A FEW GOOD MEN on Family Channel at 8 tonight

I'll never forget that movie. The first time I saw it, was on a red-eye flight to Brussels in late June 1993. The movie ended and when everyone opened their windows, England was below us.

That was a pretty wild flight for a commercial airliner. All kinds of neat characters wound up on that plane. It was sorta like Cheers at 35,000 feet. Too bad passengers aren't allowed to be so jovial anymore.

Anyway, it's a great movie if you've never seen it before, so I thought I'd let y'all know it's coming on :-)

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Is "Globalization" a merit badge? Lead-laden Chinese products now plague Boy Scouts

Yesterday the following item landed in my e-mail:

Attention Scouters and Parents,

We received notification on Oct. 3 relating to defects in the Cub Scout Immediate Recognition Kit (Item # 01804). It may contain lead levels in excess of U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission standards in the paint on the totem badge.

The Boy Scouts of America has directed all of its Scout Shops to remove it from their shelves immediately. We are requesting anyone who may have purchased the item to remove the Cub Scout Recognition totem badge from their children’s possession and, until further instructions are received, keep it in a safe place where only adults will have access to them. Our highest priority is the safety of our youth members and their families. Boy Scouts of America apologizes for any concern this matter causes parents. BSA is doing everything we can to ensure the health and safety of all those who participate in our programs.

Over there on the right you can see what the Cub Scout Immediate Recognition Kit looks like. It's something worn over the chest pocket (hence the hole for the button). Every time a Cub Scout earns three achievements, he gets one bead. You start out as a Bobcat in Cub Scouts and then you earn your way up to Wolf, and the yellow beads represent your progress toward that. Then after you've earned Wolf you can progress to Bear, and the red beads mark your way toward that.

I've still got my old Cub Scout uniform, including the Progress Toward Ranks thingy with all of the beads. I don't know who made that one (it was 25 years ago when I started in Cub Scouts) but the Cub Scout Immediate Recognition Kit that's being recalled is marketed by Kahoot, a toy company in Roswell, Georgia. According to its website, Kahoot has been around for 22 years so my own Progress Toward Ranks predates the company.

In light of all the Chinese-made products - especially items for children - that are being recalled lately because of how much lead they contain, I wondered when I first got this e-mail if the Cub Scout Immediate Recognition Kit was also made in China. I started looking into it on my own...

...but I didn't have to look for long: it turns out that the Cub Scout Immediate Recognition Kit sold by Kahoot IS being made in China!

Look, I've been an assistant scoutmaster for 15 years now. I've been involved with the Boy Scouts since 1982, when I became a Cub Scout. I earned my Bear Badge, then achieved the Arrow of Light as a Webelos Scout and then attained the rank of Eagle Scout: something that is still quite a rare thing for a Boy Scout to do. I defy anyone to tell me that I'm not loyal to the Boy Scouts and what they're supposed to stand for.

But how the hell is it that the Boy Scouts of America is using products made in China?

Aren't there any companies in the United States that can make these Cub Scout awards?

Did the Boy Scouts of America actively seek out companies to supply them, that have products that are made domestically?

Why is the Boy Scouts of America, in the least bit way, helping not just a foreign economy but one that would like nothing more than for there to be no more America?

I know that, unfortunately, it's not possible to avoid everything made in China at the present time. I wish it were otherwise. There is no reason why the United States cannot produce everything it needs so far as consumer goods go. Maybe someday we will be making things again instead of just buying them as cheaply as possible.

But let's get real: it's a thin plastic badge with synthetic beads and a thong. How really difficult is it for a factory in America to stamp these things out?

In the Boy Scouts there are three merit badges: Citizenship in the Community, Citizenship in the Nation, and Citizenship in the World. All three are among the merit badges required for Eagle, so I had to earn each of them. Something I realized in the course of achieving those merit badges: we as Americans are at our best when we are good citizens in our communities. And we as citizens of this world are at our best when we are good citizens of America. If we take care of what is immediately around us and then apply that to the nation that God put us in, that is how we do our part to be good stewards in this world.

