Descending a ramp to get the hell out of the Florida Citrus Bowl, “The Victors” made its way through the bowels of the old stadium and into my pissed-off ears. Michigan, which had been beaten by a Division I-AA team a mere four months earlier, had just beaten my beloved school by six points, and I was in no mood for any Big 10 revelry. It was about 4 p.m. on Jan. 1, 2008, and my year was off to a shitty start.
Lucky for me, 2008 was a leap year, so I still had 365 days to turn it around. And indeed I did, but not solely by my own volition. The following helped:
The Alligator staff and the hours we spent at budget meetings, on deadline, playing trash-can basketball, putting out newspapers, etc., etc.; the fleeting moments I got to see my girlfriend in between all of the aforementioned madness; graduating; getting a job; The Gaslight Anthem; “Wall-E”; Florida 49, Georgia 10; Florida 45, Florida State 15; Florida 31, Alabama 20; indulging myself with a MacBook and a bathrobe; covering an Obama rally on the eve of Election Day; and the West Coast: Disneyland, the Moz homestead, and driving up the Pacific Coast Highway, celebrities’ beachfront Malibu homes on one side and the Santa Monica Mountains on the other.
Onward and upward, to England, a trophy made of Waterford Crystal, a haircut — a year of downright refusal…
