ClayNation Dixieland Delight College Football Tour: Bye week

Typically, the bye week is a time when teams assess their strengths and weaknesses, heal their injuries and gather their fortitude for the final stretch of games. Now that college football has gone to 12 games, there is only one bye week. Since the DDT is nothing if not a rigorous, precise and scientifically exhaustive analysis of the Southeastern Conference, I thought it would be ridiculous not to have a bye week myself. And so I did.

I spent last weekend watching college football for 12½ consecutive hours. I began with UT-Memphis at 11 a.m. CT, followed that up with Florida-Alabama at 2:30 p.m., left in the fourth quarter to watch Vanderbilt-Temple in person (the lowest cost for a scalped ticket on record at $6), returned home to watch the end of Michigan-Minnesota, Kansas-Nebraska and most of Georgia-Mississippi. It was a thoroughly unproductive day that felt, paradoxically, extremely productive. And by the end of the weekend, I was ready to once more embark on the DDT.

After four weeks and stops at Tennessee, Mississippi State, Auburn and Arkansas, I feel pretty good about the status of the DDT. So far, no one has taken a swing at me, I haven't been arrested, and I haven't even gotten a speeding ticket. Also, I haven't had to pay more than $50 for a ticket to any game. Occasionally during the columns, I've gotten wrapped up in all sorts of interesting questions. Some of them have been resolved. Others, like whether you can see after your head gets chopped off by a guillotine, remain scientific mysteries. Nevertheless, now that the bye week has come and the DDT is officially one-third complete, it's time for a self-assessment, examining what I've learned thus far.

Included in my analysis will be e-mails from readers. And we've gotten a ton. Many were funny, some were from people who hate me and, even more amusing, considering they have done nothing at all, hate my friends as well. Four came from people with ideas of how to get in touch with Jake the Snake (one guy says he is a friend of the Snake's agent), and one threatened a pompon-infused beating. All reflect, in various states of grammar from the eloquent to the Orgeron, a true passion for Southern football. Thanks to all of you for writing, and I only hope I can keep you as entertained on the remaining eight trips as much as y'all have kept me entertained on the first four.

Without further ado, 12 things I've learned on the DDT so far:

1. Cymbal players get scholarships. Some of you will probably recall that I ruminated upon this with Krishna, Shekhar, Shaw and Cliff while we were in Starkville and were passed by the cymbal players. Now we have the answer, thanks to cymbal player Andrew Barnes of Mississippi State. Andrew wrote:

Yes, cymbals players do get college scholarships. (Getty Images)

"Hi. My name is Andrew, and I'm a cymbal player from MSU. I read your interesting article about your trip here, and the exciting time you had. ... I also agree that we should have ordered the khaki shorts along with the polo and the band T-shirt, etc. (It does look pretty tacky.) But of course, you had to bash the cymbals. (ClayNation: Was this pun intended? If so, well done.) This is the first I actually played cymbals for any marching band, and it's harder than it looks. They do get heavy, and it's hard to memorize scores of random crashes and chokes (if you don't know, chokes are when we crash the cymbals and immediately bring it to our chest to muffle the sound, which resulted in numerous bruises). And yes, we do get scholarships. We deserve it, and it IS possible to be a better cymbal player than someone else. If you ever joined a drumline, you would understand things a little better."

Andrew,

This is the 50th time in my life someone has said that if I joined a drumline, I would understand things better. I don't doubt this is true. That's why it was particularly disappointing to me when I got cut really early in the auditions for the movie Drumline. Now you've had to go and make me dredge that whole memory up again. (Wiping the corners of my eyes.) Give me a second ...

OK. I stand by my contention that getting a cymbal scholarship has to be the easiest route to a college scholarship on earth. You don't have to get a particular score on a standardized test, be particularly athletic, be any smarter than average, taller than average, fatter than average or dumber than average. You really don't have to be anything except willing to bang two metal objects together. Think about it, aside from being a mascot, name something you can get a full ride to college for and not be much better than a random person on the street.

Do you watch 12.5 hours of college football in one day? (Getty Images)

In fact, name something that you can arrive at college never having done before, take up and get a scholarship for. Imagine if this was how the football teams got chosen. I'm breaking out the ClayNation Guarantee here: If you put me in the band and gave me a couple of hours of training, I could play the cymbals as well as anyone else and not one person would be able to tell I didn't belong.

Bottom line: Playing the cymbals is the easiest way to get a scholarship on campus. (I take this back if those people who walk around with flags beside the band also get scholarships. That's even more ridiculous and requires even less qualification. Someone can write me if you get a scholarship for this as well.)

I also heard from another cymbal player, Matthew Livaudais (incidentally this is probably the first time someone has ever heard from more than one cymbal player).