Thanks to O&B Hue reader Jeff Brown for penning this manifesto. It’s a two-parter, but well worth the read. Enjoy.

The game is still days away, but I’ve already got that feeling in my gut… and my liver.

It’s a sensation that’s equal parts anxiety, nervousness and anticipation. Games against Troy or Middle Tennessee State don’t give me this feeling. Neither do games against Vandy or Mississippi State. What puts this damn sensation in my stomach is knowing that in just a few days my Alma Mater, The University of Florida will once again meet the University of Georgia on a football field in Jacksonville. Yes, once again it’s time for the World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party and like so many others before; this game will have major implications in regards to who will win the Southeastern Conference championship.

This year’s game has me worked-up more than usual. The 2007 Gators are an incredibly young squad and with inexperience comes unpredictability. True we are literally seconds away from being undefeated and possibly the number one team in the country, but this squad still scares the hell out of me. Maybe it is the fact that Gator losses the past four years have been excruciatingly painful. It’s not so much the gut-wrenching defeats in the game’s waning seconds that are killing me (they are giving me ulcers, loss of sleep, blood in my urine and heartburn, but not necessarily killing me). It’s the media that’s driving me nuts because they can’t seem to put a Gator loss to rest. Just when I feel like climbing out of my bunker after a tough loss I’m subjected to Pontiac Game Changing Moments, ESPN Instant Classics and Lou Holtz pep talks (Lou, if you really want to help, just buy me a drink and stop spitting on me). Hell, even when we get clobbered like we did a few years ago against Alabama; it makes the cover of Sports Illustrated.

For what seems like forever I’ve heard a lot of complaining coming out of Athens about the Gators having an open date the week prior to the WLOCP. I heard one guy, in all seriousness go so far as to say that the SEC should step-in and make it illegal for the Gators to have a bye before we play the Bulldogs. I wanted to tell the fellow that the conference is much too busy recruiting at the Jose Feliciano School of Instant Replay Officials to concern themselves with the Gators schedule. When they’re not barking like mental patients Georgia folks seem to have the market cornered when it comes to complaining about the annual game in Jacksonville.

“They have a bye week!”

“The Gators can take a bus to the game and we have to come via an airplane”

“What do you mean I’ve got to wear shoes in this restaurant!?!?

But then again, if I lived in a state that didn’t allow me to buy a six-pack on a Sunday, I’d be bitter and fast to complain as well.

This year the red and black faithful may have a point about the open week before the game. You see, it is Georgia that had last weekend to relax and give their aches and pains time to heal, while the Gators had to go on the road and face the #8 Kentucky Wildcats in what turned out to be a bruising shootout. Though we have had an amazing stretch of success against the Dogs, the bye week theory has me concerned. But then again I’m a Gator, and I’m paranoid about everything when it comes to the Georgia Bulldogs and the Cocktail Party. Open date or not, it’s just as likely that I’ll reach for an Alka-Seltzer as I will a martini this week.

Remember the old Road Runner cartoon? You know the part where Wiley E. Coyote paints a big brick wall to look like a road? The Road Runner comes racing up and runs right through it, and continues on his way. Wiley stands back and scratches his head then he decides to run through it. Of course he goes splat because it’s really just a big painted brick wall. Through the decades Georgia has been that brick wall for the Gators. But for the past 16 years or so we’ve been able to turn the table on the Bulldogs and unlike poor Wiley we’ve been the ones who’ve dropped an anvil on Georgia instead of ourselves. In order to get back to the SEC Championship Game we need to beat the Bulldogs. If we lose, we open things up for any number of SEC East squads to take our rightful place in the SEC Championship game. On the other hand, if we win, I’ll be pouring pitchers down my throat and becoming best friends with the bartender.

I’m always a wreck the week of the Florida/Georgia game. I hate the Bulldogs worse then any team the Gators play. Losing to FSU is a fate worse than death, and the thought of getting beat by LSU makes me want to jump out a window. A loss to the Vols? I’d rather leap in front of a train. But a defeat at the hands of the Georgia Bulldogs would make any of these other situations seem like a fun-filled Caribbean vacation.

Why do I hate Georgia? Actually there are plenty of reasons, but to list them all would require a book so large, it would make “War and Peace” look like a TV Guide. So I offer just a handful of the many reasons I detest, hate, loathe and despise Georgia:

1. THE JACKSONVILLE BULLDOG CLUB

They claim to be the largest Bulldog club outside the state of Georgia. Maybe they are that’s not the reason they get under my skin. It’s their logo that irks me. It’s the regular UGA logo (the older, uglier one, not the new one that looks like it was drawn by a sixth grader) with a Gator in its mouth. If their intention was to tick off Gators, then they have succeeded. Its one thing to see a drawing like this on a t-shirt or a banner, but this is their official club logo!

