The Adventures of Team Parker

What had originally begun as a low-key one-event weeked for us some weeks ago suddenly turned into whirlwind weekend. Just before we got to Chicago, Sameer found out that Kimya Dawson would be performing in town in April and we decided that we had to make the concert. So when we arrived here, one of the first things we did was book those tickets. That concert is this evening, Monday.

A few days later, after we’d got settled in our apartment, we went to chat with the concierge and he recommended that we join a group going to watch a baseball game between the White Sox and the Detroit Tigers. Incidentally, that was scheduled for the same weekend but we said, hey, we should go. Safe environment, all details sorted out by the concierge, what’s not to like? That was on Saturday past.

Then last week, while walking down Randolph Street from Borders, we spotted a sign at the Chicago Theater that said “Jerry Seinfeld – Sold Out”. Sameer lost it. He was so upset that we didn’t know about Seinfeld. My argument was that it was probably sold out months in advance. Intrepid hubby got onto the internet and managed to find tickets for sale online. At first, we questioned whether we should go but the argument was: When are we ever going to do this again? So we bit the bullet and bought the tickets and so that’s what we did on Friday evening, went to the Chicago Theater to see Jerry Seinfeld live. (In the rush of baseball fever, I never got a chance to blog about it.) But basically, the theater was amazing. So beautiful, so old school with it’s gilted statues and rich, velvety curtains (it was opened in 1921). I forgot to take my camera with so unfortunately, this picture off the internet will have to do but really, it doesn’t do it justice.

And seeing Jerry Seinfeld in person was just so surreal. He got on stage and my jaw just dropped. I couldn’t believe I was seeing this guy in real life and hearing his voice live. And of course, he was hilarious. There were times we laughed so hard we could barely breath. It was great, and I’m glad we decided to go.

After booking the White Sox tickets we looked into other local sporting events. Unfortunately the ice hockey season was over and the football season will only begin after we leave the country. But there was still basketball. There were two home games that we could possibly go to, one this Sunday and one next Sunday. We’re going to be out of town next weekend, so the decision was made for us. Last night, we went to a Chicago Bulls game at the United Center.

We got the cheapest tickets we could get and they were still more expensive than the baseball tickets or the concert tickets for Kimya Dawson. With our cheapo tickets, we ended up sitting in the nosebleeds, about ten rows from the very back of the stadium. But it had to be done. Ten rows forward and they would have cost about $75 each, making them more expensive than first section tickets to Seinfeld. The tickets on the ground floor of the stadium were all priced between $500 and $2000 each.

Here’s a picture of me on the ground floor, sucking in the vibe and wishing that’s where we could have sat.

Here’s a picture taken from where we actually sat.

It was very different from the baseball game. The game is indoors and in the evening, and it was a lot more fast paced than the baseball. When it started, there were fireworks in the center of the stadium. The countdown on the shot clock meant that as soon as the ball changed from one team to the other, they had to do something with it in 25 seconds or forfeit the ball. Points were scored fast and furious. Also, the game is divided into four quarters and there are time outs. Every quarterly interval or time out, there were either cheerleaders doing dance routines, or little kids doing dance routines, or circus acts, or a hip hop crew, or the bulls mascot doing something silly, or a pep team firing rolled up t-shirts into the crowd. They had something called “Regurgicam” which was rewinded video of people in the stadium eating and something else called Melonhead which was a fish eye lens on a camera taking shots of people’s heads so they looked like mad scientists. There was a giant bull-shaped balloon floating through the stadium and it kept dropping souvenirs. In some of the intervals they had competitions where an audience member had to score a certain number of hoops from different distances or score hoops to get noughts or crosses so they could play tick tack toe against another guy shooting hoops on the other end of the court. And they have this weird animated race between different Dunkin Donuts characters (a coffee, a donut, and a bagel) and depending on which character you have on your voucher, you win free stuff from Dunkin Donuts. You would be surprised how loudly people cheered for the animated races!

Anyway, the game was pretty exciting but also very disappointing because the home team was totally outplayed by the visitors. Every time the Bulls scored, the Magic just scored back and then increased their lead again. The final score – Orlando Magic 104, Chicago Bulls 84.

So basically, now I am really, really tired. Exhausted even. It’s been a great weekend and, though technically not over yet, I am absolutely exhausted. I feel as though I haven’t had a chance to catch my breath. In an ideal world we would have been able to spread things out a bit more but it just didn’t pan out that way. Hopefully I’ll be able to recover sufficiently in time for next weekend.