Spazzy Mcgee
May 16, 2008 Dec 11, 2009 17 9684
a fan of
San Francisco Giants
San Francisco 49ers
California Golden Bears
California Golden Bears
San Jose Sharks
RSSUser Blog
Wheel of Morality, Turn Turn Turn
by Spazzy Mcgee on Feb 20, 2009 4:11 AM EST
34 comments
34 comments | 3 recs
More Emerald Bowl Photos
by Spazzy Mcgee on Dec 31, 2008 4:38 AM EST
5 comments
I had fun, and the win was exciting, but I'll be honest: I would still rather have a trip to Vegas or San Diego.
Here are my original seats, right next to the band on the left field bleachers. I kind of shifted around until I was next to some guys who were pretty into the game: making noise on D, cheering etc. Everyone_else in the section was stone-faced silent. Unfortunately the real owners of those seats came so I had to move down a few rows and over, to sit with rest of the fans educated at the Milford Academy.
Others have mentioned how close the end zone is to the fans. Here is an illustration of that. I seriously don't understand how this is legal; if a player were to go for a diving catch towards the back of the endzone, he would slam helmet-first into the wall, which is like 3 feet beyond the back of the endzone.
"It IS metal!!"
This did result in some pretty sweet shots of the parachuters.
This is also what a farting contest at the Friedgen home looks like.
Signore Tavecchio practices kicking the ball:
Backup kicker Nick Demopolous practices kicking Bryan Anger:
This is why you're the backup.
Can you imagine this scene while high?
".........like....................................................whoa."
America's Favorite QB practices with Luxury Yacht. They weren't actually throwing or anything. Boateng just likes holding the ball way up high like that.
The team makes its way out.
Coin toss.
"For I, Admiral Macadamia, do preside over this, the coin toss of Antioch....."
Here's why my seats sucked. I was so close to the goalpost and so low to the field, the crossbar obscured ~30 yards of depth on the field. I either had to crouch down or stand up to see anything at all.
Awesome drive summary.
The seats were so crappy I eventually moved over to the student section. I'll say this, though, the jumbotron is awesome. Can the Phoenix Five pull together a plot to steal this next time? Even the players had a better view of the game by watching the screen...
Coach, can we switch over to ANTM?
Til next time...
GO BEARS!
5 comments | 3 recs
My Favorite Big Game Article
by Spazzy Mcgee on Nov 18, 2008 4:13 PM EST
10 comments
Written by the best single blogger the Cal community has ever known, Tightwad Hill. I'll post the link and the text here. Also, if you haven't had a chance, read his writeups on the 50 greatest Golden Bear football players and some of the top basketball players, too. His writing and analysis was cogent, to the point, reasoned, and funny. Tightwad Hill, you are missed!!!
Many of the great rivalries are fundamentally class rivalries - the "big-city" university v the land grant agriculture college. This is what fuels Alabama/Auburn, or Oregon/OSU. Some are even about religion (BYU/Utah) or fashion (USC/UCLA).
Cal/Stanford is the only great rivalry that's fundamentally about ideology. And by ideology, we don't mean the traditional left-right distinction - Stanford's a good bit more conservative than Cal, but they're both squarely in God-hating commie territory.
No, the ideology at play here is authoritarianism. Cal teaches its own to question authority by imposing a faceless, soul-crushing bureaucracy upon its students. No classes? Tough shit. No housing? There's always co-ops. Want the personal touch? Try getting to know your 1200 classmates in Anthro 1. Four years at Berkeley feels like a Kafka novel - you come out with a perhaps too-healthy skepticism of professors, administrators, Presidents and the like.
Stanford is a school next to a mall and some golf courses that is populated by cheerful authority figures who want to like you. They serve as your counselor, and help you choose your classes. They arrange comfy dorm rooms, and social events with your fellow fascinating students drawn from all parts of the country. They want you to succeed, because you're one of them - the few, the proud, the elites. Isn't it grand?You exit Stanford feeling really, really good about yourself. You exit Berkeley happy to have survived the experience. Berkeley is exhilirating; Stanford is pleasant. Both sets of alumni run the world, but only one group of alumni feels entitled to.
posted by Tightwad @ 12:00 PM
Leland Stanford didn't attend the university that bears his name. He simply founded it - with money stolen from the pockets of the good men and women of California, on the backs of Chinese immigrants that his railroad literally worked to death. Want to know why our State Capitol is in Sacramento? Because Leland Stanford's railroad was going to end there, and because he said so. The California built by Stanford and his fellow Robber Barons was, in essence, a kleptocracy benefiting the elites at the expense of the masses. After all - they deserved it.
