Stray Hawkeye

Last we saw Parker, he was roaming the Uptown Art Fair looking for a snack, and had been directed towards Calhoun Square by a friendly stranger.  More of the Dino Saga here.

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“Let’s see, he said thee was food down this way…”

“Uh, Parker, I don’t think it’s that kind of an apple store, I think they actually sell…”

“Come on Parker, let’s get you some real food.”

“Come on Parker, let’s at least play with some of the other toys.  Here, why don’t you try out an iPod.”

“We could get you one of these for your birthday Parker.  Would you like that?”

“I don’t know, I still really like my Walkman.”

“Your Walkman?!?!  You really are a dinosaur Parker!  These are way better than that!”

“Okay, what do they do?”

“Well, you can listen to music on them.  The newest models even have an fm radio built right into them.”

“Does it let you record music?”

“Well, no.”

“Does it have replaceable batteries?”

“Um, no, I guess not.”

“Can you use it to make mix tapes to give to your friends?”

“Well, not really.  I guess you could hook it to your computer and make a play list in iTunes.  But, the other person would need to download the songs too before they could play it, and, well…”

“Yeah, I think I’ll stick to my Walkman.”

“Okay, I guess I’ll have to think of something else for your birthday.  Let’s go get you some food.”

“Look – deep fried cheese curds, and it’s not even the state fair yet!”

“Let’s see if we can find you something a little more healthy.  Here, try some corn.”

“Wow, I’m stuffed now.  I think it’s time for some more art.”

“Okay, let’s check out some t-shirt.  These ones by Batik by Kat are nice!”

“Hello there, little one.  I’m Kat, can I help you find anything?”

“You’re Kat?  Somehow I was expecting more whiskers and fur, and maybe a tail…,  you look much more like a friendly person than a Kat.”

“Ah yes, that confuses many of the little dinosaurs that stop by our booth.  I am, in fact, a person.”

“I see, well, I like these ones, but I don’t think they’re quite me…”

“Oh, I think we have a design you might like better.  Here, try this one.”

“Can we get it Kearn? Can we pleeeaaasssseeee?!?!”

“I don’t know Parker, it looks a little big for you.  Excuse me Kat, do you make this in an extra, extra, extra, extra dino small?”

“Oh, sorry, we only go down to an extra, extra dino small.  And it looks like your little friend would take some growing to fit into one of those.  But here, take our card and you can get one from our website when he gets bigger.”

“Thank you.  Parker, I may have a birthday present idea for you after all, just maybe not for this year.”

“I like that idea.  Let’s see who else we can meet while we’re here.”

Next we wandered past Wild Cat Works‘ bird houses.

But it turned out no birds had moved into the shiny new bird penthouses yet, so we kept moving.

“Parker, I think I see a place you may like.”

Next we walked past the myTalk 107.1 booth, and Parker took an interest in a sign they had our in front.

Next we stopped by a booth where you could get your picture taken in front of a green screen, and have the background replaced with anywhere in the world.  Parker was going to play a trick on everyone and get one with the Roman Coliseum in the background and tell everyone he went to Rome over the weekend.  Unfortunately, the computer had a hard time telling the difference between Parker and the background.  So, he’ll have to find another trick to play.

We kept walking, and before long we pasted in front of James Sauer’s sculptures, and…

They may have been a little too realistic for Parker’s taste.

Luckily, once Parker finally slowed down, we weren’t far from Keith Kinney’s booth, where Parker found a place to rest for a bit.

(I couldn’t find a business card at Keith’s booth, and from searching, the only website I found for him (http://www.stylesofoakheritage.net/) seems to be down / missing, but it was Keith Kinney of Yellow Springs, OH, in case you like the rockers.)

“Kearn, all that running from the eagle made me awfully tired, and we’ve been walking a lot today.  Can we head home and take a break before going to the Powederhorn Art Fair?”

“Sure Parker, let’s get you some rest and some air conditioning.”

On the way out, we walked past the RuTu Paddle Company, which has some really pretty stuff, but Parker was too tired to pose any more.

However, just past there, we came across the strangest thing, and had to pause for one last picture…

“I don’t know Parker, sometimes Uptown just doesn’t make sense.”

For the Penn State game, the Iowa athletic department has apparently decided to counter Penn State’s usual clan rally white out look with a creation of their own:

I’ll be the first to admit that when we started doing the whole “all the fans wear the same color” thing, I loved it. I thought black outs at Iowa were the greatest thing ever. Until I saw one from field level… and noticed that you can’t really see shirts so much as everyone’s faces from that angle… and realized just how white our fan base is, and that is was more of a grey out than anything.

