"No, it's too perilous"

Cowboy fans enter Philadelphia’s Lincoln Financial Field with trepidation and unease. Bronco backers pass near Oakland’s Black Hole with their eyes down and their hands on their women and their wallets. Red Sox fans wear their grungiest clothes to Yankee Stadium, secure in the knowledge that they’ll get beer tossed on them. Or will at least have to powerwash their togs to remove the lingering stench of Yankee Nation.

Those are walks in the park compared to the foul gauntlet Teejay and I contemplate. Beginning at sundown this evening, we’ll fortify our stomachs and steel our resolve before making the short walk from Brion’s Grill (don’t ask about the spelling – I don’t get it, either) to the Patriot Center, where the William & Mary Tribe will face all manner of malodorous perils in the persons of the George Mason Patriots and their fans.

Consider the following:
Not only do we have to sit courtside, significantly increasing our risk of exposure to flying sweat and Tony Shaver’s moustache, we’ll be asked…nay, forced, to amble 30 yards or so in to the Patriot Club to nosh on free crudite and domestic lagers before the game and at halftime. And believe me when I tell you that these people don’t think twice about drinking Budweiser straight from a bottle. Shiver.

If that’s not bad enough, there’s this:

Seriously, that walking petri dish makes Youppi look hygenic. And we’ll be mere yards from it.

Finally, feast your eyes upon the coup de grace, Mason’s fearsome band director/student body “talent wrangler”. This at a publicly-funded institute of higher learning. Oh, and as my wife reminds me, today's my youngest daughter's 4th birthday, so I'm neglecting my fatherly duties in some considerable fashion (at least according to my wife - I'll be at the birthday party with bells on, for Chrissakes). Honestly, kids, the things we at G:TB do so you don’t have to. We’ll be back tomorrow with the gory details. If we make it.

It is a far, far better thing we do today than we've ever done. Think well of us in this time of quiet contemplation and mental preparation. And root against ODU, 'cause the Tribe's gonna need all the help they can get. Litos has it 66-59, Mason, and I like his optimism.