What a night yesterday! We got tickets through the FSU Alumni Club for the NC State/FSU game held (obviously) at NC State. This Thursday night game was shown live on ESPN and I tried not to make any silly faces just in case I happened to get on tv again! Unfortunately, the game coincided with the opening night of the NC State Fair which is a HUGE deal and right next to the stadium.
We left the house early so we would have plenty of time to park, walk, and tailgate a bit before kickoff. We ended up parking in a lot (cow pasture) that had free shuttles running to the stadium. This would’ve worked out great except the shuttles all got stuck with everyone else in game/fair/rush hour traffic. And our bus DIDN’T HAVE AC! It was straight out of 1972. Don’t let me fail to mention that it was almost 90 degrees yesterday (I have no idea what is taking Fall so long to arrive this year). So we are all stuffed on this bus, with some drunk but loveable FSU fans, who were from Lexington, NC (try and find that one on the map). After sitting on the bus for about 30min and making it 1.5 miles, everyone just up and left – I think the bus driver knew he was about to have a major mutiny on his hands! We quickly found the FSU Alumni tailgate and had some beer and made some friends before the game. We also ran into our triathlon friends, Tim and Angela Gautreau – Tim’s a huge FSU fan, but Angela went to NC State – they still sat in the FSU section. She’s a good sport.
We sat in the FSU section and everyone was pretty pumped – we stood a lot during the game. I felt like we were in the student section! There were some FSU superfans (probably college students who drove up here) that never seemed to tire of doing the tomahawk chop or jumping up and down for their team. It was a close game and in the end the FSU kicker was the hero, making a 53 yard field goal with less than 2 minutes to go (right near us!) It’s so fun to go to someone else’s stadium and beat their team ;) Now, I didn’t go to FSU, but Marty did so I cheer for them by default.
Marty wanted to leave after the 3rd quarter so we wouldn’t hit any traffic but Bill and I (Bill flew up from Orlando to go the game) were like, No Way! But he had it in his head and wasn’t budging. So we finally compromised and he was going to walk back to the car and come and get us along the way once we left. So Bill and I stayed and got to see the exciting finish and then left to start our walk back. We saw the line for the shuttles which was a million miles long, and all the shuttles were stuck in traffic and said, screw it, we’re hoofing it. I couldn’t get a hold of Marty and then all of the sudden I get a call from an odd number. I answer and it’s Marty – he had gotten lost trying to find our car and ended up who knows where before deciding to just go back to the stadium and get on a shuttle! He was luckily already on a shuttle and didn’t have to wait in that line we saw. In the end, he still got to the car before us and picked us up along the street and we got out of there before hitting any backups!
At one point during the game I went to the bathroom and had to laugh at what was painted behind every toilet – “Please do not throw liquor bottles down the toilet.” Ha! Only in North Cackalacky!!
Totally on a different topic – the Philly half marathon and marathon are sold out! I had sent my entry in through the mail because I didn’t want to pay the Active fee (which is such a ripoff) but I didn’t know if my stuff got there in time (I’m not sure when exactly it sold out). When I checked, I wasn’t on the confirmation list. I emailed them and a few days went by before I finally got confirmation that I was in – probably just barely. Pheww!