The University of California, by contrast, was established by Governor Frederick Low in 1868 with the passage of the Organic Act. UC was designed on the University of Michigan model and sought to make higher education available to all residents of the state, regardless of their ability to pay.
Prominent Stanford alumni in the corporate world include Steve Ballmer, Phil Knight - uber-elites. Cal has Steve Wozniak, who did all the hard work at Apple and then retired to do philanthropy instead of press conferences, and the Haas family, noted for their pursuit of business ethics.
Cal has Alice Waters, Timothy Leary, Joan Didion - slightly kooky trailblazers in their respective fields. Stanford has Herbert Hoover, who couldn't be bothered with all that talk of a Great Depression, and Gray Davis, who never left his office to notice the State collapsing around him. Elites. Cal's Laura Tyson is famous for presiding over the great Clinton economic run of the 1990s as head of the CEA and NEC. Stanford's Condi Rice is famous for presiding over the collapse of the world.
Some may look on this as a false distinction between two privileged groups, but we disagree. The ideology that separates Cal and Stanford, Berkeley and Palo Alto, rugged individualism and elitist group-think is what brings the taste of bile to our lips every time we see that dancing tree.
It's not jealousy, it's resentment - and there's a difference. You see, we know those smug, snarky clowns in red and white are someday going to fuck up the entire world, and we're not happy about it.
10 comments | 6 recs
Dr. Los Angeles or: How I learned to stop worrying about the game and love the food.
by Spazzy Mcgee on Nov 11, 2008 1:40 AM EST
50 comments
After last year's fUCLA game, I vowed never to return to the city of Los Angeles for a football game. Unfortunately my weakness for road trips overcame my vow, and the next thing I knew I was passing Casa de Fruta. This began the way every trip to the LA game does: at the In n Out in Kettleman City surrounded by other Cal fans in a generally upbeat mood. But, at this point, I told myself this trip would be different. There would be neither heartache nor let down. There would be no sadness, nor would there be the hollow echoes of lost chances exploring the cavernous hall in my brain where I keep my treasure trove of disappointments related to Cal football (I plan to unleash their beguilting power on my grandchildren 50 years from now).
Not because Cal might win, of course. Pete Carroll and the Trojans in the Coliseum are less a football team in my mind now than a primeval, unexplainable force. No, the reason I would not feel disappointed after our likely loss was that I planned to eat so much food that I could not feel anything else. For LA is blessed with fine eating establishments which know no conference allegiance or terrible reffing. Canter's, Pink's, Roscoe's, Diddy Riese, Albert's Mexican food and of course the omnipresent In n Out (on Radford). Commence editorialized journalism.
Although ironically our first stop would be in the hip, happenin' city of Bell Gardens:
"If a ragnarok would burn all the slums and gas-works, and shabby garages, and long arc-lit suburbs, it could for me burn all the works of art--and I'd go back to trees..." -JRR Tolkien
For these...
"Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are." -Brillat-Savarin
In some places, you might walk down the street to a market or eatery. In LA, you take Wilshire to 405 to 10 to 60 to 710 to Garfield. In traffic. On a Saturday morning.
If they'd lower the taxes and get rid of the smog and clean up the traffic mess, I really believe I'd settle here until the next earthquake. -Groucho Marx
The wind really cleared out the air the night before. Apparently there are mountains surrounding LA. Who knew?
"Tip the world on its side and everything loose will land in Los Angeles." -Frank Lloyd Wright
I tried to look for Stego warming up, but ended up only seeing a Sanchezosaur. 
"This is a fine tailgate, but the crowd is a bit older and it’s a sedate affair. I walk to campus, swept along by a sea of people wearing red shirts and carrying coolers. The idea of tailgating is to socialise with your friends before a sporting event—usually, an American football game." -The Economist
A fine tailgate, indeed. At which point we attempted to get to Will Call. Unfortunately at that moment the Trojans decided to walk into the stadium, requiring they rope off the crowd for 25 minutes. This gentleman tried to razz the team. To my astonishment, little effect, if any, was noticeable on the playing field.
