I just joined the forum and have been sharing my trials and tribulations from my road trip for the season opener with all of my friends especially the Tech faithful....I've grown up Catholic and a big ND fan but after that weekend there are few things I hate more than the fighting irish, here goes...
For starters I am in law school in Columbia, SC and have friends all over the place. Three of us met in Atlanta since my buddy is still at Tech and is Mac's manager. Another buddy came from Huntsville. We drove 7 hours to Cincinnati staying the night and picking up another fraternity brother who works up there. The next morning, Thursday we drove to Chicago and stayed downtown at the Palmer House later attending a Cubs-Brewers game at Wrigley which was awesome being my first game. After typical albeit copious consumption of cheap beer we retired for a big weekend. As a sign of my dedication to Tech I had traveled some 1100 miles in 18 hours with 4 hours of sleep and consumed around 1 1/2 racks of the good stuff between the trip, pregame, game, and postgame.
Friday was spent going to South Bend and screwing around on their campus which is beautiful albeit monochromactic with all the tan/stone. We stayed at the KOA campground in a cabin roughly the size of the passat we went up in and had a ritualistic pregame bbq where another few racks were consumed between the four of us before a short nights rest.
Saturday morning began at 6 am and we were tailgating by 8. After the several hour interim we were good and lubricated for an epic afternoon. We spent the 15 minute walk to the stadium singing the ramblin wreck/white and gold and generally were in good spirits...until we entered the stadium and all my dreams were destroyed.
After entering the stadium and buying a coke we mixed up a standard beam and coke and approached our seats in the last row of the southeast endzone. I don't have the ticket anymore for reasons to soon be explained. After the idiot ticket usher put people in our seats after we had stood in them for 10 minutes I approached him to explain the problem. At which time he admitted being wrong and as I turned to go back to my seat he yelled at me "let me see your drink". Being of age and a college graduate I was stunned by this but conceeded. At which time he grabbed it out of my hand and then smelled it. He then told me "you're out of here" to which I asked "why" he said because you have whiskey in here to which i responded "so". At this time I was escorted out of the stands to the concourse where a head usher no taller than 5'2" called me a liar and drunk after I tried to explain I was an alumnus, sorry, and that I had traveled some distance to come there. After this I was ejected with the original usher telling me and I quote "don't come to my section again without a valid ticket" at which time he tore mine up and threw it away.
Being both disheartened but a diehard I refused to give in and bought another ticket within 5minutes from another tech alumnus outside in the same section no less. I procede back through the same gate I got thrown out of up to the same section where the usher saw me coming, grabbed me by the arm (which I'm pretty sure is illegal according to SC law) and proceeded to tough talk me and how big of a piece of sh** i was as he threw me out again. As he did another usher high-fived him and he returned the favor, they laughed and pointed at me. I take this as indicative of their desire not only to target me but taking pride in stopping Tech fans from enjoying the game.
Being more emboldened I refused to give in to the diabolical Notre Dame usher corps. It took about another 45 minutes to get another ticket. This turned out to be the scariest confrontation...
The ticket was in the north endzone dead center of the aisle so I had to cross 20+ people to get to the seat from both sides. As I got to the seat a man told me I was in the wrong section and to get the hell out there. At which time an usher helped me to my seat where the man again stood up and accused me of robbing him earlier that day and taking his ticket. He then showed the usher a group of season ticekts to that seat. Not wanting for this man who was threatening to kill to pull a shank I walked off to the bathroom telling the usher to figure it out when I returned.
As I emerged I was cornered by head ushers and police asking where I got the ticket - not lying I explained I bought it 20 minutes previous from a scalper. What the usher who escorted me out of the game explained is season ticekt holders up there pull the following scam...they buy the season group. Then on game day sell that ticket keeping the rest of the season tickets on them. They then report that ticket stolen and when someone shows up at the seat with the real one they argue that its stolen and the person who buys the scalped ticket is out his money (which was me). At this point I gave up and retired to the gym across the way to watch the second half.
I know this story sounds untrue and many might say I got what was coming to me. Its true you can't bring alcohol in but realistically was it necessary to kick me out for merely possessing it, especially being a grown adult? I do think I've set a record for most ejections in a game, definately on a road game! I laugh about it now only because of how ridiculous it was and how determined I seemed to be and in the end still lost. Is this bottom line "don't flask it" ? I think not, or how else would things like this materialize?
