This is a fun one. We’re in South Bend, Ind. for a football game. Notre Dame was hosting Air Force. Before the big game we strolled into the campus bookstore for t-shirts. We’re looking around and one row over I see this guy in an Auburn hat.

We go over and talk. Pat said he was in town to visit relatives. He said he makes it to a Notre Dame game each year.

He was at Auburn in the early 1980s and also attended UAB, where Lauren and I got our master’s degrees — and where we met. He laughed at me because of my Samford shirt. His wife went to school where I teach. Small world.

We’d just gotten off our cruise ship and were standing in line for a ferry to take us from King’s Warf to St. George’s. This gentleman comes up to offer an intent War Eagle. We talk for a moment, take a picture and say our goodbyes. He went to Auburn — class of ’68, but that inset is from the ’67 Glomerata — his wife was in the class of ’71.

Later we find ourselves on the same ferry. Turns out he was an aeronautical engineer, she was a school teacher. They’ve retired. One daughter went to Auburn, and studied journalism — the program where I studied, and in the department where my wife is now on the faculty. His other daughter went to Northwestern. I gave him my card, and he laughed. I thought we would have a Samford/Howard connection, but no. Our names are very similar. Small world.

“I believe Auburn remains the best place to teach and instill good southern values,” he said.

By now our friend from small-town south Alabama had spent two days in New York City. And while she’d enjoyed her visit, she says everything moves too fast, kind of like the two Auburn folks we met on East 47th, who didn’t even slow down, but did remind us how big the New York City alumni chapter really is. That’s three War Eagle moments in Manhattan in one day.

We were on top of the Empire State Building, two Auburn grads and my wife, the Auburn professor, when we met two guys who stopped for a quick chat. They just so happened to catch us by the mastodons. Everyone agreed, the best elephants are the fossilized ones.

We were on top of the Empire State Building, two Auburn grads and my wife, the Auburn professor, at the Met in Manhattan, when we met a kid walking the other direction. He was with his brother, mother and father, who grimaced and announced his Alabamaness. The kid was goosing his dad, and it worked. Well played, young man, and War Eagle to you.

We were on top of the Empire State Building, two Auburn grads and my wife, the Auburn professor, when we ran into a nice man from Asia. He was with his family and wearing a retro-Auburn shirt, crisp and white. He was explaining how New York unfolded below them, when he turned and we said War Eagle. He was surprised at first, but recovered. And then he had to explain this War Eagle thing to his grandmother.

We’re in Ben Benson’s, a famous New York steakhouse. The manager is a family friend. He sets us up at Al Roker’s table — and when you eat where Roker eats, you’re big time. He talks to my wife, whom he hasn’t seen in quite some time. She tells him she’s a professor at Auburn. A few minutes later he seats this table. Turns out their also from Alabama. Turns out he’s an Auburn graduate. They’d just gotten married on a crisp and cold afternoon in Central Park and took a carriage ride to the restaurant. They just happened to be sitting beneath the tiger painting.

Victoria was visiting Sara in Washington D.C. and ventured out to watch the Arkansas game. Sarah says Victoria “was grumpy because the Auburn family is a little more distant in DC than she’s used to. I suggested she ask this guy sitting alone to join us (he declined), but later she saw him tweeting and realized he had just re-tweeted her. So we started chatting, then I realized he was @JPoor007 and I’ve known him on Twitter forever. We had a great time together for the rest of the game, and he even protected Vic from some crazy VTech fans.”

We’d visited the top of Mt. Vesuvius and then turned to the ruined city of Pompei. In the House of the Faun, one of the largest houses in the ancient town, a girl says “Hey, he’s from Auburn. War Eagle!” They are all current students, studying abroad for the summer. All very nice young ladies. And you can see the faun, the namesake of the house, just beneath them. This group is my largest War Eagle Moment so far.