The biggest news of the weekend was that fall practice is finally underway for the season. My season tickets finally came in the mail and are happily placed on the shelf for use in less than four weeks. If I can only get Delta Airlines and their asinine ticketing policy to work I might even be able to book this elusive Oregon trip. If not, plan B is the Oklahoma-Miami game on October 3^rd to appeal to Mrs. T-Mill's tastes.

Have I mentioned how wonderful it is to have a wife that loves college football?

Practice underway, Gabe Holmes not there - Boilerdowd had the best wrap up this morning of the first two days of practice. The biggest issue so far is that our depth at tight end is all but evaporated. Colton McKey is out because of a knee injury and incoming freshman Gabe Holmes has not been cleared by the NCAA yet. That leaves Kyle Adams (who was hurt all of last year), Jeff Lindsey, and Jeff Panfil (converted quarterback) as the safety valve options. These guys don't exactly inspire the second coming of Dustin Keller, but they should be good options for Elliott if protection breaks down.

Drew Brees loses his mother - I know our favorite quarterback hasn't had the best relationship with his mother for several years, but she unexpectedly passed away over the weekend, prompting Brees to leave Saints camp. My thoughts and prayers are with the Brees family over this, as it sounds like a very delicate situation.

Rod Woodson joins the Hall of Fame - I think we forget just how good Rod Woodson was as a player. Saturday he was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, just Purdue's fourth player to be honored so. Rod was our last non-Special Teams player to be a consensus First Team All-American. He still holds the NFL record for interception return yards and touchdowns. He was Ed Reed before Ed Reed even thought of playing football.

Boy do we know how to party - Apparently campus life is defined by more than just the party atmosphere on campus. We all know that Penn State owns us in that category. I haven't heard word from my two friends that did their undergrad at Purdue and then grad work at Penn State, but it must be true. Still, the same Princeton review recently rated Purdue very high in overall campus life. As for intramurals, tell that to my friend Ross who tore his ACL on the awful IM fields our senior year during a football game.

Painter to play Friday night - Jim Sorgi recently went down with a strained hammy, so that means our own Curtis Painter should see quite a bit of action Friday night when the Colts open the preseason at home again Minnesota.

Anyone interested in basketball tickets? - I got my renewal form in the mail last week and I wanted to see if anyone is interested in purchasing a few games from me for face value. The plan is the same as last year: I'll go to a few games and try to sell the rest if I decide to get tickets, but the hefty up front investment has me investigating whether it is worth it not. E-mail me if you're interested.