It's a sport and you will lose every time, parent.

You travel as the concierge to narcoleptic, emotionally unstable, untitled aristocrats. Every vacation with children is escorting King George III on his daily routine. King George III was the jerk king with porphyria who, when ill, took to sudden flights of fancy, argued with everyone in sight over absolutely nothing, and occasionally just had to lie down for a while when it all got to be too much.

This is traveling with two children five and under to Disney World. Someone will cry. Someone will make insane demands. Someone will want mounds of overpriced plastic crap. If they do not get it, there will be emotions, and someone will wind up weeping on the floor until you distract them with something else. I recommend a promise of "More and different overpriced plastic crap around the corner." It works every time as long as you do this until they fall asleep, and may be removed unconscious from the park without protest.

Florida has completely reversed American traffic patterns. "No one in Florida knows how to act" is a general rule for a lot of reasons. The reason the left lane in Florida is now the right lane is simple: old people who believe the left lane is not based on speed, but on accumulated merit from repeated tax-paying in some other state. Throw in a few other convenient idiot people who believe BIG DOGS ROLL IN THE LEFT LANE, and you've got your classic thing ruined by the Sunshine State's toxic cocktail of belligerent, underbrained youth and entitled cranky imported senility.

This turns the middle lane into the passing lane, and the right lane into a fast lane interrupted frequently by semi-trucks. If this sounds stupid and poorly conceived, it is, but there's a Quebecois guy who's just convinced his Buick Rendezvous going 73 mph deserves express status. Three inches from his bumper is a goateed redneck from Lake County in a Ford Raptor flashing his lights and honking. They've been doing that for 35 miles now, and will continue to do it until it results in gunplay or an accident. Just pass them in the right lane, and abandon the idea that anyone in the state knows what they're doing ever.

People on vacation also enjoy making statements on T-shirts they have no ability to validate. Every man wearing a t-shirt saying "GO HARD OR GO HOME", "TACTICAL AS F*$!", "TRY AND KEEP UP", or "UNLEASH YOUR ALPHA" appeared to be someone who was going home immediately, was not tactical to any degree of any profanity, could be caught easily on foot, or was currently holding the leash of their alpha firmly. The man you do not want to fight at Disney World is wearing a "PRINCESS BREAKFAST 2014" shirt and he had a more sensible breakfast than the beignets you ate at the Port Orleans buffet.

Brazilian dads are the real MVPs. They wander in their tour groups in athletic shorts and sleeveless shirts like they just fell out of bed. They are not yelling at their kids to get out of the gift shop and put down the goddamn make-your-own lightsaber. They come in two body types: beer and recently retired MMA fighter. They wear their sunglasses everywhere and find the beer first. They say there is no beer in the Magic Kingdom but I saw a Brazilian dad tapping Dumbo's trunk for pint of Yuengling. He did it because Brazilian dads are chill, wear whatever the hell they want because they know how to dress for warm weather, and can tap random objects for beer. It's their superpower and I want it more than any other dad superpower in the world.

The French on vacation are human cholesterol. Clogging up lines, taking 25 minutes as a family to build their own salads at lunch, and becoming paralyzed by anything involving more than two options at a time. They're pleasant, sure, but they do not move quickly under the best of conditions, and will not move at all if considering more than one thing. Something in American gluttony stupefies the French, and when they're in clumps they simply freeze up and block every major artery in the park.

Even simulated privilege turns you into a monster in minutes. Disney has an option to schedule certain rides ahead of time: The Fastpass, your ticket to understanding just how rapidly even a purchased and inconsequential piece of privilege can mutate you into an aristocratic ass-person. You just get to stroll right in, flash your band pass a sensor, and then skip giggling past proles waiting in a 45 minute line. The first time you are slightly embarrassed; by the third time you openly taunt and bare your ass at total strangers who foolishly did not schedule ahead of time. Fastpass turned me into a monstrous human in the course of a few hours; I cannot imagine what horrors a lifetime of private school and an Ivy League education would have wrought. It will turn you into an investment banker in seconds. (P.S. The next time I do this it will be in a powdered wig dressed exactly like Hugh Laurie in Blackadder.)

Beer. You will need it. The World Showcase exists solely as a booze carousel, so use it. Germany has a zillion good beers you can purchase in very large containers that you may bring anywhere in the park. They also sell shots of Jagermeister and Barenjager because Disney has sort of given up on the concept of Epcot/World Showcase being anything but "Sponsored Corporate Pavillionland/International HoochMart." In eight years when weed is legal in Florida the vape shop will open in Morocco first.

Japan offers little half-pints of Kirin for sustenance, while Morocco has bottles of Efes. Efes is bad Turkish beer, but you have to make a few stretches when stocking the bar at the only Muslim country in the lineup. France has Gray Goose Citron slushies, and the Little Britain-looking England section has a pub in case you just want to give up, abandon your family completely, and just get genuinely hammered in a supremely fake English setting. Everything is overpriced except the alcohol, because alcohol in a moment of need can never be overpriced.

Canada has the sneakiest deal: three Unibroue beers on tap at a cart with no lines. Their hokey nationalistic show is also hosted by Martin Short. Canada, based on Disney World alone, is the greatest fuckin' nation on the planet. You should not be drunk at Disney World, but a good working buzz does help when you're pushing a double stroller loaded with children and facing your eighth road-blocking Frenchtourgroupberg of the afternoon. Pardon, madames et monsieurs.

Pay whatever they ask. Your children will get tired and then you will realize what a perfectly conceived fascist trap of a wonderland Disney is. There is a pool if you cannot muster the energy to get more than 500 feet from your hotel room and there is a bar there to make sure you stay there. If you are too tired to even do that they will set up a movie on the courtyard of your hotel and pipe Tinkerbell films directly into your child's eyeballs while you drink tallboys of respectable craft beer.

This is how total the control at Disney is. You can lay on grass without a single biting ant, cat-sized cockroach, or a single mosquito touching you. It's unnatural and wrong and it is wonderful because, after a few days of this, your children may sleep as late at 7:45 a.m. Pay them for these miracles. Pay them and smile, because if you have children you will end up paying them anyway.

TAKE THEIR TICKETS

Bob Stoops did a good and right thing that we should all know was right and good. Oklahoma football cancelled practice and instead made a silent display of walking out and praying together as a team. OU as a whole reacted grandly to a video of a University of Oklahoma SAE member singing a racist song with a bus full of his friends: a day after it hit the internet the fraternity was booted off campus and their letters were torn off the house. The President of the university called them a "disgrace." That happened, and should have happened.

That's all good. The weirdness that remains for us is considering why fraternities exist at all on a college campus. This is an honest curiosity: we have no idea why they exist, or why anyone would pay to belong to one-- or most importantly to the concerns of this website, why you'd ever allow them to have a seating block in a football stadium every damn year.

And before we go there: no, we didn't ever want to pledge one, as the idea of paying for friends seemed weird. Any professional concerns about the value of networking were eliminated by having no professional concerns that made any sense, or had any hopes of making any money whatsoever.

More importantly: we never wanted to hang out with a bunch of dudes. That made zero sense for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is that women could get into parties and acquire booze and contraband way, way more easily than a guy could. Women, for a dude living alone for the first time, were a godsend: they reminded you to behave like a human, wash your clothes at least bi-monthly, and not to do things that...well, that fraternity members were known for doing.