Helping foreign industry, to the detriment of our own, is not showing good citizenship in either our community or our nation. And it's not good citizenship in the world, either.

This kind of thing, of "going with the flow" and not supporting our own industry because something can be bought cheaper (and Lord only knows what kind of labor went into these badges) makes a mockery of everything that the Boy Scouts used to teach about American citizenship.

Maybe that's "globalization", and perhaps someone, somewhere in the Boy Scouts hierarchy is hoping that it will become a merit badge. But the day it does, then I can't be a part of the Boy Scouts of America any longer.

The Boy Scouts need to learn from this. The organization should begin to actively take steps to make sure that the companies it contracts with to produce Scouting materials, as much as it is at all possible, use American industry to produce these goods.

And I'm especially talking about materials with the "Boy Scouts of America" brand on them. If something made for the Boy Scouts of America can't honestly boast of being made in America, then it's not really of the Boy Scouts of America at all. It may bear the logo, but it will never boast the spirit of Scouting.

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Dinner at Back Yard Burgers ... with magic by Marlo!

For the past few months WGSR has been running these 30-minute promos for the Back Yard Burgers in Danville (just across the border in Virginia for those who aren't local). I'd never eaten at a Back Yard Burgers before, so last night Lisa and I drove up U.S. 29 to check it out.

I think that many more trips to Danville are going to be in my future, because I got the Double Meat Back Yard Burger with lettuce, tomatoes and Swiss cheese and it was deeeee-licious! Tasted just like a hamburger you might grill on your patio. I also got a chocolate milkshake was also quite tasty.

We also got treated to a show by Marlo the Magician, who comes by every Thursday night at 6 to entertain the patrons, 'specially the kids. Marlo came by our table and whipped out his wallet to give us a card. But as soon as he opened the wallet it caught fire! I mean serious flames coming out of that thing, 'cuz Marlo said that his was "the hottest show in town". I'm still in a bit of shock after that one :-) We watched Marlo do his thing for a bit and thought he was pretty good. We'll probably come again some Thursday just to watch him again.

Anyhoo, if there's a Back Yard Burgers somewhere near you (click here to check out their locations) I'll recommend it as a pretty darned good place to eat.

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Obama won't wear an American flag pin... and I agree with him

I will never vote for Barack Obama to be President. Let me be absolutely clear about that. You'll never see me trying to persuade others to vote for him either. But if he seriously believes this, then I'll absolutely agree with the man on this much. Obama has stopped wearing the American flag pin that is seen adorning just about every politician in this country.

Why? Because since 9/11, Obama told an Iowa TV station, the pin has become "a substitute" for "true patriotism."

He's right.

And it's going to be interesting to see how many "patriotic conservative" pundits come out of the woodwork to condemn him about this. I think Obama is doing something perfectly conservative: he's choosing not to wrap himself up in the flag and portray phony patriotism. Obama's patriotism, if it's really there, is going to be on display for whatever it is. For however the voters choose to accept it or reject it. Which is just as it should be.

In all honesty, I hate those stupid little American flag pins. And I think that elected officials or those running for office are shallow and tacky when they wear them. I didn't wear one when I ran for school board, and I'll never wear one if I ever run for office again. If some prospective voter thinks less of me on that basis, I won't care and wouldn't have wanted their vote to begin with. I'd rather win an election based on my beliefs and ideas, not cheap theatrics or gaudy decorations.

Because the fact of the matter is, I still do believe in what the American flag stands for - or what it used to stand for - too much than to want to use it to hide my own shortcomings.

But it's this kind of use of the American flag, like wearing it as jewelry, that has almost completely robbed the flag of any meaning whatsoever.

The American flag is not our own version of the Blutfahne. In fact, there is nothing very special or significant about the American flag itself, at all. There is no intrinsic value or power imbued in the thing. And yet many Americans - and too many politicians - hide behind it as if it were the Shield of Perseus.

We've come to think that it guards us when facing evil. In truth we use the American flag to guard against facing ourselves.

If the American flag is to have meaning, it's only going to be because the American people have given it meaning, first.

