Monday, September 17, 2007

I get it....

Sometimes on ESPN, or other sports-related news media... people will talk about how obnoxious and rude OU fans are... I, who consider myself an OU fan, would normally get mildly offended and wonder what the heck they were talking about. Oklahoma is a friendly place full of good 'ole boys! I've been to several OU football games (although none in Norman since before 2000, until Saturday) and a couple of basketball games and have found none of these so called "obnoxious" fans. Sure, there are students who paint their bellies and loudly scream the fight song, but what college doesn't have that? So, I would tell those OU fan bashers they didn't know what they were talking about.... until Saturday...

*I will preface all of this by saying that I'm a girl, normally I love football games, when it's cool outside... I don't like being sweaty and hot... I have a low tolerance for stupid people... and I'm pregnant and generally gripey*

Once we trekked 3 miles to the stadium and we got to our seats... It was nice... my happiness scale was sitting at a 8. Once I had nachos and a coke... it hit a solid 9. All is going well, I'm enjoying nachos and a soda... pre-game is going on... Ryan has someone there to talk "technical sports talk" with. This is great... the seats aren't crowded, there is even a breeze. Hooray for football!

Then, seconds before kickoff... a large man comes up the stadium stairs. I saw him coming rows away... and I know his seat is the empty one to my left. The only problem is, our row is completely filled except for this one seat, and people have already spaced out. This empty seat is almost completely filled by my empty nacho boat... and this man is MUCH larger than a nacho boat.
Large man squeezes down the row... and then he sits, partly on my left leg. I scoot over towards Ryan where I am practically sitting on him now. There's only one thing I hate worse than being sweaty... being sweaty and TOUCHING someone... now I'm being touched on both sides. (this I only blame on the university for wanting to cram so many people in the stadium... that, and America's obesity problem.)
Wait... something smells.... It's the big man! What is that smell... obviously, BO.... and..... Band-aids?!? Does he have some big injury and a dislike for deodorant?? Oh wait.... something else.... pork rinds!! BO, pork-rinds, and band-aids. GAG ME!!
About 6 minutes into the first quarter, Big man decides to put his hands on the bleacher... except there's no room on the bleacher... so he's touching my butt!! This lasts for entirely TOO long and makes me incredibly uncomfortable. I say something to Ryan about big man touching my butt, and he just laughs and goes back to the game.

Then, Roseanne Barr's "voice twins" sister (who apparently is an avid OU fan) is sitting behind and to my left. All she yells is "Defense, stop it right now!" OVER and OVER. If you replaced Defense with Darlene, I could have sworn someone was watching Roseanne reruns. Much to my surprise, she switched up her yell in the 3rd quarter by replacing every 6th "Defense, stop it right now!" to "SackHimSackHimSackHimSackHimSackHim". I swear, she sounded exactly like Roseanne, but 35139 time louder. It was ridiculous!!

Then directly behind me was a family that walked right out of a Jeff Foxworthy joke. They were absolutely WT and had the worst accents I've ever heard! I can't even sum up everything they said that was absolutely ridiculous, but here's a few quotes...

From the mom to the daughter (who was blonde, yet had dreadlocks that looked like she had slept in them for a month...all frizzy and falling out): "See thar.... that's why yous need to say in gymnastics... so you can be one of those cheerleaders flippin' around out thar."

Dad to son EVERY PLAY: Watch 'is son... thar's gonna be a touchdown/intercept'en (depending on who had the ball) I ken fill it.

Mom on cell phone: I sencha a pitcher of the feld with the players on it... I can't hear ya.... I can't hear ya.... I can't hear ya...

(The best one of the night) Dad to family: Babe, sister, son... any of ya want any of this coke fore I put whiskey in it?
(alcohol is banned at all big 12 stadiums, just FYI... apparently not from a flask hidden in your overall pockets, though)

So all of this went on... coupled with the pregame "welcome to the visiting team" that you couldn't even hear because everyone was booing so loud.

I have to say... it was nice to see a game in Norman since OU has been, well, ranked. The last time I went to a game at Norman I think there were somewhere around 20,000 in attendance and it was "Pre-Stoops". At Saturday's game the attendance was 85,000. I enjoyed the OU games more in Waco or College Stadium where the seats weren't as crowded and I think it was later in the year, so it was nicer weather. I managed to get a sun burn, so that stinks, but I found our way back to the car (quite the feat).

I could totally see how OU fans would be coined rude or obnoxious. I definitely saw obnoxious... and if the boos were that loud for a no-name team, I can only imagine how it gets during conference play. Sadly, I don't think it's the students that are the rude ones... You could almost write that off as being young and immature... But I see the older (probably not even alumni) fans as being the rude, obnoxious ones. (Prime example being the testicle guy...) I'm not saying that being a fan when you're not a student/alumni is bad... I'm a fan and not an alumni. (I went to a no-name school where our football record was like 2-8 and our claim to fame is one of the guys from the Friday Night lights movie played there.) I just think it's ridiculous to be so fanatical about a school you don't have any ties to, other than you like their football team.

Anyway, I'm still an OU fan... just one that watches the games from home.