2. THE USHERS ARE BIASED

Back when Georgia held the upper hand in the series; the Bulldog faithful had no problems with the Gator Bowl’s seating arrangement or staff. But a few years ago, after several straight ugly losses to the Gators, the Dog fans started getting upset. They said they didn’t like the way the seats were divided between UF and UGA fans (even though it had been set-up this way for years). They griped about price gouging and a few other things, but the one item that really made me chuckle, was they thought too many ushers were wearing Florida hats. I’m not making this up. This was one of their complaints. Personally, I don’t care if an usher wears a grass skirt, hi-heels and has a toilet lid around his neck. All I want him to do is show me my seat and not turn me in if he sees me mixing a drink.

3. THE JACKSONVILLE GAME

Depending on who you are rooting for, the game is normally called the UF/UGA or the UGA/UF game. I can live with this. It’s not a slap in the other school’s face. Understandably you want your school’s name to come before the others. But back the University of Georgia used to take it one step further. They don’t want to mention Florida’s name at all. In their programs the game was called “The Jacksonville Game”. Like once a year Georgia travels to Jacksonville and plays a different opponent every time. I prefer not to stoop to their level and refer to the contest as the Jacksonville Game. I’d rather call it what it really is: The Florida/Goober game.

4. LINDSAY SCOTT, LINDSAY SCOTT, LINDSAY SCOTT

If ever there has ever been a lower moment in Florida football history then the 1980 UF/UGA game, I don’t want to know about it. We had this game locked up. If you were to have told me that with less than two minutes left, Georgia would be backed up on their own goaline and their only hope was that their “noodle-armed” quarterback, Buck Belue, would pass them down the field. I’d have said “Let’s chill the champagne!” Unfortunately, that’s what the Gator defense was thinking. If we had won, there would have been no national championship in Athens. Hell, there would’ve been no SEC championship! To make matters worse, every year during the UF/UGA game this play is shown sometimes during the broadcast. It doesn’t matter if we are winning 47-7 with two minutes left, seeing this play makes me want to vomit. I’ve been addicted to Rolaids ever since Nov 8th, 1980.

5. JEAN SHORTS

The Georgia Faithful like to portray the average Gator fan as a jean short wearing, mullet styling, Zima drinking cheeseball. I’ll be the first to say that there are Gators with mullet hairdos, tank tops and jean shorts. But you know what? UF doesn’t have a monopoly on these types of fans. All schools have their share and UGA is no exception. It astounds me that Bulldogs think they’re Carey Grant’s answer to the Southeastern Conference. I’ve seen a lot of Carey’s movies and not once have I seen him in red and black bib overalls. I don’t sport a mullet (to be honest I don’t sport much hair at all) and I don’t own jean shorts, but if that’s how they want to portray me, then fine. Just don’t label me a Zima drinker. I’ll punch you in the mouth if you do.

6. BARKING AND HUNKERING

You know the number of times someone has “barked” at me outside the Jacksonville city limits? Zero. You know the number of times I’ve been barked at during a typical Florida/Georgia weekend? 1,895,987 times. The only thing worse then hearing a real dog bark is hearing some red polyester clad jackass start yapping.

This never fails: It’s the Saturday morning of the game. Your head is pounding like a Keith Moon drum solo. You’ve just pulled in to your parking spot and you’re gingerly unloading your tailgate supplies. When all of a sudden one of the “Duke boys” comes screeching up to the spot next to you, barely comes to a stop and jumps out of the “General Lee” and starts barking like Lon Chaney Jr. on a Southern Comfort bender. At 9:00 in the morning, this is the last thing you need.

Hunkering is another thing that gets me. “Hunker down Daaawgs!” You hear this cry all weekend as well. During the ‘82 Auburn/Georgia game, Bulldog radio announcer Larry Munson, repeated this phrase so often, it drove an Auburn fan to toss his bourbon and Coca-Cola into the UGA broadcast booth. I don’t think Munson has to worry about anyone tossing a drink into the booth this weekend. Maybe an empty bottle, but at “The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party”, nobody is going to throw away their drink.

I have so many memories of Florida/Georgia games. Some fond and some that I’m sure have taken years off my life. Allow me to take a stroll down memory lane and remember some of the “Cocktail Parties” of years past:

(continued in part II)