Story of my First NFL Game Ever! (It's a Doozy)

(This is based on a true story. I say “based” because as you will see, my memory of these events are shotty at best.)

It was Monday, October 11, 2010. The country has changed so much since then. The world has changed so much since then...I’ve changed so much since then.

Let me paint you a mind picture. The Green and White New York Jets were playing the Purple and Gold Minnesota Vikings and I was going to attend this game as my first NFL game in my life. Duke, his brother Joe, his girlfriend Joe and Nick had all both tickets together and planned on having a great time.

We planned and God laughed.           

We got there hours early to tailgate. We didn’t have a parking pass so we parked in the lawn of a nearby hotel. It was close and there were a bunch of other cars so we were happy and started setting up our pregame party.

The weather was the perfect tailgating type of weather. Sun was shining and for October, it was pretty warm.

I love to grill. It’s a man thing. Cooking the dead flesh of an animal. Will anything make you more of a man than that? Maybe just eating the dead flesh without cooking it, but you’d probably end up dead that way. Though you’d die in the manliest way possible.

As the Grill Master, a title I created, the number one rule is to cook for all of your subjects first and then once everyone has something you can cook for yourself. Well that’s good for most people, not me. You see I love to drink. Drinking is the best no matter what those commies at AA tell you. So before the grill even came out of the car, I was pounding beers. No, pounding isn’t the right word. Binge drinking would also be a poor comparison. Devouring. Yes. I was devouring beers like a Satan-like figure would devour evil souls in hell. And as I bet Satan-like figures know, the eviler the soul the better they taste. These beers were going down like I was consuming Hitler’s soul on repeat.

But I hadn't eaten any real food.

I don't think the first burger was put on the grill and I was already opening my 5th beer. So I was drunk. But I was reallly excited. First NFL game ever!!!! WOOOOOO!!!!!

Other than cooking, I had lots of other stuff to do too. You know, usually virgin football stuff like painting my entire body in Green and White paint. I shaved my head the night before so I could cover everything above my waist.

 (You might wonder what kind of weird underwear I'm wearing. Well it's not underwear STOOPID! It's my green speedo.)

So now I was probably 8 beers in, having been parked for an hour, with Joey Dukes rubbing paint on me like a Geisha giving her master a sponge bath. He was also shirtless at the time, with his bottom half wearing my Green Man suit, so it was a pretty manly body painting session.

More beer was drunk. I was drunk. Honestly I have no idea if I ever got actually cook something for myself. I’m pretty sure someone else must’ve taken over grill duties at some point. But I was still pumped. And the more I drank, the more pumped I got. If I was jam, I was being pumped harder than any jam has ever been pumped up.

Now it was time to head off to the stadium. Joe wearing the Green Man Suit like a true champion. Me, half naked from the waist up, not that anyone could tell from the perfect paint job I had received. It was Sports Illustrated Body Paint Swimsuit Edition quality. And of course Duke, Nick and Danielle followed in tow. (Note: My buddy Kemmann and his dad were there too, but they didn’t park with us and I’m not sure if they left the tailgate before we headed out. Really not important, but didn’t want him to think I forgot about him.)

Let me clarify something right now. I’m not stupid. Let’s just make that clear. It was October, so I did bring a sweater with me. You know, just in case it got cold. Pretty smart thing to do. Unfortunately, neither I nor my sweater was ready for what was about to happen.

As we began to walk, we felt a slight drizzle begin. No worries. It was sunny all day and I didn’t remember seeing a single cloud in the sky. This would pass right over. Unfortunately, this storm has no intention of passing over anything. This storm was no Moses. (Passing over. Passover. Jewish. Moses. Get it?)

Seconds after the drizzle began and nanoseconds after my Moses joke, it began to down pour. Luckily we were nearby a tunnel we had to walk through to get to the stadium anyway and by the time we walked through the rain would be over.

Ahhh. NOPE! Not only was it raining even harder, it was now HAILING! There was a flash of lightning in the sky. What the hell was going on? Were we in “This Is The End?” Was someone playing Jumanji nearby? “Every month at the quarter moon there will be a typhoon in your lagoon.” I was there to watch a football game. I don’t care what I landed on, I wasn’t going to wait until someone rolled a five or eight to get to this stadium.

Should I keep going on with Jumanji references?

We decided to just go into the stadium where at least the corridors would protect us. Unfortunately (the 3^rd unfortunately so far) by the time I was through the entrance, all of my body paint was gone. Completely washed away. I just looked like a douche bag going to a football game with no shirt on. Now I still had my trusty sweatshirt, but it was already soaking wet and really couldn’t protect me anymore.

(Note: From this point on my memory becomes less and less of a good witness. I some of it was told back to me, other parts I think I remember.)

We made it inside the stadium. The Promised Land where everything will be completely dry and warm and perfect. Unfortunately (4^th), not so much. It was raining/hailing so hard that there wasn’t any place to go that you wouldn’t get wet. The walls became waterfalls. The hallways became rivers. Plus the game was now delayed. There was no escaping it. Well that’s not completely true. There was actually two escape routes.