For starters I am in law school in Columbia, SC and have friends all over the place. Three of us met in Atlanta since my buddy is still at Tech and is Mac's manager. Another buddy came from Huntsville. We drove 7 hours to Cincinnati staying the night and picking up another fraternity brother who works up there. The next morning, Thursday we drove to Chicago and stayed downtown at the Palmer House later attending a Cubs-Brewers game at Wrigley which was awesome being my first game. After typical albeit copious consumption of cheap beer we retired for a big weekend. As a sign of my dedication to Tech I had traveled some 1100 miles in 18 hours with 4 hours of sleep and consumed around 1 1/2 racks of the good stuff between the trip, pregame, game, and postgame.
Friday was spent going to South Bend and screwing around on their campus which is beautiful albeit monochromactic with all the tan/stone. We stayed at the KOA campground in a cabin roughly the size of the passat we went up in and had a ritualistic pregame bbq where another few racks were consumed between the four of us before a short nights rest.
Saturday morning began at 6 am and we were tailgating by 8. After the several hour interim we were good and lubricated for an epic afternoon. We spent the 15 minute walk to the stadium singing the ramblin wreck/white and gold and generally were in good spirits...until we entered the stadium and all my dreams were destroyed.
After entering the stadium and buying a coke we mixed up a standard beam and coke and approached our seats in the last row of the southeast endzone. I don't have the ticket anymore for reasons to soon be explained. After the idiot ticket usher put people in our seats after we had stood in them for 10 minutes I approached him to explain the problem. At which time he admitted being wrong and as I turned to go back to my seat he yelled at me "let me see your drink". Being of age and a college graduate I was stunned by this but conceeded. At which time he grabbed it out of my hand and then smelled it. He then told me "you're out of here" to which I asked "why" he said because you have whiskey in here to which i responded "so". At this time I was escorted out of the stands to the concourse where a head usher no taller than 5'2" called me a liar and drunk after I tried to explain I was an alumnus, sorry, and that I had traveled some distance to come there. After this I was ejected with the original usher telling me and I quote "don't come to my section again without a valid ticket" at which time he tore mine up and threw it away.
Being both disheartened but a diehard I refused to give in and bought another ticket within 5minutes from another tech alumnus outside in the same section no less. I procede back through the same gate I got thrown out of up to the same section where the usher saw me coming, grabbed me by the arm (which I'm pretty sure is illegal according to SC law) and proceeded to tough talk me and how big of a piece of sh** i was as he threw me out again. As he did another usher high-fived him and he returned the favor, they laughed and pointed at me. I take this as indicative of their desire not only to target me but taking pride in stopping Tech fans from enjoying the game.
Being more emboldened I refused to give in to the diabolical Notre Dame usher corps. It took about another 45 minutes to get another ticket. This turned out to be the scariest confrontation...
The ticket was in the north endzone dead center of the aisle so I had to cross 20+ people to get to the seat from both sides. As I got to the seat a man told me I was in the wrong section and to get the hell out there. At which time an usher helped me to my seat where the man again stood up and accused me of robbing him earlier that day and taking his ticket. He then showed the usher a group of season ticekts to that seat. Not wanting for this man who was threatening to kill to pull a shank I walked off to the bathroom telling the usher to figure it out when I returned.
As I emerged I was cornered by head ushers and police asking where I got the ticket - not lying I explained I bought it 20 minutes previous from a scalper. What the usher who escorted me out of the game explained is season ticekt holders up there pull the following scam...they buy the season group. Then on game day sell that ticket keeping the rest of the season tickets on them. They then report that ticket stolen and when someone shows up at the seat with the real one they argue that its stolen and the person who buys the scalped ticket is out his money (which was me). At this point I gave up and retired to the gym across the way to watch the second half.
I know this story sounds untrue and many might say I got what was coming to me. Its true you can't bring alcohol in but realistically was it necessary to kick me out for merely possessing it, especially being a grown adult? I do think I've set a record for most ejections in a game, definately on a road game! I laugh about it now only because of how ridiculous it was and how determined I seemed to be and in the end still lost. Is this bottom line "don't flask it" ? I think not, or how else would things like this materialize?
