12.22.2007

Big Game Week 07: A Look Back Part III

Today in the blog we have a short interview with newly-Former Band Manager Adam "(AC) Slater" Cohen.

So man, you're not in charge of Band anymore. What's next for you?

Lotta workin, lotta sleepin. Lotta drinkin. Lotta makin fun of Liz, mostly.

How old does being an ex-manager make you feel?

The other day I was talking to my roommate, who's a Ph.D. student, and I cracked a joke about grad students and their bike helmets. He said, "hey, you're a grad student now." It took me about 2 days to recover. True story.

Let's say the entire new Band staph died from eating poison tacos on their staph retreat, and the rest of Band said "Hey Slater ol' buddy, we need you to be manager again." What would you say to that?

I think there are some Stanford administrators who might have something to say about that. I would not be surprised if some of them preferred zombie-taco-poison Liz to me. I would say no, and then someone would convince Mike Priest* to do it. He's the one with the martyr complex anyway.

*Note: Mike Priest, who has been mentioned twice in this blog (and more to come, probably) is a former Band Manager and trumpet player. Mike graduated and has a "real job" now, but that does not stop us from using him as the subject of jokes.

Is it true that former managers get to join a special club in a secret clubhouse that has bearskin rugs, a pinball machine, and a viewing window to laugh at the new manager?

Yes. It's called the Asshole farm, and all I can tell you is that there is a secret entrance to it in the Adventureland section of Disneyland. I got my key last week. Oh, and the viewing window is more of a CCTV camera system, but the principle is the same.

I hear that Band managers often get nightmares during their terms of office. Did any dreadful fantasies plague your slumber?

I swear on my mother I am not making this up. About 3 weeks before Big Game, I had a dream that a certain member of the Athletic Department, whom I will not name on the outside chance that this gets back to that person and makes Liz's life more difficult, showed up to the Shak right before a Monday rehearsal with a bottle of Glenlivet. You see, it turns out that all of the antagonism that this person showed the Band was actually a result of him being insulted that we had never invited him to perform with us! So, he had brought me a peace offering of scotch whiskey -- which we shared, of course -- and wanted to give Snare drum a shot. And then everyone lived happily ever after. Waking up after realizing that my brain had just created this horrible, horrible image was one of the most terrifying moments of my life. I still haven't fully recovered.


Well folks, that just may wrap up our BGW 07 coverage. Fun stuff from that epic week may still trickle in, but for the most part we are going to move onwards and upwards to a variety of coverage of Band's adventures during Winter Quarter.

Love,
The LSJUMB

12.17.2007

Big Game Week 07: A Look Back Part II

Now that Band is for the most part home for winter break, busy forgetting how to play their instruments, it's time for more BGW 07 reminiscing.

Please observe the pictures below:

In these pictures we have the LSJUMB Killa Trumpz doing one really cool thing, but then nullifying it by doing a totally wack thing. The cool thing is that they one-upped us all yet again by building the best Big Game project for a third straight year. Two years ago it was the well-crafted and spectacularly inconvenient "Brickhenge." Last year it was the well-crafted and spectacularly helpful "Mike Priest Memorial Roundabout" (don't worry - Mike's not dead, he's just dead to us) which inspired the university to build a real roundabout. And this year the Trumpz gave us the "Trumpz Hot Dog Stand." It is a thing of beauty and nourishment, and everyone in Band who rocked out during BGW 07 owes the Trumpz a debt of gratitude for all the dogs, burgers, and Polishes.
HOWEVER, as you can see in the picture, the Trumpz chose ninjas as their Big Game sexion costume. That would have been totally fine, but as you can see they seem to have missed the memo which said "make your costume mostly red." Given that the Trumpz are mostly engineering students, it puzzles us how they messed up this simple directive. Maybe they knew they controlled the local hot dog scene, and felt they were above our petty rules. I don't know. In any case, while every other sexion rocked cool red costumes on the field, the Trumpz looked like living photographic negatives of what they were supposed to look like. Good job, guys. We'd be more angry if those bratwursts hadn't been so delicious.

And now a few word about the new staph.

Manager: Liz Schackmann
Remember, Liz: power corrupts, so I guess it's a good thing that as Band Manager you won't have any.
Liz is rather unique in that she was also once a Dollie. So when we throw nickels at her and command her to dance, as we do with all new managers, she might actually do it.

Ass(istant) Man(ager): Nate "Chopz" Foorman
As a former manager once said, "Being Band Management is like making the worst decision of your life, and then making it again a year later." So Chopzie has made one horrific wrong turn on the road of life, and has another one to look forward to in twelve months. Congrats, Chopz!

Drum Major: "Hat"Dave Borowitz
HatDave challenges the old "Monkey with a Stick" stereotype; as he will proudly tell you, he aims to be the "Monkey with a Stick - with a hat!" Also, Dave is good with computers.

Chris Holt Memorial Public Relations: Scott "Sweet Cheeks" Bland
Scott is dear to my heart, as he is my successor in the CHMPR position. What's that, ladies? Does the nickname lie? No, it doesn't lie - those cheeks sure are sweet. How sweet? Sweet like a lemon is sour, sweet like chocolate-dipped honeycomb laced with LSD. Soo sweet. Hi Scott!

Alumni Relations: C.J. Jameson
C.J.'s job is to shake down the Old Fartz who once rocked out but now own wineries or drink 50-year-old single malts out of jeweled decanters. If C.J. got a dollar for every time he's going to hear the phrase "When I Was in Band...," he could play at John Arrillaga's table on poker night.

Treasure: Jill Wurzburg
What? Her again? Jill was treasurer last year, and now she is treasurer again. Why Jill, why? She did a great job handling our funds so we didn't have to hock our instruments, but I think she keeps coming back because she owes some sort of life debt to Liz Schackmann. Jill and I are working on a plan to raise twenty grand so Scott Bland will play "Frankenstein" instead of the Star Spangled Banner solo at a football game next year.

