E-mails Sent to the
University of Alabama
English Department
Flag-Football Team.
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The University of Alabama English Department Football League (UAEDFL) was founded in 2007 and has since established a weekly event involving cleats, tear-away flags, and a highly elaborate rule book. Before each contest, Brian Oliu, the league's commissioner, sends an e-mail to the English Department Listserv to rally these poet-athletes. From time to time, we'll be sharing these missives with you.
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E - M A I L 10
The UAEDFL And The Dangers of Draft Stock.
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To: Alabama English Department Listserv
From: Commissioner Oliu
Subject: The UAEDFL And The Dangers of Draft Stock
Internet,
Like the delicate swallows dancing their aerial dance up and around the adobe walls of San Juan Capistrano Mission, bringing much delight to the ghost of Padre Junipero Serra, who playfully rings the bells of Jesus and lunchtime throughout the peaks and valleys of fair California, we too, marvels, all of us, have returned from our apathetic and asthmatic leave of absence to sting the fields of gold with our love of the game that we love so much where everything little thing we do is magic, Roxanne.
Yes, the autumnal equinox has come and gone, and where other equinoxi have delightfully swanky holidays that surround these heliocentricities (I'm looking at you Zoroastrians), the September equinox has little or nothing to brag about, with the exception of New Year's Day of the French Republican Calendar, which was swiftly obliterated by the Concordat of 1801 (my second favorite Concordat behind the Concordat of 1993, which was a Holy See fistbump with Poland ... what's your favorite Concordat?) and Chuseok.
While I do love a great gama fight and my Ganggangsullae lessons are paying off—have you seen my core lately? My core is awesome—there is nothing like celebrating the sweet make-out session of the celestial equator and ecliptic than with a prolate spheroid ricocheting off of your dainty hands and into the equally dainty hands of Carl Peterson.
I know what you are thinking. You are thinking, "What's for dinner?" and the answer is "pizza and sadness" and you are also thinking "How did that football, the football that I swore to protect, the football that I asked for in the huddle, the football that was delivered to me, how did that football not wind up cradled in my arms like a young Farrah Fawcett-Majors scared of the night time?" and the answer is "How was your off-training regimen?" and the answer to that answer which was actually another question is "How did you fare at the UAEDFL Combine?" and the answer to that answer which was actually another question, which spurned another answer, which is actually another question is "No, I was not at the UAEDFL Combine." and to that I say "Is your name Mike Mamula?" and to that you say "No, it is not." And then I flip down all of the people who look like Mike Mamula on my Guess Who? board and then you ask me, "Are you Bernard?" and then I say, "NO I'M NOT BERNARD DO I LOOK LIKE I'D WEAR A HAT THAT DUMB?" and then you say nothing.
The UAEDFL Combine, held in February (or Fructidor for those still on the French Republican Calendar kick from two paragraphs ago, and if so, it's time to plant the immortelle?) is a week-long showcase of various hilarious talents and tests of strength, including the Wonderlic Test, a Cybex test, and everyone's favorite, the shuttle run, in which you run back and forth picking up wooden blocks (after squirting your hands with Purell because it kills 99% of all germs) while Stephen Schneider shouts obscenities from the top of the rope swing at you and how you'll never going to get a National Physical Fitness Award, let alone a Presidential Physical Fitness Award, and then you'll be all gross and you'll hit the showers and there will be a rumor that there is a peephole that leads to the Girls' Locker Room and that rumor will be denounced on Snopes.com as "FALSE" and you'll have to forward it to your mom but you don't really want to because it'll kind of make her look like an idiot for believing it and forwarding it to all of her friends.
But, let's say there's an alternate universe (like on Lost or in your dreams when you sleep at night!) and you're really good at exercising! You can get a 19 on the sit-and-reach because it's the most easily skewed test! You can do the bent arm-hang like you're in a funny action movie and you've just come across the villains talking about getting into the helicopter before getting into the helicopter! You're a regular Georg Hackenschmidt on the bench press! People smile at you more! They think, "Wow, that ragamuffin has really got it together!" And when we pick teams whispers of "Pick so-and-so, I hear they're really good at logic puzzles, and did you see the tape from the combine? Explosive!" float across the air like the ball that bounced off of your stone hands and into the dainty hands of Carl Peterson because you are what is called a "Work-out Warrior" which is a PEJORATIVE!
Folks, I have not been entirely honest with you. That story of the dropped pass? That was me, naïve me, sometime ago. Just because I have the chiseled body of an Adonis doesn't automatically mean that I am the second coming of Chuck Bednarik (though I've met his niece and she is very nice). It takes heart! grit! and breakfast! to be a champion, something that all of you have/can prepare in a skillet or microwave. Do not be frightened by the collective attractiveness and sharp wits of those who play in the UAEDFL because "beauty can't convert fourth and cone when the blitz is coming" (yearbook quote).
This being said, please come and join us this SUNDAY AT 10AM AT QUEEN CITY/15TH STREET PARK to learn what true beauty is.
Humbly,
The Commissioner
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