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It’s finally here, the thing I’ve looked forward to all year. The off-season crew is traveling to college campuses, catching up with old friends and making some new ones along the way. We’ve been to Knoxville and Nashville so far, interviewing college guys in our search for this summer’s staff.
Somehow, Peter and I found the strength to enjoy Knoxville, despite the sickening sea of orange that surrounded us (sorry, it’s just hard for us Alabama fans to take). Actually it was very fun. We spent the day interviewing guys in the student union, then got a chance to take some old friends out to dinner at Litton’s in Knoxville. Weston Duke, Carter McCall, Steven Thompson, Evan Warner, Garrett Smith, Taylor Stewart, Thomas Hendrix and Philip Gilman all came by to see us at dinner. Steven strongly recommended the pimento cheese “Thunder Burger” to me, but it was only after the monstrous hulk of a sandwich came out that he mentioned he had never tried it. Thank you, Steven.
After, Litton’s we headed over to RUF, where we got to hear a riveting sermon and meet up with even more old friends. Evan, Steven and Carter agreed to pose for a picture with me, which Carter seemed pretty excited about:
From Knoxville we journeyed over to Nashville, to meet some guys from Vanderbilt. What a gorgeous drive. The only thing more beautiful than the changing leaves was this beauty standing proudly by the highway:
Next time I’m voting for that instead of the Hampton Inn.
Nashville was awesome. We ran into Carver Morgan at lunch, then started up with a few interviews that afternoon. We got to see Carver again that night, along with Stephen Maroda and Margaret Pless (my sister). The three of them joined Peter, Glenn and me for dinner at Panera Bread before we went to Vandy’s RUF service.
Traveling around and seeing friends is certainly my favorite part of this job, and the people we got to see in Knoxville and Nashville made the trips worthwhile. Our next stop is Starkville, MS on Tuesday, where we’re meeting up with our Bulldog friends for some Barbecue at The Little Dooey. Wednesday we’ll drive over to Oxford and meet our friends there for a hot meal at the Pizza Den. Any former staff members in the area are welcome to join us. We’d love to see you!