We knew one reason to join a frat, and it's one that made only marginal sense if you wanted to sit with a bunch of people you paid to be friends with: you got a block of seats at football, and those seats would be sort of the same each time. Why they got these was a matter of sad campus politics too tedious to recall, but they got them, and get them at other schools across the SEC and beyond. (And in some cases, lose them when they don't show up to games, or leave early.)

So SAE's probably been punished enough, save one thing: if they have a seating block at SAE, break it up and take their tickets. If we were an OU fan, it's what we'd want. Not that they be banned forever from the stadium just so we could feel better about ourselves, but for a season because that's not something we tolerate as fans of  [INSERT TEAM HERE].

If they take it a step further and take their tickets, we'd prefer that they refund them, of course. They don't deserve to have money their money stolen, as tempting as it might be to consider. But like football clubs in Europe do to racist fans, you do quietly take them, and hope that they apply next year for general admission seating like everyone else. It's a symbolic gesture that serves as a reminder of how equal we all are in the eyes of the lord, and more importantly in the sight of your local football ticket office agent.

NEVER NEVER NEVER GO FULL PCB

Dak Prescott (1) won't be pressing charges against anyone in the assault (2) that left him bloodied outside a Waka Flocka (3) concert at Club La Vela (4) in Panama City Beach. (5)

1. The starting quarterback for the Mississippi State Bulldogs and most successful thing about the Shreveport-Bossier City metropolitan area ever. However, Prescott was born elsewhere: Sulphur, Louisiana, named for the sulphur mining industry there. If you wonder where you have to be from to seek asylum in the notorious SBC, well, you have to be from a place that smells like literal hellfire 24/7.

2. Even if the people who allegedly beat up Prescott and two other Miss State football players may have happily admitted to it on Twitter. Never, ever tweet.

3. Softish throat drop spokesman and noted Atlantan.

4. Oh man if this all didn't sound like a bad enough idea by being in Panama City Beach to begin with, you have to add Club La Vela to the mix. Club La Vela was designed by an Auburn grad AND hosted WCW events. Those two facts alone should convince you never to go there, and that's before we remind you of its role as the backdrop for MTV's ode to gonorrhea, Wild On. Shaggy AND Saliva are both playing there in the next month. SHAGGY AND SALIVA.

5. So the rule is to never, ever got to Panama City Beach. But but but but no. Do not go. It is a gulch of fluorescent alcoholic pre-puke stands salted in between concrete nests of spring breakers and degenerate rednecks on hell's discount holiday. The ratio of men to women is 5 to 1 at its worst at the worst imaginable times, leaving it to become something less like a quaint beach romp, and more like a shirtless Karachi. You might get assaulted at a Waka Flocka concert, and no one should ever get assaulted at such a loving event as a Waka Flocka concert.

At this point, Jim wants to run some routes. Stationary targets aren’t enough. So, he tells the two girls doing the catching, "you run straight 10 yards and turn around. The ball will be there when you turn around, so have your hands up." You can imagine what happened. She runs 10 yards, turns around and gets blasted in the face with a Harbaugh pass.

THE OBC PUTS DOWN HIS FIVE IRON FOR TEN SECONDS TO FLEX ON YOU HOLLYWOOD FOOLS

Don't worry about Matthew McConaughey not picking up any awards for Interstellar. Any Longhorn fan's used to a pointless night or two.

I'd say Eddie Redmayne as Stephen Hawking could play quarterback at Florida but he's capable of a decent rollout.

Julianne Moore's pretty expensive. You want a redhead who's happy to get exposed for two hours for less and break down on command, call Jason Garrett when you're ready.

Sound of Music's not so touching once you've seen Lane Kiffin sing "Sixteen Going On Seventeen" at a recruiting camp.

Oregon knows what it's like to win for the best clothes every year and lose the big one, Wes Anderson.

You didn't win, Steve Carell, but at least you're ready to play George O'Leary now.

Poor Bobby Petrino. Must be so confused that Whiplash is a good thing in 2015.

I know Kirk Ferentz was disappointed in Boyhood losing, since he understands what it's like to spend over a decade building something that puts everyone to sleep.

Jeremy Foley cried during Feast because he gets emotional watching anyone else take all the cupcakes, especially if it's a dawg.

When do you think Linklater said "fuck it" and cut the Michigan championship scene from the script?

The Best Foreign Language Film without Lou Holtz on "College Football Final" is no category at all, frankly.

Big win for Florida State last night. The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance is the school motto, after all.

That locked box gag was so weak Baylor's scheduled it in 2018.

Not all bad for that Neil Patrick Harris guy, though. Bomb like that in Los Angeles and they'll still hire you as Alabama's offensive coordinator.

I liked it better when it was Big East Sniper and Frank Beamer was in it.

American Sniper's all about hitting your target accurately so I assume every SEC offensive coordinator hated it.

Always thought Rex Grossman would go to Hollywood, but Ed Norton took the job where you rewrite plays and like the smell of your own farts.

Charlie Weis was fantastic in Big Hero 6. (He turned down The Lego Movie because it's about successful building.)

The "In Memoriam" portion's always tough. I think Dabo's startin' to suspect that Ruby Dee didn't go live on a farm.

Not sure how "UNC Plays Defense Well" didn't get a nomination for Short Film.

Not a single nomination for Godzilla, but that's what happens when you release that and Cardale Jones in the same year.

Y'all think these seat fillers are willing to wear a Jacory Harris jersey?

Stedman shows up on time, sits quietly, and will never leave. He's Hollywood Kirby Smart.

I didn't watch Into the Woods because that's also the name of Ed Orgeron's sex tape.

J.K. Simmons told everyone to call their daddy and yet Mark Richt hasn't even texted me yet.

IF I WANT A TROPHY OF A NUDE MAN I'LL GO TO SWITZER'S CHRISTMAS PARTY

HELLO DYNASTY

Florida football is on a three victory streak. First: a triumphant win over East Carolina in the Birmingham Bowl, complete with what turned out to be literal pants-shitting effort from Adam Lane. This is never meant to embarrass Adam Lane. He simply did what others only talk about doing: working yourself so hard you leave it all on the field.

The second victory: Jeremy Foley vs. window.

UF AD Jeremy Foley at the home of CSU Rams head coach Jim McElwain presumably discussing #Gators job @TFrei#Gatorspic.twitter.com/tLc6IjXKSP

— John Leyba (@Presto89) December 3, 2014

AND YOU CALL YOURSELF DOUBLE-PANED. Foley won that staring contest easily, and hired a coach who was not an overhyped gym teacher with ADHD and an office full of empty Monster Energy Rehab cans. That's almost like a third victory. (Almost.)

The third victory? Getting out of the 2014 NCAA bump violation case with no penalties beyond what Florida has already self-imposed. That's three in a row, and damn near what we'd call a trend. That coach is not named in the NCAA report, but he is outlined by position and experience and role, and his name definitely does not rhyme with Poker Billups. "Poker Billups," again not named in the report, also was tipped off to the recruit's location by a recruiting writer, which is not at all an unseemly and weird look into the dark world of collegiate recruiting, but whatever THREE WINS IN A ROW.

If we get through the spring game without five ACL tears and with more than one quarterback on the roster that's like four in a row. Practically a dynasty at this point, really.

IT IS BY NAME A CAT SCHOOL, AFTER ALL

Trust this advice from a fan of a team whose players and their interactions with dogs have never gone well: leave the dog alone. Yes, that is an adorable dog. All dogs are in their own way adorable, even the Xoloitzcuintli. That's the dog in the Westminster that looked like a hellbeast birthed from the unholy union of a doberman and a sentient, burning oil slick. They're used as living warming pads by pain sufferers, and seem to be perfectly happy just laying on people and waiting around to be fed despite their obvious demon genes.

