Well I had intended to finish writing about homecoming last
week, but as usual I let myself get sidetracked….
As a quick recap, the Fabolous concert on Thursday (November
4th) got the homecoming ball rolling. The following morning I awoke with the usual
disdain and hatred for my alarm clock, which is an easy target for blame when
waking up at 7 a.m. for class after a
night of boozing. I reluctantly headed
of to Torts, most likely my least favorite class, in a truculent mood. My peevish disposition that morning was a result
of having to go to Torts instead of watching the live taping of several
segments for ESPN’s morning show, Cold Pizza, which was filming on campus. Unlike all of my other professors, my Torts
teacher has a mandatory attendance policy-which is complete nonsense by the
way-so I really didn’t have a choice. The
filming was taking place from 8-10 a.m. so I knew that I’d be able to catch at
least some of the show, but our head football coach Larry Coker and former UM
and Redskins linebacker, Jessie Armstead, were going to be interviewed and I
was worried that I would miss those particular segments. So I impatiently sat in class surfing the
web, refusing to pay attention out of spite for my professor. I had an almost constant gaze fixed on the
seemingly unmoving hands of the clock that was hanging on the wall, just over
my right shoulder. The more I looked at
the clock, the slower it seemed to move, mocking me. Finally the clock struck 9:20 and I was sitting on the edge of my seat, all packed,
and waiting to make my dash for the door. However, as is the norm in Torts, our professor kept us about five
minutes past the scheduled time, which especially irked me that morning. I muttered a few expletives under by breath
but ultimately conceded that as a student I was subject to the whims of my
professor, no matter how annoying. Finally class let out and my friend Drew and I made our way over to the
Cold Pizza set, hoping that we hadn’t missed everything.
When we arrived at the set the crew was setting up for their
final shoot. It was going to be a
segment with one of the hosts, Thea Andrews, a bubbly and attractive Canadian brunette,
Jessie Armstead, and the Feasty Boys, who are Cold Pizza’s resident cooks. The irreverent duo does cooking
demonstrations on the show every Friday, usually with recipes geared towards
tailgating, with the major ingredients tending to be meat and some variety of
alcohol, most often beer. So we watched
the crew set up and the participants run through a series of rehearsals in
preparation for the live shoot. It was
cool seeing all the different parts of the production; from the make-up lady touching
up the participants, to the director putting final touches on the production. When you’re sitting on the couch in the
comfort of your own living room, you don’t realize all that is being done to
bring you your favorite show. For each
person that is actually on camera, there are probably at least five off camera
doing the underappreciated grunt work that is necessary to pull of a show. Anyway, I digress. Once the final preparations were completed
and the crew got the go ahead from the home set in NYC they began the segment,
which involved the Feasty Boys demonstrating for the viewers some sort of
seafood dish that they cooked in aluminum foil on the grill. Thea and Armstead made token attempts to
participate but both seemed somewhat lost in the cooking process and stood on
the periphery as the Feasty Boys prepared their dish.
Seeing the show was enlightening and exciting, but Drew and
I were motivated more out of a desire to meet celebrities than anything
else. While the filming was going on, we
struck up a conversation with a reporter for the campus newspaper who was there
to interview both Thea and Armstead. Clearly she had no celebrity status of her own, as she was just a lowly
freshman, but she was our ticket in. After the shoot finished she introduced us first to Thea, and then to
Armstead. Both were very nice and
accommodating, and briefly talked with us and posed for pictures. Television appearances are deceiving,
however, with Thea not being as hot in person as she appeared on screen, while Armstead’s
height and weight are definitely inflated by the teams that he plays for. In fact, Thea kept her shoes off during the
segment so that she would not appear taller than Armstead and the Feasty Boys. Meeting Thea was cool but the real highlight
was meeting Armstead, a five time pro-bowler that played college ball for the
Hurricanes and in the pros with the Giants, Skins, and Panthers. While defiantly nowhere near his listed
playing weight, Armstead makes up the difference in the amount of bling that he
sports. Not only did he have a large
gold cross full of diamonds hanging around his neck, diamond ring, and diamond
watch, he also wore a three inch wide bracelet that was completely blanketed
with diamonds. Must be nice being a
football star, huh?
