What an unbelievable weekend!  What a huge victory over our long-standing and bitter rival.  And thank god with our victory over said long-standing and bitter rival, we were able to keep the big trophy.

Yes, praise be to California for defeating our hated foes from Missouri to keep the BigXII/Pac10 Chopping Tool Trophy (which I may or may not have just made up and most likely doesn’t exist).  But man would it suck if we had lost a game this weekend to lose a trophy which could be used for the purposes of chopping. 

All Hail, Blue And Gold

Thy colors unfold

O’er loyal Califo- 

Wait, I’m being told that we actually did lose a "competative" sporting event to our bitter and long-standing rival this weekend to lose a trophy designed for chopping.  And I’m being told I was in attendance at that event and the above copy on the Cal-Missouri game was just a witty way to a)introduce the more important Big Game topic and b)defend against the lifetime of shame I just witnessed yesterday.  Well, while it might succeed at a), nothing save for amnesia could keep me from feeling a lifetime of shame from yesterday.   

Well, spekaing of a lifetime of shame, I have to tell you, the reader, something important.  This is not something I like to admit to people.  This is not a part of TwistNHook that I like about myself.  This is not a Twist N. Hook that I like personally.  But I have to be open, I have to be honest.    

Yes, I like that new Britney Spears album.  I can’t deny it! It just makes me want to dance.

Ok, now that we got that out of the way, let’s move on to the other secret shame I have.  I like failure.  I am part of a generation of Cal fans who came of age during the Holmoecaust.  We don’t know what to do with success.  The past few years while newer alums have been yelling "GO BEARS!!!!," I have been yelling "GO BEARS????"  

While I have no idea how to emotionally deal with success, I am more than well equiped to deal with failure.  It excites me.  And when I say "excite" I really mean "arouse."  It turns me on.  I really get off on failure.  This whole year while everybody else was "Saying oh no, not another Longshore interception just as it looked like we might tie the game up late in the 4th" I was touching myself inappropriately and yelling "Oh yeah, Nate, underthrow that shit, oh yeah, fucking underthrow the shit out of that, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah." 

Tedford, when Robert Jordan nearly decapitated that camera-man yesterday I think I splooged all over section 228 row I.  And those are some pretty long rows.

This whole year has been an amazing, erotic journey for me (from Milan to Minsk).  It’s just been one new experience of failure after enother.  "Oh yeah, unknown Washington running back who nobody has ever heard of before, run another 60 yard run straight through the middle without getting touched, I’m going limp here!"

Tom Shneider pulling his hammy before the opener was a god-send.  Anytime I saw Kay sprint out there for a FG over 35 yards, it was just all "Schwing!" 

My wife even knows.  When she wants to steamy up our love-making, she knows all she has to do is just whisper "1st and Goal at the 1" into my ear.  And I am good to go.

Cal’s stunning inability to not score helps me score!

So, congratulations to Stanford and its fans.  Unlike to USC fans, I will be gracious in defeat to Stanford fans.  I remember what 2002 was like, it was an amazing feeling.  That is probably how you guys are feeling now.  Enjoy the axe, because in 2008, it’s coming home! 

Some post-game thoughts:

1.  The stadium is gorgeous.  Nobody loves Memorial than me, due to its a)general history and b)personal history.  But from an objective level, their new stadium is unbelievable.  It’s kinda like the Oakland Coliseum v. PacBell.  Sure, the Coliseum is not even in the same celestial orbit as PacBell, but I have memories dating back in the Coliseum to like 1986.  I wonder what Stanford fans think of the change.  

2.  Their whole campus is gorgeous.  We had a pre-game tailgate in a Rodan statue garden.  At Cal, we have pre-game tailgates in concrete parking lots.  At Stanford, you have it next to a giant art musem.   Shows the difference between the two schools, I think.

Rodan called this piece "The 2007 Cal Fan."

3.  Their announcer was so annoying.  The Cal announcer will just state the facts.  Their announcer will embellish it.  To wit, "Behind the block of X player, Y player glided to a Stanford first down!"  And when he screamed "THE AXE IS COMING HOME!" at the end, while the students swarmed the field, I wanted to kill somebody.  That was really the worst part.  I guess that is probably how Stanford fans felt in 2002.  Watching the other team’s fans swarm the field in the big rivalry game in person is one of the most brutal things.  Hearing the announcer basically beg his supervisors to let him run down there with them only made it worse.

4.  The writers strike is clearly hurting more than Jay Leno non-writing staff members.  That was one of the worst Stanford band performances I’ve ever seen.  For a Cal fan, I love the Stanford band.  If I had, yknow, been accepted to Stanford, I woulda joined it in a second.  But man did they have the worst writing ever.  They even had an interesting idea of "Controversial science theories."  Their best bit was probably Theory #2:  Female Funniness:

They had an intriguing thought, but the on the ground actual writing lacked hilarity merit.  I thought that the female funniness was good and then the only other good thing was the start of their halftime show when they said "And now a show you haven’t already seen!"  That was because the Cal band redid their Video Game show.  IIRC, the Cal Band doesn’t generally do a new show for a road game, but they did change around a few of the characters (instead of Oski v. Trojan it was Drum Major v. SubZero).   

I did love the burkahs that one section was wearing, tho.   Delightfully irreverent, as usual.

5.  I’ll leave the analysis to my more intelligent chums here at the California Golden Blogs.  But let’s just look at some quick drives here:

That went from the start of the 2nd half to 9:49 into the 4th quarter.  We apparently had 6 drives and got a grand total of -3 yards.  I don’t think I need to do much more analysis on this than to say that I feel incredibly aroused right now, just writing about this. 

6.  There was an article written from a Stanford student this past week about how Cal fans had reached a new low when they yelled "UC" over the Star Spangled Banner.  As to be expected from a Stanford student, it was fairly inane.  But I did feel that Cal fans reached a new low at the Big Game.  On one play, Longshore stayed down and was massaging his ankle.  The Cal sections around me started to break into a wild cheer.  That disturbed me.  A lot.  I wanted Cal to win as much as the next guy, but I’m not going to root for Longshore to get injured.  Some drunken buffoon behind me kept yelling "Look, I don’t want Longshore to get hurt, but if he could tear his ACL or something, that’d be great."  AI!