SI's virtual vault

While most fans have already found their way over by now, here's a post for the late adopters.

Sports Illustrated has gone against the grain and is offering up their old issues in digital form.. wait for it... for free!

Aside from the cheap giggles of browsing a periodical centered around sports and crammed with cigarette and alcohol ads, I've wasted a few hours at this point cross-referencing SI with critical junctures in my life.

What was going on the week I was born (not a damn thing) and the summer that followed (World Cup in 1978)? How about my first weeks of college? What about the last weeks that were a booze-soaked spiral?

It's strange to see articles I remember reading in my room during junior high school or picking out the pictures I cut and pasted to my walls.

Safe to say, if you're a red-blooded American sports fan, you'll find something after digging around for just a few minutes.

I have to say that while searchable content is great, my favorite feature are the full issues available to digitally thumb through page by page. If you have some sick time, you might want to take tomorrow off and just camp out with a cup of coffee, your laptop and your PJs.

(Image from: SI.com)