeling "Eat a Peach" decal from the previous owner. Doin' deeds and eating gas station breakfast biscuits.

It gets a little white knuckle in the Fiesta on the Pig Trail, but I have no doubt he wheels it into Fayetteville on occasion. Once you peel back the ever-growing layers of four-laned strip mall build-up, you've got a core that is one of America's under-rated college towns. Aside from Ole Miss bringing along our Golden Flake early morning kick-off curse, this is the kind of weekend you should use to experience a gameday road environment for the first time. There's not an awful lot on the line, so nobody's chewing glass in anticipation. But, it's still an SEC West game, which  brings with it a certain level of intrigue and an enjoyable level of excitement. Energy without spilling over into meltdown.

Ole Miss/Arkansas games have a weird rhythm to them. It's a series that has a hard time finding its beat. Before the Houston Nutt shotgun rivalry was born, it was more like being set-up on a date with a girl who's lived across the street from you your entire life. We've got sort of parallel history, and it seems like there should be some kind of spark between us. It just never seems to catch. Even the Houston Nutt fire has started to dampen, and we've fallen back into our routine of nodding politely on the walk out to grab the morning paper.

Arkansas is a team with deflated aspirations of making the jump (they got double-bounced by Auburn, it appears) and is coming to terms with non-BCS success. Ole Miss is a team trying to find a foundation for whatever's coming next in moral victories and pride. What happens when they get together? A five hour teenage grope fest with Crimson and Clover playing in the background. The threat of electricity hanging in the air without a lighting strike ever actually finding the ground.

Other programs have rings of honor where they remember the greats from their championship teams. Ole Miss is quickly developing quite a ring of martyrdom. Great players who played their asses off stuck on bad teams. Upon induction, they will receive a pastel Vineyard Vines hairshirt and have their names engraved on the train tracks outside of campus. Jerrell Powe is earning his place in this illustrious grouping with his play this year, trying to pull whatever he can out of an underachieving defensive unit that was supposed to carry the team. However, being in the backfield on every down only means so much when there's no containment on any other part of the field. I don't know that Jeremiah Masioli will qualify with only one season. But as Rick Cleveland points out,  running for his life behind an offensive line of walk-ons while watching his former team compete for a championship is the steepest punishment for petty theft this side of Saudi Arabia.

But like I said, this was a day for small victories, including good timing to avoid the rain and the generosity of friends with shelter, whiskey and televisions. And a good Saturday night college town band with no cover charge at Grub's playing Gillian Welch's "Miss Ohio" featuring a male singer and a 3/4 time pace. And $2.50 beers and greasy late night food. And feeling amused superiority at the young novice drinkers puking doubled over trashcans with exposed undergarments...only to end up in the same position yourself later in the night.



And one guy in a studded black leather jacket, a portable amp and a worn guitar on the street banging out Ronnie James Dio solos, non-ironic mullet flowing in the wind, while drunken frat boys cheer and toss dollars in his case.

It doesn't matter if nobody's listening. Or if the people who are listening don't get it. It's all about keeping the faith. And that's easier to do in a good, Christian time zone.

Post-Puberty Defeat And The Valor of Polish Calvary

The light of Monday morning broke through the windows of the Tuscaloosa Chuck E. Cheese to find a lone figure asleep in the ball pit. Mouth open, a half-eaten piece of rock candy stuck to his auburn hair hanging over a freckled face, he clutches a wad of ski ball prize tickets to his chest. Jefferson Davis Bryant (J-Bear to his friends), owner of the establishment, found him while closing up shop the night before.

Coming to grips with defeat through balloons.

"You want wake him?" asked the Ecuadorian cleaning staff.

"No, Consevella. Let him be. Just clean around him. The little guy's had a rough day."

Loss was unfamiliar to Greg McElroy. Undefeated since puberty, he coped in the only way he knew how-- the same way he had the last time a Greg McElroy quarterbacked team came up short. He binged on rock candy, ski ball and then cried himself to sleep in a corner of the ball pit while animatronic bears serenaded him with happy songs from a better time. 