The gold out at night against Ohio State looked awesome, though it was pretty well tainted by the game.

In fact, it seems like on the whole, we tend to lose themed games more than not. So, I’ve pretty well soured on them.

But this one, even assuming it works, how long do you think it will be before someone photoshops it up to look like, well, hell, it’s going to happen anyway, so it might as well be done by one of our own…

At least we thought of it before Georgia Tech. Unfortunately no one told us we’re not the Yellow Jackets / Ramblin Really Nice Old Car.  Though, it wouldn’t be so bad to have the pretty sweet Nice New Camaro Bumblebee from the dog shit terrible Transformers movie as a mascot (I’m not sure exactly how that’s related, but in my mind it is).

Has anyone else ever noticed that the clothes the sledgehammer girl is wearing in the iconic 1984 Apple commercial below really closely resemble the outfits the waitresses at Hooters wear?  Like, basically identical.  No?  Just me?  Okay.

This was going to be a brief little post of a couple of things from the Orange Bowl / Miami trip.  However, instead of being brief and little, it somehow got really, really long.  I thought about breaking it into a few more little posts, but I figure at this point most of you are probably sick of hearing about my vacation, and it’s already close to a month after the fact, I so I figure I’ll get it all out of the way here in one last post on the subject.  Some topics covered – compare and contrast Iowa fans and the locals, tangent on advertising, pictures of some Hawkeye fashions, a lengthy deconstruction of fan turn out / ticket sales for the two teams, various non-dino game pictures, and some videos I took along the way.

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The contrast between the Hawkeye fans the the natives of South Beach was both awesome and hilarious (to me at least). (Note that this whole description engages in huge, broad, sweeping generalization to try to illustrate the point, there’s lots of exceptions, but we’re going for a general feeling here.)

South Beach and it’s residents seem to see themselves as (and may well be, I don’t keep track of these things) the center of fashion and stylishness for America and possibly the world.  They’re all very, very well dressed in whatever the latest style is.  At the same time that this would probably make them noticeable anywhere else, in South Beach, everyone is so in tune with the latest fashions, that they all end up looking basically the same (at least to my uncultured eyes).  It’s almost like there’s a dress code / uniform for the whole area, which probably changes about every two weeks.  They also seem to tend to be very fit (and dress to show it (or maybe cover it up where lacking)) and very tan.  I also don’t usually tend to notice plastic surgery, but wow, plastic people everywhere in South Beach.  There was also the highest concentration of Ethiopian refugee grade skinny girls that I’ve ever seen in one place.  Like walking skeletons in mini-skirts.  Super gross, but still trying to show it off.

In addition, it was also *by Miami standards* really cold while we were there.  Highs around 60-65, and lows around 40.  Yeah, I know, it was about 5 (above) when I got on the plane to go down, there was frozen puke (New Year’s morning) at the bus stop on the way to the airport.  But 40′s are apparently near record lows for them.  The natives were bundled up, in layers and layers and layers.  Sweaters, stocking caps, gloves, the whole bit.

They also all seemed to be rather serious and self-conscious.  Not in an unconfident way, just a being very aware of how they look and how others are looking at them.  And, perhaps because we were in an area pretty heavy in shops and restaurants, so lots of service industry people, they tended to all be in their 20′s and 30′s.  Though that could be the plastic surgery talking.

In contrast to that were the Iowa fans, who I love.  Totally on vacation, and caring about fashion and style even less than Mid-westerners normally do, which is already basically not at all.  Tigerhawks and “IOWA” on every shirt, fuck Dolce and Gabbana – our defense would kill them both, whoever they play for.  T-shirt stretched over a beer gut and stained jeans?  Sounds like an outfit to me.  XXL t-shirt on a XL frame and athletic short?  Let’s head to the beach!  It’s not that Iowa fans look bad by any means, it’s just that by and large, they couldn’t care less about designers or the latest trend.  Especially when on a vacation that centers around a sporting event.  And they’re not necessarily unfit (though, I would say on average we’ve probably got 25-50 pounds on South Beachers), but fitness for us is centered around being able to do the job at hand (usually farming) even if there is some padding over the muscle, rather than centered around looking toned at the beach.

To sum up the fitness part, I noted a few times from looking at the size and build of the Iowa fans and at the locals, that if a fight were to break out between the Iowa fans and the locals, every dollar I have or could borrow would be on the Iowa fans, and I’d gladly take 2 to 1 odds on that.

