THE
FINALS
Day
4
Mon, April 4, 2016
WOW!!! That is all we can say. Although Houston continues to disappoint us,
that final game sure did not. Could not
have asked for a better finish for sure, and we do not think we have to
elaborate on this. We are still amazed.
9:00 – Everyone is up.
9:01 – Sinickal makes a
Dunkin Donut run to make up for the fact that it was blocked off on
Sunday. This is the longest Dunkinless
Donut streak of his career.
10:02 – While watching
some news and catching up on our collective work e-mails and calls (it is
Monday after all), Sinickal brings up an engineering dispute in which he has
been appointed the arbiter. Pepster states
the reasons must have been because he is so neutral and unopinionated.
11:48 – Ready to head
out for some barbecue, and Sinickal notices that Doug Christie (Corey) is
wearing a Brown University shirt. As
Doug Christie also did not attend Brown, Sinickal asks him which girl asked him
to wear that. Doug Christie tried to
answer before Sinickal tells him that he could have worn the Brown shirt to the
Syracuse – North Carolina game because as an Ivy League school they were not
even in the Final Four. Pepster reminds
them that Brown is barely an Ivy League school.
Tony, remembering yesterday’s conversation about Doug Christie’s hatred
of Providence, reminds Doug Christie that Brown is IN Providence.
11:59 – At Jackson’s
Bar-B-Q near Minute Maid Stadium.
DELICIOUS!
12:44 – An employee,
who has more fun at his job than anyone else has at their job, is walking
around asking if anybody needs anything and thanking everyone for coming to
Jacksons. He says, “Just like Michael Jackson,
if there is no you, there is no us”.
12:53 – On the walk to
FanFest we walk on the campus of Minute Maid Park right next to the
stadium. You can see the entire field
from the sidewalk outside of the left field part of the stadium, and you can
tell baseball season has begun. Field
looks GREAT.
12:55 – Walk past the 5
7 Grill inside the stadium. 5 7 is so
called because it is the numbers of Astros greats Jeff Bagwell and Craig
Biggio. Sinickal asks if “The waitresses
have to put the needles into your arm for you, or can you do it on your own?”
13:09 – We get to
FanFest in the convention center, and there is so much construction that large
swaths of the convention center and areas immediately adjacent are completely
inaccessible. This town has known about
this event for about 5 years, including the fact that FanFest would be in the
convention center. Just horrific
planning.
13:21 – Kenny “The Jet”
Smith is playing pop-a-shot with fans.
Pepster believes we can walk right up to him because “He must remember
Doug Christie from their days in North Carolina together.”
13:28 – Enter the LG
exhibit because it looks interesting (it isn’t). The greeter comes up and says, “Hi, my name
is Gisele”. Pepster asks her where Tom
is. She doesn’t miss a beat. “He was acting up so I left his butt in
Boston.”
13:39 – “GP are you
with me”. Yes, the Glove himself, Gary
Payton is taking pictures with fans.
13:42 – Decide we want
to exit FanFest and we see some foot traffic heading toward doors clearly marked
with the standard exit sign. As we approach the exit doors, a FanFest employee is telling everyone to turn around as
that doorway, “Isn’t an exit”. When
Pepster points out the “Exit” sign, she is offended and tells us to follow her
so she can show us something. When she
gets to where she wants to be, she points down the convention hall to a sign
that says, “Exit”. Sinickal tells her
that the sign, “Looks exactly like the other one”. She is absolutely dumbfounded.
14:01 – At a merchandise
tent near Discovery Park, where the NCAA Final Four concert series was held,
one of the employees is telling a potential customer that he has one game ball
left, and it is “The ball they use during the game”. Sinickal tells him, “Not if that customer
buys it”.
14:14 – At Tejas Grill
again to do a last sweep for merchandise.
[Editor’s Note – The merchandise shop from yesterday is right next to
Tejas, accessible from inside the restaurant].
Same slow service as yesterday.
