Friday In Four Acts

 

SONO Ice House, Norwalk, CT.
The "booth" was at center ice

Act 1: A hockey rink in South Norwalk, CT

SONO, to be exact. The Connecticut Roughriders host the New York Apple Core and I've been asked to call the game from the SONO Ice House.

I've never worked there nor have I ever been to this rink. But as I walked in I discovered stands at the top of the arena behind the net. OK, that will do.

But, wait, there's no camera of play-by-play setup at all.

Upon meeting up with my contact there, he leads me back downstairs through the team bench onto the ice and into the joint penalty box/scorers booth.

That's where the setup is and boy it would get tight in there.

Still, there's a job to do and I'm there to do it. So I connect my equipment, we do a sound test, and I call the game. The Roughriders lost 7-4 but it was a game of twists and turns.

I pack up and jump back in the car to return to Greenwich.

No, really, that was the booth at ice side

Act 2: Back home

Sean and The Cat are in the apartment when I get home. 

I have a little time to zone out, eat some lunch, and prep for football. 

Chris Erway eventually comes over to chat about things in the world. We have seen each other in about six weeks so it's a good chance to talk and review things about the game ahead of us.

As I'm parked in our driveway, blocking Sean, I leave my keys behind because Sean wants to go get some dinner. He can use my car.

Chris also parks his car in the driveway and we take note of his rear tire before heading to Cardinal Stadium.

It looked -- how shall I put this? -- low.

Big Tone! Coach of the Week!

Act 3: Friday Night Lights

It was our first time back in Cardinal Stadium in a few weeks.

We set up, had everything in place, and had some time on our hands.

We headed down to the field to say hello to head coach Tony Morello, who was recently named the New York Jets high school coach of the week.

It also happened to be senior night so we watched as the ceremony began before we headed back towards the booth.

The food trucks lined up, including the delicious Dough Girls Pizza. We grabbed a pie ... just in case our other dinner didn't show up.

We've been promised that tonight is the night we're getting free sandwiches from Jersey Mike's ("A Sub Above") as part of our postgame interview agreement.

But one thing we both know is that a hungry broadcaster is a bad broadcaster. 

So, pizza. And it's fantastic.

Yet not long after the broadcast has begun my phone blows up with texts. Jersey Mike's can't figure out how to get to us.

I mean, we're only in the stadium on the upper level in the booth. No big deal.

OK, they found us. We ate some and it was delicious. We took the leftovers home.

Greenwich won the game 35-0 and they're 9-0. They play Staples on Thanksgiving before the playoffs begin.

Subs, hats, football, and flat tires

Act 4: A dark corner

We returned to Chris's car to find that the tire was worse.

With fingers crossed we began the short drive back to The Presidential Suite but we barely made it out of Greenwich High School before realizing the tire was really bad.

We tried to get back to the apartment but then we heard noises.

Game over. We stopped.

Sitting at a street corner, Chris repositioned the car as I called Sean. We thought perhaps (foolishly, I know) we could inflate the tire.

Then we got a better look at it. Nope. It was toast.

Sean joined us in my car and that added better lighting to the situation as I began to work with the jack that was in the car.

It's the same kind of awful jack that I have in my car.

I twisted and turned and Chris tried to figure out if he had AAA roadside assistance. Well, he thought he did with the help of his wife, Genna.

Initially, we were also having trouble getting the lugnuts off when a strange, large, older gentleman approached the lug wrench and, within a minute or two, had each lugnut loosened.

Son of a gun. Sean wanted to know where his old man found such strength!

Me too, kid. Me too.

Still, the car needed to get off the ground. That's when a stranger pulled up next to us, and we decided AAA wasn't going to be an option.

The stranger (no, not the Billy Joel album) asked me if we needed help. I said we needed a good jack. We needed anything better than what we had.

He had something.

Sean had taken note of him down the street as if he was watching us. That had my radar heightened.

Admittedly skeptical of strangers and such good fortune, I watched the man as he worked. He certainly did have the kind of jack we needed and, quickly, had the car up, tire off, spare on, and car back down.

Then almost as quickly, he packed up and left with our thanks.

Chris headed home.

So did we.

I'm thrilled to be reminded of the good that there is in the world, despite any misgivings. It's easy to be skeptical, even if it's a healthy skepticism. This stranger was our savior at the end of a long day.

Chris will get a new tire tomorrow.

I'll go call Williston Northampton and Brunswick.

We'll likely both eat the remainder of our Jersey Mike's sandwiches.

Then we'll get back together on Sunday for the GYFL championships.

It feels like it was a whole day of making it work.

That's what we did.