Hey, I don't come down to where you work and knock the license plate out of your hand. -Seinfeld
Soon thereafter, it was time to get to our seats. We were located a contour or two shy of Camp Four, halfway between the Hillary Step and South Col. We only lost two men and a yak to edema. The view, however, was nice.
"What's our vector, Victor?" "Do we have clearance, Clarence?" "Roger Roger." "Over."
Details aside, the game was tight, and the crowd, thankfully, was into it. 
"You're all winners!!!!!!"
The game being over meant it was time to continue eating, this time at Roscoe's. 
Overnight, the fourteen pounds of newly acquired food inside of me decided it wanted to explore the world outside my GI tract. Thankfully, I manned up and punched the food, in the face, back to where it belongs. It was the biggest victory of the trip.
Little else of note happened on the remainder of the trip, except a visit from The Lord Almighty God Himself shortly after Kettleman:
Coach Michalzik didst suffer much wailing and gnashing of teeth. "Do not fret, my son," spake the lord, "Tepper shalt be granted a 6th year of eligibility." There was much rejoicing.
And God Himself reminded me that in the end, looking back, even in the rafters of the LA Coliseum, California is all blue and gold:
GO BEARS.
50 comments | 3 recs
DBD 9.10.08 - A New Era Is Upon Us, So Mulch To Talk About!
by Spazzy Mcgee on Sep 10, 2008 3:39 AM EDT
63 comments
Now that the oak grove is safely woodchipped and Mando, Dumpster Muffin, Shemp, Moe and Curly are spreading their BO elsewhere, some questions are begged:
Who's down for a tailgate on Panoramic Hill, music and BBQs blaring, (also, can we get the cannon over there?) every Saturday, forever?
When will actual construction start? Are they going to concomitantly fix the stadium, as rumored? Will we be watching a season from the Coliseum?
But most importantly WHERE WILL CGB GET >70% of its material?!?!?!!??!?!
These will be answered in due time. Some links.
EDSBS Takes Note of the end of our sitcha-ation in only the way that most diehard hardcore frat boy drankin college football fans do: a lovely poem.
Today, save a moment for
The lunatic and dedicated.
Their moment has abated,Replaced with order, stability.
Dumpster Muffin, down from her tree.
This is the only way it can be.
Okanes gets players' and Tedford's reaction to the end of the grove, plus dealing with the time change.
Fullback Will Ta’ufo’ou said he couldn’t believe his eyes when the team got back to the stadium Saturday.
“I was shocked,” he said. “I didn’t think I would ever see this. I know it’s not going to be done until I leave. For me, it’s just more of a relief to see a conclusion to what’s going on.
Dump away, folks.
63 comments | 0 recs
MY take on Longshore vs. Riley
by Spazzy Mcgee on Aug 5, 2008 4:22 AM EDT
40 comments
You wanna know what my take is on Longshore vs. Riley?
Shut The Fuck Up About Longshore Vs. Riley.
Do you know who the coach of Cal football is? Jeff Tedford. He will make the decision as to who will start, and he is 1000 times the football coach you could ever dream to be.
The best QB will get the job. Period. End of story.
NO MORE LONGSHORE VS. RILEY POSTS UNTIL AFTER THE MSU GAME.
_________________________________________________________________
And yea, it was written.
40 comments | 1 recs
[Official] Treesitter Removal Ideas, Theories, Truths, and Consequences
by Spazzy Mcgee on Jul 15, 2008 7:19 PM EDT
32 comments
From: First Officer and Official of Officious Officiousness Spazzy McGee
To: All CaliforniaGoldenBlogs Purveyors, Partakers, Perusers, and ... Picnickers?
It has come to my attention that the time for removing the Photosynthetically-Enhanced Societally-Challenged Dwellers draws nigh. In this thread we shall participate in a think tank wherein all possibilities of their immediate and/or gradual removal shall be considered without remonstrance or chastisement. The rules are thus: as long as no one dies, all methods are kosher.
Engage.
32 comments | 2 recs
Newer Showing 11 - 17 of 17
Certain photos copyright © 2009 by Associated Press or Getty Images. Any commercial use or distribution without the express written consent of Associated Press and Getty Images is strictly prohibited.