The Iowa fans also skewed more towards the 40-ish and 50-ish age range.  I would assume because that’s more of who has the resources to be able to fly down to Miami for a quick vacation.

So, needless to say, seeing the two groups mixing and passing on the street while you sat and ate was one of the more entertaining things on the trip (aside from the game of course).

The really weird part is that both groups have this same air of pride about them, but at the same time, a totally different form of it.  South Beachers have a sort of pride in appearance and their own perception of their social place at the forefront of culture and fashion.  Iowans I have a harder time analyzing, since I am one, but sort of a pride in being strong, independent, resilient, tough, caring, good people.  A sort of hereditary German pride in some sorts.

Anyway, an interesting compare and contrast while you’re sitting at a sidewalk cafe eating pizza and watching people walk by.

Now, on to some pictures.  First, this was still up in the Minneapolis airport when I flew out on the first:

Though Accenture was the first sponsor to drop Tiger Woods when he started hitting the news (and stationary objects such as trees and fire hydrants), apparently airport ads are on a bit of a slow rotation.  Also, all of their Tiger Woods posters went from sort of “eh?” to being downright insightful.  Someone also pointed out the new Accenture ads to me after I mentioned this.  Perhaps it’s just me, but when I first saw this one, I saw a rather small, blurry version like below, from a bit of a distance, and I thought to myself, “Why would they want their image to be a terrified elephant crouched on a melting iceberg off the coast of Antarctica?”  That makes no sense, and I’m pretty sure there is no part of that which is the image they want to get across.

Then I realized that it’s not a terrified elephant crouched on a melting iceberg off the coast of Antarctica.  Rather, it’s a bi-pedal, hunchbacked elephant on a surf board riding a crappy wave.  Because that makes waaayyyy more sense.

Anyway, back to Miami.  We were walking on the beach, and my sister pointed out this great shot:

What’s that?  It’s just a bunch of hotels on the beach you say?  Ah, look closer…

Now, I also generally think it’s sort of weird and creepy to take random picture of people you don’t know, but sometimes you just see things that are too awesome to resist sharing.

And, hell, while we’re being creepy and posting some of my favorite fan apparel (which I’m now also noticing is probably a fair example of my above statements about Iowa fans and fashion and the cultural difference with the locals, especially, especially the second one below), here’s two more.

What more can I say?

The team buses were also styling:

Now a couple of pictures which illustrate as clearly as one can the distribution of fans for the game.

Admittedly Exhibit B was taken a little while before kick off, but Exhibit A was during the game.  And here’s the seating chart for the game:

As you can see, each team’s athletic department is responsible for selling out about a quarter of the stadium.  This ensures some revenue for ticket sales for the bowl, and makes sure it feels like each team has a side.  These seats are indicated in grey in Exhibit C to illustrate that they’re not available through the Orange Bowl website, just through that team’s athletic department.  Now you may be saying, “Wait, Iowa left that many seats empty in their section?  No way!!  Well…, I guess it is a long trip, and it’s a recession and all, and they might have had their hopes up for the Fiesta…”.  No. No. No.

We were sitting in section 414.  Let’s orient those pictures for you:

The Iowa sections was full.  Maybe not quite 100%, but at least 85%, and probably closer to 90%.  Plus there were lots of Iowa fans like myself who bought tickets in the neutral areas between the two (the colored seats in the above pictures).  In fact, basically all the fans in the neutral areas were Iowa fans.  Not exaggerating, probably 85% of the fans in both of the neutral corners were Iowa as well.  Granted, those sections weren’t completely sold out, but they were pretty well populated.  This means that Iowa, the traveling/visiting team, with no particular tie to the Orange Bowl (the ACC does have a tie in with the Orange Bowl), sold out at least half of the stadium, and probably more like 60-65% of the seats.  Now you’re saying, “So, Georgia Tech must have sold out the other 35-40% seats?”  No.  Not at all.  See Exhibit A.  In fact, let me clarify Exhibit A a bit with…

So, Georgia Tech was tasked with selling, at minimum, 25% of the seats IN A BCS BOWL GAME.  In the picture above, I’ve circled a couple not so small holes in that 25% of the stadium.  And mind you, this was DURING THE GAME.  It’s not like these holes filled in when people came in from tailgating.  They stayed like that the whole time.   And then, there’s the elephant in the room, and it’s not even on a surf board this time.  What are those black bits?

