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SATURDAY - GF and I left from Milwaukee on Saturday morning, and headed for my parents' lake cottage which is 30 miles south of Green Bay. But this was not fun and games; the cottage has been sold and we had to help in packing everything up and putting it into storage. In the spring parents will build a home on another nearby lake which is where they will retire. So lots of changes coming up in the family. But we'll have a place to stay outside of Green Bay for game weekends. :-) Saturday night GF and I checked into the SANDMAN motel, which is in BRILLION. I had called for rooms in Green Bay but they were charging something like $125+ per night and a minimum of two nights. The Sandman was $53 with the tax. When I checked in the lady asked me: "Going to the game or hunting?" That's Wisconsin this time of year. :-)

SUNDAY MORNING - We slept in, being a bit tired from the work on Saturday, and there was no hurry for running into Green Bay since the game was at 3:15PM. If you go up county road PP from Brillion, you hit DE PERE, and we ate lunch at SPLINTER'S, which is a sports bar on the south side of the Green Bay area. The place was dead, but when we left it was already half full. This was at 12:30PM and I was in awe of all these people coming in already to claim a seat for a game that didn't start for almost another 3 hours. It was still a little early to be arriving for the game, so we stopped at BAY PARK(?) shopping mall. We've been here before but it's been a couple years, so the GF was happy to browse beyond her usual diggings. I actually bought a turtle-neck Packers shirt to help keep me warm since it was a bit nippy outside. ($17.63 at Kohl's; not too bad).

We head on up to Lambeau and park on the street for free Southwest of the stadium. My cousin lives a couple streets south of Lambeau and we stopped in to visit. He has cars park on his lawn for $7 but it was a slow day, not too many cars this time. Last week for the Ravens game he was full up. Cousin BLEEDS green and gold and he had been trying to get a ticket all week. Going price was $200 and up and I was a really surprised by that. I keep an eye on the hype but I didn't know tickets for the 49er game were that hot. Perhaps it was because this was a "Milwaukee" game making it a scramble for Green Bay folks to find a ticket. There were a lot of people wanting to get into Lambeau for *THIS* game. Cousin said he was going to the scalper pit when he was done parking cars to see what he could get. Then it was off to Lambeau! We timed it pretty well, it being an hour before the game started, so we went to our seats and didn't cruise through the crowd like we sometimes do.

The FREEBIE DU JOUR was a yellow foam tube that looked like a big macaroni noodle. So printed on it was "Packeroni." Yeah, it was dumb, but we like free stuff and when you have a stadium full of people waving these things, it's kind of neat. :) WHOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooosh! I hope you were in your seat when the game started because all of a sudden it's 7-0 Packers! Gotta love that! :-) Oh, yeah, my seats. We're in the north end zone, which is the end with the "Green Bay" letters. If you take the letter "Y" and follow the line that the outside arm of the "Y" makes, it points directly to where we're sitting. We're in the SECOND row and it's great being down that close to the field! On that first play of the game you could see Brett right there, up close and personal, making an audible change in the play and moving the players around into the proper positions. Then WHAM it's 7-0.

The crowd is on it's feet and we're all laughing and cheering and dancing to the music on the PA system. It's hard to believe we're here! :-) Sure, you get to see each play on TV with all kinds of zooms and angles, but you don't get the feel of being in the crowd when we're all on our feet and yelling during key plays and scores. People are shouting and are emotional and into the game, and you *FEEL* the intensity. You see the TV close in on Steve Young, but we get to see the defense waving its arms for noise, and everyone obliging, getting on their feet and hollering their heads off. But it works the other way too sometimes. The third quarter was ugly. The crowd was getting pretty quiet, and everyone was bracing themselves for the loss that was going to come. But the loss never came and the rally to victory made this game that much more to savor and relish. "The roar of the crowd" may be such an old cliche, but to be caught in that roar is something you can feel, and no TV is going to bring *THAT* into your living room. Remember the touchdown pass Brett Favre made but it was nullified by a penalty? Before the penalty was apparent, Brett Favre was right down there in front of us, bellowing to the crowd as we cheered him, and it was great! To be able to be right there and a part of it was unique, and to see Brett up close and personal very enjoyable. Then we saw that derned yellow piece of cloth and we had to settle for the field goal. But what a moment... :-)

Let's see... Just before the game starts they have this promotion where 2 contestants get a chance to catch a 30 yard and a 60 yard punt for prizes. Two women were chosen, and they both caught the 30 yarders, but both missed the 60 yarder. It was fun to watch. At halftime there are two more contestants who throw footballs into the back of a pick-up truck. Make a near-impossible throw through a hole in the window and you win the truck, but you can forget that. The two guys they had were TERRIBLE. But *THAT* was fun to watch. :-) The U-W Marching Band from Madison was the band that played during halftime. I went to college in another state so I was kind of neutral about them, but a lot of Bucky Badger fans enjoyed their performance. At the 2-minute warning at the end of the game, you all went to commercial but in Lambeau they were playing "YMCA" by the Village People and everyone was on their feet, dancing to the music. At that point it was really festive because the game was won and we were savoring the victory. As the Packers went off the field through the north end zone, we cheered them, appreciating our ability to be so close to the action. A number of players throw their gloves and similar items into the crowd, and Henderson ran down right in front of us to personally give his gloves to some kids. That's what it's all about. :-)

Then the U-W Marching Band did their 5th-quarter performance, and it was a mob scene. :-) They started out formal-like, but as it went along half the band would be playing while the other half just ran around, doing various kinds of tricks or just plain fooling around. A number of the band members started doing the Lambeau Leap right in front of us, they jumping into the stands right along with us. And everyone is laughing and singing and dancing, or just watching, having a good ol' time.

Suddenly, a smoke bomb comes flying from behind us and onto the field. The police and security people snap to it and are really pissed off. Then other "bomb" comes down and they see the guy who threw the second one. It really wasn't a smoke bomb, but a jar full of some kind of powder making for the appearance of some kind of projectile giving off smoke. But throwing glass jars onto the field is a serious matter. The police yell at the crowd to grab the guy, and he is led down and is ordered onto the field where he is handcuffed and arrested. This person is wearing a Dallas Cowboys hat and a Dallas Cowboys sweatshirt. (No, I'm not kidding. This all really happened). My only thought is how lucky this guy is. He gets to go to jail and meet his favorite team. ;-)

GF and I head on back to the car and we stop at my cousin's house for a bit. He and a friend got tickets from the scalpers, paying $90/ticket. But it was such a great game so he was glad to get in. What really made it special for him was that he had 4 friends come up from Milwaukee who were going to the game. The tickets my cousin got, which were purchased pretty much at random, were about 5 seats away from his 4 friends from Milwaukee so they were all at the game together. It just doesn't get any better than that. :-) Well, I hope this gave you a little different perspective of the game and a feel for Lambeau Field. That was the last of my tickets so no more trip reports from me for this year. After being at Lambeau for such a great game, it's going to be hard to go back to the TV. ;-) I'd like to say something that would end this post in just the right way, but I can't find any words to make a good finish. But it was such great fun when the announcer came over the PA system announcing the final score of the Viking/Bucs game. You had to be there. :-)