day the end, hollywood

its not even midnight and im tired. i have no idea why. yeah i just drove around the country but its not like i walked. its not like i wasnt treated right by pretty much everyone everywhere i went. its not like mother nature didnt totally take it easy on me. its not like my car wasnt ideal.

everything fell into place the whole trip and at this point i should have some deep and powerful lessons learned that i should share with you. but im so tired. but ok i will.

but first let me tell you what happened yesterday at the university of phoenix arena where i bought one ticket for $80 to see my beloved Bears face off against the arizona cardinals on monday night football.

my ticket’s face value was $25 and it was in the corner of the new stadium and it was way up in the sky but still a good seat if you ask me because even though im olde my eyesight is pretty good for some reason. probably all the preventitive glaucoma medicine i took while in college.

i got to the game three hours early because a) what the fuck else was i supposed to do in zona b) where else would i rather be than surrounded by giddy bears fans in the parking lot in sunny phoenix glendale c) i wanted to make sure i got a ticket

the bears fans were everywhere. the tailgating food smelled wonderful but how do you ask to eat someones steak? it was bad enough that i was video interviewing them without their permission.

because arizona is smart they have this little area right by the front door of the stadium where the cops watch as people sell their tickets to people looking for tickets. and its ok to sell them above face value. anyone who thinks im a democrat is crazy. i believe in capitalism and small government more than the next guy and i love that little area of freedom and i didnt care that i was paying almost four times the price, i wanted in and everyone else were selling better tickets for $300 and even though i could have gotten that sorta scratch, i promised myself not to pay more than $100 and i got my ticket and sighed a sigh of relief and partied.

the game started and the bears let the fucking usc rookie march down the field on them and the fans cheered. then somehow they got another touchdown. then a field goal. by halftime it was 20-0 or 20-3 and i had walked all around the spacious stadium to try to find a lucky spot for the Bears who had nothing working for them and at halftime i was that close to leaving the fucking place in disgust.

i found myself in the smoking section of the arena which is a ramp on the far end. it was dark and gloomy and all the people were smoking and drinking and the bear fans who were once loud and proud were quiet and hopeless. these were the Bears we had all grown up with: fucking retarded losers.

as i interviewed people i asked them if i should leave and they all said no. i said but i can make it to Vegas by midnight if i bail now and they said youve been living in LA too long, this aint no fucking Dodger game.

and the fans cheered me up and we moaned and we drank and i inhaled their second hand smoke and it felt like being in college again. and i met two girls who were acting so wild i didnt know if they were just party girls or working girls or what but i liked them and they seemed to like me and in the video below you can see the dude ask me if im with the Bear fans or with the Cardinal girls and i walk over to the Cardinal girls as a joke.

by the fourth quarter the bears are down 23-3 and now ive snuck down to the best seats in the house. ive found an empty seat next to a guy dressed in a bear outfit from head to toe. he looks like a 7 foot teddy bear. he has a bears jersey on. he doesnt say a word.

with 11 minutes to go in the 4th quarter i have circled the stadium dozens of times and ive even tried to ignore the game to give them luck but it doesnt work, rex grossman goes three and out for the last time and i did what my mother often does – leave the room. in this case i left the stadium and i wasnt the only one. so many of us hopped onto the shuttle busses back to the high school two miles away where the parking lot is. someone jokes that zona had scored again and we all moan.

the guy im sitting next to calls his wife who says, god i feel so bad. and he says, “you? im the one at the game in a fucking grizzly bear outfit.”

get to the lot, find my car in the dark which is tougher than it seems. everyone else has car alarms that they activate from their key chains but i have to rely on my spidey senses and find the fucker and turn on my computer to figure out if im gonna go to vegas or LA or san diego or mexico. everywhere is 6 hours away and its 8:30pm and i had been given some drinks by the ladies but i had convinced myself that those, just like all the other beers, were bad luck beers, and i poured them out after the bears had done something dumb. but still i was too tired and buzzed to drive too far. at that point i realize that Yuma should be my last stop. it was only two hours away and four hours from San Diego where i could have a late lunch with my girl danielle who i hadnt seen in too long.

i drive out of the lot, end up on a freeway that takes me past the stadium and i think, man im glad i didnt have to fight traffic against all those cars, but wow no one else seems to be leaving the stadium. then i turn on the radio and the announcer says “the bears somehow stay undefeated in what might have been the craziest ending to a monday night game EVER.”

and thats how i won the game for chicago.

you’re welcome.