September 29, 2007

That was the last time that Purdue beat Notre Dame. The world was a totally different place back then. I had a flip-phone. I'm pretty sure Taylor Swift wasn't a thing yet. We had a divided government, we were escalating our commitment to an unwinnable quagmire in Iraq, and everyone was angry because George R.R. Martin was taking for-goddamned-ever to finish his next novel. Wait...

At any rate, a popular Notre Dame internet discussion forum was asking everybody where they were for that... ignominious game... which prompted our own irishoutsider to finally sit down and put quill to parchment about the wicked fun trip we took to Florida that weekend in those heady, pre-puppets, pre-wives-and-babies mid-to-late-00's. It was glorious. With his permission I have cross-posted it here for the world to bask in.

My own account of the tale is here, but it's short and it sucks and you probably shouldn't even bother with it. I think I was still sweating out the poison at the time. 

Enjoy!

-fightinamish

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Florida Has Its Own Tag, by irishoutsider

tl;dr Before the puppets, we had a ridiculous time in Florida

Amish and I gave {} fucks and headed south that weekend. In very short amount of time, we managed to grab student tickets to Florida-Auburn at The Swamp and also catch a Friday night opening act in Tampa: USF-West Virginia

I think all 4 teams were in the top 5? USF stormed the field and this iconic HouseRockBuilt photo was taken:

[fightinamish: Yeah, that's me and singlet guy]

After some late extracurricular activity in Tampa, we set out to Gainesville bright and early to catch the ND-Purdue Pam Ward special in whatever dive bar we could manage. The Copper Monkey let us watch on a broke ass TV/VCR combo that had hooked up in the corner, and we decided to make things interesting.

A shot of whiskey every time ND scores or makes a grievous error. This establishment was kind enough to serve their shots in the larger plastic containers used to hold chicken wing dipping sauces.

I believe we proceeded to open the game with 2 airmailed shotgun snaps, a few INT, and an ND INT for TD, affectionately known as Ze Pickenhouse.

We had a ways to go before we met up with a local Florida blogger, and the bartender was pretty cool about the entire endeavor. "Guys, it's early. I'm not going to cut you off, but I'm worried about you." In a compromise, we switched to Apple Pucker as to delay alcohol poisoning for at least a few more hours.

We eventually met up with Orson Swindle and proceeded to tailgate with him and his lawyer in an undisclosed location. The rest is a blur from here as I only remember what I think was Keystone Light and tackle football. Amish managed to pipe hit Swindle and proceed to celebrate with the Shawne Merriman Lights Out dance (fightinamish: this picture was taken like 25 seconds before said decleating. This was taken a few seconds after).

We settled into the Gator student section, fully prepared to call truce for the evening and do as the Romans do. Then, Urban came on the jumbotron, and we knew in our hearts that this was unpossible. We managed to keep a good face on things right until Auburn kicked the winning field goal, silencing the Hellmouth that was The Swamp after dark.

Before we headed back to Tampa that night, we met back up with the Swindles and proceeded to the closest Sonic for post-game toasters and cherry-lime ades at what I think was 1 am. The drive home was spent through the unlit everglades, making sure we weren't pulled over by alligators who had eaten Highway Patrol and put on their uniforms in order to capture and eat speeding motorists [editor's note: I drove. Irishoutsider was unconscious, snoring and drooling in the passenger seat the entire time].