It is FINALLY the week of Tiger Tunes, one of Ouachita’s most well-known traditions. This week is filled with shows and many other homecoming activities for students, staff and alumni who come back home to OBU to celebrate. If you can’t be on campus, you can celebrate homecoming this year at your own home, wherever that may be.
If you did not know, The Signal, Ouachita’s newspaper, streams the Saturday night Tiger Tunes awards show. Because of this, many Ouachita alumni who are not able to make it back to Arkadelphia for the weekend are able to make new memories and traditions of their own. The best way to do this is to host a Tiger Tunes Watch Party. Following are some tips and tricks on how to make the most out of this experience.
1. Invite all of your family and friends to join you in the celebration. Whether it’s making a Facebook event or being a little extra and sending out invitations, invite anyone and everyone to your home to join you in reliving the glory days.
2. Make sure you have a viewing device that can stream an internet feed. The key to this is having a device that is large enough to accommodate all the viewers you previously invited. Needless to say, you don’t want to have 20 people all cramping together to watch from one laptop. If all else fails, most televisions have an HDMI outlet that will connect to a laptop. A quick trip to the store will get you an inexpensive HDMI cord.
3. After that, plan the party and its itinerary. The livestream starts at approximately 7:25 p.m. Saturday night, so if you want dinner beforehand, you might want to have your guests come at 6:00. However, you may just want party food. For us OBU folks, Tiger Tunes is pretty much equivalent to the Super Bowl so plan your party accordingly. Go all out with appetizers of EVERY kind, many delicious main dishes and desserts of all sorts. Here at the Signal office, we’re partial to chips and dip, pretty much anything cooked on the grill and of course, some chocolate chip cookies and brownies.
4. Once everything is set food-wise, plan for games. If you have enough time beforehand and many of your party attendees are Ouachita alums, make an OBU trivia game about your time spent at the most glorious university. Although this is a fun personable option, it is not something for everyone. Any board game or card game will do for pastime, as long as you and your guests are having a fabulous time.
You could also fill the time until the JPAC lights dim by catching up on previous shows. Just head over to the the Signal site and select from a decade’s worth of Tunes shows. Even though you might not want to admit it, you still have moves and can probably (AHEM…no…definitely) remember some choreography and music from when you were at Ouachita.
Finally, offer your party goers a score sheet so they can play the judge. Score shows based on musicality, theme and lyric, costumes and choreography, and tally up those scores to see how they compare with the final awards. Don’t forget to let your crew pick a crowd favorite, and tell us your pick on Livestream, Facebook, or Twitter!
5. Finally, let the show begin! Be prepared with comfortable seating so that everyone is eager and excited to tune in. Have some snacks and drinks ready on the coffee table so all you have to do is sit back, turn up the volume and watch! If you feel like jumping up to dance along with the mega mix, we won’t judge.
While a Tiger Tunes Watch Party does take some planning, it’s worth it to enjoy this Ouachita tradition and share it with those you love. So, unlike all those years that you were in a show and completely stressed out right about now, enjoy not being in Tiger Tunes and simply watch it for pleasure.
Oh, and don’t forget to post pictures of your Tunescast Watch Party and tag the Signal so we can party along with you! You can find us on Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat as @obusignal, and Facebook as @OBU Signal.
By Ethan Dial, online editor
