Football Fever Has Infected My Mom

I got to Texas today, where I am visiting my family and some friends. I had heard that last night there was some big football game, and I think I knew that Texas was involved, but today, I have discovered that this was a VERY BIG DEAL to Texans, particularly Austinites. There is a great hullabaloo here. It’s funny, when I lived here, I would keep track of the UT games and made a point of attending one or two every season, but I guess it wasn’t a true interest of mine, because once I left Texas I forgot all about football. My mom picked me up from the airport wearing an orange spirit pin celebrating UT’s victory at the Rose Bowl. She informed me that it was a very close and exciting game with many Heisman winners and hopefuls displaying their athletic prowess. And, of course, we won.

My mother hinted a couple of times that she would like to go take pictures of the UT tower, which this week is lit up in burnt orange glory with a number 1 in honor of the team’s victory. I decided that a little nighttime walk on UT campus with my mom wouldn’t be such a bad way to spend the evening even if I didn’t fully understand the need to document this not uncommon architectural illumination event. I mean, it seems they are lighting up this tower at least once a month for something.

When we got to campus, I was shocked to find that there were hundreds of people with my mother’s same exact goal of taking pictures of the tower. There were three TV news vans to cover the occasion and hordes of families taking turns getting their picture taken, all wearing burnt orange t-shirts and looking pleased at their success. My mother (and everyone else) had to take a couple of shots of the tower from at least three different angles. The only things missing were cotton candy and t-shirt salesman, but I found out later when we went to the grocery store that HEB had the latter covered.