I'm not confused. I'm just well mixed.

Monday, November 22, 2010

And then they started to throw the paper airplanes

Wow, time goes by fast. It seems that I never get around to updating my blog. Anyway, another month has gone by since I last posted. In that month my camera broke and needs repairs so there will be no photos to accompany this post. I did pick up a cute red Kodak Easy Share camera so I could at least give you something to look at but the darn thing didn't work yesterday when I needed it to. Anyway on to the post.

The loving husband and I have been married for 10 years. It has been kind of a running joke that we need to get away for a "just the two of us" vacation. However, the three wonderful very energetic children we have pose a slight roadblock to that vacation. Also, we happen to like taking our children on fun vacations so there really was no pressing need to vacation sans kids.

Earlier this month an opportunity came up that involved tickets to the Vikings-Packers game. The loving husband had the opportunity to attend with his boss and several co-workers. Normally it's a he only gets to go kind of thing but due to unusual circumstances he was given the chance to take me with him. After a few phone calls he had childcare for the kids and let me know the happy news. Can you say "Happy Butt Dance" moment.

The plan was to drive to Yankton on Saturday night and drop the kids off with my Mother in Law. My Sister in Law and my nephew (her son) would help watch the kids on Sunday while we were at the game. We would drive back down to Yankton Sunday night and pick the kids up. That gave us about 24 hours of kid-free time.

We didn't tell the kids our plans until we got to Grandma's house and of course they were pretty excited. I was kinda nervous about leaving them alone without me but I knew they would be well taken care of. We drove back to our strangely quiet home to try and get a few hours sleep before our very early wake up. We had to meet up with Jim's boss at 5:45 am.

Sunday morning arrived very early and the roads were not the best so it took a little longer to get up to the Dome. We were supposed to meet another group at the VIP tent at 9:30 but we didn't get there until after 10. We also discovered that there are several tents set up in the area around the Dome so we had a little difficulty finding the right one.

If you remember my post last January about freezing my butt off in the "Losers Tent" as I called it I am happy to write about my VIP tent experience. We had to have a special ticket to get in but once we were in it was really nice. It was warm with lots of tables set up and a huge buffet in the middle of the room. There was also a bar set up too but I only took a Mt. Dew. There were a few Vikings Cheerleaders there selling calenders and posing for photos. Since the calender was the swimsuit edition I could not in good conscience get my dad a calender but I did get one for my brother, complete with autographs. The food was very good and there was enough variety that I was able to eat something too. They did have this oh so wonderful smelling apple crisp everyone was eating for dessert.

After filling up and chatting with some very nice people I decided to head over to the Dome and say hi to my friend Pam. I also wanted to take photos but sadly, the camera I bought decided to not work. It worked the day before but I think the batteries went dead. Surprisingly they don't sell batteries at the Metrodome. Pam was nice enough to lend me her camera so I got a few shots. I gave the camera back to her at the end of the game so I'm hoping she e-mails me my photos.

Seat wise, last year I had an awesome seat with a killer view of the Vikings bench and field. This year my seat was on the other side of the field and much higher. I did have a great view of the end zone though. The photos I did take were not as good and close as the ones I took back in January.

Since this was a Vikings-Packers game there were a lot of Cheeseheads in the stands. I had a few in front of me that were a little on the annoying side but not too bad. The atmosphere before the game was happy and festive and the energy in the dome was at excitement level. We were yelling and screaming and on our feet most of the first quarter. There were some really great hits too. Things weren't quite so loud the second quarter, especially when the interception happened. We still managed to keep the noise level up there but the Cheeseheads were able to cheer louder.

At halftime I watched the ring ceremony for John Randle who was a very good defensive player for the Vikings. He had been inducted into the Hall of Fame and he was being recognized by the Vikings. Hubby and I also headed out to find something for my dad. I also called home from the Dome to say hi to the folks. Hubby called his mom to find out how everything was going with the kids.

I missed kickoff for the second half and by the time I got back to my seat, Green Bay had already scored. Things went pretty much downhill from there. The plays on the field got worse and worse for the Vikings and better and better for the Packers. My great view of the end zone provided me many opportunities to see Packer touchdowns. I actually commented to the guy next to me that while I was excited to see touchdowns, these were not the ones I wanted to see.

Late in the third quarter it was starting to look as if the Vikings forgot to come back out of the locker room. The "Go Pack Go" shouts were getting louder and the "Go Brett Go" cheers were becoming less and less. Sometime late in the quarter after yet another Green Bay score a loud "Fire Childress" chant started. It was hard to shout and laugh at the same time but I guess I get to cross another thing off my bucket list...yelling 'Fire Childress" at the Metrodome during a game. It was also in this quarter the paper airplanes started to appear.

As the fourth quarter started, the trickle of Purple started to get larger. From areas above and around me paper airplanes started flying around. Made no doubt by fans with nothing better to do than watch them fly. I almost got hit by a few but luckily, escaped. The loudest cheer from the Viking fans in my area occurred when one of the airplanes made it down on the field. I have to give the cheerleaders credit, they tired their best to jump around and look happy to be cheering for this team. Even the Vikings horn started to sound flat and weak. Almost as if the horn blower wasn't overly excited about whatever play the Vikes made. Ok, they weren't making too many of them at this point. By the two minute warning when the Vikings fate was beyond sealed, they started to leave in droves. I decided to stop by and give Pam her camera back so I left and told hubby to meet me downstairs.

After dropping off the camera I stood at the foot of the staircase and waited for my group to come down. As I waited, I was able to observe the fans. Most of those in purple were reserved and wanting to just leave. The ones in green and gold were much much happier. There were high fives and hand slaps. It didn't matter if they knew each other, green was good. Thankfully no fights broke out. I'm sure since this was such a lopsided loss there really wasn't much to fight about.

After re-grouping, we all headed outside to get the van and start home. Even the outside activities were reflective of this loss. There were lots of photos and goofy poses from those wearing green. Everyone else walked on by. A group of Packer fans were swarming a poor camerawomen in excitement of this win. I'm pretty sure it was a Wisconsin station. There were a few musicians playing to the crowds for tips. The one guy on a trumpet played some very good New Orleans style funeral music.

Van found, it was time to get back home. We all wanted to get back before the weather got icky. Shortly after we got out of the city, Jim's boss commented on how easy and fast it was to get back on the interstate and out of the downtown area. I of course pointed out that a lot of people already had left before the game's end so there was much less traffic than usual.

Four hours or so later hubby and I were dropped back off at our car in a parking lot in Brandon. We drove back home, switched cars and headed down to Yankton to get the kids. They were pretty happy to see us.

Even though the Vikings lost the game and as far as games go, this one pretty much stunk, I still had a blast. It was wonderful to spend so much kid-free time with the loving husband and do a fun activity together. We decided to call this our happy 10th anniversary vacation getaway.