So folks, what exactly can we say, that we have given this flag?

Because I don't know how we can still be proud of this flag, when we dare fly it while we keep surrendering the freedoms that too many of our ancestors fought and died for us to have. The American flag does not give us freedom. The American flag can't give us freedom.

Without that freedom, it's just a worthless scrap of cloth. That's practically all it is now.

And we're not going to regain that freedom by slavishly following after some power-mad lunatic in a suit and a silly flag pin.

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Sputnik was launched 50 years ago today

One of the biggest achievements in human history took place 50 years ago today on October 4th, 1957. That was the day that the Soviet Union launched Спутник-1, better known to we in the western world as "Sputnik 1" (it means "Co-Traveler 1"), the first artificial satellite to be launched into Earth orbit.

For something about the size of a beach ball, Sputnik raised a hella big furor back in the day, especially for Americans. Cartoons such as the one on the right bemoaned the fact that the Russians could now put something in the sky right over the United States and there wasn't anything that could be done about it. My personal favorite cartoon from the time was one where a Russian dude is telling an American woman "Who else can give you a moon?" Less than a month later the Soviets triumphed again when they launched Sputnik 2 with the dog Laika on board: the first living animal to be put into space (unfortunately Laika survived launch but died a few hours later from heat and stress).

The Americans didn't catch up with the Soviets until January 1958, when it launched Explorer I. Then it was a race to put a man into space. The Soviets not only did that but they put a woman up there, too. And then both sides set their eyes on the Moon...

The space age had begun.

In remembering the importance of this anniversary, I also feel obligated to honor the memory of the man who not only designed Sputnik, but was in every conceivable measure the father of Russian space flight...

Sergei Korolev was a man who over the past decade I have come to absolutely respect and admire. From a young age Korolev studied the works of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky and other rocket researchers, and Korolev set out to make a reality out of the theory. It was Korolev who first proposed Sputnik, and from there he went on to oversee everything else in Russia's early space program. Korolev was a brilliant engineer and a man of remarkable vision who pulled off some amazing things. All of it in spite of the political posturing by the Soviet government that became more hindrance than help. One famous example was when Nikita Kruschev was visiting the United Nations and he phoned back to Russia and demanded that Korolev launch a rocket to demonstrate Russia's space superiority. Kruschev wanted that rocket and he wanted it "now!" So Korolev had no choice but to send one up. Unfortunately Kruschev was in such a rush that there was no time to properly prepare the rocket. It blew up on the launch pad and took hundreds of lives, including most of Korolev's staff at the site. The folks back home got boxes of dirt to bury. Korolev was furious! But he had no real choice but to keep heading the Soviet space effort. By the time he died in 1966, Korolev was already well into the design phase for an attempted Soviet lunar landing.

Anyway, to Sputnik and its creator, here's a toast raised in their honor on the anniversary of their historic journey!

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Hollywood coming to Rockingham County! MANDIE AND THE SECRET TUNNEL to film at Chinqua-Penn

This is great news, because it really shows how far Chinqua-Penn Plantation has come in just the past year. The historic manor near Reidsville was once among the most opulent and celebrated houses in America, until it had to close down several years ago because of lack of funding. Then last year Calvin and Lisa Phelps bought the place and immediately started turning things around. This past weekend they even had Gatsby Days (a celebration of the 1920s) again at Chinqua-Penn.

Now there's this: film production company A Five Picture Deal out of Atlanta is going to start shooting Mandie and the Secret Tunnel at Chinqua-Penn next week!

It stars Dean Jones! Who played whats-his-name in Disney's "Herbie" movies!

Look! Press release!

October 2, 2007

For immediate release –

Chinqua Penn Plantation, located at 2138 Wentworth Street in Reidsville, N.C., is pleased to announce it will be the site of a movie to be filmed October 10 – 25, 2007. Independent film makers, Owen Smith and Joy Chapman of A Five Picture Deal in Atlanta chose Chinqua Penn for the interior scenes of "Mandie and the Secret Tunnel". Smith acquired the film rights from author Lois Leppard's book by the same name, several years ago when his little sister was reading it and suggested it be made into a movie. The story centers on Mandie, who comes to live with her Uncle John at his estate upon her father’s death, and the adventures she shares there with new-found friends. Set in the early 1900's, the Mandie series boasts a delightful cast of characters who, in the tradition of Little House on the Prairie and Anne of Green Gables, learn valuable lessons as they suffer hardships and celebrate life's triumphs.

