Packing It In

Sunday November 8th, 2009 - Harris, MI

This has turned out to be an extremely exhausting week of drives to the northernmost parts of Michigan and back. I’m not upset tonight was the last one for a while. I love to work and really appreciate the money, but I earned every single penny of it on this run.

Tonight’s obscure Upper Michigan destination was the booming metropolis of Harris, which consists of about six small buildings and some wandering cattle. The Island Casino pokes through the Harris skyline like a finger through cheap toilet paper, and that’s where the show was. I’ve been there several times before as has my opening act, Steve Purcell.

Steve lives near Madison, WI and we agreed to meet up to share a ride. There’s no easy route to get there from where I live so I had to wind my way through country roads and it took a lot longer than I thought, but the weather was spectacular so I enjoyed the drive.

The Packers were playing the 0-7 Tampa Bay Buccaneers, so Steve and I assumed we’d be able to enjoy the broadcast of an easy win which would make a picture perfect weather day perfect all around. Ha! Nope. We’re both lifetime fans, but today we both regretted it.

I can’t ever remember being in a car with someone and seeing a mood change as fast as ours did without being angry with each other. We couldn’t believe how the game slipped away from the Packers but neither one of us could turn it off. We’re both Packer-holics.

I asked Steve why it matters so much to us what a bunch of millionaire steroid shooting gorillas who aren’t even from Wisconsin do, and neither one of us could think of a decent answer. We both felt cheated, and I’m sure there were millions of others who felt that too.

How can such flaming incompetence go unpunished? With a performance like that, I’m through with the Packers this year. I don’t want to waste three hours of attention on those pinheads, and if life was fair coach Mike McCarthy and general manager Ted Thompson would have their bags forwarded to their home cities and they would be out of jobs. Now.

A fish rots from the head, and this was the last straw. The Brett Favre situation was bad enough, but I don’t blame McCarthy or Thompson for that fiasco. But, losing to the lowly Bucs who have a rookie quarterback is unacceptable. I can piss away my own life, I don’t need to let a bunch of surrogate saps ruin my Sunday afternoons. This was a bad dream.

Steve and I were pretty quiet the rest of the trip and we got to Harris with under an hour to spare. I hate cutting it that close but there’s just no quick and easy way there. We got in and got ready and did the show. The people laughed and then we packed up again and got back in the car and drove right back to Madison. And then I got in my car, disappointed.

There was a lot of time to think on the way home, and I tried to block out the Packers as much as I could. I’m ashamed that it bothers me at all, but it really does. Who knows why that is? I’ve got my own life to fix. I can use these extra three hours on Sundays to do it.