Thoughts from a big concrete box

To tell you about my weekend in full would be unfair. It was so good that the details would fuel a bitter envy in you and make you taste nothing but bile, which would ruin your lunch, and if there's one thing I would never do—even to my worst enemy—it's ruin anyone's lunch. But that's how good my weekend was. Lunch-ruining good.

The most notable event of the weekend was the Ravens-Texans football game that I attended thanks to the thoughtfulness of frequent areseven.com commenter Scott. This was the most notable event of the weekend not because of the matchup (have you seen the records of these two teams? This was not a notable game), and not even because it was the second-ever time that I've gotten to watch the Texans in person¹, but because it involved tickets. You can tell if anything is big time or not by whether or not it has tickets.

While some of you may have seen the result of this game and thought of me upset over the ridiculous result, I kind of felt like I got to see the quintessential '05 Texans: playing badly, going into the last minute with a lead only to lose it in the last second. Plus, it means they're still in line for the first pick of the draft, which is a good thing, I guess, even though I really like Domanick Davis and don't really want him to be replaced (and don't think he really needs to be). So I wasn't really too upset with the result, although I did take the opportunity to yell a disgusted "DISGRACE!" at the Texans bench as time expired. But I was in as high a level as you could be, so it's not like they heard, but it was really more for God than Dom Capers. You take my one and only beloved football team from me and then replace them with THIS?!!, my prayer went.

It was nice to finally see the Ravens stadium, too, and interesting to compare it to its next-door neighbor Camden Yards, which I've been to once before. The most interesting difference was that, while new football stadiums have plenty more concession stands and bathrooms than their torture-chamber predecessors built in the '60's and '70's, they're still basically big concrete boxes. They're all about utility with the only frills left for the over-priced luxury boxes and club level. The baseball stadium, on the other hand, is full of nicer, more varied restaurants and lots of gimmicks and curiosities. I think it comes down to the number of games: with only 8 regular-season games a year, football doesn't need to do a whole lot to hold your attention, whereas baseball has 60 home games a year, so they have to sweeten the deal a little bit with playgrounds, wireless connections and other distractions. New baseball stadiums seem to say, "Come to the game and you can even bring the people in your life that hate baseball; they'll have plenty to do!" New football stadiums are more like, "Sit down, shut up and watch the game." Which is one of the many reasons I love football.

One other thing that I would like to point out is the Baltimore fans. Because no one seems to be able to mention the word "Baltimore" without adding "working-class" somewhere in the next few words, I figured that a Baltimore crowd would be a lot like a Philly crowd (read: obnoxious and unruly), and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little bit nervous wearing my Texans hat into the stadium. But while it was definitely pretty blue-collar crowd, they were extremely friendly, and it was some of the funniest heckling I've ever heard. Best of the day was someone yelling, "Why don't you get on your knees and throw it?" after a Kyle Boller incompletion, a reference to the hype that he was getting just before he was drafted where people were getting all excited that he could get on his knees on the 50-yard-line and throw the ball through the goalposts. Which is useful...how?

I should end this rambling, but not before I mention that I think I may now be the only person in the world who ate fried pickles as an appetizer for an Ethiopian dinner.

¹ This is now exactly the same number of times they've been shown on nationwide TV in four years. EDIT: I'm wrong on this. So so so wrong. Are Seven regrets the error and assures our readers that our research staff will be executed for this mistake.