Hubris

Oh, how I regret my recent hubris…

You would think that by now I’d learn that every time I make some boastful prediction about a thing that particular thing goes terribly awry.  Today’s game was no exception.  At 1:00, Richard and I settled into our bleacher seats, grinning with that cocky assurance one has when they feel assured of a victory.  A little over 90 minutes later, we felt like the soggy, trampled crepe paper that littered the stadium grounds.  But even with the loss, there were still plenty of highlights:

1. Seeing the players before the game in their civvies — up close and personal – making their way through the crowd on their way to the dressing room.  Without exception, each one looked like a runway model in their suits and each one stopped graciously to sign autographs and shake hands with fans.
2. On that note, my excited shouts of “DE-RO!!!” got me a smile and a wave from the man himself.  I nearly swooned; Richard quietly died of embarassment next to me.
3. There was a Mexican family sitting on the bleacher below us and, at one point, the seven-year-old son dropped some quarters he had been palming.  The father picked them up and handed them back to his little boy, saying, “Careful with your pocket money, mijo, or you won’t have anything to buy cervezas with.”
4. Richard and I got free hats for being part of the first 9,500 fans to enter the stadium (out of an eventual 30,500 that packed the stands).  Richard hasn’t taken his off all day.
5. The lone bagpiper was in top form today.
6. There was a so-bad-it’s-good dance number prior to the game in which “The Spice Girls” “performed” their greatest “hits.”  “Ginger Spice” was played by a black chick with a horrendous red wig.
7. “Posh Spice” was wooed and won by Diesel, the Dynamo mascot, after he performed dance moves that the announcer dubbed “greater than anything we’ve seen out of Beckham this season.”
8. And continuing the whole faux-Beckham trend of the day, a rather good David Beckham impersonator had to be escorted out of the stands by the police because the crowd had turned on him and was concentrating more on booing the impersonator than watching the game (pictures after the jump).
9. El Batallon and the Texian Army were also in top form today and louder than I’ve ever heard them.  The aforementioned crepe paper streamers that were thrown onto the pitch by both groups (after repeated warnings from the announcer that throwing things onto the “field” was forbidden) actually caused Joe Cannon to receive a yellow card when he wasted time by trying to clear his goal of streamers instead of throwing the ball back into play.
10. And…we’re still going to the playoffs, so that’s all that really counts.

Pictures from the game after the jump.

The main entrance to Robertson Stadium; if not for the tiny seating map, you’d never know the Dynamo play here.  I can’t wait until they have their own stadium…

A fresh, empty pitch.

The beautiful — albeit a bit hazy from all of today’s rain — Houston skyline.

“The Spice Girls”

El Batallon and their many flags.

The awesome Texian Army and the thunderclouds that soaked us shortly afterwards.

And last but not least, the Beckham impersonator himself.