Anyone have some backbone I could borrow?

D and I went to the Ohio State game yesterday. It’s an annual thing...we usually go to at least one game and it’s something we both really enjoy! It’s especially fun now, since we use our game day as a “date” and leave the kids with generous family members (my brother-in-law and sister-in-law were the lucky ones yesterday...thanks, G & D!!). So we went to the band show, hung out with friends at a tailgate, then went to the game.

We got to our seats and quickly discovered that we were sitting right in front of two very loud, very drunk 30-somethings who simply couldn’t control themselves. Their language was obscene and quite frankly, they annoyed us to the point that we left the game after halftime. By far, the worst thing about the whole experience was the fact that there was a young boy (probably 10 or 11 years old) sitting next to me, directly in front of one of these guys. It wasn’t long before this young boy began imitating everything being said behind him. He didn’t use vulgar language, but he quickly went from being a quiet little guy interested in the game to a yelling, screaming little guy trying to sound like the two idiots sitting behind him. The other worst thing about the whole experience was hearing one of the “gentlemen” say that he has three kids of his own. Oooooo!! Lucky them! I wonder how he’d feel if his own kids saw him acting that way.

The other worst thing about the whole experience was that we sat there through an entire half of a football game and never said a word to these two guys. Never asked them to tone it down, never made any kind of comment, never threatened to get a stadium usher to have them removed. It’s just in our nature to keep quiet at the risk of causing trouble. I’m sure, however, that had we had one or both of our kids there, we would’ve handled it differently. Or at least I’d like to think so.