A Five Picture Deal specializes in period family films. Smith and Chapman teamed up previously to produce the five-part Sugar Creek Gang series based on books by the same name. Their approach is to make the films accessible and entertaining for all ages. Rather than a kid film with a few laughs for the adults, or a grown-up film with some silly character tossed in for the kids, Smith and Chapman strive to create fully developed stories that are timeless in their appeal and therefore target people of all ages.

Chapman said, "In our search for the perfect mansion we initially looked for a classic southern plantation home. Fortunately for us, Chinqua Penn has the word plantation in its name! An internet search brought up the web site for Chinqua Penn and the uniqueness of the house quickly gave us new ideas for taking the location in an entirely new and interesting direction. Chinqua Penn is the sort of place we would never have imagined to look for, but it is exactly the place we needed. The house and its contents quickly became characters in their own right and will add an entirely new dimension to the film. No one is going to be prepared for what they see when we introduce them to the interiors of Chinqua Penn Plantation in the movie. I know we were certainly not expecting it when we were given our initial tour of the house."

Dean Jones, well-known for his work with Disney in such films as Herbie the Love Bug and That Darn Cat, stars as Jason Bond, caretaker of the estate. Lexi Johnson, of The Sugar Creek Gang series plays Mandie. Amanda Waters,
child model, will make her acting debut in "Mandie" as the title character's neighbor. William Yelton (past work includes the upcoming HBO mini-series John Adams with Tom Hanks, a part in the film Bolden and Hound Dog with Dakota Fanning) will play the role of Joe Woodard, Mandie's life-long friend.

The shooting will be closed-set and therefore the house will not be open for weekday tours October 9 through October 25. However, tours will be conducted on weekends as usual during this time and Grounds Tours, the Gift Shop and the Wine Tasting Room will operate on their regular week-day schedule over these dates.

Very cool news indeed! Maybe someday I'll get to make a movie there :-)

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More copyright insanity: Sony BMG claims ripping CDs is "stealing"

Slashdot is reporting that the head lawyer for Sony BMG is claiming that we should not be allowed to copy the tracks from CDs that we buy to our personal MP3 players. Jennifer Pariser says that we should be buying multiple copies of a CD: one for each device that we intend to play it on.

Ars Technica has more on the story, which came from testimony in a court case involving music companies.

As someone on the Slashdot thread has already noted: Sony thinks that it's wrong for us to use CDs on more than one device that we own, but Sony also doesn't have a problem with installing malicious software on our computers without our knowing about it.

By the way, my wife and I each own an MP3 player. Would this mean that we should be compelled to purchase three CDs: one for each player and one for regular use in our home's stereo system?

I doubt it will ever happen anytime soon, but there needs to be a codified right where it's made explicitly clear that consumers are entitled to make a reasonable amount of copies of music or software that they have purchased, so long as it is for personal use. I don't want to see piracy take place here... but it has to be said that when Sony comes out and claims that we should have to buy a CD just so that we can put that on our MP3 players, then something has gone terribly screwy.

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30-second clips from TRANSFORMERS: THE SCORE now online

30-second snippets from each track on Transformers: The Score are now on the CD's product page at Wal-Mart's website.

Just going by these clips, this album sounds amazing. Easily many orders of magnitude better than anything from the score that has wound up online (with "official releases" like Burger King's posting of the Decepticons theme on its website in mind). And there are now only six days left before it comes out!

