There is something about being in the woods away from existence that soothes the soul. This past weekend, I went up to my parents' cabin. Two days of no TV or internet, but just the cool winter air. From hiking through the woods, to cross country skiing, it is just what the doctor ordered for a stressed out college student. I recommend all of you to give it a try!
This post isn't even about my wonderful plans of spring break that will probably just consist of me waking up late, making a couple trips to the fridge and catching up with my old pal, television (some of you may be going somewhere warm, but I would like to point out that my apartment stays at a pleasant 70 degrees and that the travel channel can take care of the visuals). It may not be the ideal spring break (I admit actually traveling is far better than TV), but one thing in common for all of us students is that it means NO SCHOOL! I can manage to get by in those first weeks of the semester where you have a couple readings and homework assignments to keep up with. But... remember the first day of classes where you look at your syllabus and see all those hellish weeks ahead of you where a million things are due? I don't know about you, but I just put it in the back of my mind, since after all it's like a month away. Well it is officially time for those worries to work their way back into my cognitive thoughts. Seeing as I have too many things I have to get done than I have time for, it should be a great week. It is at times like this that I ask...
You know all of those alerts you get as you watch TV that tell you to not go out in the blizzard... why must the University of Wisconsin-Madison never be on the list for school closings. Is it too much to ask for us college students to get that childhood dream as well? In high school, I got one snow day, and it was glorious. The year after I graduated, they got one snow day and two cold days. This year, they have already racked up 2 snow days and a cold day. The reason this upsets me is that for them to get to school, they have to get to a single building, and stay there for the rest of the day. As a college student, we have 15 minutes to get from one building to the next, usually completely across campus. I'm not arguing that we shouldn't allow the high schools to close for the day, but for the university to cut us a little slack. Don't just cancel classes after 3:30, when most of the storm has passed. I lost count of the number of cars I saw stuck in the middle of the road and the number of people that wiped out on my way to class. It is funny at first... but who can honestly say they haven't slipped yet. So come on chancellor, let us college kids have that childhood dream back.
I have been a huge Packer fan all of my life. I grew up here in Wisconsin, where many view Sunday as a holy day just for the football. In all of my years here, I never actually went to a live packer game at Lambeau field. That is not to say that I am lazy by any means, it is just that difficult to get tickets (for a reasonable price... I am a college student you know). This all changed two weeks ago, and if you are a Packer's fan, you can do the math and see what game I am talking about. That's right, two weeks ago was the NFC championship game played at Lambeau (it is basically the biggest game that can be played by the Packers in that stadium). Oh... but it gets better. Not only did I go to the game, but I was paid to go to the game. How?
It has been yet another luxury of being apart of the Wisconsin Marching Band. For both playoff games, they got a handful of us to play some of our 5th quarter music during half-time, to travel the stadium playing songs (just like we do at Camp Randall for Badger Games) and to hold the American Flag during the national anthem. As much as I love marching for the badger games and the atmosphere surrounding Badger football, I have never experienced a game like this before. Maybe it was the stinging cold, but I like to think that it was standing on that field with the American flag as I watched the Packer team come running out of the tunnel literally 20 feet away from me. I remember thinking, it doesn't get better than this. But it did.
I don't now how many of you know much about musical instruments, but you really run into some problems when playing in the negative temperatures. The biggest problem is, as a trumpet player, your valves freeze which basically means... you can't play any notes! While many desperately tried to warm up their valves to go play some music for the crowd, either by just blowing air onto them, or even using a rubber band to attach hand warmers onto the valves (brilliant!), a couple buddies of mine and I decided why not go play for the box seats and suites that are indoors! What happens next is basically a lucky chain of events. Pretty soon we were making our rounds, going from suite to suite playing some music, and receiving much praise from the fans. Turned out someone really liked what we were doing, and asked us to play in the room next door where the governor was at. We were all pretty excited just about that, the governor is a pretty big deal. Well along with the governor, in that same suite was the Secretary of the Packers, who invited us to go to the "executive" boxes to play some Wisconsin songs for them. That "them" being the coaches family, Packers executive, and other families. So what started as a simple idea of playing some music indoors turned into a private tour of the executive area of Lambeau. I have lost count of the number of times I have played On Wisconsin, our fight song, (mostly because the badgers tend to score a lot), but playing it in the executive box at the NFC championship Packers game has probably been my favorite.
While a Packer win would have topped the night off, I still can't help to think back to that night as one of the best of my life. Just being in that electric stadium on such a profound night, seeing Brett Favre play (hopefully not his last game!) is enough to make it an unforgettable experience.
Below I found a video on youtube of the band's performance during halftime (remember, the sound quality is poor because half of us couldn't play due to the cold, and the half that could... well... between your face being numb and the instrument being frozen.. you get the point.)
I have one of my personal pictures here.. it isn't even one of the game, well technically it is of the game because it is of a flat screen TV in the elevator on our way to the executive boxes. It's my favorite picture because it is a way nicer TV then I will ever have, and well... it's in an elevator! SWEET