Houston really has no idea how to throw a big event.
14:24 – Doug Christie
buys Miss North Carolina a souvenir. He was not gone long, so his 48 minute reconnaissance
mission yesterday must have done some good. [Editor’s Note – Most of us bought somebody a
souvenir of some type – it wasn’t just Doug Christie.]
15:04 – The JW Marriott
merchandise shop is closed. The JW
Marriott was the Syracuse hotel.
As an aside, Syracuse
was the only team that stayed downtown.
The other 3 all stayed out near the Galleria – miles upon miles away. To generate buzz, this event needs to be held
in a city that is more compact.
15:08 – Back to the
townhouse to recharge. Our Uber driver Barry
is nuts, probably certifiable. Everything
to this guy is funny, including Silas’s belief that Syracuse is going to win
tonight. Barry drops us off to the chant
that only he is saying, “Let’s go Syracuse”.
17:21 – Doug Christie
is wearing his North Carolina blue again.
17:30 – At a downtown
establishment called Christian’s Tailgates.
How have we not seen this place before?
We definitely should not have missed it.
17:37 – While again
lighting in on Doug Christie, Doug responds by attacking Sinickal for not
wearing his Syracuse orange (he is wearing Cubs gear in support of Opening
Day). Sinickal responds, “I don’t want
to root against you!” Doug really should
have re-thought his plan to bring that Carolina shirt.
17:40 – Sinickal asks
Doug Christie, “When do you have to give that shirt back? Do you have to wash it first?”
17:42 – Preparing to
leave Tailgates to head to NRG Stadium when we see a 50 cents wings on Monday
sign. Since we have not eaten after
Jackson’s Bar-B-Q, nor have we needed to, we think we will want something after
the game. See a manager to ask what time
they close tonight and he says “2”, but walks away before we can ask if the
wing special was all day or just happy hour.
The bartender comes by and we ask him about the wings. The wing special is all day, but the kitchen
closes 30 minutes before the restaurant does.
Since we now assume we can order food as late as 1:30, the bartender
tells us that they don’t know what time they close, they usually close at 12 on
Monday, this was the first time the employees heard that the restaurant was
going to stay open until 2, and they hope it does not stay open that late
because the bartenders and waitresses all go to college and have class in the
morning. When informed that they could
go to class a little tired once in a while to make some money while the big
event is in town, the bartender responds, “And I have to go to a wake tomorrow
because my grandmother just died”. That
would ordinarily be a legitimate excuse to not have to stay late, but it wasn’t
the excuse he tried to use initially.
Priorities I suppose.
17:54 – Board the light
rail platform to purchase our ride tickets, and the machine is absolutely
impossible to use. A light rail employee
has to help us, telling Tony his mistake was “pushing it [his credit card] too
fast and that you have to give it to her slow.”
Sinickal tells the employee how un-user friendly their transportation
machinery is and the guy is flabbergasted.
He doesn’t understand that two of us actually work in the transportation
industry.
17:59 – Notice that the
restaurant on the corner is called Moonshiners.
This is important because we thought the name of the restaurant was
Southern Hospitality. So, the entire
rant against Southern Hospitality from yesterday was actually directed toward
Moonshiners. Apparently there is not a
restaurant named Southern Hospitality in Houston.
18:49 – At NRG Stadium –
milling around in the official “NCAA Tailgate”.
Lots to see, not a lot to do except to mentally prepare for the game.
19:11 – The female barker
for the Coca-Cola exhibit which includes a mechanical bull, a photo backdrop
that says “Final Four” and lots of music is encouraging people to come over by
saying into the microphone , “Rock out with your Coke out!”
19:26 – While walking
around we see a guy in what has to be a Duke t-shirt. We say has to be because we only see the back
which says, “Real Men Don’t Wear Powder Blue”.
Sinickal superimposes a picture of the back of that shirt with a newly
taken picture of Doug Christie wearing “his” North Carolina polo.