Like Greg, the Alabama Crimson Tide are not a group that really knows a lot about losing, and that includes how to get the taste out of your mouth and move on. More likely than not, they're going to take the same route of frustrated English soccer fans and just take out their frustration by mercilessly beating the sense out of someone who can't really defend themselves. That's obviously the thinking of whoever set the kickoff for 8:00 pm CST. Some things aren't fit for the light of day, and Mark Ingram against the Ole Miss linebacking corps is likely going to be one of those.

But maybe...just maybe, they won't know how to bounce back. Like Drago in Rocky IV, the rest of the world has seen them bleed. With the unfamiliar taste of blood in their mouth, Alabama might come to the revelation for the first time that they are, in fact, mortal. With that lesson learned, they lose the edge, the swagger that previously drove their team. Sometimes loss metastasizes in more loss.

Ole Miss knows loss to the point where coping has become part of our unofficial motto of never losing the party. When you wake up on Sunday morning with that taste in your mouth, the best Listerine is the melted ice in last night's rocks glass. Gargle, swish, spit and get ready for the week to come. 

One of the great overlooked quirks of the invasion of Poland is that when the Nazi tanks rolled across the border, the Poles sent horseback calvary to meet them. These poor bastards straightened their uniforms, took a strong swig of vodka and actually charged tanks with horses. Not because they wanted to or even thought they had a chance of success; they charged because when it comes time for a fight, you're pride-bound to do the best with what you have. It's a Hell of a mentality, and it's one that you're going to need if you're going to be on the Ole Miss side of things tonight...along with a little good vodka and maybe a lance. Jerrell Powe didn't drive his moped all this way just to lay down. He's going to a club a fucker or two, and I'm riding with him. 

As for little Greg in the ball pit, play him home, boys.

A Circular Motion, Week 7: Columbus, Caminos and Cubans

Because if you stare into the great abyss looking for the future, what you're really seeing is the past, we preview this weekends games by looking back through History.com's "This Week in History."

McNeese St. at LSU (6:00 pm CST)/Columbus Stumbles Into The Bahamas (Rum Drinks O'Clock EST)

Relying simply on pure balls and blessed ignorance, funny-hatted captain with poor clock management narrowly staves off mutiny and desertion with unexpected success and exotic spices. Scholars debate whether he was ahead of his time or clinically insane.

MSU at Florida (7:00 pm EST)/Rommel Commits Suicide By Cyanide (3:35 pm Fuhrer Time)
A struggling superpower looks for a fall guy outside of the infalliable dear leader, who is genius and cannot possibly be the cause of the downward trend. A close assistant is singled out and done away with.


Iowa at Michigan (11:00 am CST)/Blind Man, Terrified Co-Pilot Set Land Speed Record (8:45 am CET)
Full of bravado, a man in the dark puts the pedal down. He has no idea where he's going, but he knows he's going to get there fast...and probably with his shoelaces untied. Beside him, a very nervous man holding a clip board screams encrouagement, because his life depends on this success.

California at USC (12:30 pm PT)/Charlie Rich Presents CMA Entertainer of the Year Award to John Denver, Lights It On Fire (8:38 pm CST)
A former winner on the decline looks around at where the industry is going. Instead of passing the torch, instead decides just to set the whole thing on fire by incincerating an award of questionable relevance. Then, goes to hang out with a monkey at a truck stop.

Arkansas at Auburn (2:30 pm CST)/William Jefferson Clinton and Hillary Rodhman Are Married (4:00 pm CST)

A marriage of shotgun convience erupts into turbulance/betrayal/lies/strange sexual advances/world domination.

BYU at TCU (3:00 pm CST)/The Republic of Texas Joins United States (2:15 am TEXAS TIME)

After breaking away from a small-time, dysfunctional association, a pissy group of white guys with inflated opinions of themselves come to the painful realization that maybe independence is not quite all it's cracked up to be.