I was thinking the other day: wouldn't it be incredibly cool if sometime or another, that there could be a live concert performance of the Transformers score? A few years ago Lisa and one of her college friends and I went to Atlanta to hear Howard Shore himself conduct a concert of his music from The Lord of the Rings. It was a positively epic experience: I will never forget listening to the Rohan theme, with its majestic use of the violin. Now imagine hearing the music from the Autobots' arrival on Earth being played by a live orchestra. I know: that probably won't ever happen... but it's sure fun to imagine :-)

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My wife leaves me to go study banjos

No joke: over the past 3 months my wife Lisa has been gone from home for roughly a month. All on trips to places where she's been learning how to enhance her abilities as a music teacher. This past week she went to the North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching out in Cullowhee (right across the road from Western Carolina University) to learn about the banjo and its history: from its origins in Africa to its adoption as a traditional Appalachian folk instrument.

Look! Lisa even posted about it on her blog!

She had a lot of fun. And she learned a lot about the banjo and how to apply it to her classes. Not to mention that she brought home a wazoo-load of CDs from bluegrass groups that came to the seminar like Carolina Chocolate Drops and Balsam Range.

In spite of its location, Lisa informs me that at no time did anyone perform "Dueling Banjos"...

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An X-Wing Fighter that actually flies!

An outfit calling themselves Polecat Aerospace in California has built an almost full-sized X-Wing Fighter from the Star Wars movies. It's 21 feet long, has a 19-foot wingspan, and it really flies!

It is made of wood and some aluminum, and is propelled by four solid-fuel rockets. It even has an Artoo unit that can rotate its head by remote control. And to top it all off, the wings can adjust position in flight just like a real X-Wing would!

Polecat Aerospace is going to launch it next week. Can't wait to see the video of this thing in action!

More details about the X-Wing here.

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James Purefoy will wield the sword of Solomon Kane

Superhero Hype! is reporting that James Purefoy has been cast as the namesake character in Solomon Kane. Recently, Purefoy has been widely acclaimed for his portrayal of Mark Antony in HBO's hit series Rome.

In case you're wondering who Solomon Kane is, he's a creation of Robert E. Howard: the same writer who gave the world Conan the Barbarian and Kull the Conqueror. Solomon Kane is a 16th-century Puritan who is described as "somber-looking". Something like a cross between Cable from Marvel Comics, Jesse Custer from DC's Preacher series and Kwai Chang Caine from Kung-Fu, Solomon Kane wanders the Earth armed with guns and swords and daggers, fighting evil wherever its found in the name of God. His adventures have taken him from the streets of Europe to the heart of darkest Africa and he's battled everything from pirates to demons. Here's one classic depiction of the man:

Solomon Kane is a very cool character and for James Purefoy to play him is excellent casting! The movie starts shooting next month.

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Thoughts and prayers for those who could use them

A short while ago I received some very heartbreaking news, regarding a person who I have come to greatly admire.

This person is going through a loss so severe, that I can't even begin to comprehend how hard this must be.

I want to ask everyone reading this, especially this blog's regular viewers, to please hold this person up in your thoughts and prayers right now. And to especially ask God to grant this person the peace that surpasses all understand.

And folks, tonight I want you to give the people that you love most a really big hug, and tell them how much they mean to you and how thankful you are to have them in your life. Don't ever take them for granted. Treat ever moment that you have with them as if it were a precious, sacred gift.

That's all I really know to say right now. But to our friend who is hurting: we love you and we're definitely thinking about you.

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I have a new letter in today's News & Record

"Leaders at all levels seek power ahead of justice".

I won't quote the entire letter here but this part of it warrants special mention:

I live in Rockingham County. For months I've watched elected officials in my own backyard trample on the Constitution: from a school board member suing citizens for practicing the right to petition, to a city council banning new churches.

I'll give you three guesses who is being referred to here :-P

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Christian "leaders" considering third-party for President

According to The New York Times:

Alarmed at the chance that the Republican party might pick Rudolph Giuliani as its presidential nominee despite his support for abortion rights, a coalition of influential Christian conservatives is threatening to back a third-party candidate in an attempt to stop him.

