Here’s a funny, endearing piece by Brett Michael Dykes, an LSU graduate who went to fan day at both LSU and the University of Alabama recently, and reports on what he saw. He nearly got arrested in Alabama, even though he was minding his manners. In the end:

All of this led to my main conclusion after spending time in each place on a nongame weekend: Alabama fans are, well, just crazier about their football team than L.S.U. fans are.

It pains me to admit this, mind you, as in SEC country, the sheer lunacy of the fan base one exists in is often a source of irrational pride. I’ve actually gotten into arguments with people over whose fan base tilts more toward the insane. But L.S.U. football in Baton Rouge is a sideshow — an elaborate sideshow people feel passionately about, yes, but a sideshow nonetheless. In Tuscaloosa, Alabama football is the main event, a full-blown circus in the Greatest Show on Earth tradition of P. T. Barnum. To put it bluntly, on any given day, Tuscaloosa is probably the closest thing to a college football theme park that a person could visit.

It’s hard for me to imagine being in a place that’s crazier about college football than the people where I live are about the LSU Tigers. Then again, if I lived in Alabama, I guess I’d have to find something to live for, then grab it with both of my six-fingered Gumpy hands and squeeze it till it just about popped.

(Running and hiding from Alan Jacobs…)