So yes, even if you are walking to class and see an adorable dog and it turns out to be a service dog, Auburn football players, DO NOT PET THE DOG. Also, don't run up and yell WHAT at the person when they ask you to stop petting the dog, because it is Auburn, and there are plenty of dogs to pet. Brave, fearless dogs there to advance the researches of Auburn's School of Exploding Dog Studies. Dogs that don't belong to a veteran with PTSD who has the dog for that exact reason, and who goes to a local television station and tells them all about it.

P.S. Why you gotta specify "female" veteran, AL.com? We mean, a veteran is a veteran.

P.P.S. Okay maybe Auburn players should just give up on being close to dogs at all, ever.

The Westminster Dog Show reviews its most massive and terrifying group tonight, the Working Group.

Thus follows a terrifying review of the working group, mostly comprised of dogs designed for war, controlling huge animals, the pursuit of frightened humans, and for invasions of other planets.

AKITA

Japanese breed whose name means exactly what it is: "large." Stoic, silent protectors bred when a lonely 17th century woodcutter carved the first Akita into existence to make his only friend in the world. The Akita leapt from the picture and killed his creator, but not before the lonely woodcutter croaked out his famous last words: "At last, friendship." Akitas should not be left alone with children; together, their conspiracies will be your undoing.

ALASKAN MALAMUTE

Will eat nothing but frozen horsemeat for months at a time, thus earning it the nickname "The Novak Djokovic of the dog world."

ANATOLIAN SHEPHERD DOG

Bred for protecting livestock against the wolves of the rugged highlands of Turkey, the Anatolian Shepherd is right behind you. No, don't move; he'll only chase you, and will die before giving up. Just breathe slowly: a racing pulse only makes your fear more delicious to him.

BERNESE MOUNTAIN DOG

Gentrification with four paws. If you put more than four in one space, a coffeeshop with three craft beer taps appears on the nearest streetcorner.

BLACK RUSSIAN TERRIER

Bred with a great cascade of black fur over its eyes to shield the world from the laserlike contempt it holds for human frailty. Highly radioactive, but only when it is in a good mood. Is never radioactive.

BOERBOEL

The Boerboel is WHATEVER IT WANTS YOU TO THINK IT IS because the phrase "African farm muscle car dog" doesn't even really come close to describing it. It guarded the mines against diamond thieves in South Africa so I'm pretty sure its preferred food is "terrified diamond thieves." This one wants to be thought of as a unicorn, and it's a unicorn. It is. Just say it, and back away slowly without making eye contact. JUST SAY IT BEFORE IT NOTICES YOU'RE HESITATING.

BOXER

X-Rays reveal its interior contains no organs, only springs, chewed up shoes, and huge clouds of pure fart gas.

BULLMASTIFF

Per Wikipedia, these are "quiet dogs that very rarely bark." If they do, you are seconds from an imminent death or from being sat on like a lawnchair by a 150 pound dog. Depends on the day, really.

CANE CORSO

A "light sporting mastiff" for the dog owner who wants a Bronze Age war dog, but with modern styling and performance. Described as "dominant," so not recommended for owners incapable of deadlifting twice their bodyweight.

CHINOOK

The state dog of New Hampshire; can turn into a Subaru Outback at will.

DOBERMAN PINSCHER

Bred by a German tax collector, so you know it's going to be bulletproof and incapable of empathy or pity. The Doberman's tail is often docked, as the adult's tail matures into a fully functional submachine gun. Delightful with kids.

DOGUE DU BORDEAUX

Once you find out they're French, it's impossible to shake that Frenchness. This dog should be given cigarettes as a reward in the arena; the breed description should read "must be balanced through its powerful flanks, and committed to a vague but militant atheism it jettisons on visits to its grandmother in Toulouse." Despises America; has never been to America.

GERMAN PINSCHER

This dog is tiny compared to the other beasts in this group, so assume its heavily armed at all times, and wanted for murder in one of those states that don't really seem to find murder suspects very often like South Carolina or Illinois.

GIANT SCHNAUZER

This dog exists only to prove that the dream of a Giant Dachshund remains real and attainable.

GREAT DANE

Deceptive in that they are actually aliens piloting giant dogbots designed to commandeer the most important territory on earth for colonization: the most comfortable couches or beds in any home.

GREAT PYRENEES

A very amiable line of brown bears dyed white by corrupt Spanish breeders for centuries.

GREATER SWISS MOUNTAIN DOG

The try-hard, insecure, title-obsessed brother of the merely Great Swiss Mountain Dog, evidently.

KOMONDOR

The giant white dreadlocked thing running around the ring tonight, the Komondor uses its unique threaded coat to protect its skin against the teeth of predators trying to eat livestock, and its feelings against those who will never understand its need for individuality in an increasingly homogenous society.

KUVASZ

Breed traits include cartoonish racism.

LEONBERGER

An affable, giant goofball of a dog, the Leonberger was bred in hope of making a dog that looked like a lion.

German illustrators of the 19th century SUCKED at drawing lions.

MASTIFF

Would knock over an AT-AT simply by pissing on it. Breed traits include "plodding," "window-rattling steps," and "drool trails reminiscent of whole beached jellyfish."

NEOPOLITAN MASTIFF

A Mastiff left in the oven too long.

NEWFOUNDLAND

Dogs strong enough to pull swimmers in distress out of the water, the Newfoundland is often referred to as the "nanny dog" for its boundless affection for children, and also because it, too, goes undisclosed on tax records. (P.S. It is not legal to leave a child with a dog no matter what Good Dog Carltold you.)

PORTUGUESE WATER DOG

Its hypoallergenic coat made it an ideal choice for President Obama's family. Please share this dog on Facebook immediately for best results.

ROTTWEILER

"The dogs are said to have been used by traveling butchers at markets during the Middle Ages to guard money pouches tied around their necks." BUTCHERS MUST HAVE BEEN THE WEALTHIEST PEOPLE IN GERMANY IN THE MIDDLE AGES.

SAMOYED

Hailing from Siberia. Has antifreeze for blood and will eventually settle in South Florida once it attains oligarch status through a copper mining scheme.

SIBERIAN HUSKY

Also hails from Siberia; also will pursue relocation to South Florida, where it will DJ two nights a week as opener for DJ Rony Seikaly.

STANDARD SCHNAUZER

Not really a fit with the rest of these, but the Germans made it so it must be designed to absolutely destroy something.

TIBETAN MASTIFF

The Lhasa Car Alarm! You're supposed to throw a fistful of gravel in the face of one of these if they come after you during a trip to Tibet. A friend did this as instructed, and the dog ran through it like so much buckshot off the hide of a tank. He had to camp out on top of a car for ten minutes until someone came and got the dog. I assume that person was either the mayor, or the mayor's assistant in a scenario where the dog was mayor. (The dog was undoubtedly the mayor.)

ST. BERNARD

Unusual in this category in that it is used for "Search and Rescue," and not merely "Search."

SB Nation Video Archives:Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show Petting Challenge (2012)

It's a sport and you will lose every time, parent.

You travel as the concierge to narcoleptic, emotionally unstable, untitled aristocrats. Every vacation with children is escorting King George III on his daily routine. King George III was the jerk king with porphyria who, when ill, took to sudden flights of fancy, argued with everyone in sight over absolutely nothing, and occasionally just had to lie down for a while when it all got to be too much.

