Wasn't born into the Buckeye fold. After getting out of the Marine Corps in 1993, I had no idea where I wanted to go to school. I hung out in Alexandria, VA where my mother and brothers were for a few months trying to figure it out, when a girl I knew in the area (who came from a full line of OSU grads) was getting ready to head up to OSU, and I figured that was as good a place as any. Good reason, eh? So I actually selected OSU over prospects at VaTech, Johns Hopkins and UVA. I liked the idea of heading up to a completely new area, and I knew football was a religion up there. I had grown up a fan of Princeton (long time family ties), and Navy (proximity, and my own interest in the Naval Academy through high school) -- and while I was aware of OSU, I had never seen a game.
It took all of about 5 minutes of the 1994 season to hook me, and all of about 30 seconds of exposure to a game day on campus to make me realize that ours was a football atmosphere like no other. Fell instantly in love with the history and pageantry, and became a permanent fan in very short order.
It's only become stronger with time. Not having the long-term background as a Buckeye so many of my peers do, I've had to soak up a lot of history and information to go along with the modern appreciation for the teams, and that's been nothing but fun. I can't quite stand up to the knowledge base of a BuckJim/NOB or Dubs, but gimme time and I won't be too far behind.
Frankly, it's hard for me to imagine that there was a time when I didn't follow OSU these days.
My wife is someone I knew from VA, after I had been up there for a year or so, she graduated from Longwood College in VA, and came up to Columbus with me -- ended up getting her master's degree from the school of journalism while we both were up there. She's as into it all as any of the rest of us, and still harbors a little "thing" for Matt Keller, who she met a few times during her time on campus.
Living in Jacksonville, Florida now. As most already know too well, I have undiagnosed health issues that mandate an extremely limited lifestyle. I'm stuck in bed for months on end, and when I'm not, I'm still more or less limited to the confines of my home. A tough pill for a guy who loves being active and outside. Had been living large during the dot com boom, a good trick for a non-tech guy who was microbio/biochem in college, then the health collapsed just before that industry did, and have been treading water since. These days we get by as well as possible with the odd contract job here and there, and some online work for Educational Testing Service up in Princeton, NJ. Until the health issues break, we're constantly looking for means of income to help buy time as we're otherwise just chewing through savings and assets. A recent death in the family allowed us to dodge a foreclosure on the house, which would have had us relocate back to CBus, where my younger bro (vrbryant on this board) is still at OSU. Maybe this is too much info, but 90% here already know it, and might as well bring the other 10 up to speed. No secrets, life happens. Both the good and the bad are all part of the fabric, and you have to embrace both.
I'm a relative youngster at 32, Jo(anna) is 31. We've got a pair of German-German Sheps who round out the fam. Sebastian, the older is pushing 11, and happy to be doing so after a major surgery this past year where he was nearly put down, and Chloe is 4.
Oh, and if you think it rubs you the wrong way every time the NYTimes goes after us, you should try it from where I'm sitting. A long-since passed relative was once a key figure for that paper, and I share his name (William Cullen Bryant). The attacks hit close to home, and they're always a reminder of how far that paper has slipped.
Favorite Buckeye? Given the timing of my intro to OSU football, it's hard not to say Eddie.
A lot of info -- but I figured I'd go all out for this one as the other Sound Off contribution was brief.