Jacksonville USMNT May 25-26, 2012

Memorial weekend was great because I spent it in Jacksonville. While my friends (from Texian Army & AO Houston) drove 15 hours to get there, I took the easy way out and departed on May 25th. From Houston, it's about a 2-2.5hr flight.

One thing to note about flying out of IAH is that TSA policies vary from terminal to terminal. In terminal C, you need to have your boarding pass before you enter the scanning machine. In terminal B, which is where I was for Jacksonville departure, you only need to have your boarding pass before you enter the scanning machine IF it is in paper form. If you have a mobile version of your boarding pass, you don't have to show it to the TSA agents prior to entering the scanning machine. I find this oddly ironic.

It's funny how my friends left Houston around 10:30PM the night before, but arrived at the hotel about 10 minutes later than me. At the hotel, two of the four decided to sleep and not attend the public training (LAME!). I paid for a US Soccer membership so that we could have field access (will be useful for future games this year), and it was great. One of my friends, JM, was also able to get a couple of locals (Adam and Nikki) onto the field by showing his US Soccer membership card despite failure to pre-register (take note!). It turned out Adam and Nikki were AO members of the Jacksonville chapter, so we made instant friends.

We took many pictures with the players (Boca, Timmy, Dempsey, and Cameron being my favorites), and MF was able to get her jersey signed by Beckerman. At one point, Clint was training by himself, and I yelled, "Nacogdoches!" I'm not sure if he heard me, but during the autograph session he and MF compared Texas tattoos. He thinks his is better because he has Nacogdoches starred, but everyone knows that it's really NacaNoWhere.

From there, we went back to the hotel, picked up the sleepy lame ones (CS & MS), and headed to Fionn MacCool's for dinner, based on Adam's recommendation for food. His recommendation did NOT disappoint. The scotch egg and beer cheese soup in a bread bowl were both delicious and excellent in quality. The portion sizes were generous for the prices, and $3 pints of Yuengling satisfied the sleepy lame ones, since they weren't eating. Just FYI, Yuengling cannot be found in Houston (or Texas from what I've been told), so apparently it is a hot commodity.

From Fionn MacCool's, we walked to Lynch's Irish Pub a block away, home of the AO Jacksonville chapter. This was definitely a happening place, not just because of all the American Outlaws, but because it seems to be a local's favorite hangout (based on the line at the front door). I ran into the two Phoenix guys (hung out with them in Miami and Los Angeles last year) that always travel, which was good. AO Jacksonville seems to have unique chants, and we now have in our heads images of Oompa Loompas with the gold ticket forever associated with this chapter.

The next day (May 26th) after free breakfast at the hotel, we decided to hit Jacksonville Beach - same area where we were the previous night. The beach is non-alcoholic, but we still brought alcohol. As long as you quietly pour beer into a cup (get free cups from Whataburger), the cops won't disturb you. The beach was pretty packed, although not uncomfortably crowded. My friends had brought the canopy from Houston (strapped to the roof of the SUV). Apparently there had been a huge argument prior to driving as to how to secure the canopy, but one of the guys said, "Thanks for making us bring the canopy" because it was extremely hot. The sand was so hot it wasn't uncommon for small children to cry.

The waves were pretty rough. Unlike the beach in Surfside, TX, it was impossible to make it out to sea past the break where the waves started. Nevertheless, the water was clean and there was no seaweed being brought ashore, which was a nice change. CS and MS rented boogie boards ($15/hour), but MS had a hard time since he didn't know how to boogie board in the first place. Many of us returned sunburned, but it was worth it.

Around 1PM or so we headed back to the hotel to shower and change. I will say it is impressive when you can get five, sandy people to shower, change, and get ready for the game (tailgate supplies included) within an hour. We also had sandwich stuff from the store (luncheon meat, bread, and condiments), which was helpful throughout the whole trip. We also had a refrigerator, and that was a lifesaver (not all hotels provide fridges).

The tailgate was one of the best I've attended at the USMNT games  mainly because the Jacksonville chapter had a HUGE grill. Typically at AO tailgates, we just order pizza, but this time were were grilled hamburgers and Ballpark hot dogs. [The hot dog brand makes a difference, so take note!] We met people from all over the nation - El Paso, Dallas (not a FC Dallas fan/supporter, whew!), Jacksonville, Phoenix, and goodness knows where else. People were cool, although when we initially entered the parking lot (grassy area), someone asked MS rudely, "Why are you wearing a kilt?" I should note MS, being of Scottish heritage, wore a kilt (nothing underneath!) with a US Soccer jersey.

The game itself was a blast, of course, since the USMNT won 5-1. Everbank Field is your typical stadium with no shade. There was a woman checking every ticket for our section. I will say security was quite lax. There were probably about four or so small smoke bombs lit. You can tell whoever was setting them was an amateur, sending up smoke within a couple of minutes of kickoff (no goal). The smoke bombs were so small though that they may not have made it on television. Nothing was done (that I know of) in terms of consequences, and we can still bring banners to this week's game.

After the game, we headed back to the tailgate area at Russ Doe's sandwich shop. The sandwich shop made quite a bit of money on parking, allowing us to park for $10 on their grass lot. We hung out with the Phoenix guys for so long that there were only four vehicles left (including each of ours). Someone needed a jump, but we didn't have jumper cables.

We were still wide awake, so we decided to have a pool party at the hotel (thanks hotel for having unlocked gate). CS, being a board of director, invited everyone in Texian Army via Facebook to join us (of course, some couldn't make it to Jacksonville on short notice). However, upon review at the hotel, there was no more beer. I found a 24-hour Walgreens within a 5-min drive who sold alcohol until 2AM. At 1:40AM, to quote CS, "I've never seen us so motivated to go somewhere; I like it." We managed to make it to Walgreens in time. There were at least three other people who also had the same idea at 2AM. We finally went to bed around 4AM, despite my suggestion that we should stay up another two hours to have breakfast.

I will resume this chronicle tomorrow. Good night.