This is traveling with two children five and under to Disney World. Someone will cry. Someone will make insane demands. Someone will want mounds of overpriced plastic crap. If they do not get it, there will be emotions, and someone will wind up weeping on the floor until you distract them with something else. I recommend a promise of "More and different overpriced plastic crap around the corner." It works every time as long as you do this until they fall asleep, and may be removed unconscious from the park without protest.

Florida has completely reversed American traffic patterns. "No one in Florida knows how to act" is a general rule for a lot of reasons. The reason the left lane in Florida is now the right lane is simple: old people who believe the left lane is not based on speed, but on accumulated merit from repeated tax-paying in some other state. Throw in a few other convenient idiot people who believe BIG DOGS ROLL IN THE LEFT LANE, and you've got your classic thing ruined by the Sunshine State's toxic cocktail of belligerent, underbrained youth and entitled cranky imported senility.

This turns the middle lane into the passing lane, and the right lane into a fast lane interrupted frequently by semi-trucks. If this sounds stupid and poorly conceived, it is, but there's a Quebecois guy who's just convinced his Buick Rendezvous going 73 mph deserves express status. Three inches from his bumper is a goateed redneck from Lake County in a Ford Raptor flashing his lights and honking. They've been doing that for 35 miles now, and will continue to do it until it results in gunplay or an accident. Just pass them in the right lane, and abandon the idea that anyone in the state knows what they're doing ever.

People on vacation also enjoy making statements on T-shirts they have no ability to validate. Every man wearing a t-shirt saying "GO HARD OR GO HOME", "TACTICAL AS F*$!", "TRY AND KEEP UP", or "UNLEASH YOUR ALPHA" appeared to be someone who was going home immediately, was not tactical to any degree of any profanity, could be caught easily on foot, or was currently holding the leash of their alpha firmly. The man you do not want to fight at Disney World is wearing a "PRINCESS BREAKFAST 2014" shirt and he had a more sensible breakfast than the beignets you ate at the Port Orleans buffet.

Brazilian dads are the real MVPs. They wander in their tour groups in athletic shorts and sleeveless shirts like they just fell out of bed. They are not yelling at their kids to get out of the gift shop and put down the goddamn make-your-own lightsaber. They come in two body types: beer and recently retired MMA fighter. They wear their sunglasses everywhere and find the beer first. They say there is no beer in the Magic Kingdom but I saw a Brazilian dad tapping Dumbo's trunk for pint of Yuengling. He did it because Brazilian dads are chill, wear whatever the hell they want because they know how to dress for warm weather, and can tap random objects for beer. It's their superpower and I want it more than any other dad superpower in the world.

The French on vacation are human cholesterol. Clogging up lines, taking 25 minutes as a family to build their own salads at lunch, and becoming paralyzed by anything involving more than two options at a time. They're pleasant, sure, but they do not move quickly under the best of conditions, and will not move at all if considering more than one thing. Something in American gluttony stupefies the French, and when they're in clumps they simply freeze up and block every major artery in the park.

Even simulated privilege turns you into a monster in minutes. Disney has an option to schedule certain rides ahead of time: The Fastpass, your ticket to understanding just how rapidly even a purchased and inconsequential piece of privilege can mutate you into an aristocratic ass-person. You just get to stroll right in, flash your band pass a sensor, and then skip giggling past proles waiting in a 45 minute line. The first time you are slightly embarrassed; by the third time you openly taunt and bare your ass at total strangers who foolishly did not schedule ahead of time. Fastpass turned me into a monstrous human in the course of a few hours; I cannot imagine what horrors a lifetime of private school and an Ivy League education would have wrought. It will turn you into an investment banker in seconds. (P.S. The next time I do this it will be in a powdered wig dressed exactly like Hugh Laurie in Blackadder.)

Beer. You will need it. The World Showcase exists solely as a booze carousel, so use it. Germany has a zillion good beers you can purchase in very large containers that you may bring anywhere in the park. They also sell shots of Jagermeister and Barenjager because Disney has sort of given up on the concept of Epcot/World Showcase being anything but "Sponsored Corporate Pavillionland/International HoochMart." In eight years when weed is legal in Florida the vape shop will open in Morocco first.

Japan offers little half-pints of Kirin for sustenance, while Morocco has bottles of Efes. Efes is bad Turkish beer, but you have to make a few stretches when stocking the bar at the only Muslim country in the lineup. France has Gray Goose Citron slushies, and the Little Britain-looking England section has a pub in case you just want to give up, abandon your family completely, and just get genuinely hammered in a supremely fake English setting. Everything is overpriced except the alcohol, because alcohol in a moment of need can never be overpriced.

Canada has the sneakiest deal: three Unibroue beers on tap at a cart with no lines. Their hokey nationalistic show is also hosted by Martin Short. Canada, based on Disney World alone, is the greatest fuckin' nation on the planet. You should not be drunk at Disney World, but a good working buzz does help when you're pushing a double stroller loaded with children and facing your eighth road-blocking Frenchtourgroupberg of the afternoon. Pardon, madames et monsieurs.

Pay whatever they ask. Your children will get tired and then you will realize what a perfectly conceived fascist trap of a wonderland Disney is. There is a pool if you cannot muster the energy to get more than 500 feet from your hotel room and there is a bar there to make sure you stay there. If you are too tired to even do that they will set up a movie on the courtyard of your hotel and pipe Tinkerbell films directly into your child's eyeballs while you drink tallboys of respectable craft beer.

This is how total the control at Disney is. You can lay on grass without a single biting ant, cat-sized cockroach, or a single mosquito touching you. It's unnatural and wrong and it is wonderful because, after a few days of this, your children may sleep as late at 7:45 a.m. Pay them for these miracles. Pay them and smile, because if you have children you will end up paying them anyway.

NEVER NEVER NEVER GO FULL PCB

Dak Prescott (1) won't be pressing charges against anyone in the assault (2) that left him bloodied outside a Waka Flocka (3) concert at Club La Vela (4) in Panama City Beach. (5)

1. The starting quarterback for the Mississippi State Bulldogs and most successful thing about the Shreveport-Bossier City metropolitan area ever. However, Prescott was born elsewhere: Sulphur, Louisiana, named for the sulphur mining industry there. If you wonder where you have to be from to seek asylum in the notorious SBC, well, you have to be from a place that smells like literal hellfire 24/7.

2. Even if the people who allegedly beat up Prescott and two other Miss State football players may have happily admitted to it on Twitter. Never, ever tweet.

3. Softish throat drop spokesman and noted Atlantan.

4. Oh man if this all didn't sound like a bad enough idea by being in Panama City Beach to begin with, you have to add Club La Vela to the mix. Club La Vela was designed by an Auburn grad AND hosted WCW events. Those two facts alone should convince you never to go there, and that's before we remind you of its role as the backdrop for MTV's ode to gonorrhea, Wild On. Shaggy AND Saliva are both playing there in the next month. SHAGGY AND SALIVA.

5. So the rule is to never, ever got to Panama City Beach. But but but but no. Do not go. It is a gulch of fluorescent alcoholic pre-puke stands salted in between concrete nests of spring breakers and degenerate rednecks on hell's discount holiday. The ratio of men to women is 5 to 1 at its worst at the worst imaginable times, leaving it to become something less like a quaint beach romp, and more like a shirtless Karachi. You might get assaulted at a Waka Flocka concert, and no one should ever get assaulted at such a loving event as a Waka Flocka concert.

