DISINTEGRATING PANTS

For me, there is nothing quite as satisfying as seeing Kansas University clobbered in some sporting event.  It is especially sweet when their basketball team goes down to a lesser foe, of which there are many.  However, I will bask in the warmth of watching their football team get hammered or their baseball team getting run off the field.  I am not sure why I enjoy it so.  Perhaps it was because I was raised from an extremely early age that Mizzou was the greatest thing in college sports.  Grandpa use to say that "Nothing good ever came out of Kansas" and I guess that has stuck in my brain.  My Uncle Jack and Aunt June both attended Mizzou and wore the black and gold proudly.  At any rate, one could say that I was far from being a KU fan and continue holding that belief to this day. (MIZ-ZOU).

The people who lived behind us were neither Kansas nor Mizzou fans.  They fell somewhere in the middle by being Oklahoma alumni.  Every Saturday Mr. Eddie would fly a bright red Oklahoma flag on his flag pole.  If the team lost, he would sadly go out and fly the flag upside down for the remainder of the day.

They were huge Oklahoma football fans and had complete season tickets every year for both road games and home games.  As they aged and started going to the games less and less they started offering me tickets to the games that were close to home.  One year I would get tickets to the Mizzou-OU game and the next year I would be the beneficiary  of Kansas-OU tickets.  Even though I never saw a game where Oklahoma lost it was still fun to travel to Lawrence or Columbia to see a ball game.

I can't remember which year it was but I do know it was a year that the Eddie's offered me tickets to see Oklahoma play Kansas.  It was a no brainer as it was every year to accept the tickets.  Barb didn't feel much like going and so I called my friend Larry to see if he wanted to take the trip.  He was more than willing.  Later in life, Larry would actually attend Kansas and become a Jayhawk lover himself.  He is close enough of a friend that I don't hold it against him though.  After all it is not his fault he was brainwashed while he attended the University.

Larry arrived at the house and we prepared old blue to transport us to the game.  When we got into the car something went wrong.  Old blue did not want to start.  It seems that his battery had run down over night.  I wasn't going to let anything keep old blue from running or keep me from going to the game so I went and bought a new battery.

Simply put, brought the new battery home.  Took out the old battery, installed the new one and headed out to Kansas.  It was a nice drive.  The weather was perfect for football.  The sun was shining and the temperature was in the sixties.  To make the day even better, both Larry and I knew that this was going to be an ugly display that was about to happen on the Kansas campus.

The first quarter went as we expected.  Kansas unable to stop Oklahoma with the football and unable to move the football against that huge Oklahoma defense.   The second quart was going pretty much the same as the first until I looked down at my jeans.  I noticed a small hole a little above the knee.  MY leg was itching just a little but I didn't think much about it at the time.  Halfway through the second quarter I looked back at my jeans and the hole was almost twice as big as before and a second hole was beginning.

It was then that I showed the holes to Larry.  He shrugged and said what's going on?  I knew what was going on.  It was called battery acid from old blues old battery.  We were coming down towards halftime and the left leg of my jeans now had one large hole and three others beginning and growing.  The right leg of the jeans had two holes starting already.  It was going to be a race between the end of the ball game and the end of my jeans.

At halftime I went to the restrooms and tried to rinse off what was left of my jeans with some cold water and paper towels. I knew that with my pants soaking wet I would not have to worry about any girls making a move on me.  It looked rather disgusting actually.

As the third quarter progressed I started to actually lose bits and pieces of my pants.  I was able to just touch a bit of denim and it would slide off with my hand.   Most of my thigh of my left leg was open to the sunlight and the right leg was catching up.  I began to wonder at the end of the third quarter whether I would be departing the stadium in my underwear or not.  This was beginning to be a rather embarrassing situation.

I have no idea what went on during the fourth quarter that day.  I don't know how bad Oklahoma ended up destroying Kansas by. My whole concentration was on my jeans.  Every time a piece of denim would float to the concrete under our bleacher Larry would let out a little giggle.  I was not giggling however.  Larry wanted to know if we were still going to stop for a bite to eat on our way home.  Nope, didn't think so.

The game finally ended and I left the stadium looking like I was wearing a pair of clam diggers instead of my big bell Levis.   It was a long trip home.  While I was driving I could feel more of my jeans flaking off.  We passed up where we were going to eat because I had this fear that half way through the meal they would kick us out because I wouldn't be wearing pants.

Barb greeted us as we arrived home.  I got out of the car in my new pair of shorts.  Barb was in shock.  What had happened to my jeans?  I proceeded to tell her about changing the battery in old blue and how I had stupidly rested the old battery on my thigh when I pulled it out before replacing the new battery.

She must have thought she had married an idiot.  As a matter of fact I think she may have said something to that effect.  Through all of this I never blamed old blue for my stupidity.  It wouldn't have been fair.  Then again, I never blamed old blue for anything that went wrong as long as I owned it.