The Boilermaker Ball!

We were invited to the Boilermaker Ball last weekend.  We gladly obliged and headed down to Indy for the alumni event. 

  

It was at the J-Dub downtown.  I'd never been there before so I was excited to check it out.  There was a seating chart in the program.  We realized there were around 1000 people there!! We were the cool people at table 2. 

 

 

 When we first walked in, we had the opportunity to have our picture taken with Purdue Pete. What am I doing with my arm? Once a cheerleader, always a cheerleader, I guess.  

Good thing Pete didn't blink right? (Groan.  Eye roll.  Don't worry, I stole that joke from Andrew.)

 The theme was "Down the Rabbit Hole" this year.  We didn't actually have our dessert first.  It was just listed that way on the menu.  Party Planning Peeps be cray cray!! Haha!

I did not take enough pictures but that just shows how much fun we had! Too busy tying one on to take pics!

I took a picture of the dance floor and stage.  Kind of. 

I thought this was funny.  I took a picture of the couple across from us who got their picture with Purdue's AD and had Brian Cardinal, of all people, take it. Umm... so if you had your choice between NBA Champion and Purdue AD, which would you choose? Here, guy, you're not doing anything besides wearing a Tweedle Dee hat.  Take our picture, will ya?

The tables had giant flowers on them.  It was quite a Golden Afternoon, huh? GET IT??? ;)

Here's Andrew with his new bestie, Brian.  You might remember him from this post.  Their friendship has really blossomed. 

We sat at the table with Brian and his wife, Danielle.  We also partied with Jerry from Nine Irish, as we do.

The live band was amazing! We danced to almost 4 straight hours of live music.  Endless Summer Band.  Book them now, if you're getting married.  They were awesome!

Bowtie buddies, Andrew and Jerry.  Andrew did not think about the fact that he didn't know how to tie a bowtie until he was putting on his suit and we were late for the cocktail hour.  Whoops! Thank Goodness for Youtube videos, amirite?

Hubby and Wifey with the band in the back.  Can't you tell? ;)

Silly front view

 

Should I tag this #cardinalselfie ... or #WeAreAllTweedleDUM ?

What would this hashtag be? #nineirishphotobooth maybe? I think I'm on Instagram too much.

End of night selfie.  We both had our uncomfortable shoes off for the walk back to our room. 

A great night was had by all Boiler Alums in attendance. Thanks for the invite, Brian.  We had a great time!

Dinner with our friend, Brian

A couple weeks ago, we had the opportunity to go to dinner with Brian Cardinal.  Some of you readers may not know who he is (because I'm WORLDWIDE, Folks!!).  Brian was a player at our ol' Purdue University.  Then he went on to the NBA and played for few different teams before retiring to a more regular life in Indiana just recently. 

He tweeted a picture of us.  We felt super cool. He told some great stories about Gene Keady and playing for Purdue.  He was a really funny and extremely nice to us nerdy fans.  :-) 

I'm keeping this short because I could go on and on with super dorky anecdotes but that might bore you.  The only thing you need to know is that he can take a good ribbing and give it right back to you.  Also, he was nice enough to come over to our seats during the Purdue game and say a casual hello.  I couldn't go to the game that night but boy, did Andrew enjoy that.  Everybody sitting around them said, "OMG, that's Brian Cardinal."  Our seat neighbors must be asking "Who ARE These people?" after seeing us sit in the gold seats, have a fully uniformed officer come over to talk to us every game, and being visited by Brian Cardinal.  I guess we're just something special. :)

I don't have time to talk about all the funny articles I found on Brian Cardinal, I will just link to them so you can read them in your spare time.  This one is possibly true on how he got a big contract.  This is about his twitter presence getting him in trouble.  This post has a super quick reference to his foul shot ritual.  Sadly, that was the ONLY thing I could find on that.  Oh wait, just kidding.  Here's another one from a former Ohio State player talking about the foul shot ritual. Hilarious.  We know why he did it!!!! Oohhh secrets!!

Anyway, super exciting night for true Purdue fans.  Plus he was a really interesting person to talk to.  Double bonus! Thanks for dinner, our new friend Brian.  (I totally hope he googles himself and finds this, by the way. :-) 

We're Golden!

An opportunity came up recently for us to have better seats for the Purdue b-ball game against Lamar.  Who? This is Lamar.  They're from Texas.  

Anyway we got our tickets through a friend of a friend who was nice enough to let us use them.  They were laminated.  Kerchow! I could have worn my ticket on a lanyard, folks!! Nerd alert.

 Before the game, because of the tickets and peeps we knew, we got to go to what felt like "backstage" at Mackey.

 To get there, we had to go by the athletic training area which was super cool.  This picture is not exciting but I felt like someone was about to crack down on the psycho taking pics with her iPhone so that's exciting to me. :)

 The person who brought us to the game bought us prime rib in the little room (I call it that because I don't know what it's actually called) where we started.