TAKE THEIR TICKETS

Bob Stoops did a good and right thing that we should all know was right and good. Oklahoma football cancelled practice and instead made a silent display of walking out and praying together as a team. OU as a whole reacted grandly to a video of a University of Oklahoma SAE member singing a racist song with a bus full of his friends: a day after it hit the internet the fraternity was booted off campus and their letters were torn off the house. The President of the university called them a "disgrace." That happened, and should have happened.

That's all good. The weirdness that remains for us is considering why fraternities exist at all on a college campus. This is an honest curiosity: we have no idea why they exist, or why anyone would pay to belong to one-- or most importantly to the concerns of this website, why you'd ever allow them to have a seating block in a football stadium every damn year.

And before we go there: no, we didn't ever want to pledge one, as the idea of paying for friends seemed weird. Any professional concerns about the value of networking were eliminated by having no professional concerns that made any sense, or had any hopes of making any money whatsoever.

More importantly: we never wanted to hang out with a bunch of dudes. That made zero sense for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is that women could get into parties and acquire booze and contraband way, way more easily than a guy could. Women, for a dude living alone for the first time, were a godsend: they reminded you to behave like a human, wash your clothes at least bi-monthly, and not to do things that...well, that fraternity members were known for doing.

We knew one reason to join a frat, and it's one that made only marginal sense if you wanted to sit with a bunch of people you paid to be friends with: you got a block of seats at football, and those seats would be sort of the same each time. Why they got these was a matter of sad campus politics too tedious to recall, but they got them, and get them at other schools across the SEC and beyond. (And in some cases, lose them when they don't show up to games, or leave early.)

So SAE's probably been punished enough, save one thing: if they have a seating block at SAE, break it up and take their tickets. If we were an OU fan, it's what we'd want. Not that they be banned forever from the stadium just so we could feel better about ourselves, but for a season because that's not something we tolerate as fans of  [INSERT TEAM HERE].

If they take it a step further and take their tickets, we'd prefer that they refund them, of course. They don't deserve to have money their money stolen, as tempting as it might be to consider. But like football clubs in Europe do to racist fans, you do quietly take them, and hope that they apply next year for general admission seating like everyone else. It's a symbolic gesture that serves as a reminder of how equal we all are in the eyes of the lord, and more importantly in the sight of your local football ticket office agent.

GET ON THAT, LAWYERS

Lawyers of the world needing a bold new field to specialize in: please consider the pressing issue of haters' law. With the increasing prevalence of haters, hateration, and live-hatin' in the streets, the field is wide open for the taking, both in theory and in practice. Be the pioneer of personalized torts this hater-besieged frontier needs.

For instance: take the case of Dak Prescott, Mississippi State quarterback who got tuned up at a Waka Flocka concert. Prime case of what we're talking about here. You could say that Prescott was merely assaulted at random, but that's not what happened, really. Saying that would be like calling arson a violation of city codes determining where you could burn trash.

No, no. This was not assault. This was overt public hating on, the degree of which will be determined by future legal scholars. For instance:

The responding officer writes that he noticed the laceration on Prescott's face after asking him to remove the shirt from his head. He asked Prescott what happened.

"A bunch of dudes were hating on me," Prescott said.

Hatin' and hatin' on in various degrees will be the hot crime stat for the 21st century, and the FBI will track it. Though numbers plummeted overall in the United States, Columbus, Ohio reported rising levels of hatin' and active hatin' on well above the national average. Tallahassee, Florida remained both the most hated on and the most hated, while perceived levels of hatin' on continued to soar well beyond actual levels of hatin' in South Bend, Indiana. The nation's only hatin' free college town? Provo. You take that hatin' and that beard to Rice-Eccles, son.

Don't credit us, science and the achievers of tomorrow. Just wiggle your toes a little so that we know you feel these giant shoulders beneath your striving toes as you see the horizon of the future.

YOU'LL BE DRINKING AT ONE OF THESE TONIGHT IF YOU'RE NOT SMART

Harp and Zune

Kidnapper's Alley

The Horsebit Nun

Finnegan's #WOKE

Blight Howard

McGouty's

Sir Hossis' Scarlet Cheeks

The Death of Feelings

John D. McTwerk's

Liverdance

Seven Destitute Men of Cork

McTrillaguddy's

Bono's House

Where Enya Gets Absolutely Shitfaced And Tries To Fight Every Man In The Place

Sure This 15 Dollar Taco Plate Is Irish

Spelld Withaught Caunnntext

The Quick and the Fred (owner: Fred)

Fassblender's Frozen Daiquiri Stand

The Sunpoisoned Dragon Inn

Backstrom

Angela's Asses

Pocket Twos and a Clawhammer

O'Crohnsdisease

St. Gibrian's Lymph

Woolscowler's

O'Canyoubelievecollegestudentswillpaythismuchforjameson's

The Shamrock and Gunt

Wade's Bog

This Used To Be A Blimpie's

The Cock and Bull Shannon

This Was The First Place You Found When You Left The Bus Station

Grady's Sip and Piss

Fiaclóir Capall, which is Irish for horse dentist

One Itchy Ploughboy

Begorrhea's

Franklin and Bash

The Pint and Video Poker Machine

Not A Licensed Daycare

The Randy Persimmon

Pickled Ginger's

A Horse

The Skip and Bayless

Brewlysses

Rag and Boner

Dead Sailors and Thawed Curly Fries

Fatherless Jimmy's

Turner and Hooch

Book of Kellz

GO AHEAD JUST WATCH SOME BASKETBALL

Just do it, you filthy swine. Give into your laziness. Just go watch basketball.

No, no, no, don't apologize. Apologies are lies.  Be you right now. Sure there's spring football going on but yeah, go watch the Pinback State Bonerweepers get their teeth kicked in by Kentucky. You do that, and then write some bullshit about how you totally wouldn't hang around in velour tracksuits with John Calipari.

[/sprays entire can of whipped cream onto piece of fried chicken, eats it]

You mean these practice reports aren't enough? How? You're not fascinated by this? Look, this guy SHOWED today. He put forth EFFORT. Writers are taking a dude who's been there two months or so and are already saying how much they don't trust him. You know who wasn't a used car salesman? WILL MUSCHAMP BUDDY.*

*You know why you can trust a car from Will Muschamp motors well it's because you know that motor will always TURNOVER. I'm writing this while I'm throwing darts into a popcorn ceiling and drinking red wine vinegar in ignorant hope of a trace buzz. This isn't sad at all.

But fine, act like you care about UAB versus Iowa State and aren't just transparently gambling on the outcomes of games you barely understand in the middle of a work day. Get passionate about bad passing. Do it on Twitter. Tell an NBA fan how good it is. Watch them drive to your house and lecture you on the evils of amateur athletics. Get in a fight with them and burst through the wall and find me, throwing darts into a popcorn ceiling and saying yes: this is March, and we've been waiting for you, here at the end of all things.

Act like this picture isn't a sign of a khaki-colored apocalypse.

YES YOU GO AHEAD AND HAVE MARCH AND THE FINEST FOUR DAYS IN SPORT. The Season Of Nantz is here, and we will go to the west and hide in the desert until it is over. GO BLAZERS. Whatever. At least we've got the Masters to look forward to.

