College Football

OKTC Road Trip: Texas-OU

Updated Mar. 5, 2020 2:16 a.m. ET

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What if I told you that you could leave a game at halftime, visit the fair, and then go back to the game? Mind blown, right? That's exactly what Texas-Oklahoma is. The Cotton Bowl sits in the middle of the Texas State Fair. It's beautiful chaos.

The entire city of Dallas caters to this game. All of the bars and businesses displayed their Texas and OU flags all week. On Friday morning I check out the fair, because everyone said I needed to experience it. What I really needed to experience was the fried mashed potatoes, because they might be the greatest thing I've ever put in my mouth.

We have a crawfish boil to prep for Saturday. It's pretty low key everywhere Friday because for some ungodly reason this game starts at 11am every year. Having to wake up before the sun for football is not acceptable. Saturday morning comes, and I can barely keep my eyes open. It's 8am and we're tailgating. The fair opened at 7am. This is insane to me. Nobody needs fried Oreos at 7am on a Saturday. Besides the early start time, my only complaint is the tailgating is really spread out so we opt to just head into the fair. We're greeted by the Naked Cowboy of Dallas.

For the game, my friend Katey and I are sitting in the Oklahoma section wearing Roll Tide pins. If I had a dollar for every time someone said "who won the sugar bowl" or "you're at the wrong game," I would quit my job today. We know, you guys. Clearly the Cotton Bowl is not Bryant-Denny. So much for Southern hospitality.

Sooners fans are convinced Oklahoma is about to murder Texas, so with each blasting of a cannon they get more and more upset. We move down to the Texas section and have what is the most fun I've had at a football game in I don't remember when. At halftime, fans can go to the fair and get a beer, and then come back in. This needs to be adopted everywhere. After Texas wins --mark that under things nobody thought would happen-- we decide to play fair games. Looking back, this was probably not our best decision.

When we make it back to Dallas it's only 3pm. Okay, so maybe 11am games have some perks. We bar hop for the rest of the day. The City of Dallas does a great job of making sure there are plenty of activities that weekend, so Sunday is spent watching the Cowboys get annihilated by the Patriots and then heading to the Rangers game.

Overall, it was a solid weekend at Texas/OU. Next week the OKTC Road Trip is headed to Alabama at Texas A&M and then to the Taylor Swift concert....full disclosure, I'm more excited about the latter on that list. Hook 'Em.