The group making the threat, which came together Saturday in Salt Lake City during a break-away gathering during a meeting of the secretive Council for National Policy, includes Dr. James Dobson of Focus on the Family, who is perhaps the most influential of the group, as well as Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, the direct mail pioneer Richard Viguerie and dozens of other politically-oriented conservative Christians, participants said. Almost everyone present expressed support for a written resolution that "if the Republican Party nominates a pro-abortion candidate we will consider running a third party candidate."

After reading the story, I had the following thoughts...

1. Why are these people considered to be "Christian leaders"? I sure as hell don't follow them. I don't see why any other Christian should be beholden to them, either.

2. There is a candidate for President running on the Republican ticket who is everything that so-called "Christian conservatives" have always claimed to have wanted in a candidate: Ron Paul. None of these "leaders" however, to the best of my knowledge, has ever come out and said that they support Dr. Paul.

3. These Christians should not be looking toward supporting a third party... because these Christians should have never stood behind any political party to begin with, at all. To follow Christ means to defy the patterns of this world, and not adhere to them at the cost of Christ-like principles and character. Do I believe that Christians in America should be politically active? Yes. But only so far as individual candidates go. Hitching our wagon onto the Republican party has led Christianity in this country toward disaster time after time. As it is, it's not enough to talk about going with a "third party": if these "Christian authorities" are going to show serious leadership, then they are going to have to advocate that this country's Christians break away from the party structure and process completely. It must be an absolute divorce, with no turning back as Lot's wife did at Sodom.

4. The previous observations, sadly, can only lead me once again to believe that too many Christians in this country are more fixated on acquiring worldly power than they are with seeking out Christ and serving Him with due humility.

5. It is our failure to do that which is destroying America. Yes, I blame the Christians in America for that. Because we have chosen not to be the salt of the earth any longer.

6. Being that the previous point demonstrates a monstrous lack of skills contributing to criminal negligence in the spiritual sense, I propose that we, the followers of Christ in these United States, kick Dobson, Perkins, and other self-proclaimed "leaders" to the curb. We should then proceed to find and install new "leaders" if we are to insist on having them. Because the current management is, to put it mildly, screwed beyond all hope.

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Another SESAME STREET classic: "Ernie Counts Sheep"

The first time that I saw this Bert and Ernie sketch, I was maybe five years old and it seriously cracked me up! Every time that I couldn't sleep I would start thinking about sheep, then fire engines just like Ernie does. So here it is: the "Ernie Counts Sheep" skit...

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TNT this morning is running THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS

So I'm watching it again - 'cuz it's one of my all-time favorite movies - and I'm wondering...

Dare I post a video on YouTube of myself doing my extremely disturbing yet hysterically funny impersonation of Buffalo Bill?

It seemed to be a rather popular trick when I was in high school. So much so that during a swim meet my senior year my teammates asked me to do it while I was standing up on one of the diving blocks. Of course, I obliged them.

So I'm thinking of videotaping it and sticking it on YouTube. Might become a sensation. And then again it might get me arrested.

What do you think? :-P

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Biggest sporting event in Elon history?

I just got back from Burlington a little while ago. On the return trip I decided to stop by Sandy's Subs, located near the campus of my alma mater Elon University, to get a sandwich to take home.

I had totally forgotten about how Elon is playing Appalachian State today in football. Bear in mind that a few weeks ago Appalachian State pulled off an amazing victory against Michigan, one of the top-ranked teams in the nation. And then factor in that this is Family Weekend at Elon.

When Lisa and I were dating, she was a student at University of Georgia. Whenever I visited her on Saturdays in the fall, if Georgia had a home game going on the whole place was pandemonium. I'd never seen people go so positively bonkers for football as I did whenever it was a game day at Sanford Stadium.

What I saw today, driving through Elon, was in some ways crazier than anything that I saw at Georgia! The number of Appalachian State fans that I saw tailgating alone is something that still has my senses reeling.

I have never seen that many people around Elon before. And Elon is certainly not as big a campus as Georgia.

I wish that I'd had my camera with me, 'cuz mere words can do it no justice. But take my word for it: if you're familiar at all with Elon University, today might be the biggest sporting event in the school's history. It's already well known that this is the first-ever sellout game for Elon's footballl program (at least since the school had a stadium to call its own).

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