Brilliant Adventures: Part III…
Free Kick Masters of Disaster…
Saturday, July 5th, a day that will live in…memory.
My Brother and Sis-in-Law had free tickets to an event being hosted at Reliant Stadium; the event was called The Free Kick Masters. It was a competition where internationally renowned football (soccer) players would shoot free kicks to gain points, proceed to the next round and eventually have the chance to win a million dollars, which they would then give to starving kids or something. Free Kicks, by nature, are not the most thrilling or entertaining moments of a football (soccer) match, yet I was intrigued to see how they would pull off such an event.
They didn’t, that’s how.
This event was a plate of ball sizzles from the ghe-tto…I mean get-go. It looked as if it was put together by a dude named ‘Shady Steve’ and ‘The Shyster Twins.”
We arrived at 7:15pm, 15 minutes after the event was slated to begin. We followed a trail of fellow Houstonians into the stadium expecting to hear the loud roar of the masses gathered to celebrate the wonder that is “The Free Kick,” what we got was a stadium that was ¾ empty and no sign of the event having begun.
Thirty minutes later, the Houston Dynamo cheerleaders ran out onto the field tossing their pom-poms back and forth, and for the first time we heard the deep, Latin announcer voice say…“LLLLLadies and Gentlemen, please welcome the…Houston. Dynamo…girls” and slowly faded out with an overwhelming sense of uncertainty. We sat in complete silence again for 20 minutes, nothing was happening, we began to wonder if any of the players had shown up. My brother began to tell me how the organizers were charging $26 dollars a ticket a few weeks earlier, and how a week before the event, they were giving away the tickets in order to fill the seats.
It was so bad, that even writing about it is boring the shit out of me.
An hour after the intended start time, the event began…slowly. The Latin announcer guy was super excited about everything he said, even the most mundane things. He welcomed us and passed the microphone to this lady who had something to do with something? She proceeded to address the audience with a speech that lasted three years and would make the Pope get out of his seat and punch her in the face. Then she proceeded to give the same speech in two different languages which was impressive, but I knew what she was saying, so not really. This boredom was only intensified by the fact that the sound system was bunk and didn’t work half the time.
Then came the national anthem…oh yes. The young man began singing the national anthem with no sound coming from the speakers. From the large television in the stadium, you could see him continue singing whist trying to turn the microphone on. He continued in his effort when over the speakers you could hear as loud as day, “Check the bottom. Check the bottom of the microphone. I don’t think it’s on.” The singer stopped and grimaced at the sound booth. After switching the microphones, the young man gave a thrilling rendition of the National Anthem to the great satisfaction of the audience.
The rest of the event was to boring for me to describe. It was unorganized and barely entertaining; we spent more time waiting for something to happen than watching the competition. Even thinking about it makes me tired and bored.
My brother was pissed. We got up and left early, my brother apologizing profusely, angry that we used three hours of our life we could never get back. On the way back to the train, we followed a young girl with bleach blonde hair and shorts that showed her vagina…literally showed her vagina. I think that we all got gonorrhea just by looking at her, she was dirty. Then we got on the train and listened to a large woman loudly talk about how she had been smoking weed all day and that she felt really good. Then she loudly proclaimed in a thick Texas accent that she was from London, or Luuuuunnnnduuuunnnn, as she said it whilst dropping it as if it were hot. As we departed from the train, we heard her loudly stating that she used to work for the YMCA, but was released because she “kept whooping those little n-words.” Seriously? Really? What the crap? If she were in Jurassic Park, a dinosaur would have spit poison in her eyes and eaten her alive.
All in all, the absurdity of the night made it completely worth it and I love spending time with my family. I rest assured that the event is still going on, that Luuuunnnnduuuun girl is high and whooping children at her new job and that dirty girl is making life choices she can never truly take back (or wash off) and all is right with the world.
Except that Iran is going to nuke everyone.
Have a great day!