Social: Jacob "Diego" Etc., and Megan Moroney
These guys organize ice cream mixers, barn dances, potato sack races, and all the other wholesome, innocent things Band does for fun. Seriously, it's like having Ned Flanders be our Minister of Fun, except there's two of him.

Graphix: Jeff "Eh Victor" Rowell and Byron Vosburg
Possibly the biggest chumps on the list. These guys are the only staph members whom Band is expressly required to ridicule and antagonize. In a way, being Graphix is kind of kinky, which is why I think these guys like it.

Librarian: Daniel "Babz" Babinksi
Babz went to Russia, and a great cry went up across Stanford. "I miss Babz," the upperclassmen cried. "Who 'dis Babz?" cried the freshmen. "Quiet, younglings," the upperclassmen said, "and we will tell you a story of a man who made tyrants weep with his alto sax, a man who was such a badass he rode the trans-Siberian Express while we fooled around on a football field." When Babz comes back to campus, the feast in his honor is expected to last for ten days and nights.

Propz: Lauran "Razzberry" Palumbi, Blake English, and Alan "Rager" Rager
Being propz is one case in which bravery is indistinguishable from insanity. Chances are good at least one of these three is completely insane. Propz hands out Band jackets. Band loses and "loses" jackets several times per week. Propz gets instruments fixed. Band breaks the instruments again, pretending to be The Who. Propz tidies up the Shak. Band drinks one hundred Capri Suns and can't be bothered to find a trash can. Come to think of it, at this time next year, all three may be insane.

Recruiter: Martha "Ariel" Smith, Roxanne Paul
It's the job of these two to make a pitch for Band to ProFros, new frosh, and idle upperclassmen that makes Google fringe benefits look like a sudden brick to the kneecap. Their bag of tricks contains promises of road trip per diems, free Capri Sun and donuts, and the chance to make some very embarrassing decisions at parties. People who turn down this offer usually go hang out with J. Alfred Prufrock instead.

Webmaster: Ruddick "Vinny" Lawrence
Vinny, like Jill, is a returning staph member. But unlike with Jill, it is clear why Vinny wants to be on staph again: to create strife from the inside. Vinny has and does champion such initiatives as "Vote No on Everything," and "Booby-Trap the Shak Computer." Vinny has also been to Italy, and when he needs help procrastinating, he comes to this blogger's dorm room, where he often leaves behind garbage as a "joke."

Blah. I can't believe I wasted so much time writing about those jerks.

Until next time, Friends. Also, were you aware we beat U$C in football? Just checkin'.

12.14.2007

Big Game Week 07: A Look Back Part I

Hey hey hey!

Hello and welcome to our newest friends, those web log enthusiasts who found their way here when some one decided that our infant blog is "of note." One wonders what exactly constitutes "of note" status. Our organization knows a thing or two about being "of note." Since 1963, we've skipped back and forth across the spectrum of noteworthiness, from "Ha ha, they've done it again!" to "That's the last straw; they've done it again." All we really want in terms of this blog is to be noted as more entertaining and a better source of journalism than The Stanford Daily. I bet we'll be there after a few more (not necessarily sober, even) posts.

So as it turns out, when Big Game Week leads into Dead Week, which in turn leads into Finals Week, things take longer than promised in earlier blog posts. Rather than keep our valued readers in the dark for another day, we've broken up our coverage of BGW 07. This first installment covers some of the Toobz Sexion's handiwork.

To start, we have the Toobz' project, an Embo projected and then chalked over on the layers of our rehearsal hall. Viewers sitting in the correct place in the hall see the image below.

Everyone agrees that this is pretty cool, so we've been bugging the management about turning this into a permanent decoration.

As mentioned in the previous post, we also introduced a new tuba bell design at Big Game. Given that this baby wasn't started until the night before BG, she's not done yet, but after a few more coats, some touch-up and perspective-tweaking work, and the completion of the beer label, she'll be ready to rock and roll at a Ph.D. level. May we present the Beer Block S:



Yep, she'll be a beauty when she's done. Want to know even better news? Three tubas are slated to get fresh, iconic paint jobs next quarter. It will be awesome, and it will be in this blog.

Before we go: Congratulations to Women's Volleyball! On to the Final!

12.02.2007

Band Survives an Epic Big Game Week

Hello Awesome People!

As it says in the Band Bible (Embo 3:50), "If every week were Big Game Week, we'd all be dead."

I suppose that doesn't preclude Big Game Week itself from killing us, but, good news, WE'RE STILL ALIVE!

Yes, Band survived the epic BGW '07. After about 18 hours of solid Band-ing on Saturday, we are all still too deep in recovery mode to write a proper blog post, but you can expect a jam packed post later this week, after all the hilarious moments, inspirational stories, and stark, embarrassing photos have been collected. Highlights to look forward to: A new Band Staph takes office and kicks the old jerks to the curb, the toobz get a new bell painting, the trumpz build something of remarkable utility, and outgoing Band manager Slater contemplates life "on the outside." Do they give a Pullitzer for bloggery? How about a Nobel? If not, maybe they will soon, because the impending BGW recap will rank right up there with triumphs of human expression like To Kill a Mockingbird and The Big Lebowski.

And now something important: Yes, this was a 4-8 football season. But this was also the season Stanford Football defeated (and ruined the national title hopes of) the Evil Empire of Southern California (U$C) on the road despite astronomical odds, and brought the Axe home after a drought that was getting depressing (my fellow seniors and I are especially grateful for that). Those were two great wins (which Band had the immense, unforgettable pleasure and honor of witnessing) and we couldn't be prouder.

Catch ya later this week!