I’m sure you’ve read all about it already, but I was there. Ok, I wasn’t there there, but I was in the stadium. Yes, we made it to Monday Night Football last night. It took us two hours to get there, a mile of walking past tailgaters, port-a-potties and up four stadium levels of ramps to get to our seats on the upper-deck. That said, we had a surprisingly good view of the field and play.
Ok, the game sucked. It sucked so bad that we knew it was over after the Eagles’ second drive. We were surrounded by a bunch of Eagles fans (four right in front of us, one next to me), and there were a surprising number in the stadium. As the game wore on, and the outcome became more inevitable, it became less and less comfortable to be there. The exodus began shortly after the second half began. As the third quarter drudged towards the 0:00, every Redskins screw up started a stream of Redskins fans headed for the exit and the awaiting traffic jam. That left the hardcore drunkards rooting for both teams, which led to the pepper spray incident I linked to above. When the referee said, “A foreign substance has been sprayed on the Eagle’s bench,” we decided we’d had enough and headed for the ramps.
That’s when we saw the dark side of pro football games – the drunk bastards. See, the police used pepper spray to stop a fight. When we got to the first ramp, it was shut down, and we saw half a dozen fans being sequestered against the rail, surrounded by cops and two or three state police directing us to another ramp because they had closed the ramp to clean up the mess.
On our way to ramp number two, we walked past a small group of Eagles and Redskins fans in a shouting match. As we walked past, the words were heated and slurred and bodies were inching closer to each other, chests thrust out. Yeah, I narced on them.
We escaped the drunken yells of “E-A-G-L-E-S EAGLES!!!” and got the car, where we waited about twenty minutes to get out of the parking lot. Surprisingly, traffic was light on the beltway headed home, and we made it home a little before two.
It was fun, but Jen and I both agreed we don’t need to do it again. I like Pro Football best when I can watch it on TV, with my bathroom handy, my snack food (that doesn’t cost 4 times what it should), and I can flip to other games, and turn off the TV if the game gets boring. It was an experience; one I’m glad I had, but not one I’m ready to repeat.
And today – root canal. YES!