The Big Game

Day 7 - "The Big Game"

Kevin had been looking forward to this day for a long, long time. Texas' chance at another National Championship. He (a Texas alum) and his boss (an Alabama alum) had even gone so far as to try to get tickets and were planning to road trip to the game. Unfortunately tickets were a bit hard to come by. One day at lunch a couple of weeks ago while chatting with another patron in line the guy mentioned the article in the paper he held saying it would cost $800 a ticket just to set foot inside the stadium (even for the worst nosebleed seat in the whole place!) and $2400+ for a ticket anywhere near the 40 yard line.

So with tickets to the game not forthcoming several other ideas including a trip to Austin, or a movie theater stadium event came and went. He ended up at a local restaurant/sports bar with several friends. As they had to be there over 2 hours before the game to get a table I thought it might be fun for the kids and I stop by for dinner before the game. It was a bright and noisy place with a boisterous, decidedly Texas crowd. Throughout the pregame as the crowd clapped and cheered at the sight of their team and players the boys got really excited - jumping up down, smiling, and clapping along. It was adorable.

At one point the Alabama faithful were cheering and the boys shouted and clapped along, too. Kevin, trying to discourage the cheering for Alabama had Ryan booing though still clapping at the same time. And I had Connor yelling "Roll Tide!" much to Kevin's disappointment.

With the boys having such a good time with the crowd I decided to stay for the kick off and watch a series or two despite the fact that kick-off was later than I thought and would put us home well past the boys' bedtime. About the time Colt McCoy was headed to the locker room the boys' high was wearing off and sleepiness was setting in so we called it a night.