January 1, 2016

January 1, 2016

Happy New Year!  I am up early this morning.  A friend is picking me up so we can drive to Phoenix and attend my first Bowl Game.  I was hoping to wait till the Fighting Illini made it to the Rose Bowl, but it is looking like I might be quite old before that happens again.  So here I am.

The Fiesta Bowl is held in Glendale, AZ at the University of Phoenix Stadium.  It is a two-hour drive with no traffic.  When we get to Phoenix there is thick smog and a whiff of burning.  We don’t have a lot of trees in southern Arizona so it can’t be forest fires.  I later learn it was attributed to fireworks from last night lingering in the valley.  It is making me glad we picked Tucson for retirement.  Our air is much cleaner.

The University of Phoenix Stadium is a little misleading.  The college is mostly online with no intermural sports teams.  The corporation that owns the school bought the naming rights like any other sponsor.  It is actually the home field of the Arizona Cardinals NFL team.

Winter mornings in the desert are frigid.  It is supposed to warm up to the high 60’s today so after finding the parking lot, I pull on a sweatshirt.  Once inside the stadium, we find the enclosed area is still cold from last night and I am underdressed.  We walk the inside perimeter to stay warm, and check out the choices for an early lunch.  The promenade has a storyboard about Cardinal history and I get a few reminisces about the “Cardiac Cards” time in St Louis.  There was another display about the playing field.  It is one of a kind.  The surface is real grass and is grown by literally rolling the field out sideways into the sun.

Once the game got underway, Ohio State jumped to an early 14-0 lead against Notre Dame.  Thankfully I was rooting for OSU and I could jump and cheer often to help stay warm.  It turned out to be a high scoring game with OSU winning 44-28.  Since we paid so much for the tickets, we stayed for the post game activities and award ceremony to get our money’s worth.