August 15th Challenge

Hi it’s Christina –

Finally got yesterday's pic
to sync up from my phone

Good morning from Dallas, well technically Arlington – day two.

Oh was my hubby a happy, happy boy yesterday, well until 2:30 that is, but I’ll get to that in a moment. As I told you, we went on our guided tour of AT&T stadium. As you know, I am not, still am not, nor will I ever be, a Dallas Cowboys fan. However, I am a big enough person to admit, I did enjoy the stadium. The place is impressive, but then again, when you spend 1.2 billion – that is not a misprint, that is billion with a “B” – dollars, how could it not be?

The final bill for the place was double the initial budget. Now, and I’m sure like many of you, I have gone over budget on projects. It happens, but I know if I have a $100 budget for something, and I end up spending $120, a mere $20, I’m not happy with myself. I couldn’t even imagine blowing my budget by $600,000,000.00. Dang that’s a lot of zeroes!

Our tour guide Daniel

Our tour guide yesterday was Daniel, and he did a fabulous job. He was really funny and informative. We saw a few other tours while we were going through the stadium, and they did not look like they were having nearly as much fun as we were.

Happy Boy!

I promise I will not bore you with all the stats on the stadium, but I do want to give you one fun fact. Did you know the Statue of Liberty, base and all, could sit on the star in the middle of the field, and the roof would be able to close over the raised torch, and there would still be room to spare? Pretty impressive.

Our tour started at eleven, and officially ended a little after one. We were then left to our own devises. We could stay on the field as long as we wanted, so I took a few photos and then we made our way to the pro shop. (My son and his girlfriend gave my hubby a gift certificate to the pro shop for his birthday.) My hubby was like a kid in the candy store again, but he did good. He only went over budget by $12 and most of that was tax.

We finally leave the pro shop a little after two. It was 103 yesterday, so there was no way we were going to be able to hop right in the black interior car and drive away, not after it was baking in the hot Texas sun for almost four hours. So we opened up all the doors so it could air out a bit.

New Chevy Impala

While the car was cooling down, my husband spotted a brand new Chevy Impala parked in the next row. He thought it looked cool, so he went over to check it out. As he was walking around the car, he stepped off of the curb, his ankle folded under him, and he went down on all fours.

DANGER:
Step away from the curb!

Now by us, storm drains are covered by a grate, and are, for the most part, level with the road. Not the ones at AT&T Stadium. The ones there are similar to the one in this photo, no grate, just back sloped, and all open. I’m not saying they are better or worse than the ones we have at home, but at least the ones we have at home are clearly recognizable. You would think the curb above the drain would be painted, so people would notice them and prepare themselves to take a longer step to avoid the drain.

So there he was, on the ground, and I’m thinking there’s no way I’m going to be able to get him to the car by myself. I get him swiveled around so he at least sitting on the curb, and I go for help. Within in minutes, this huge teddy bear of a man, Ricky, comes walking towards us. (AT&T Stadium staff is courteous and attentive, my hat’s off to them.) Ricky starts asking questions to ascertain if my husband is okay, and starts filling out the accident report, or he tried to. His pen wouldn’t work and he ended up messing up the card he was supposed to fill out.

While we were talking, my hubby managed to stand up and start to put a little tentative pressure on his ankle. Then he gingerly picked his way the ten yards or so over to our car and leans back against it for some support. He’s uncomfortable, but it was nowhere near as bad as he initially thought, so when asked if he wanted medical attention, he said no, we’ll just ice it and wrap it up when we got back to the hotel.

YUCK!

At this point, a second guy arrived to see if we needed any more help. Ricky tells him he needs to go in to the office and fill out the paperwork. The new guy goes to hand Ricky a new card, to which Ricky tells him to fill out while he goes in the office. Before Ricky walks away, my husband pushes away from the car so he could take a few more steps – he’s from the “walk it off” generation – and there, on the back taillight where my husband was leaning, was this huge green sticky blob.

I told my husband to freeze, and I went to check the back of his pants. Sure enough, there was a matching green sticky blob on the back of his shorts, not on his butt, but just above the pockets. I guess when he pulled himself up onto the curb, he must have scraped up gum (or whatever the green goop was). If it was gum, then someone had several pieces in his mouth at one time. I’m telling you, the blob was really big.

Anyway, after the initial chuckles and comments as to how my husband’s day was going, Ricky left to go to the office, and I took the incident card from the other guy so I could fill it out for him. It had all the usual things you would expect, name, address, phone number, date, time of incident, etc.; but then I get down to the printed yes and no question portion of the card. Was there alcohol involved? Was the person ejected from the game? Was the person banned from the stadium? Was the person arrested? Good grief! Just a little insight to what these guys have to deal with on game days. God bless them!

I can't believe I found a picture
of Ricky!

After fifteen minutes or so, Ricky comes back, and bless his heart, with him he has a wad of paper towels so I can clean off my husband’s shorts and the car, plus a plastic bag to put over the seat just in case I can’t get the goop off the shorts (I couldn’t). What a thoughtful guy! He hands us his card and tells us to call if we need anything, and I said depending on how my husband’s ankle is on Saturday, he may need help getting to our seats. I was teasing, but Ricky said to just call if he does, and he’ll get it taken care of. Again, what a sweet man.

We shake hands, say goodbye, and I drive across the street to Wal*Mart. Run in, grab two different sized ace bandages, then I get my hubby back to our room, get his foot propped up on the ottoman, and a bag of ice to keep the swelling down. Later in the afternoon he was able to go down to the pool, and then we went out to dinner last night – I said I could just pick up some curb-side to go, but he insisted on going out. Okay, he’s the boss.

We went to this Cajun seafood restaurant called Razzoo’s, about twenty minutes from our hotel. It was alright. I wanted crawfish. I hadn’t had them since I was a kid and I wanted my hubby to try them. Razzoo’s was the only place we could find that served them, and I was a little – no scratch that – a lot disappointed that all they had was fried crawfish tails. I was looking forward to a boiled heaping mound of them. Everything was tasty, but after the fried tails, the fried okra, and the spicy stuffed fish, my tummy was not too happy; and I’m pretty sure the two big glasses of sweet tea at seven o’clock at night is the reason I didn’t fall asleep until 12:30 and was up by 3:30 this morning. It’s going to be a LONG day.

On a more positive note, my cousin Debbie called me yesterday, and we will be spending all day Sunday together. I’m so excited, I haven’t seen her in over thirty years. We’re leaving early in the morning to make the three and a half hour drive out to her place in Austin. She offered for us to spend Sunday night at her place so we didn’t need to drive back after the long day. I didn’t want to impose, so I respectfully declined.

I was chatting with Courtney here at the front desk of our hotel, and told her what our plans were. She told me I do not want to be driving from Austin to Dallas on a Sunday night. It’s kinda like driving in Sunday night shore traffic back home. Hmmm… I may be rethinking my cousin’s kind offer. My husband said we should pack a bag, just in case.

Okay, I’ve rambled on long enough. I hope you have a great day, and happy writing!

Your Next Challenge is:

The wind gently rustled through the trees…

You have ten minutes (be honest). There is no right or wrong, just write. Spelling and punctuation don’t count, and NO ONE is allowed to criticize what someone else has written. Go.