8 reasons why I love: The one, the only, the truly incomparable Leland Stanford Junior University Marching Band

1. The uniform consists of a white fishing hat with red trim (and as many buttons as will fit), red blazer, black pants, and and "the ugliest tie you can get your hands on."

2. In 1991, the University of Notre Dame banned the LSJUMB from visiting its campus after a halftime show at Stanford in which drum major Eric Selvik dressed as a nun and conducted the band using a wooden cross as a baton.

3. In 1994, the Band was disciplined after nineteen members of the band skipped a field rehearsal in Los Angeles to play outside the L.A. County Courthouse during jury selection for the O.J. Simpson trial. The band's song selection included an arrangement of The Zombies' "She's Not There." During the halftime show of the football game against USC that year, band members drove a white Bronco with bloody handprints around the Stanford stadium track.

4. In 1997, the Band was disciplined for shows lampooning Catholicism and the Irish at a game against Notre Dame. The Band put on a show entitled "These Irish, Why Must they Fight?" Besides the mocking supposedly stereotypical Irish-Catholic behavior, there was a Riverdance formation, and a Potato Famine joke.

5. In 2004, the Band drew national attention for joking about polygamy, during a game against Brigham Young University. The Dollies appeared in wedding veils with the Band Manager of the time kneeling and proposing to each in turn as the announcer referred to marriage as "the sacred bond that exists between a man and a woman... and a woman... and a woman... and a woman... and a woman”

6. When traveling on airplanes en masse, it is traditional for LSJUMB members to mimic the safety instructions of flight attendants in unison, including hand motions pointing to exits and demonstrating the oxygen masks by putting airsickness bags over the face and inhaling and exhaling

7. Alcoholic "rank drinks", sneaked into the football stadium and drunk "in ranks", are as extravagant as possible and vary from good to deliberately awful. 1991 saw the debut of the "tuna colada", possibly the rankest drink ever conceived.

8. They Rock!