[/taps freon line, huffs until vision turns plaid]

JIM HARBAUGH IS GOOD AT LITERALLY EVERYTHING INCLUDING LATE STAGE CAPITALISM

Jim Harbaugh's expertise knows no bounds: the ins and outs of pro-style offenses, football conditioning, actual mean-ass run blocking, proper quarterback thumb-to-center's asshole positioning, how to get young women to run passing drills until they are ragged, discount pants shopping, making your television cameos count...the list is boundless, and expanding by the day.

And now, you may add another area of expertise: Late stage capitalism. In an interview this week, Harbaugh admitted to Charlie LeDuff that he was not worth five million dollars a year in salary.

America is crazy about football but is $5 million per year is a lot of money. Charlie asked Harbaugh if he was worth that much. Coach's answer? "No."

So Charlie suggested he give it back.

"Naw," he said. "I like making a buck just like the next guy. I'm not doing five times as much work as somebody else or doing more work than someone who's not the head football coach at the University of Michigan so to answer your question honestly I would have to say no."

You know that he makes five mil already, but still: Eat that, Thomas Piketty. Harbaugh both knows this is a dystopian, Golden Age oligarchs' game, and he's all too happy to play, man. As a matter of clarification: the MC knows and will affirm that it is worth five million dollars a year, and are all too happy to accept payment for it from the first buyer. Five million a year, and not a penny less.

HE'S BEEN BAD TO MIDDLING, BUT THAT'S PRETTY GOOD FOR ILLINOIS

He's not that bad because:

Have you seen Illini football? As in the historical construct of Illini football? Deng Xiaoping had people run over with tanks, turned the screws of political oppression on millions of Tibetans, and was a supporter of the Great Leap Forward. Still, considering his role in the sheer number of people raised out of poverty, he might be the Chinese leader with the greatest positive impact on the people of the nation. (He also broke his leg playing pool once. HOW HARD DID DENG XIAOPING BILLIARD?)

That's the "first among a group of mediocre, often openly malicious peers" defense. It is really way more valid a defense than you even imagined once you see Illinois' struggles visualized over the past century via Bill Connelly's projected S&P+ for the Illini over the course of the century.

There are a lot of ways to put it. Illinois might be the Ole Miss of the Big Ten, a schizoid, boom-or-bust program whose booms don't make a spectacular amount of noise, and whose busts sink lower than one could imagine. The Illini football program claims two seasons with ten wins in the last twenty-five years. They can also wince at the four two-win seasons, the three win seasons, or the 0-11 1997 season.

Since 2000, the Illini have lost 104 games, meaning the once bright-eyed Illini fan who onboarded with the team after the 2001 10-2 campaign have watched their team lose enough for two teams over the ensuing period. This is a literal statement: the Illini have lost more games in that span than Ohio State and Michigan's combined 98 losses. That bright-eyed Illini fan is now old beyond their years, drinks hard liquor because beer stopped working a long time ago, and guffaws like a barking seal at the mention of Ron Zook's appearance in a Rose Bowl.

This is an actual sentence from that 49-17 rout's AP recap re: Illinois:

Certainly, a better test could have come against Georgia or Virginia Tech, or maybe next week against Ohio State in the national title game.

By comparison, Ole Miss only lost 86 games during that same span, a low total given the Rebel's sustained general misery. There may be another way to look at Illinois besides "Like a way less racist Oxford on the stank-flats of Illinois," and by extension also another way of looking at the job Tim Beckman's done so far in pulling the Illini off the floor, into something like a standing position, and then at least halfway onto a convenient barstool.

Beckman somehow got Illinois to .500 during the regular season in 2014, and not entirely through an easy menu of empty calorie out-of-conference games. The Illini beat Minnesota in October, and finished the season with wins over Penn State and Northwestern. (The Illini have a sneaky advantage for a while here: most any win can be considered a quality win because we are still dealing with Illinois.) Three conference wins is paltry. It also represents the most conference wins any Illini team's had since 2010. What you call a hardship diet, the Illini fan will call a buffet.

Beckman also has Illinois trending mostly upward in the recruiting rankings, and not just through the kind of parking lot beggary we're fond of making fun of. They're currently in the mid-thirties per most recruiting services, and consistently bringing in talent, a thing Illinois really should consider a rarity. Stuck between conference rivals and located two extremely long hours away from Chicago, Champaign-Urbana isn't Lubbock, but it's also not Miami or Los Angeles in terms of proximity to speedy young men in need of playing time.

So 6-7, relatively speaking, is something to be pretty happy about for Illinois--and by extension, for Tim Beckman. (Like, not ecstatic or bounding off the walls, but still cautiously optimistic nonetheless.)*

*From Ryan:"Since 2008, Illinois is 1-18 against ranked teams. the one win was over ASU in 2011, who finished 6-7 and opened the door for todd graham. so never say illinois is not an agent of change." Ryan finds the meanest facts ever.

This is all happening despite Beckman not being the coach you'd pick first in the game of "that man is obviously supremely successful." Beckman may have little control over the sound of his own voice. He can be intense to the point of awkwardness, both in press conferences and on the sideline, going so far this offseason to suggest the press should be more positive about the Illini because, um, something something mutual benefit. He bellows a lot, could be described as "fiery," and steps on his own feet in press conferences from time to time.

In the grand taxonomy of college coaches, file Beckman in the Bombastic Meathead Crew along with cohorts like Will Muschamp, Mike Dubose, and former Illini coach Ron Zook. In terms of historical Illinois head coaches, Beckman after two seasons is dismal even by local standards, but still trending up from dismal. That's all good news in context, if only because things have by tradition been very, very bad at Illinois.

You want a one-handed economist like Harry Truman said, because there's always something coming in the other hand you might not want to hear. This is the other hand. It has something bad in it.

The last coach with any real success at Illinois was Ron Zook, who then stayed until things regressed and then got fired. Before him was Ron Turner, who took the team to a Sugar Bowl, then stayed until he got fired. Mike White got the Illini's other ten win season in semi-recent history before succumbing to NCAA violations and more regression toward the mean. There is a pattern and it is an ugly one. Illinois achieves some degree of success, suffers an insulin crash, and then bottoms out only to a.) either start the cycle all over with low peaks and deep lows, or b.) just ride a muddle of varying lows until firing their coach.

Only one coach bucked the pattern: John Mackovic, the coach who in four seasons somehow avoided having a single losing season in Champaign. He also deserves credit for being the only one to understand how special he wasn't, in the long run. After a ten win season in in 1989, he, too, started the long slide backwards with 8 and 6 win seasons, and then wisely rode the waves of hiring season to the Texas job. He then went on to suffer the worst loss in Texas history, and then coached so inhumanely at Arizona that players mutinied and refused to play for him, but still: Mackovic got paychecks into the 21st century. Bailing on Illinois at just the right time undoubtedly helped.

That's the real tragicomedy here. If Beckman's successful, and has any clue about how things have worked out for everyone else at Illinois historically, he'll bail for the first slightly better job in need of his services. You don't want to go to assume you're the one that won't change things forever--but that's probably not you, right? At least by the averages, and certainly not in any terms of Illinois' averages, especially? As a rule, all football programs eventually eat the ones they love. If Tim Beckman leaves after the first course, you can't blame him. He's seen this dinner before. It ends up with him on the wrong end of the fork before coffee and dessert.

A fool always crashes the car

Top Gear, the most popular automotive show in the world hosted by your hostile, chain-smoking racist uncle, is over. Or at least the version you knew best, hosted by aforementioned racist uncle Jeremy Clarkson with Richard Hammond and James May, is over and done. Clarkson was let go by the BBC for his final final straw, a punch-up with a producer over steak and fries, because you even had to be terminated in the most British fashion imaginable, Jeremy. You just had to.

