NJ to IN to NJ in 5 days (or Taking The Red Eye)

(Or Seeing Red...I don't know, there's a pun in there somewhere.)
We drove out to the in-laws this weekend, since the kids had a long weekend off from school. Got there Friday night, had dinner with mom, brother and cousin. Next day it was up early so Stan and I could escape for an Indiana breakfast. That means sausage gravy and biscuits at Cloverleaf. Then back home to get ready for the football game.

This entails, first and foremost, finding our red and donning it. If I had been thinking like a proper IU alumnus, I would have had the doctor's wrap Sean's arm in Cream & Crimson.

I never see so much red in my life as when I'm in Bloomington/IU.
It's cool, but after four years of college (okay 5, but who's counting), it's like, enough already. Then you return to other parts of the world and you see that loud red and white outfits are not quite so coveted and you remember why. But for IU football Saturdays, it's a must. Unless you're travelling and you forgot to pack it.

Then, tailgating! We brought out the food and the boys played football.
They had lots of fun. But watch out when you are playing football in the lot where people pay the big bucks (like my mil). These excited red flag flyin' IU fans drive into their warm fuzzy familiar spaces as if your five year old with a broken arm and a plateful of ribs doesn't exist, so you must teach your children to dive and roll.

There were some students across the street jumping drunk on a trampoline on an incline under a balcony. Good to see nothing has changed since I left.


Luke is the rib-eatin' king. He dives in and doesn't come up for air until they're clean...or mom makes him look up for a picture.

You really need to click on this one to get the full effect. The guy who brought the ribs said he knew Luke liked them when he saw sauce on his forehead.
There's Stan and me and our family vacation friend "Manpurse!"



Then to the stands for the game! It was hot and quite sunny. I was wishing for some crisp Indiana fall football game weather, but we got South Carolina beach heatwave weather instead. Oh well:
Go Big Red.

I used to sit all the way over to the right of the picture below when I had season tickets as a student. This time I was over with all the other old people and IU alumni. I managed to have fun anyway (AND I wasn't drunk, which I can see now is a great way to enjoy the college football experience!) The old songs and chants came right back and I stood and danced and sang and clapped and screamed,
"Go! IU! Fight! Fight! Fight!"

And my boys looked at me like, "Um, who is she? Our mom likes football all the sudden?" Of course not. I was just getting all caught up in the university experience. Not hard to do at Ole IU.

Oh, and IU beat Minnesota too. Another twist to the IU football experience. IU has a winning record this year!!!

Indiana, Our Indiana, Indiana We're all for you!