Today was a fine today I suppose. Started out strong, went on well, ended poorly. In the end, two for three is over 50 percent so I suppose I can chalk today up for a win.
Started out nice and early with me getting up at 8:30, in the shower at 8:45, out, eating Cheerios, leaving at 9:20, and getting to TU and on the field WELL before the 10:00 call time. So while I waited around for things to start, I joined the small huddle that was surrounding Sarge for story time. After some good ones we all broke off to start warming up on our own, fell into our block on command, ran the pregame and the show, and then we were done. At that point I figured since I was already at TU and I had to attend at least one actual Phi Mu Alpha meeting to fulfill my probationary requirement that I'd just go to the one at 11. Sure enough I went over to Tyreal, got another interview done (this time with Alex Jones), and attended the meeting. I lucked out because they actually moved to skip a few parts and no one had much to discuss, so the meeting was over in about 10 minutes.
At this point I decided I'd just go ahead and go home for a quick shower, after which I'd grab my uniform and other things and head right back to TU. I thought it'd only take 30 minutes but it ended up taking twice as long because I forgot so many things that I ended up making about 10 trips to and from my car. I blame those memory issues on the fact that this week has been like a series of Mondays. So many small mental errors you'd make on a Monday, but made on Thursday and Friday and today. Either way, I managed to get everything I needed (and then some) and head back to TU.
By the time I had gotten back to TU they'd already decided to start closing the parking lots nearest the stadium so I ended up parking in the lot near Tyreal and hauling my backpack, tenor, and uniform over to the band room. For those who have no concept of the TU campus, it's not very far away at all (between two or three football fields) but carrying all that crap didn't make it seem any shorter than it really was. I got back to the bandroom, set my crap down, and hoped to get started on our Music Theory III group project. This was made a slight challenge by the fact that I was the only one in the room from our group. That was nullified quickly by the arrival of Amy, Amber, and Jennifer (with Ricky following his usual pattern of showing up 30+ minutes late). We began to work on our theory work and for once, I honestly had no idea what I was doing. There have been a lot of times where I only halfway know the concept and manage to bullshit my way through it, but this was not one of them.
After getting relatively little of the theory work done over the course of an hour and a half I was called by one of the Phi Mu Alpha guys to come assist with the cookout. They usually hold a cookout before each game and today was no exception. Jason grilled the burgers (after damn near grilling himself/using half a bottle of lighter fluid), and my task was to cart them in a small pan to the table inside so that the band members could partake in their delicious deliciousness. It actually instilled a pretty sizable feeling of doing something good to help out with such a thing and to provide food for hungry friends. Unfortunately, because they had to go walk around campus with the drum line and weren't present, the drum majors didn't get burgers before we started putting things up, so if they happen upon this, my most sincere apologies.
Anyway, after the cookout everyone got their uniform on and their instrument out and we all lined up to march out to the stadium from the parking lot. We started out and barely out of the parking lot my foot starts cramping like none other for no particular reason. Marching for an hour straight, that's fine. Marching a quarter mile at OU's campus, that's jim dandy. Going 30 feet from the TU parking lot, that's impossible. So we marched to the stadium, and past it. We went out into the large field in the [new] U and played several stand tunes for the tailgating-on-the-grass crowd that was there. Then we marched to the stadium and stood in the road outside of it playing to a wall of the athletic building. Finally we marched into the stadium and lined up behind the end zone and waited for 30 minutes or so before we started into pregame. While we waited, the football team was warming up, which means that the kicker was kicking field goals. Through the goal posts. That we were right behind. It was actually kind of fun having to watch out for incoming footballs and possibly deflect or dodge them.
We got through pregame fine and headed into our two lines to make a tunnel for the players to run through. Then came the children. Hundreds upon hundreds of children were at the game for some reason and they were allowed to line up with us and make the tunnel stretch from one corner of the field to the other. That worked out without much problem, but the rest of the stuff was horrible. First ran out some group of people who were a mob of school spirit and body paint, then was a super golf cart with our new and "improved" Captain Cane mascot (to his credit, how the hell would you make a good hurricane mascot?), and then the athletic director rode his motorcycle out. We played the fight song, and started into our "super well rehearsed" move backwards move. It wasn't pretty, but no one died.
We went into the stands and sat there, playing Short (the ending few measures of the fight song we can just rattle off) several times because this week was like last week in reverse. We started smashing the other team, despite making stupid mistakes. It didn't end up being a shutout because they, unlike us, weren't too proud to just take a damn field goal. Either way the first half went by fairly quickly, and then came halftime. We went down to the field and Sam Houston State's band started into their Journey show. Honestly I don't have much of an opinion on it. It wasn't good, but it wasn't horrible. It just wasn't worth caring about to me. We went through out show and when we got back around to our side there were QT sandwiches and Pepsi and cookies provided for us. I grabbed a club sandwich and a Pepsi and a chocolate chip cookie and headed back to my spot in the stands.
Giving us sandwiches and cookies and then expecting us to eat them, while being ready to pick up our horns and play in a split second's notice provided much entertainment at the expense of Kurt's temper. Regardless of how much of a challenge that was, it didn't matter to me because I had about three bites of the sandwich and remembered I don't like them (Sam I Am) and moved on to the cookie. I took a single bite of the cookie and it was utterly horrible. It was hard, but not the crunchy type of hard. More like hardened steel. Then, to add insult to injury, it tasted abysmal as well. I felt kind of bad taking the food and not eating it when someone else could have grabbed either/or and have been happy with it.
Third quarter started with the traveling band getting up and, well, traveling. I kind of wish I was a part of it but on the other hand, it's nice to have a lax quarter to recover and recuperate. The rest of the game went by fairly quickly (in the blink of an eye compared to last week's game against OU) and we went down to the field to march back to the band room. We did so, and when we got back everyone managed to be gone surprisingly quickly. I checked to see if anyone was doing anything and the majority of my TCC friends were going to the Owasso marching invitational, of which I had no steak or interest so I decided to call them gay and not go. Other than that, no one was doing anything or at least nothing I was up for, so I headed back to my car with all my stuff.
Having gotten there I find a lovely little ticket resting on my windshield. The way things are set up are so that if you have season tickets (or just tickets, I don't know) you have a colored sticker for your car, and that allows you to park in certain lots. Nevermind the fact that my car was parked there WELL before they closed the lot off, I still didn't have one of those parking stickers. So I come back to find a ticket on my windshield that wasn't for the $25 that we had originally thought, but instead for twice that much. Fuck. That. Shit. Sarge told those of us at TCC that if we get a ticket for parking on campus that he'll take care of them, so come Monday I'm going to let him.
After that I got home, salted a slug (I expected more of a show but instead it just shriveled up), remembered I was hungry, and went to get tacos. As I pulled up to the drive through I had my window down and heard the tail end of a conversation between the squawk box and the person in front of me telling them that they'd have to deliver their complaint to the manager the following morning. I didn't think that boded well for my order but as it turned out things went fine. Brought the tacos home, ate them, and then wrote this.
The End.
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