Football, and Hockey, and ATL Fans, OH MY!!!

It's that time of year again when football season begins, hockey season kicks off, and I anxiously await the end of October to be able to watch Bibby the Atlanta Hawks play again. Yes everyone, Mike Bibby is still with the Atlanta Hawks... lucky me!

Back to reality, Sean and I were lucky enough to snag the company tickets for one of the very few Falcons games. Of course the seats were incredible, and having never been to an indoor stadium like the Dome, it was quite the noisy experience. It's crazy how much sound is captured under a giant tent full of intense NFL fans. Sean and I quickly noticed that we fit in a little better with the college football crowd ( not so much the NFL crowd, they're pretty different). Despite feeling slightly out of place, we had a blast sitting just a few rows up from the players, jumping up and down, and screaming and yelling.

Have you ever seen a mascot riding a quad with spinners before? I bet not, not if you've never lived in ATL! At least we look like big fans!?! (we got the colors right)

Well moving on to a more recent update, we went to the Atlanta Thrashers opening game last night. I thought that NFL fans were special... I was sadly mistaken. NHL fans, and players, are all in it for a good anger management session. There were 3 fights, THREE! The best part is the referees don't even try to break them up, they just let the players wail on each other until it starts getting too out of hand (or if someone starts bleeding profusely). I mean, these players are ripping off jerseys, helmets, gloves, and then throwing punches at each others heads!!! These people are NUTS!!! However, I will confess that I did want to go up to the glass and start pounding on it every time they were in a scuffle. So maybe I'm a perfect hockey fan, slightly nuts??

On to our unique seat situation... Sean got company tickets again and was told that tickets were "4 rows from the glass, and so close that you ducked every time a puck came flying at the wall." Well we get there and show the attendant our tickets and she points us up a level, as in up the stairs. Sean (thinking he's much too important to walk UP stairs to look for his seats since down the stairs is where he believes he deserves to sit) questions her again as to where our seats are, and again, she continued to point up the stairs to an area that is a bit further away from the glass than we expected. DANG! We didn't get the company tickets we thought we had! They weren't bad seats by any means, just not super close, so no big deal we're still having a blast. Well toward the end of the first period Sean spots the CEO of RaceTrac, and he's in the fourth row seats! We got screwed!!! A few minutes later, I waved trying to say HI as he returned from the snack bar and after throwing me a blank stare, he quickly recognized Sean and the fun really began. He waves us down and told us to follow him to the third row seats which had been empty the whole first period. Now this was the experience we were expecting. Needless to say, it's a good thing I'm not shy, cause it landed us in the third row against the glass for the rest of the game. It was so SWEET!!! And we won, 6-3. And now I'm the biggest hockey fan ever.

Needless to say we moved from this view....

To this view...