What follows is my recollection of the events of that Sunday. All Mardi Gras alcohol jokes aside (I honestly didn't have that much to drink), I believe it to be pretty damned accurate:
- Arrival at viewing stop #1, Finn McCools in Mid City. Someone flew in from Ireland to watch the game there. It is the single rowdiest bar gathering I have ever seen in New Orleans, and I watched France v. Brazil there during the 2006 World Cup - French guys on one side of the room, pissed-off Brazilians on the other. We drank Guinness. My lovely spouse had a nice conversation with a gentleman in a black and gold dress. I thought nothing of it.
- Realizing that Finn's might turn into a riot, the Canal streetcar conveys us to the Popeye's on St. Charles Avenue, a few blocks from our hotel. The streetcar driver jokes about everyone saying they're from New Orleans. I told him I worked for the Water Board during Katrina. He gave me a look that told me he knew I wasn't kidding. He gave me a score update on his phone.
- Popeye's, St. Charles Avenue. One of the best ones. The normally surly staff, even working during the game, are cheerful. They give us score updates from their phones, too.
- While walking back towards the hotel, we crashed a street party off St. Charles where they had projected the game on the side of a building. Everyone was cool. When the Colts scored again, I declared that we were bad luck. We left. The party sighed relief.
- Circle Bar: things still don't look good. When we walk out towards the hotel, we notice that they are flashing "S-A-I-N-T-S" in a pattern on all the hotel windows.
- Hotel: Shockey TD. Tracy "Pick 6" Porter. I jump around and hug my lovely wife so much that I accidentally get scratched under the left eye. We immediately march into the private party in the lobby that had suddenly become a lot less private. The last-minute Colts drive fails. People absolutely lose it. A guy jumps up and down on crutches. I double over screaming, tears in my eyes. I will never forget the look on my lovely wife's face. They immediately play "The Saints are Coming." I call The Cousin (tm), who I know is the only blood relative who would understand this. I still am not sure if he heard any of the conversation, including my parting words that we are promptly headed to Bourbon Street, tell the family I love them, sell my stuff if I don't make it back.
- There is literally a mob of people heading from the CBD to the Quarter. It is more insane than any New Orleans party I've ever seen, Mardi Gras Day included. Screams. Hi-fives among strangers of different races, genders, backgrounds, people who would normally not even look each other in the eye.
- St. Louis Cathedral flies the Saints flag alongside the American flag. They took down the papal flag earlier in the day to make way for it, because Pope Benedict XVI had officially given his blessing to do so.
- We loop through the Quarter and to the CBD. Poydras Street is literally at a standstill with people screaming from the cars, the backs of trucks, running down the street between the vehicles. Camp Street is the same. It is the same all the way back to the hotel, which is easily a mile and a half from the edge of the Quarter. Pure, abject happiness.
1 comments:
Ah, Popeyes...the official fried chicken of the Washington Redskins. No, really.
I don't think I've come within shouting distance of something like this in my life. 2004 at Cal was close, after winning Big Game, when everybody thought the Rose Bowl was almost a done deal. Not so much.
Of course, Bama avenged that this year - but Bama winning a national title is more like "business taken care of" than "oh my God is this really happening for us." The only thing I can imagine would be Vanderbilt winning the Sugar Bowl or some such.
I remember you calling, through an alcoholic haze, but I don't think I heard a thing. I remember just holding the phone up and hoping you could hear a bunch of people in Silicon Valley screaming the Who Dat at the top of their lungs. (The "Who Dat," much like the "Our Father" or the "Hail Mary" if you will.) And I remember blubbering like a hospital scene in a Mexican soap opera, because for once, evil was laid low in ignominious fashion and good prevailed. And it made me happy.
Shit, it's been a hell of a four years since Le Pavilion, ain't it?
Post a Comment