A weekend down east

So basically, I gave up a chance to see my beloved Tar Heels pull off a win over Miami this weekend to take in my first football game at Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium in Greenville with my realtor/good friend/biggest Pirate I know - Jeff Stallings. Here are a few observations from a weekend of beer, football and, well, beer.

- ECU has a lot of women. OK, so for three years now, Jeff has been telling me how many more women are in Greenville than Chapel Hill. I always scoffed at this notion, though. Come on. UNC has a 70-30 female to male ratio. Of course, I never really got to take advantage of that, since I had a girlfriend all through college (Yes, I was that guy, although without that girlfriend I probably would not have graduated... so I guess God knows what he's doing after all).
But Jeff was right. There are way too many girls in Greenville. Of course, now, at 27, I am too old to take advantage. I am now the old creepy guy at the game to them. My timing is impeccable.

- ECU has a kickass team entrance. Again, Jeff has been touting this for years, and he was right about this one, too. It was awesome. A pirate comes out of a ship. There are cannons. It's exciting.

- The Pirates know how to tailgate. So all Saturday Jeff was telling me how disappointed he was in the tailgating crowd, but it was much better than anything I ever saw at Chapel Hill. I love Carolina, but we do have a bit of a wine and cheese crowd. Maybe it has something to do with us being a basketball school. It's hard to tailgate in 20 degree weather. But that may be changing with Butch in charge.

- Some ECU fans have a bit of an inferiority complex...Whenever someone asked me where I went to school and I said Carolina (and it happened a lot, probably because I was one of the only people in a sea of purple and gold with a light blue shirt on), they would automatically launch into a diatribe about how badly Carolina treats ECU. And every complaint would have a "Y'all", as in "Y'all didn't wants us to have a Medical school" or "Y'all tried to keep us from getting a dental school" or "Y'all don't want us in the ACC" or "Y'all didn't want to play us" or "We kicked y'all's asses this year."
For the record, I have never made a single decision on the academic or athletic pursuits of either college. And I didn't take a single down in that game earlier this year where we lost by 3 points...Hardly an ass-kicking.
Finally, one fan asked me how I liked my visit in Greenville, with a smirk as if to say it was 10 times better than anything in Chapel Hill. My response? "Y'all got a nice little school down here" with an equally condescending smirk. He didn't like that.

- I am still a Tar Heel.. I would trade all the cannons and girls in Greenville for the sight of a beautiful, pristine Carolina blue Saturday in Kenan Stadium, with the Bell Tower looking over you as the Tar Heels blast out of the tunnel with Hell's Bells playing.

- And the town of Greenville has got nothing on Chapel Hill. When I die, I hope they bury me in Chapel Hill, under one of those big poplars in Polk Place. God I miss that place. It's the closest to heaven that I'll ever be.

- I'm getting too old for this. When I say I miss that place, I mean Chapel Hill, not college. College was fun, but it had it's time and place. And though I am not allergic to a good time, I wouldn't go back for the world.
It's weird, but in high school and college, I ate, drank and slept Carolina athletics. Now, I still pay attention and want us to win. But I don't have that same fire anymore. I have new stuff to worry about. I love Roy Williams, but he ain't going to pay my car payment for me.
Growing up sucks. Or does it?

I had a good time in Greenville, though. It was a great game, and I even bought a t-shirt, along with one for my roommate (an ECU alum) to repay him for a run-in he had with a redneck this weekend on my behalf. And thanks to Jeff for taking me down there.