We were also able to drink beers.  What the what? Very exciting!

In that same room, we were able to watch the team walk by and run through the tunnel.  Très cool.

 Now that's a good reason to use my panorama!

 I went with an entire group of dudes. Here are some of those dudes in their gold seats. :)

 Like the freak that I am, I took a picture of Painter being interviewed at half-time.  I think the cops had their eye on me.  I kept telling myself, "Act like you've been here before!" It wasn't working.

 I mean, what a freak.  I took a picture of the waiter who served our area.  Stop it!

 Check out Petey talking up this white haired gentleman.

 I got a great shot of Anthony that I was stoked about.

Finally here's a super squinty pic of Andrew and I by our gold seats.  Great night! Would love to be able to do it again sometime but it's not entirely likely.  :) Fun while it lasted!

Boilermaker Basketball!

Tommy went to his second Purdue basketball game last week.  The first time he was a babe so he doesn't quite remember it.  

For the second game experience, we went to Scotty's for dinner before the game.  The way the table and high chairs were set up, this was as close as we could get him to the table.  He still surprisingly ate all his dinner even though he could barely reach it.  

Then it was game time! 

 For the first half, Tommy sat on Steph's lap (or Teef as Tommy says).

 Tommy was really excited about the game.  He loved clapped along with the crowd.

He pointed out Purdue Pete the whole night, even when he was clear across Mackey he would always find him.  He would wave and say "Hi Pete!" THEN!! He came up to our section! Tommy was a little freaked out but he still waved at him when he was that close.

 Then he came down and gave Tommy a high five and a fist bump. Tommy was stoked!

 Then Ol' Pete performed a guitar solo in our section on his hammer.

 Travis and his mustache came to visit our section.

Tommy and Dada enjoying the game

 Tommy and Mama cheesing for the camera

 This picture cracks me up. He just sitting there smiling to himself. Kiddo LOVES Purdue basketball.

Group pic!

Tommy was SOOO GOOD during this game.  It was awesome. In fact, I didn't even say anything until the game was over because I didn't want to jinx it.   Thanks for impressing all our game seat neighbors, Tommy.  I see a big time Purdue fan in the making!

Football Saturday vs Wisconsin

On Saturday Purdue played Wisconsin. Andrew, Andrew's dad and I all went to the tailgate/game. 

Some friendly tailgaters offered us some drunken bears.  Genius idea.  Instead of using vodka, she used Malibu which made them taste even MORE like candy.  YUM-O.

The same tailgate also had a "passed out girl".  She was probably up too late the night before studying so hard.  She was obviously very tired.  When we came back from the game several hours later, she was STILL sleeping in the same place.  Impressive.

 When we went to the game, I tried to get a picture of someone sitting close to us but my husband is 13 year olds still.

 There! I got him.  This is the infamous Wendell Wolka.  If you are Purdue fan, I think you need to read this next little passage.

At first, people might not get the connection between Boilermakers and Pharaohs. Known as “The King,” Wendell Wolka wears a giant gold-and-black Egyptian Pharaoh hat to each contest to show his true colors.

After missing Purdue’s stunning 1974 upset of Notre Dame in South Bend because he didn’t think the Boilermakers had a chance, Wolka vowed to never miss another Purdue football game.

Wolka has kept that promise, now 415 games later. The streak almost came to a halt in the 1990s when he was required to show up in Texas on Saturday for a business conference. So what did Wolka do? Naturally, he drove from Milwaukee to West Lafayette for one play, got back in his car to drive to Indianapolis and then caught a flightto Houston.

Before he got married to his wife in 2007, Wolka made sure to ask her if she was prepared for 12 football games a year. Was she ever. The two rented the Boilermaker Special train mascot as their limo for the big day and now when Wolka attends each game in his Pharaoh style hat, she is at his side donning Cleopatra headgear.

Here's the pic from the article.  He was voted number 9 in the top 20 college football super fans based on their passion, loyalty, flair and celebrity status on campus.  I've seen him at every basketball game too.  He's truly a super fan.  

We were having trouble being fans at all that day.  It started raining. I was the only one smart enough to bring a raincoat.  The Thornburg Men look none too pleased. 

 Then we raced around at halftime to buy these super awesome ponchos.  Yes I bought one too.  My lap was getting soaked so I guess the raincoat wasn't THAT smart.

 After the game, we went visited the tailgate where my brother was chillin'.  Look at that tasty looking Purdue P cake. It was only in the rain for a little bit.  Yikes.

 I'm in to taking self-group portraits (is that a thing?).  So here's Adam, my fat face, the other Adam and Drewfus.

We came back home to Thomasaurus and Gaga.  They had a grande ol' time.  

Oh, my sweet little bucket head.

  

Then it was time to chillax and watch the evening foozball games.  Tommy takes this position on the couch now every single time.  It's hilarious.  He's so comfortable.  I wonder who he's imitating. ;-)