Friday night brought about another homecoming event, the
Wyclef Jean concert, which is what I was most looking forward to coming into
the weekend. A group of us headed to
campus around 9 p.m. and I was shocked
by the transformation the campus had undergone since that morning. What had looked like a normal college campus
only a few hours earlier, now more closely resembled a carnival than a place of
education. There were food stands
everywhere, dolling out free cotton candy popcorn. The area around the student center had taken
on the identity of a children’s play area, with moon bounces and a petting zoo covering
the area where I sometimes eat lunch. A
goat was now roaming the stage where 24 hours ago Fabolous had performed. Every empty space housed a different reunion,
ranging from recent grads to those that had graced Miami’s
campus 50 years earlier. Limos were
pulling in and out as if dropping off celebrity guests on the red carpet at the
Oscars.
We made our way through the chaos and emerged on the open
green in the middle of campus. There the
technicians had set up a large stage for Wyclef’s performance. Spectators were trickling into the area and
milling about while waiting for the show to start. As Fabolous had proved the day before,
hip-hop concerts very rarely start on time. At about 10:15, the opening
act came on and performed a few songs. They sounded alright, clearly needing much more work if they aspired to
reach the success level of the artist that they were opening for. However, reluctantly I admit that I said the
same thing about the group that opened for Wyclef five years ago at UVA, which
happened to be the Black Eyed Peas.
They played 3 or 4 songs then left to a warm applause. As the technicians put the finishing touches
on the set and prepared Wyclef’s instruments the crowd started growing restless
with applause ringing out every time someone mistook one of the crew on stage
for the rapper. Standing in the grassy area
I heard applause ring out once again but assumed it was another false alarm. This time, however, the applause did not die
down, but began escalating as more people realized that Wyclef was coming on
stage. He emerged with his
characteristic dreadlocks flapping in the wind, sporting a UMIAMI sweatshirt. He dove right into his performance by singing
Stayin' Alive, my favorite Wyclef
song. Soon the hooded sweatshirt was off
and thrown into the crowd, revealing a UM football jersey, which was greeted by
rousing applause and cheers from the crowd. Wyclef performed traditional favorites such as Guantanamera and Gone 'til
November, as well as several Fugees songs and even a cover of a Jackson Five
song. Wyclef’s music is terrific on its
own, but he’s also an awesome performer that puts on a hell of a show. Not only did he play his guitar behind his
head, but also with his teeth, something that I didn’t even know was
possible. He also dropped some free
style lyrics and at one point was joined onstage by Cannabis, which was an
unexpected surprised for everyone. Typical of Wyclef, and to the chagrin of any school administrator, he
made constant references and jokes about marijuana, which drew the expected
roars of applause from the students. There was one incident in particular that needs a more detailed
explanation…
The day leading up to the show students could purchase
raffle tickets to win an autographed guitar signed by Wyclef. About halfway through the show Wyclef took a
break in his routine to announce the winner of the raffle. One of his crew brought out a box with names
in it and Wyclef pulled one out and announced it to the crowd. Unfortunately, nobody from the audience made
any indications that they were the winner. Just as another name was to be pulled a kid in the crowd screamed that
he was the winner and Wyclef made his way over and asked to see his id. Of course he didn’t show it because he wasn’t
the actual winner, which led to Wyclef saying “My fu&*ing d*&k you’re….(I
don’t remember the name). So another name
was finally pulled and some girl yelled out, showed her id, and claimed her
prize. Sounds like a done deal,
right? Well, just as this girl received
her guitar and started making her way back to her spot in the crowd to show off
her prize to her friends, the original winner emerged breathlessly on stage
after apparently sprinting from his spot in the back of the crowd to the stage
once he heard his name called. Well the
prize was given out already and here was the kid who was supposed to have it. Hhmm…So following the unwritten rule of
first-come first-serve, yet not wanting the guy to leave empty handed, Wyclef
rummaged around on stage and produced a fitting prize…..the cardboard box that
the guitar had come on. The kid whose
name I don’t remember was a good sport about everything and triumphantly held
the box over his head and did a mini victory lap on stage before finally disappearing
down the steps behind the stage. This
was just one snapshot of a show that was filled with both great music and
comedic events.
The concert itself was tons of fun and even topped the
previous two Wyclef shows that I had been to. Florida apparently doesn’t
have the same head-scratching rules that Virginia does and the concert lasted well past midnight. I left campus with the ringing in my ears
that accompanies any concert, less annoying after a good show such as this
one. It was late so I passed on meeting
some friends in South Beach and instead went home and threw in a DVD and contently passed out on my comfy red
couch…
The next day was the homecoming game….
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