Note to self: Do not go anywhere near downtown during a Cornhusker football gameday. Actually I knew this, but I got an ugly reminder last night. Due to the WTC/Pentagon tragedy - college football games had to be rescheduled. The UNL - Rice game got rescheduled to Thursday night at 7:30. Now, if you aren't familar with the Big Red Sea phenomenon here in Lincoln, I'll try to explain. About 5 hours before game time, fans from all over the state start to flock into an area of about 1 square mile in size, maybe smaller, around the campus. The stadium itself becomes the state's third largest city during a football game. (I am not exaggerating! There really are that many people who come into the games) The sidewalks are filled with people of all ages wearing red and carrying flags, pom poms, and of course - Husker tickets. The streets are filled with cars and pickups trying to find cheap parking. Needless to say - there's a lot of people and some of them have probably been hitting the sauce already. Not pleasent to be in, unless you are part of the flow heading toward the stadium.

Normally games are on Saturday so no problem. Those of us who prefer not to partake in the madness simply stay away from campus for the day. Having the game on Thursday night - that made avoiding the crowds a bit harder to do. People are flocking into downtown just as people are trying to get out of downtown and go home. Can you say major traffic problems? I had planned on staying home that afternoon and then go to a friends house for a session of RPGing, but due to some weird circumstances, I was asked to go pick up two friends from campus for the nights festivities.

Now that I've set up the scenario - imagine me trying to get into downtown during all this, about an hour before game time and during rush hour. On a stretch of street that normally takes me 2 minutes to get through - counting stop lights - I spent 15 minutes trying to get through. But I got through it and so did the friends I picked up. We all had fun gaming and the 'Huskers won handily so I guess things are OK.