That chain-smoking racist uncle and Prince Philip of the BBC got to this point via a long and shambolic series of half-tiffs and legitimate offenses to the viewing public, much of it on the BBC's very, very large Top Gear expense account. He used an ethnic slur in Burma, and used another one in a schoolboy's nursery rhyme in an outtake that made its way to the Internet. He has, in turn, offended Germans, the Poles, the blind, the government of Malaysia, the developmentally disabled, the gay community, those with facial deformities, the entire nation of Argentina, the Welsh, the entire nation of Mexico, the entire nation of Romania and one particular tree in Somerset. Look, there's an entire wiki entry devoted to Top Gear's offenses. It is not a short list, because Jeremy Clarkson, the show's dominant force, is a dick, or in James May's more British phrasing, "a monumental bellend."

If that's truly it for this version of Top Gear, the best car show on the planet implodes after a 12-year run in its best-known format. For those not familiar with the program, that format usually included several or all of the following in variation:

• Cars that cost as much as nice houses sliding sideways on test tracks
• One or more of those hosts screaming "HOOOOHOHOOHO" while nearly crashing said car
• A random destruction element (like putting an old Citroen in the path of a jet engine, for example)
• The most perfunctory review of actual car news imaginable, often done in front of a clearly terrified and uncomfortable audience
• Random challenges involving beater cars, often in well-expensed road challenges abroad
• A celebrity interview which was an excuse to get them behind the wheel of a useless compact car on a test track
• James May seemingly walking in from a calmer, more civilized nature documentary to find his job had changed overnight, and not for the better
• Jeremy Clarkson openly pining for the return of the British Empire
• Richard Hammond pointing at Clarkson and nodding along while giggling

That's pretty much it, and pretty much all the show needed to be. Cars aren't the most exciting subject in the world for the general viewer, and Top Gear's creative team seemed to be all too happy to admit that. They sandwiched in gearhead talk between smoking tires, and erotic contour surveys of the body of a Pagani Zonda and lavish camerawork and editing that would embarrass the budgets of 90 percent of American television shows. No car on Top Gear ever turned through a corner with fewer than five cameras on it at all times, and never without slashing through five different quick-cuts on the way to the back straightaway.

If all the cars and flashy editing failed to move your needle, then Top Gear would happily stun you with scenery, as they did in creeping along Bolivia's Death Road, putting a Ferrari on ice above the Arctic Circle in Norway or trundling across Africa in battered station wagons. And if that didn't work you could always just wait to see what celebrity would turn into Mr. Toad behind the wheels of a car, or nearly crash it in the attempt as Michael Gambon did on the corner of the track named for him.

*For the record: Brian Johnson of AC/DC was the fastest star in multiple runs in multiple cars, a fact that should surprise exactly zero people alive, and comedienne Jennifer Saunders was the fastest woman.

If watching venerable stage actors nearly roll a Chevy Cruze missed you, an episode of Top Gearstill held two cards it played better than any show on television.

First, there was farce, a moment where the racist uncle excelled at his job. If James May were the quiet English gardening enthusiast misplaced in an overgrown teenager's car show and Richard Hammond the peppy sychophant seconds from leaping into a firesuit, then Clarkson was the sway-gutted master of extremely personalized and bombastic farce. Too tall to ride in most cars -- he famously could not fit in the original Ford GT without an act of self-decapitation -- and hopelessly middle-aged, Clarkson often put himself in the tiniest cars imaginable and let the breeze blow his flappy jowls to the back of his head in an Ariel Atom. He loved the Toyota Hilux so much he blew up a building to prove its durability. Clarkson happily joined the long tradition of miserable British globetrotting, waking up in improvised campers in Uganda or nursing hangovers on camera in New Delhi hotel rooms. Often, he seemed to prefer humiliating failure to success, giggling and bellowing "OH NO" theatrically as his hovercrafts sank or as his Lexus LFA died in a drag race against a shitkicking pickup truck in Nevada.

Clarkson did precisely what you would want to do in a car, all the time. He acted like an idiot, especially when put behind the wheel of a three-wheeled Robin Reliant.

Second, if farce missed you, there was always the car -- or more importantly, the ability to pop open a rusty hatch in the side of a dour adult's psychological armor, peer inside and find the adolescent boy inside and ask: "Do you want to see something completely and utterly cool?" Clarkson on Top Gear, for all the other complete bullshit and at his best, was a conductor for the raw electricities of speed and power at the limit. At Imola, he seemed genuinely astonished. When driving a Corvette across the American West, he begrudgingly started to love it despite his avowed distaste for American muscle cars, hooting as he hammered the throttle and praising its "savagery." The Ferrari 458 reduced him to exasperated, giddy gibberish.

In the moment of driving, Clarkson could convince the viewer a car was a living thing, something with human flaws, quirks, equally lovable and detestable in turns, an erotic thing in a conversation with the equally lovable and detestable human at the wheel. Take a test lap with him in a Fiat 500 Abarth and he could properly place the car in a historical context, point out the cappuccino machine styling and describe the car's ADHD handling all while still gleefully pointing out "a turbo boost gauge the size of a fat spaniel's face." Never mind how the Abarth swore to Jeremy that it was a Lamborghini; it just did, and you got to eavesdrop on the conversation.

Being done at the BBC doesn't mean they're done-done. Top Gear will probably go to Netflix, or some other provider with ample cash and more tolerance of Jeremy Clarkson's periodic forays into racist unclehood. That'll happen because prior to burying his fist in an underling's face, Top Gear still commanded something north of five million viewers per episode in the UK alone. This doesn't include ratings abroad in 50 different countries, streaming views or the income from Top Gear's numerous nationally-branded spinoffs. As a viewer, you'll probably get two shows out of it, actually: whatever the BBC does under the Top Gear name, plus the Clarkson and Company show on a channel to be named later.

That's technically "more," but it definitely will not be "the same." There were other tidy, neat phrases of deadly accuracy in Clarkson's reviews. When reviewing a Lamborghini Murcielago (yet another car you will never, ever own,) he asked "What's the point of a Lamborghini that doesn't have space thrusters sticking out the side?" And yeah: what is the point of something practical, when what you want out of a car are flames, roaring and the possibly real risk of of a fiery, expensive death? Clarkson could sell you on the value of impracticality, of total foolishness for foolishness's sake. He made it admirable, even.

Another pinpoint-accurate thumbnail sketch of note bears mention. Clarkson suggested that one could never really relax in a Porsche 911, because they had "a fearsome reputation for not tolerating fools." He then continued: "And I am a fool." Clarkson crashed the 911 seconds afterwards, because a fool is a designed thing, too. They're made to crash the car in the end, and honestly deserve it. While we're being honest, that doesn't mean it wasn't fun as hell watching him rip around the track a few times, either.

IT HAPPENS AND YOU CAN LEARN FROM IT

Sometimes, a team needs a maypole, a rallying point, a symbol of both their current situation and the attitude necessary to get out of that situation. Sometimes, more than anything else, a team needs an exemplar, a totem, a person who represents the right words, actions, and gestures for that crucial moment in their history. A Joan of Arc for the battle; a Liberté leading the people over the barricade; an Ernest leading you to camp.

In an era where Florida football has put on white pants and soiled itself, running back Adam Lane continues to step up to be just that kind of leader.