Baylor at Colorado (5:00 pm MT)/In 1943, Italy Declares War On Germany (Sometime After Brunch CET) 
A weak ally with a deposed maniacal leadership jumps from a clearly sinking ship to join up with former rivals. They prove to be as worthless to their new friends as they were their old ones.

Ohio State at Wisconsin (6:00 pm CST)/The Cuban Missle Crisis Begins (8:30 pm Rum Drinks O'Clock)
Two beheamoths have a staring contest for what seems like weeks. Big talk and anxious build-up drags on into fatigue and resignation to death. By the end, everybody's just tired of watching and not particularly concerned if the world ends or not.

Ole Miss at Alabama (8:00 pm CST)/Young Hitler Survives Gas Attack In WW1 (11:42 CET)
Evil takes a knock from the old Empire, but is not finished off. Left alive, he later goes on a rampage through lesser horse-calvary states leaving bombed out cities, smoldering ashes and bitter defeat in the wake.

Iowa State at Oklahoma (6:00 pm CST)/Western Movie Star Killed By "Suitcase of Death"(8:45 pm CST)
Cruising the roads of victory, a successful Okie puts it into the ditch and is unexpectedly knocked off from behind by a blunt object projectile. Mourning Oklahomans agree the loss, while tragic, probably prevented what they foresaw as a slow, messy decline into booze, whores and dice games in the desert.




Oregon State at Washington (7:15 pm PT)/Car-Truck Hybrid 'El Camino' Rolls Off The Line (9:00 am CST)
Once with high hopes as the ushering in a new era of a struggling national brand, the hybrid struggles to live up to the hype. Once billled as "the most beautiful thing that ever shouldered a load," the stock keeps sliding into an object of ridicule and pity.

A Circular Motion: Looking Back to Look Forward At Week 6

Because if you stare into the great abyss looking for the future, what you're really seeing is the past, we preview this weekends games by looking back through History.com's "This Week in History."

Baylor at Texas Tech (12 pm EST)/Lincoln Observes Military Balloon Demonstration (11:22 am EST)

Controversial new aerial technology is demonsrated before big-eared executive, who is dubious of its actual worth in battlefield conditions. Decision is made to stick to Naploeonic formation tactics with the occasional calvary/wildcat charge.

Minnesota at Wisconsin (12 pm EST)/Minnesotan Circles The Globe On Foot (10:45 pm GMT)
Disenchanted Minnesota natives hit the road. When asked why they've decided to subject themselves to the pain of a journey that's going to inevitably bring them to exactly where they started, said "I was tired of Waseca, tired of my job, tired of a lot of little people who don't want to think, and tired of my wife."

Tennessee at Georgia (12:21 EST)/Chief Joselph Surrenders, Still Screwed (5:30 MST)
After attempting to lead honorably in the face of a dishonest world, a tired chief tries in vein once more for a victory for his people. After failing, he declares, "Hear me, my chiefs: My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever." Then, limps to Canada.

UCLA at California (12:30 pm PT)/90210 Premieres on Fox (8:00 PT)
Counting on drama and sensantionalism to bring them into competition with more staid industry stalwarts, a network under edgy new leadership brings the bad boy with the dark past to lay wreck to any notions of academia, scholarly pursuit or free love with illicit substances, unplanned pregnancies and cutthroat tactics. On the way out, a tree burns and a nation embraces its guilty pleasures.

Alabama at South Carolina (3:30 pm EST)/Stalin Demands the Liberation of Stalingrad (6:12 am MSK)
The humbled once-brash dictator stares down the new, seemingly irresitable darkness on his doorstep and perpares for a final, depserate push to turn them back. Meanwhile, the rest of the free world watches and waits to meet their new overlord.

