You KNOW you're a football fan when...

After a day of awesome football at College Station, we decided to support the Baylor team. After all, we are grad students here and they were playing TCU, a ranked team. Interesting side note…TCU and Baylor BOTH used to be in Waco, but the little town of Waco must have been two small for two religious schools with highly different ideas. In fact, Baylor moved into TCU’s old buildings…just a little bit of random history James found online. We went all out for this game…I mean…we even bought Baylor ‘gold’ (but really a gross yellow color) shirts to wear, because they (the mystical powers that run Baylor) asked us too.

We actually had a very good time, and I was very impressed with the atmosphere. We went with our only friends (Hurray history department!) and we all wore yellow. The stadium is very cute, and is actually really nice. It is fairly new, but it is a few miles from campus in not the nicest part of town. I am a believer in having your stadium on campus, but when you don't have room for it, what can you do? We weren't going to go to the game, because Baylor decided that graduate students do not pay enough in student fees to qualify for free tickets, but someone changed their minds and we were able to get free tickets!! Kudos for whoever pulled that one off! :-)

Perhaps the coolest thing I've seen at Baylor thus far is the Freshman Line tradition. To make the freshmen feel more like they are a part of the university community, each are given a free "golden" jersey with their name on it and their graduating class year. Then, on the first game, they sit in a special section together and get to make the entrance tunnel for the team...hence...the Baylor line. I think that is awesome, and a great way to get your students excited about football! :-) More beef I have with Baylor though...they play Enter Sandman when their team comes out too! And...it does nothing. James and I immediately started jumping up and down and screaming, because it’s a natural reaction. But, as we realized we were the only ones in the stadium doing so, it became awkward and we stopped. Instead, we joined the stadium in the Baylor Sic' Em Bears thing...in which you put your right arm up in the shape of a claw, and you shake it and yell. Which, is kind of cool, but that's all that they do the entire game, so it got old.