A Trip to Oxford

  I'm still not feeling up to snuff and I'm very irritated about it, but such is life. I just hope I can go to work this week as I had to call out all last week. At least I'm supposed to not be contagious anymore by Monday, but I hope I can survive two days in a row since I've been laying/sleeping on the couch for the last week now.

The boys' tent before

The boys and the tent after

Dad, Margaret, and Patrick at the tailgate

Chris, me, Katie, and Mom

Daddy's girl

Part of my lovely family

My seester

me and Pat

Me with Doc

Carolyn, Corey, and Pat

  Anyways, last weekend we boarded the pupster for the second time (eek!) and drove over to Oxford for the game. My sister is in graduate school in accounting at Ole Miss and it was very nice to have a place to stay. I was quite impressed with her condo and how cute she and Mom have decorated it! I'm sad that I didn't get any pictures of it, but I wish my apartments in college had looked that cute! Due to some car issues, we weren't able to leave until almost about noon and Patrick was dying because he wanted to leave here at 8am. Whoops. We did finally arrive and I started making some applesauce muffins for the early tailgate while we were waiting on my parents to arrive. Margaret's friend, Katie, had come in from Tuscaloosa for the game as did her boyfriend, Chris, who came in from Auburn.

 Pre-game flyover

  When my parents finally arrived in Oxford, we all met on the Square to wait in line for Ajax because Patrick was dying for their country fried steak and macaroni and cheese. At first, I was bummed out because I had scoped out the menu online and knew I wanted the vegetable plate but it wasn't offered on the menu and I couldn't figure out what the heck I wanted to eat. Thank goodness I asked the waitress and she said, "oh yes we offer a limited selection of vegetables" and all four of the veggies were available! Yay! (Aren't mashed potatoes and macaroni and cheese considered vegetables?) Unfortunately, our little group of 7 had to split up and eat at two different tables, but at least we got to eat earlier than the wait of like two hours.

Auburn captains

Ole Miss captains

  After we ate dinner, we decided (the kids) to go to a bar on the square before they started charging cover ($10 for most places and $20 in others--so steep!). We all got stamped, walked into the bar, saw a drink mixing a "Skinny B", stood around for about 2 minutes and walked back out to drive back to Margaret's to meet my parents. Then we sent Patrick and Chris out to set up our tent in the Grove since you have to wait until 10pm on Friday nights before the games to set up a tailgating spot in the Grove. An hour passed and we hadn't heard from the boys. They finally rolled in right when I was calling Patrick and they said, "Well, our tent doesn't really look perfect but it's up!" They had two poles leftover and told my dad that most of the pieces didn't really fit like they thought they were supposed to and that there must not have been enough pieces. I can see my dad calculating all of the pieces and how they fit together and it just wasn't making sense to him. So we all load up in the car to see this tent.

My favorite, Nick Fairley

I told P he would be here!! Michael Oher

  Oh my goodness, we walk into the Grove and find our tent and we all die laughing. I mean, the tent was standing, but that was about it! I had to get a picture of Pat and Chris with the tent before we broke it down and started over again. We tried once and failed, but Dad figured out the tent (rightfully so as he has been the only one to ever put it up but hadn't done so since 1997) and we got it fixed. By the time we finally finished with the tent, we were all exhausted and decided to just go back to the condo instead of going out.

My dad's in the middle with the navy vest

Cam eating some cotton candy

  Saturday morning came along and we all woke up and started getting showers (3 girls and 2 boys with 1 bathroom). We picked up our barbeque from Handy Andy and went down to our spot in the Grove. Minor detail but as we looked through all our bags, we realized we had potato salad, cole slaw, baked beans, buns, and barbeque sauce but NO barbeque. Off Patrick went to return to Handy Andy where the guy said, "I went to the back to get the meat and when I came back, y'all were gone!" We met up with my parents and started eating from our spread. Man, it was good!  Several of Patrick's friends came by as did many of Chris'. Katie Doc came by and we stopped by her tailgate too for a few minutes.

Cam and Nick

me and P after the game

  After taking a bathroom break in the Phi Mu house (how I wish Auburn had sorority houses!!!), we started making our way to the stadium. Sadly, Mom, Patrick, and I missed both the Walk of Champions and the Tiger Walk while we were in the Phi Mu house. Now I don't have to say too much about the game, but War CAM Eagle!

War Eagle! 51-31!!

  Once the game ended, we headed back to the tailgate where unfortunately, someone stole our cooler with all the contents and wiped out two of the other coolers. Patrick and I were very irritated to lose our cooler and our drinks and it was quite the frustrating end to a good game (for me, at least). I don't think it was because we were from Auburn, but it was still annoying. We had to wait for a while for my dad to get finished with the team as the one of the docs, so we started taking items that hadn't gotten stolen back to the car. Then we decided we would drive back to the Grove and that was a huge mistake as we just sat in traffic so long that my dad met up with my mom and they broke down the tent. Chris ran out to meet them and helped them with the tent and baskets before we even made it to the entrance of the Grove. Again, we sat down in Margaret's condo and decided to go to sleep. It was very sad that we couldn't make it out at least one night on the town, but I didn't miss it that badly.

Nick Fairley speaking to my dad

Pat, me, Devin, and Bryce

  On Sunday morning, I called my grandparents who said they would be home and Patrick and I were able to drop by and eat lunch with them. It was wonderful to see them and catch up even though it was only for about an hour or so. I really miss being able to see them and am thankful that I was able to see them for a bit before it was a year.

Cam in the stands

The rest of the team jumped up after Cam

  Overall, we had a great time sharing our EIGHTH Auburn-Ole Miss football game together! I can't believe that it has been that long!! War Eagle and Hotty Toddy (just kiddin', babe!)!