"It was the best thing that could have happened," Lane said. "It got a lot of attention and just put me in a place where I was out there publicly and people knew who I was. I really didn’t get a lot of grief from it."

Lane also said he wasn’t even expecting to play during the bowl game, and was grateful at the opportunity having only seen eight carries in the regular season.

"It was awesome to be out and just be able to showcase my talent and take advantage of the opportunity I had," Lane said.

Florida football pooped its pants in so many ways and you know what WE'RE GONNA MAKE IT WORK BECAUSE ADAM LANE MADE IT WORK AND SO CAN WE ALL. Besides, it's not poop is the worst substance someone's poured on the Legion Field turf in the past year or so. Might have been bringing the overall cleanliness of the place up a notch, actually.

BTW: Florida has, like, two running backs on the roster right now, so let's just let them run non-contact drills in wheelchairs until fall.

THE PRICE IS FINALLY RIGHT. IT'S TIME TO SPONSOR A BOWL GAME.

The Independence Bowl remains the greatest of our December 27th bowls, and yet somehow does not have a sponsor on this, March 26th of 2015.  This is a minor travesty because the Independence Bowl has brought us the joy of playing football in a Louisiana snowstorm, Nick Saban's greatest bowl victory ever, and the legendary revelation of the Inside Trout, Shreveport's deadliest native fish. It's brought us greatness, and deserves it in return.

A clarification: we're not saying the Independence Bowl deserves money, exactly. A gentleman's currencies should rise above trifling specie or exchange tender; no, what the Independence Bowl has is our respect, something whose value in actual currency can't begin to be calculated. Besides, the Independence Bowl gave away their naming rights last year to Duck Commander for...well, for nothing, hoping they'd recoup the money in additional sponsors glomming onto the Duck Commander name.

Nothing is a tough price to beat, but EDSBS can try. We'll cast our Nth unsuccessful bid to sponsor a bowl game by finally pitching a bowl we know is in our price range, and doing it with the kind of honesty the best business relationships all begin with before finishing in a storm of lawsuits and stolen money. (You think Shreveport civil proceedings will be easy, and then the judge orders the bailiff to bring out a cage full of rabid possums he calls The Jury.)

1. We will give you no money. None. Zero.

2. In return, you will name your bowl game The EDSBS Independence Bowl. Brand synergies will include "likes football," and "is run on the knife's edge between incompetence and near-profitability." We don't need to see paperwork on that "Near-profitability." You don't have it, and neither do we. (See? Ideal partners.)

3. Point: We will provide no support whatsoever, and do no work at all towards making the bowl game a big event. We will attend no meetings; we will dial into zero conference calls. We will not answer emails. Holy shit, will we do whatever the opposite of answering emails is. We will take the nearest chain email discussion and throw it in the nearest orphan-stuffed well. We will find the person who emailed us and we will murder them but before we murder them we'll turn off most of the lights in their house and dress them up like they're in a 1990s true crime show and have someone hold a sign reading the date and location of their house so that they think oh man, what if 'm about to be murdered in a 1990s true crime show? We will not participate in group texts and will throw a phone with a group text into our oven and turn on the broiler. Our relationship begins with "Yes, we will be the sponsor," and ends with "That was fun, and no, I'm sorry to hear your PR person was found dead in their home. The 1990s True Crime Placard Killer? Never heard of him. Or her. I mean: them. "

4. Point: not doing anything as your title sponsor will turn out to be a good thing. Most sponsors hit you up for dozens, if not hundreds, of game tickets, cutting into your revenue stream. But we can promise you something guaranteed to head off any possible intrusions: we won't even show up for the game. If we somehow do, we will tailgate outside the stadium and watch old episodes of Knight Rider on a TV we brought.

5. Point: We will not shoot an awkward sponsor commercial. We are going to need a commercial, yes, but it's just going to be two mountain rams headbutting while TLC's "Creep" plays. We will need you to license "Creep." This should be cheap, because TLC has no money.

Please consider our offer.

Sincerely,

The EDSBS staff

Reggie Miller won't stop talking and this is what it feels like

Reggie Miller just asked the professor a question that wasn't going to be on the test. Honestly, I don't even know if it was a question. He started out talking about this painting, and then kind of segued into how the pasture boy in the painting was kind of a symbol for masculinity, and about how he wasn't sure women didn't really do all the heavy lifting in the world, but then again, maybe it was a painting. He also mentioned how his mom liked to paint. He wished she did that more. Jesus, Reggie, this is a geology class.

Reggie Miller will help you with that cable television service question in one moment, but while his computer is booting up he first thought he'd take this opportunity to tell you about a few special offers you're eligible for as a MonolithCableGodCorp customer.

Reggie Miller and you are stuck at the same blackjack table in Las Vegas. He is in the last seat to the left and the dealer is showing a five. He's saying "look blackjack is a game of numbers and cards. You know what one number is and you just never know what the other guy is. But you kinda do. Look, they let you keep the card on the table." And he's just reading the odds off the card for two minutes while everyone stares at him, just going "If the dealer is showing a five, you stay, because on 15 the dealer hits, and on 16 --" And it takes two damn minutes. And he hits, takes a 10 to bust, and the dealer pulls a six, and dammit, Reggie. Dammit, how?

Reggie Miller is holding 17 pieces of mail in one hand at the DMV. He is going through every last one of them with the clerk. None of them list his home address. You bemoan the lack of beams from which to hang yourself at the DMV.

Reggie Miller is in front of you at a tollbooth and throwing pennies one by one into the basket and wondering out loud why they're not working.

Reggie Miller has just taken his ATM card out of the drive-up ATM. And he just put it back in. For the third time.

Reggie Miller has joined you for a viewing of Jackie Brown and you're at that scene, you know, the one where Samuel L. Jackson realizes he has to shoot Robert DeNiro, and there's this closeup that just goes in, and then in further, and in so tight because damn, Samuel L. Jackson is so damn intense here. You think for a second he might have, in the moment, forgotten this was a film, because he really looks like he's going to for real shoot DeNiro. It's beautiful, and it goes on forever, and you don't want a pin to drop as the camera just hugs in on Sam with his head against the pistol.

And at that moment, Reggie Miller leans over and bellows "HEY DUDE I BET HE'S GONNA SHOOT HIM. He's dead. I bet you any amount of money he's dead. Watch."

Reggie Miller is next to you on a plane and wants to tell you all about his new love for craft beer.

Reggie Miller is explaining to you that this adult kickball league isn't like other adult kickball leagues.

Reggie Miller is running a chainsaw loudly next door while you are trying to put a toddler down for their nap.

Reggie Miller is in front of you at Starbucks. He has just ordered a decaf coffee with non-fat whole milk after noon. The barista explains that after noon they can make him a decaf Americano unless he wants to wait. Whoa buddy what's an Americano, asks Reggie. Well, it's really just hot water added to a shot of espresso, which has a slightly different flavor, and Reggie's like wait, wait, WHOA now buddy. Can I get that with non-fat whole milk, though? The barista explains that there is no such thing as non-fat whole milk. Reggie says well we'll have to disagree on that, and what is an Americano again? You search for a rafter to drape your t-shirt over to hang yourself. Reggie looks in the bakery case and sees a cake pop and goes NOW IS THIS A CAKE OR A LOLLIPOP --

Reggie Miller is asking about gluten and oh god this is going to take a while.

Reggie Miller has just come back from a semester abroad and is about to tell you how you don't really know what pizza is.