THE FINAL 20 DAYS:15

by WCT, The Ship of Fools

The longest off-season in sports is almost over and we are psyched. Today is August 13th, meaning there are now exactly 15 days until the beginning of College Football season.

To commemorate this, we are counting down the 20 (or so) things that make College Football so addictive that it gets us up out of our beds and into a bar at 12 noon on fall Saturdays. Today's edition: The Fight Songs!

99.9% of the time, whenever you or I hear music played by a trumpet, or a flute, or a tuba, or a sousaphone (raise your hand if you even know what that is), we think that its crap. "Garbage," we'll say. "My grandparents listen to this junk! Turn it off!" But if it happens to be a Saturday afternoon in the fall, and the music is a college fight song, we get goosebumps. Fight songs are completely unique to College Football, and they are part of what makes the game great.

You why they are great? Because everyone knows them. You go to a game, you are suddenly sitting with 90,000 people that all know all the words to their home school's fight song. Where did they learn the song? Who taught them? Who knows? Its one of the few things in life that you literally just pick up along the way. Think about it. You know your favorite school's fight song, right? Who taught it to you? Chances are, nobody did. Most of these songs are close to 100 years-old, everyone knows all the words to them, and they just get passed on.

So remember that, this fall, when you are scanning the radio, hit the "big band" station, and scan past it as fast as you can. Then, the following Saturday when your at the game and you hear "Glory, Glory to ole Georgia," or "On Wisconsin," or "the Buckeye Battle Cry" and the hair on your neck stands up and you start singing. Or, more likely, your team scores a touchdown and you begin humming the fight song along with the band from your couch at home (I'm not the only one that does that, right?)