Random Photo(s) of the Week: Green Bay Forever

If you grow up in Oklahoma, you have to fight the urge to like the Dallas Cowboys. It happened for me, early, on a Sunday after an Oklahoma loss to Texas the day before, when I saw gloating Texas fans at a Cowboys game, playing up the TV cameras and pointing to their Longhorn gear. And I've hated the Cowboys ever since.

Who to like in the NFL then? Easy, the Green Bay Packers. A throw-back team, unabashedly wearing green-and-yellow, not owned but run by a wayward Wisconsin town of 100,000. It's practically the anti-NFL team. Plus they have a history of beating Dallas.

The last time Green Bay won a Super Bowl, I woke early -- like 3am -- to get to a Saigon sports bar playing the game live. The owner didn't understand how to throw a Super Bowl Party well, and had a cover band from the Philippines onhand to play 'Hotel California' DURING the game. Angst of bleary-eyed ex-pats encourage the band to stick with a halftime performance.

Ten years ago I visited Green Bay with friends Chip Dalby and Tom Caw. We saw Brett Favre play, Brett Favre Drive, ate brauts, threw some pre-game balls, and watched Favre failed to rally the Pack against the Chicago Bears.

Doesn't matter. Packers are the anti-Cowboys. And more.

76-Second Travel Show: 'What's the Harvard/Yale of Travel?'

Episode #046
F E A T U R I N G * 8 5 * B O N U S * S E C O N D S

Those who think the Red Sox/Yankees are the best rivalry in US sports ought to spend more time around college football. Considering the numbers of times baseball teams square off each year, and -- then -- how meaningless each game really is, nothing beats college football.

Particularly when it's two teams playing for nothing but pride. Harvard and Yale were, historically, instrumental in CREATING the sport of football. Unlike the big BCS teams, they have no polls, no bowls, no championships looming -- just a regular-season schedule capped with one of the biggest unseen rivalries in the country.

Sports in general is an underrated way of connecting with locals anywhere you go. And I found the same joy from mingling in the whirlwind of overcoats and scarves at Harvard Stadium a week-and-a-half ago. It was fun. And different from games back in Oklahoma. No merch stands, programs were free, and there were a lot of people in overcoats and scarves. One woman, a proud Crimson fan, told me, 'The boys sing 10,000 Men of Harvard in the locker room after each win.' So?, I thought. 'First in English, then in Latin.'

Football players who sing in Latin? Definitely not in Oklahoma anymore.