19:39 – Tony notices
that the girl – the one girl that was at Tailgates – just walked by us. She was rather nondescript and only really
noticeable because we were the only ones in Tailgates earlier. Doug Christie not only fails to notice her,
but fails to even understand what Tony is trying to say by repeating to Tony, “What
girl? From where?” This frustrates Tony to the point where he
throws his (empty) aluminum bottle of Bud on the ground and dents it.
19:43 – Doug Christie
then gets mad at something Tony says and “mic drops” his (empty) aluminum
bottle to the ground. Nothing happens to
the bottle. Tony says “That is the
difference between Providence and Newport.”
19:59 – Inside NRG
Stadium, raring to go.
Radio silence during
the game (or so we thought).
20:47 – Doug Christie
is gone for what seems like an inordinately long time. We think he ran into an old Carolina
classmate that may have had an extra club level ticket. [He didn’t].
20:55 – Doug Christie
returns proclaiming that he hadn’t been gone that long. It was 8 minutes after we already thought he
was gone too long.
20:55:30 – Sinickal tells
Doug Christie that he values nothing that men value.
20:57 – Sinickal turns
to Pepster and Tony and says about Doug Christie, “He had to go see about a
girl”. You gotta love a Good Will Hunting reference.
22:24 – Marcus Paige
shot. WOW!!! We thought his previous play (missed layup,
rebound which nobody knows how he got the ball, and ensuing basket) was amazing, but
nothing like a double clutch virtually last second three. (Free basketball in overtime perhaps?)
22:24 – Nearly everyone
throws their free seat cushion into the air (and onto the sections below
them). This is the last time the NCAA
gives out seat cushions ever again, we are certain.
22:25 – Sinickal notes
that every time North Carolina plays a Final Four game in this part of the country
something weird happens. Both the 1982
Final Four (The Jordan shot and the Fred Brown pass to James Worthy) and the
1993 Final Four (The Chris Webber timeout) were played in the New Orleans
Superdome.
22:28 – OH OUR
GOD!!!! Kris Jenkins!!!! His shot was nowhere near as difficult as
Marcus Paige’s, but much more important and will be remembered in basketball
history. ABSOLUTE PANDEMONIUM in the
stands.
22:32 – Guy from down
our row wearing a Roy Williams autographed North Carolina jersey comes over to
Doug Christie and says simply, “What are we gonna do”.
22:44 – One Shining Moment
22:48 – On the
concourse to exit the stadium and we see a dolt wearing a Christian Laettner
Duke jersey. It takes Sinickal, Tony and
Doug Christie to keep Pepster from knocking him down and stomping on his
chest. Pepster exclaims, “I still hate
Christian Laettner!”.
23:37 – Get near the
front of the Light Rail line (going south to go north once again), and the line
seems to have stalled. Tony yells to
nobody in particular, “C’mon train, I am sober!” Sinickal wants it noted that he – Sinickal –
is not the angry one. [Editor’s Note –
It turns out the line stalled because of a train – vehicle collision].
23:47 – On train.
23:51 – At the next
station which is where the trains turnaround.
We get to stay in our seats for the entire return ride.
23:12 – We find the
video of the cheerleader that punches out the North Carolina mascot after
Jenkins’s game-winning shot. If you
haven’t seen it, FIND IT.
00:31 – Tailgates is
open – Kind of. We immediately try to
order wings only to find out the kitchen just closed (the place is closing at
1). We debate whether to have one there
before we go eat, or just go eat. We
stayed. And boy are we glad we did.
00:42 (approximately) –
Drunk girl at the end of the bar (who we later find out is the bar back’s
cousin) orders two shots. In all
honestly, this was not important at the time which is why the time is
approximate. We only note it because of
what later transpired. After trying to
determine if the shots were going to be bitter – they weren’t, they were made almost
entirely from Schnapps - she drinks both
shots.
00:45 – She orders two
more shots.
00:47 – Another customer
asks our bartender (Daniel – the same guy from before the game) for
something. Drunk girl yells out “Ignore him! Make My Shots!”