One. Booze.

Two. Green Man.

While my outfit was completely ruined, Joe was still going strong with his. He was the Green Man. He not only got my spirits up, but the spirits of every Jet fan we passed by. He was joking with people and flirting with girls. Also, since the game was delayed and it was raining outside, everyone was inside as if it was a bar. Not many people were walking around. They were just hanging out.

At one point, I’m not sure exactly who started it, it might’ve been Joe or me (or maybe someone else completely) but every time we saw a Vikings we started to boo them. Which was funny for just us to do it, but soon every Jets fan that lined the hallway joined it. “BOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! BOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!” We started yelling insults too. Pretty shitty ones if I remember correctly. Like “Purple to a football game? Get some fashion sense.” “Who’s your favorite Viking? Eric the Red?!” And of course more Boo’s thrown out in the middle. We boo’ed so hard even ghosts were scared. (Note: I can’t be positive if any ghosts were actually scared. I don’t talk to ghosts. I’m no Jennifer Love Hewitt or Christina Ricci. I'm making a joke)

The game was delayed for quite some time and I get bored with the same joke over and over so me and Joe decided to change things up a little bit. Instead of insulting the Viking fans, we decided to block their way by walking in front of them. If we saw Viking fans come by we’d get in front of them and begin to move at a snail’s pace. When they tried to move, we got right back in front of them. It might not sound funny, but it was. Think of it this way, if you are walking down the sidewalk and you have a bunch of people walking slowly in front of you and you can’t get around them, how annoyed do you get? REALLY ANNOYED! It’s one of my pet peeves. (Note: I could’ve easily have written about Sidewalk Etiquette instead of saying “God Bless You.”)

Soon we saw a large man holding about six-eight beers. He was walking very carefully as to not drop the $70 investment he just made. This was our new target. We got right in front of him and did our usual slow down. He went right, we went right. He went left, we went left. He went forward, we went, well we went nowhere. He walked right into us thinking he could get by, but he couldn’t and his miscalculation cost him all of his beers. He dropped all of them onto the ground. I’m not even sure if we turned around to look at the damage. I just remember running as fast as we could to get away from him. Like I said, he was a large man and a man in a Green suit and a shirtless drunk were two easily found people.

And that’s all I remember. I don’t remember where we ran to, if the guy followed us, how we met back up with Duke and them. Next thing I know it’s kickoff and I’m going nuts for the Jets!

The story gets somewhat anti-climatic (as a lot of my stories do) but there are moments I do remember that are worth mentioning.

J-E-T-S JETS! JETS! JETS!

(I made this myself. Get it? It's like Jets football meets Jets from West Side Story)

The game began an hour late at 9:15 (which I just looked up), but luckily it had basically stopped raining, hailing, and lightning. Unfortunately (5^th) it was freezing now and all I had was a sweater soaked in ice cold water. I struggled to stay warm from the cold, to stay awake from the alcohol, and to stay alive from that Satan-like creature that would soon be eating my soul. When half time came, Duke and Nick wanted to check out Kemmann’s seats. Not me. I didn’t care where Kemmann was sitting. I was convinced that I was going to die in the stupidest way possible. Half naked at a football game.

It might’ve been Joe who suggested it or my own ranting about how I was going to die, but Joe decided to bring me back to the car. I don’t remember the walk back. At all. Not even in the way where someone tells you a story that you don’t remember, but you convince yourself you do and then you actually think you do remember it, but it’s really just the other people’s point of view. Nope. Not even that. I was done.

Memory comes back when we get back to the car. I walk to get in the passenger side and step in a HUGE FUCKING PUDDLE. 

The storm basically formed a huge moat around the car. I just casually walked through it and anything that had began to dry off, was now soaking wet again.

Well boys and girls, what do we do when we have wet clothes on and about to get into someone else’s car? If you said, “Get completely naked,” then you answered correctly. I took off all the clothes I was wearing and got in the car. Now I also wanted to warm up, so I found the white undershirt I wore to the game and put it on like shorts. Or really underpants would probably be a better image. With the shirt’s head going over where all my man junk was.

Then I passed out. The next thing I know Duke is waking me up saying that we’re at my house. I get out (fall out) of the car wearing only my white undershirt around my legs and stumble into my house.

Duke called me the next day and told me he found body paint all over his car. I felt bad about that, but not as bad as the hangover made me feel. Lots of my friends made fun of me saying “What kind of true fan can’t even watch a full football game?” Well I’ll tell you what kind of fan guys. A fan that spells his name D-A-V-E.

My only regret is I didn’t drink more.

P.S. You would’ve thought that I learned from this experience. In some ways I did, in some ways I didn’t. The next football game I went to was on Thanksgiving. I did get drunk, but not like in this story. The real problem I faced was getting home at 3am only to have to be at work at 4am for a 12-hour Black Friday work shift at Sports Authority. That day was also miserable.