Those are huge black tarps that were covering the upper half of basically all of the upper Georgia Tech sections.  I have no confirmation on this, but I would assume that their purpose is to make it less apparent to a TV audience that the stadium was not sold out.  This would make sense given the fan concentration just below these tarps, and the fact that they’re almost all in the Georgia Tech dedicated seating area.  Which means aside from the gaping holes circled in red that are sparse to empty, that not one single ticket was sold in the black tarp sections for the ACC CHAMPIONS to see their team compete in a BCS game BEING PLAYED THE NEXT STATE OVER.

As best I can tell, the tarps cover about 15 rows, and they’re over 14 sections, and each row is about 25 seats wide.  That means that by a back of the envelope calculation, that there were 5,250 seats under tarps in the Georgia Tech section.  Aside from that, there’s the holes in the lower section, the club level seating (the blue seats) are about 50-50, and the upper section outside the tarps is about 60% full.  So, let’s say that when we balance that out that Georgia Tech sold about half of the tickets in their quarter of the stadium, and we add in any stragglers they had in the rest of the place.  So, that puts us at around 15% of the tickets.  To Iowa’s 60-65%.

This is why I love my Iowa fans.  And why we always get invited to a bowl game one better than what our football team’s record would otherwise merit.

Anyway, the band was looking good, with the usual HAWKS formation:

As well as a new one that I hadn’t seen before.

We always talked about wanting to make a Tigerhawk while I was in band, but it never happened because we weren’t very good at big, field wide curves while I was in, and that’s basically all a Tigerhawk is.  Have you ever tried drawing one free hand?  It’s impossible to get it right.  Drawing a perfect circle free hand would be easier.  But the band seemed to pull it off pretty well.  Hopefully it will become a mainstay of the pre-game show.

And a few pictures of the post-game festivities:

And I quite like that last one, so I played with it in GIMP (free PhotoShop) a little bit, and squared it up to look more straight on, and cropped out the rest.

You can click on the image to get a bigger version of it.  It would make a great desktop background.  On every computer you touch.  Just saying.

I also tried taking some video while I was at the Hawkeye Huddle and at the game.  Random fact – the Orange Bowl has only ever had two occasions on which teams did their own pep rallies before the game, in 2003 and 2010.  Both times it was Iowa.  Apparently we’re the only team that does Hawkeye Huddles or equivalents.  So, on that note, here’s the Hawkeye Marching Band playing the short version of On Iowa at the Hawkeye Huddle from about half way back in the crowd:

A clip from Thriller:

I have no idea why that has become a sort of band tradition now. They play it all the time. The only reason I can think is because the dance is kind of fun to do. And it pisses me off to no end that they play it after the third quarter of games instead of Hey Jude. But don’t get me started on that, or any of the many other HMB traditions that Kevin Kastens and Myron Welch have combined to destroy.

Deep Breath.

And here is a full version of Hey Jude:

Ah, that makes me feel better.

And a small chunk of the series as the band marches out. Admittedly probably the most boring clip of the bunch. I was expecting them to march out through the crowd, but they went out through the back of the stage. Probably makes a lot more sense, but not quite as entertaining to watch.

And I did a quick 360 panorama of the crowd at the end of the Hawkeye Huddle to show about how big it is. This was right at the end, so people were starting to filter out:

And, the last few plays of the Orange Bowl, starting with a Georgia Tech 4th down, then an orange Gatorade shower (a little early) for Ferentz, a few kneel downs, and the starting of the post game celebration, with a bit of In Heaven There Is No Beer in the background:

Cool print by Christina Vantzou (found via Swiss Miss):

Makes me think you could make a really cool dress / Halloween costume from this.  Just a normal dress where the bottom was a shark mouth and maybe the arm/shoulder was a fin would be really cool, even with no tail.  Maybe some ripped / shredded tights to go with it.

I attempted to photoshop up this idea, but it came out laughably terrible, so I’ll let you imagine from the description.

Zappos is an online shoe retailer with a mind-blowingly good reputation for great customer service.  I’ve never actually bought anything from them, but I’ve read many, many articles about how good their customer service is, and how great of a company they are to work for.

They now have a map online that shows in real time what is being bought on their site, and roughly where it’s being shipped to.  It’s strangely fascinating.  You can also click on the images of shoes that pop up and see more details about that specific shoe.

I was looking around shirt on Snorg Tees and came across a few that made me laugh a lot.  Click the images for where you can get the shirts if you like:

Tons more on their homepage.  Lots of them are a bit more pop culture references.

I also like the gender classifications on their site, and the icon they use for your cart.

(Note that this is not me asking for these in any way, shape, or form.  I have way, way more t-shirts than I need already.  Just pointing out good comedy on the web.)