Clemson at UNC (3:30 PM EST)/Dalton Gang Gets Greedy, Ambushed, Decimated (1:15 pm MST)
Pushing their luck in an effort to take a shortcut to long-term prosperity, well-known outlaws are caught in a firefight that results in severe attrition. Those who survived offer only solemn warnings to others who think about challenging the law: "The biggest fool on earth is the one who thinks he can beat the law, that crime can be made to pay. It never paid and it never will and that was the one big lesson of the Coffeyville raid/Miami Yacht Party."

LSU at Florida (7:30 pm EST)/Sputnik Launched Into Space (10:29 pm MSK)
Supposedly less technically-advanced nation under leadership of questionable sanity continues to shock and confound the world with feats of success that seem to far outstrip their perceived abilities or performance in basic functions.

Auburn at Kentucky (7:30 pm CST)/James Bakker Indicted, Jessica Hahn Cashes In (8:30 am EST)
A fraudulent faith healer's scam finally gets exposed, while the underling he screwed over on his way out of the door makes the most of a bad situation to pad the wallet and build notoriety.

USC at Stanford (5:00 pm PT)/Liz Taylor Marries Construction Worker (8:30 pm PT)
Legendary Hollywood institution, tired from scandal and battered from the spotlight, goes slumming in rehab with the first swinging dick with a full head of hair who winks and slaps the ass. Everyone involved assumes it will end in either divorce or matricide, possibly by arsenic.

MSU at Houston (7:00 pm CST)/Work Begins On Mount Rushmore (6:15 am CST)
An ambitious visionary struggles to manipulate hard, formless nature into a lasting work of art in a desolate landscape. Little does he know, he will never live long enough to see his efforts come to fruition.

Menomena: West Coast Cool and the Value of Desperation

I need some desperation in my music. We are going to crack this symbol, bleed these fingers, break these strings, pound these keys, strangle this mic stand until you get it.

And that was what was missing from the Menomena show. By all accounts, they're comers. A rising West Coast rock band that's about ready to break out. They brought three racks of pedals, one and a half keyboards, two laptops, baritone sax, windpipe, a variety of guitars and two plastic baby doll heads. And they played them all. Yeah, the guy played the bass line with his feet while blowing out some rough bursts on the baritone sax. That was impressive. But did it actually do anything for the song? Eh.

They are all very talented musicians, and they know it. There are two great varieties of performers. The first are the self-concious who go over the top to compensate for their perceived (real or otherwise) shortcomings with pure sweat equity. The second are the cocksure geniuses of their own mind who believe they are actually the second coming of the Christ, and doesn't think you fully appreciate the greatness. But they're about to convert you.

The drummer, Danny Seim, brought it. There's no doubt. On a stage of electronics, style and technology, he brought the lo-fi wood, brass and bare feet that drove the show. The highlight of the set was a song called "Dirty Cartoons," with vocals by Seim. As the rest of the band joined in for the final build-up harmony, it was one of the few earnest moments of the night. The kind that made you sit up and see what could be with a little less primp and a little more madness.

For the rest, they were too sure of their own talent and the crowd's appreciation of it. The bass, either played by pedal or string, was steady and interesting. The keys were everything an accent should be. The guitar was strong. Even the three and four part harmonies were flawless. But that was the problem. They had nothing to prove. It was like watching the smart kid in the class solve an equation. It's the difference between a rock show and a recital.

Every show should be a revival. You have a message and crowd of non-believers. If you don't convert them, they'll spend the rest of their lives wandering hopeless and lost. It's that simple. There's somebody out there tonight who doesn't believe. And we're going to beat on their chests until either their eyes open or their ribs crack.

The band picked up energy as it went along. Looking back, it was a solid effort and certainly worth 3 beers and a $15 cover. But it was very California in the assumption of cool and appreciation. It was beauty without heartbreak, which is just kind of empty. If you like Menomena, you should check out Centro-Matic/South San Gabriel. All of the genius, a little more offbeat and a whole handful of desperation...because what else is there in Denton, Texas if not desperation?