I met up with my friend at the Buffalo airport around 10 AM on game day. I had been travelling all night with connecting flights in San Diego and Washington D.C., so naturally I looked terrible. Unfortunately my lack of sleep was the least of my problems. The previous week my friend had this genius idea that we get the hard core, real extensions sown into our hair. She assured me that the hair will last two months. No, no, it only lasted two days. My hair was already in disarray when I left for Anaheim, however, it became progressively worse each day that I was away. I called it my “crack hair,” an integral style necessary to pulling off an overall cracked out L.A. look – complete with big sunglasses to both sooth the hangover and disguise baby father induced black eyes. It was a good look.
Anyway, the hair was beyond repair by the time we/it descended upon Steel Town. Mission #1 was to find a salon that was A) still open, and B) willing to face-off against the beast lurking beneath my Calgary Flames cowgirl hat. We finally found one about fifteen minutes away from the hotel. We ran there …in the rain! The stylist didn’t know what to do with my hair. You should have seen it. The extensions appeared to be trying to mate/mutate with my hair. It was one massive birds nest! The whole extensions fiasco turned out to be a $250 mistake. Never again. After my hair surgery, we had less than an hour to get ready and get to the rink! We decided to partake in a bottle of bubbly on this momentous occasion – my friend’s first ever NHL game!
A disclaimer is required before reading the rest of this entry. I do not drink. It’s not for moral reasons or anything like that. Truthfully, I don’t like the taste of most hard liquor and I definitely don’t like being hung over. I am not opposed to consuming a couple beers at a game, or the odd fun margarita. But ever since my 20th birthday party, I have not drank more than 2-3 drinks in one sitting. That being said, getting bombed in Pittsburgh was not my intention…it just kind of happened. Here is my story.
Our bottle of sparkling wine wasn’t very big at all. And we only had about 40 minutes to consume and head to the rink. The bottle worked out to two glasses a piece, but we both had to chug our last glass to make it to the Igloo on time. At the rink we met many friendly Pittsburgh fans who were determined to buy us tall boys. The beer kept flowing, and suddenly we realized we were both in trouble. We had become very loud and obnoxious. We could be heard three sections over, and while people thought we were hilarious, murmurs about the regularity of Canadians coming to the rink and getting ripped could be heard amongst the Pittsburgh cheers. We were interviewed on PensTV; luckily this happened early on in the evening because at the end of the night it would not have been pretty! At one point, nachos miraculously appeared in our possession. How they got there? Nobody knows.
After the game my friend was determined to get Sidney Crosby’s autograph. She succeeded to the surprise of the Mellon Arena staff members! We had to wait with the other super fans for Crosby to come out of his special garage. While my friend waited in nervous anticipation, I harassed a fan wearing a Calgary Lombardi jersey. My word of the night was “Flyers-Phoenix.” This was the fan denomination I asserted to all the fans I met. “I’m a Flyers-Phoenix fan!” I challenge you to try to say that three times fast while wasted!
After the autograph was successfully acquired we went out to a bar. We weren’t alone. One of Britney Spears’ roadies was with us. Looking back on the night we kept referring to this guy by progressively shorter terms. At first it was “that Britney Spears roadie or something guy.” Then it was “the Britney Spears roadie,” “the Britney guy,” then finally just “Britney.” I’m sure years from now we will look back on this experience and we will remember it as hanging out with Britney herself!
At the bar some of the Penguins were celebrating their victory over Calgary. At this point the alcohol had really hit me. After my trip to Anaheim I was not exactly man-friendly, specifically hockey player man- friendly, and the alcohol left me unable to hide this fact. Unfortunately, I took my aggression out on one of the Penguins. I kept referring to him as “teenstache;” to his face…A LOT. “Shut up, teenstache!” “Nobody cares, teenstache! “Shhh, teenstache!” Please consider that during the entire spectacle I was wearing a Calgary Flames cowgirl hat!
I woke up the next morning confused and hung over. I said to my friend, “OK, this is what I don’t remember: I don’t remember paying at the bar, and I don’t remember going to bed.” My friend replies, “Britney Spears guy paid at the bar because he had a lot of cash on him. Then he took us in one of Britney’s tour buses…”
“Ohh right! I remember the bus. I was laying in one of the beds!”
“Yes…then when we got back to the hotel and you were laying on the floor. I had to fireman pull you into bed and put you in your pajamas…”Suddenly, I was disturbed because I wasn’t wearing a bra. My friend had decided to violate me because it was her personal opinion that sleeping in a brazier is uncomfortable! Thanks a lot for making that game time decision!
The whole experience disturbed me. I never drink, and I have never drank enough to forget anything that happened during the night. But I guess it happens to the best of us. I hope the people that gave me their numbers (because I found several) forgive me for not calling. It was a special night. Everybody gets one.
