The Whirlwind is Over

The last nine days have been a whirlwind, but it's finally over. I don't know that I physically could have done any more and now I've used two vacation days recovering from it all.

It all started on Monday, June 18 with the Cracovia Media Dinner at Janosik. Tuesday was a run of the mill work day, as was Wednesday for the most part. Thursday I had to spend the entire afternoon driving around the city picking up tickets and money from one of our consignment partners that I'll never work with again. That night I went with the Chilean and Jen to the CONCACAF Gold Cup semifinal matches at Soldier Field. The United States beat Canada 2-1 in the first game and Mexico ended the Cinderella tournament run of Guadaloupe 1-0 in the second game.

I ended up getting a little drunk with the Chilean at the game and we had a good time heckling the Mexicans about our run of success over them in the past decade. Our friend Lisa had a great scarf that read, in Spanish, "Remember Korea," complete with the date and score of the Round of 16 match when we knocked "El Tri" out of the World Cup in 2002.

Friday was my big day, the Chicago Fire's match against MKS Cracovia Krakow. I got to the stadium very early, around 8:15 or so, to prepare for the game. Once gates opened at 6:30 and the game kicked off at 8:00, it was non-stop action for me. And all kinds of issues. The highlight for me was escorting the Cracovia team President Janusz Filipik down onto the field for a halftime presentation with our team President, John Guppy. I got to have my picture taken with the two team presidents and my counterpart with Cracovia, Rafal. It was weird having members of the press taking my picture, but Rafal also promised to send me an autographed jersey and I hope to have that photo framed with it when it gets here. The lowlight: probably having to talk to a client of mine that was having a rooftop party about how his employees had acted inappropriately. One of the waitresses went home crying after getting harassed up there. Yikes.









After the game I met up with my cousin, Bryan, and my Uncle Eric downtown for a drink and then headed home to bed. The weekend had really just begun. Saturday I went down to ESPNZone and goofed around with Bryan and Neil and some of Bryan's friends and then headed home to clean a little before heading down to the Bryan and Terri's wedding rehersal and dinner. I made an appearance at Eclipse, a Polish night club where Cracovia was having their goodbye party and then I was home and in bed around 2:00 am.

Sunday morning, bright and early, I woke up and drove our to Vernon Hills with my dad for my soccer game. We lost, 3-1, and I had a miserable first half, but played better in the second and had a couple nice balls setting up opportunities for us to get back into it. No dice. We drove home in a hurry and it took me only 15 minutes to shower, change and get my stuff together for the wedding. We were back in the car, picked up my friend Natalie, and took the back roads to Soldier Field for the Gold Cup Final.

At the stadium, my dad and I grabbed some Polish sausages and we made it to our seats just as the game kicked off. The first half was somewhat boring; I taunted Landicakes Donovan a little bit as he pretty muched sleepwalked through his biggest game since Germany last summer. Mexico scored first, just a minute before halftime, and I'm almost glad they did. For one, watching a sold out 60k+ crowd that was about 95% Mexican go insane was a sight to be seen. Secondly, I think it made Head Coach Bob Bradley rethink a few thinks and light a few fires.

The U.S. came out with a different attitude in the second half and halftime sub Ricardo Clark really changed the flow of the match in the midfield. Brian Ching woke up and began really battling for the ball around the penalty area, eventually drawing a penalty kick, which Landicakes calmly converted for the equalizer.

I looked down at my watch and realized that we needed to get going soon if we were going to make it all the way to my dad's hotel in Alsip, shower, change and get to the wedding on time. The longer we waited, the worse traffic would get as it was a busy weekend in Chicago. Gold Cup, Cubs-Sox on the South side, set-up for the Taste of Chicago and the Gay Pride Parade. But I didn't want to leave a 1-1 game so we held on as long as we could, eventually taking off in the 70th minute after two players collided and both teams sent stretchers onto the pitch. Just two minutes after we walked out the door, we heard a roar from the crowd behind us and my dad thought it was a Mexican goal. Natalie just said, "Nope, not loud enough...that was probably us." Sure enough, we heard my boy Nick over the PA, "United States goal scored by Benny Feilhaber!"

I missed it!

Oh well, we were on our way to the FAR South side for the wedding. We got there in plenty of time and heard all about the U.S. goal from those that watched it on TV...I was a little jealous that I couldn't stay, but happy for my cousin nonetheless. My sister and I were the two readers, me reading I Corinthians 13:4-8, my sister a poem by an unknown author about love. The wedding was great, and it was definitely amazing to see some of my family that I hadn't since Christmas, specifically my friend prego friend Simone. I had a fun time chatting with cousin Neil, someone who 10 years ago I don't think I'd ever had uttered those words. I hope I continue to get closer with my cousins over the years.

Anyways....long story short....I was running in 5th gear all weekend and I needed a couple of days to unwind and recover, so I did that my taking Monday and Tuesday off. Much needed. Now just one more day before the madness begins again. Nick (my college roommate) and the Demi (plural of Demas, friends from high school) are coming in town this weekend for my annual July 4 bash, this year in June for the first time ever.