Clean Old Fashioned Hate

The Heck with the Ramblin Wreck.

Now let me see if I got this right. First off the rivalry between Tech and Georgia is called clean, old fashioned hate. Okay I’m diggin it. Supposedly it dates back to 1893, to Techs first win which happened to be against us. Not only did we throw rocks at them after they beat us, we threw rocks at them while they were beating us. We also called them names it appears, do what? They were called the Blacksmiths back then and probably weren’t good at that either. It was after that game the Tech fight song was written and it contains the line, To H$ll with Georgia.
The southern gentry of the late eighteen hundreds were sending their sons to Georgia to learn to run plantations. Only problem, they needed to teach the average slow peanut farmer how to shoe a fast horse. Wala, Tech was born. You’d think that in over a hundred years they’d have at least learned how to shoe a fast Bulldawg. The horse era ended with Tech still developing its curriculum. The tractor era eased in, but it was a dozen years before they figured out a tractor couldn’t be shoed. At least the tractor would sit still long enough for them to have a go at it. The idea of a dozen nerds trying to shoe a John Deere is a pretty funny one, at least in my head.
In 1961 the only guy in the school who owned a car and it being a thirty year old wreck, arrived at a game after sampling some of North Georgia’s finest shine, then drove it onto the field. At other colleges that would have been called termination, at Tech it was called tradition. You’d think the Tech program could afford to bring this tradition into the current century, like drive a Corvette or maybe a Mustang. If not they should have at least left the car original and be driving it onto the field as the wreck it represents. The truth of it, they only need come up with one person who is smart enough to drive the thing, he drives onto the field with the team in tow. Secretly the driver is a Georgia graduate in drag as a light loafered nerd. I think it’s the only way they insure the players can find the field. What do you call the driver of the Ramblin Wreck, team captain, Valedictorian?
“Gee coach where is the field?”
“Good Lord Tevin, how long you been here?” The coach rolls his eyes.
“Didn’t your mother know the difference between a T and a D? Never mind, just follow that squeaking, smoking old car on Saturday and you’ll be fine.”
Some of this rivalry stems from our lobbying so hard to keep Tech from rejoining the SEC, but mostly it comes from our beating the pants off of them for years. Did you know they have little bulldawgs in their urinals in their locker rooms? Every time a Tech player uses the restroom, he does so, on a Bulldawg. The primary color red is permanently banned from the Nerd Herds campus. Ever wonder why Tech never comes to Athens to play? We set our standards high enough to keep that from happening and we can’t allow them to come here, even for one game.
Before the game Saturday many predicted Tech would win, I bet the college they attended had classes on shoeing a tractor and discussing building bridges too. With this win coach Richt has a better record in their stadium that all their coaches combined. That is a little too funny and it caused me to have to leave my office and clean the milk from my nose. Never laugh hysterically while drinking milk and eating toast, at least not in mixed company.
So now Georgia must spend the week getting ready for the SEC championship game against LSU, this year’s bullies of the SEC. Tech players must endeavor to learn how to build a bridge that will allow tractors to cross the creek from one peanut patch to the other. I believe they are secretly working on genetically altering peanuts so they can shoe tractors and beat Bulldawgs. At least the IQ average on the team will improve.
The season is winding down and soon I’ll have to come up with other things to make fun of, but I must admit, making fun of our neighbors has been a hoot. I’ve only gotten a few death threats, none to worry about seeing as the Ramblin Wreck won’t be Ramblin to my house like some sick, hick, laser pointer. I doubt any of them could find Athens without something to follow.
Larry would have sure been proud of the way we handled Tech Saturday, it’s a shame he wasn’t there and he is missed.
Larry Munson 09/28/22 – 11/20/11