00:48 – She again
drinks both shots.
00:48 – An older gentlemen
named Colin is sitting next to Drunky.
He is known by the entire staff and is asked by someone about his wife
or girlfriend. He says, “I don’t care if
it is her birthday; I’d rather go home, masturbate, and cry myself to sleep.
00:50 – Drunky orders
two more shots. Her 5th and 6th
since we have been there.
00:55 – Waitress who
just finished working asks Daniel for a Mango Margarita. He just looks at his watch and shakes his
head. Nevertheless he makes her a
margarita.
00:56 – Bar back, who
is now off work, just says to nobody in particular, “I don’t know why they cut
me off last night”.
00:58 – Preparing for
tomorrow, Sinickal asks Daniel if we can have 50 cent wings tomorrow since the
kitchen closed early on us today.
Daniels says that Tuesday is “Taco Tuesday”. Pepster says, “Tacos are just Mexican Wings!”
01:03 – We see the
Sports Center replay of Michael Jordan’s reaction to Jenkins’s shot. Sinickal tries to take bets from the room that
Jordan drafts him!
01:05 – Drunky declares
to everybody, “I just need to walk home!”
[Editor’s Note – There is
no way to properly convey how funny this half hour or so was observing these
people in the bar, but we have to try.]
01:09 – OKRA, from
Saturday, is open and has a kitchen.
01:12 – OKRA’s kitchen is
closed.
01:14 – Everybody we
talk to say that the only food in practically the entire city is Whataburger or
Katz’s Deli. Since Katz’s deli is open
24/7 – we go there.
01:23 –Two of the four
other people in OKRA are just distraught guys wearing North Carolina
colors. They bounce their discussion
back-and-forth between (1) What a shot; I can’t believe he hit that. That was amazing; and (2) We got jobbed. The officiating was horrible. One thing they do agree on, Houston was not
the best place to host a Final Four.
They think we bond so they ask if they can share our Uber to Katz’s
deli. No way two other people can fit
with us.
01:46 – Katz’s
deli! Although open 24/7, the bar closes
at 2 (with all alcohol off tables at 2:15.
We order two beers before we sit down at our table to order.
01:49 – Sinickal orders
celebratory (for the weekend) Jameson’s shots.
Doug Christie asks who on earth drinks Jameson’s shots at 2. Sinickal answers, “People who can’t drink at
2:05!”
01:52 – The personification
of Trumpsterfire walks into Katz’s. He
is wearing a “Make America Great Again” shirt, and he looks like he would wear
a “Make America Great Again” shirt. Both arms are prosthetic. She looks even more disheveled, apparently
having lost her bra in a bet.
01:53 – Doug Christie
sips his Jameson.
01:54 – Bartender
refers to us as a “frat party”. We are
actually offended by this because none of us are from a frat, and we were not
particularly boisterous. I guess he
doesn’t sell a lot of Jameson’s at the deli.
02:01 – Bartender loudly
announces that the “Bar is closed” in several languages, to which our table
responds to each announcement in same language.
He is even more flummoxed.
02:17 – While trying to
get Doug Christie to understand the reasons we have been referring to him as “Doug
Christie”, Sinickal quotes Allison’s response to Day 2 in which she says, “Part
of me thinks [Doug Christie] needs a hug after all that. But part of me wants to reach over and thump
him on the forehead.” Sinickal notes
that this is important because “Allison doesn’t believe in violence”. Pepster adds, “She doesn’t even believe in
non-violence!”.
02:45 – Tony walks into
the restroom and sees Trumpsterfire in the restroom. Her pants were lowered down to her thighs and
he was a couple of feet away from him.
Tony goes to exit and she says, “It’s OK. Come on in”.
Tony exits.
02:50 – After the food
is delivered, Doug Christie notes, “This is way better than Whataburger”. Indeed.
03:24 – After Uber – we
are home … and still amazed by the end of the game!!!
