I'm a Bears fan living in Minneapolis. A few months ago, I bought two 5th row tickets to the Monday night Bears/Vikings game. I got them at silent auction to benefit a battered women's shelter.

It's not usually my style to splurge at an auction, but it was for a good cause, and I've never been to a "real" NFL game (only preseason). Most of the donated tickets were Wild or Twins, but there was one pair of Vikings tickets, and it was a Monday night game against my beloved Bears! I figured it was a Christmas present for my husband, last chance to see Favre, etc etc. Meant to be, right?

And now I find out that since the Souffledome disaster, our tickets are WORTHLESS. We have to go in first-come/first-serve, the GOPHERS season ticket holders get priority regardless of whether they have a ticket to this game, and if we can't get in, only the actual season ticket holder who donated the tickets we bought gets the refund (which is face value only)!!

To top it all off, the powers that be have decided that we will have NO BOOZE served at the game!! WHAT? That can only be a deliberate attempt to discourage attendance. After all, they already got their money, and they don't want anyone to make a scene. >:(

I know that replanning this game is a huge headache for the Vikes "organization", but it seems to me that they have made no effort whatsoever to try to help out ordinary ticket holders and to help us get seated. And liquored. You can't even claim that they are blowing off second-hand ticket purchases, now that they implement that on the NFL website.

I am beyond disappointed. We're going to try to attend. If we can't get in, I plan to take my tickets and get them matted and framed in midnight blue and orange under a photo of the collapsed Metrodome. It will hang in my Bears den as a memory of an expensive Christmas date gone awry, and of the apt metaphor that the Vikings 50th Anniversary season celebration became.

/end rant

PS: If anyone has insight on how one might transport libations into the TCF stadium, feel free to use this post to discuss such a hypothetical possibility. Just hypothetical. 'Cause it'd be a shame if someone were to actually enjoy the warm tingle of an alcoholic beverage during a frozen football game, ya know.