2002 Alamo Bowl

26 Dec 2002 - My first trip as a graduate, no longer a student of any sort. All my new "adult" adventures call for a new travel log. This adventure takes us to San Antonio. For what may be one of our last family road trips, Mom, Dad, Cassie & I packed the day after Christmas to begin the drive to Texas. We got a later start than usual because we had to drop Sadie off at the kennel. Through Wisconsin, the little bit of Minnesota and all of Iowa, we got good weather. Kansas was a different story. We weren't supposed to get any poor weather on the way down. Instead, we got hammered by snow. It made the roads slow and we lost time on the way to our stop for the night, Oklahoma City. When I wasn't driving, I napped, read the 2nd Lord of the Rings book (just saw the movie twice) or looked at the paper. After it got dark, there really wasn't much to do except watch the snow and traffic, and daydream. I made a quick call to the guy I'm seeing (Bob) to say hi. We finally pulled into our hotel at 10:30 pm.

27 Dec - After getting breakfast, we headed south once more. It was pretty foggy for a while. The skies were clear and bright when we got to Texas. It got a lot busier traffic-wise the further south we drove. We finally pulled into San Antonio around 4:30. We had a bit of difficulty finding our hotel. The Embassy Suites here is beautiful inside - lots of tile and iron work. After getting settled, we drove to the downtown Riverwalk. The larger trees had multicolored Christmas lights streaming down from them, twinkling as night fell. We walked along until we came to an Iris pub. It seemed like a fun place, so we stopped for a few pints. I must be becoming a lightweight again, because that beer hit me pretty hard. There was a guy playing the piano and singing songs. He'd play the fight son whenever Colorado or Wisconsin scored a "touchdown" (a tip was put in a marked bucket). He got Cassie up there to do the motions to the Unicorn Song with him and two others. After that, we went in search of a place to eat dinner. Every place had a pretty long wait, because the whole area was packed with people, including lots of fellow Badger fans. We found a place to eat, got margaritas and food. After dinner, I started to feel a little sick and tired, so we headed back to the car. We found one of the Cows on Parade and got a few pictures. I called Bob to say hi and then we went back to the hotel. I crashed pretty well when we returned, but because Cass chose to sleep on the fold-out bed in the other room, I got the double all to myself. Sweet.

28 Dec - (I'm writing this the next morning because I honestly couldn't keep awake any longer). Wow, what a day that was. I don't think I ever thought it would end as it did. We slept in this morning, which was more than nice. Once we got ready to go, we headed out under the cloudless skies to a little artisan's village. It turned out to be a lot less than we expected, so we didn't stay long. We next drove downtown to the Mercado to have a look. Cassie got some neat stuff, like a sun mask to add to her collection, but I didn't find any silver jewelry I was interested in. We then drove over by the stadium to scope out parking and ended up leaving the van there. Since it was around 2 in the afternoon, we walked towards the Riverwalk to a mall where we found a place for lunch and got to watch some of the Eagles-Giants game. You could tell there were a number of Packers fan there because of all the cheering when the Giants won. (If the Pack wins on Sunday, they get home field in the playoffs). Cass and I found a Forever 21 store in the mall, the best source for cheap going out clothes. I got a top for New Year's Eve, but it took quite a while to pay, so we didn't shop much more after that. we walked along the rest of the Riverwalk that we didn't get to before. We stopped at a "British Pub" to kill some time before the game. Cassie and I walked next door where we found a gift shop that sold magazines. I picked up a couple. After a bit, we made our way back to the van. From there, we gathered up our stuff and walked to the stadium. It is a very interesting looking dome... Got in and found our seats - high up on the lower deck, on the goal line, but at least among mostly Badger fans. There were some Colorado fans behind us. Each seat had a pack of inflatable Thunderstix (strange things - they're just tubes of inflated plastic, but if you hit the upper part together, they make a resonant tympanic sound). Cassie & I played with ours a bit. They're so annoying, but really hard to put down. After all the pregame stuff was over, we settled in. Cass & I went down and said hi to Kendra [Kaiser], who was sitting with the rest of the band in the end zone. The "student section" was right next to them. The Badgers got the ball first and were driving well until Bollinger threw an interception that was returned 91 yards. Ugh. After about half of the first quarter, Cassie and I went down to be with the other students. We just went in a row near the back, and right in front of me were two of my ME friends (Hackel & Doyle). And right then, I looked a few rows down and saw Krista [Hongisto] and Jen [Hrycyna] (friends from Rapids and/or the dorm). I got a picture with both groups each. Not only seeing them was neat, but it was amazing how many people I recognized in the small section. I guess it comes from being so old. The Badgers finished the first half with a 21-14 lead over Colorado. Half-time was okay - our band rocked, their band, not so much. Once the band returned to their seats, I grabbed Kendra and brought her over to Krista and Jen. It was nice to sit stand and talk to them. The Badgers decided to leave their game in the locker room and gave away two more touchdowns. We just could not seem to get a break. And we were getting upset because they kept showing the Colorado band, cheerleaders and fans on the Jumbotron and rarely us or ours. Grrr. we finally got into desperation play during the last two minutes. Down by a touchdown and we needed to score. I don't know how it happened, but we made two long 4th down situations. The last one was precluded on 3rd down by an incompletion on the goal line that just slipped through the receiver's arms. Right then, I thought we were done. You don't get two chances like that. But then on 4th and 12, Bollinger threw a completion to Darren Charles at the 2 for a first down. Badger fans went nuts. And then to score the typing points moments later... We went into overtime. We won the toss and elected to defend. Colorado went on offense and to our amazement, missed their field goal attempt. Right then, we new we'd have the game. Our offense went out there and our kicker made the field goal. I was screaming and jumping around with everybody - it was so cool. I really didn't have any expectations for the game. We were 8-point underdogs coming in, playing the #14 ranked team. Ha! 'Bout time they played just above the level of the competition. Cassie & I went back over by Mom & Dad for the award ceremony and 5th Quarter. Oh, that was so much fun! We finally left the stadium after 11:30 to make our way out through traffic and back to the hotel. We then ate dinner (leftovers) and stayed up until 1:30 am to watch the highlights on Sports Center.

29 Dec - We drove a long, long way today. We left San Antonio around 7:15 and headed north. There really wasn't anything eventful during the day's drive. I didn't feel that great and didn't eat much, but I did drive from Tulsa to Rolla, Mo. That was long, and like Mom before me, I was fighting this wind the whole way. We stopped for the night in St. Louis, which will give us a much shorter day tomorrow.

{transcribed 1/6/2020}