Tiger by the tail

So, the Ticat game! It was a spectacularly beautiful day with my brother Henry. The Hamilton Tiger cats are playing in Guelph this year while they renovate their stadium.

It was my first professional football game ever. I'm more of an American college and NFL fan but it was still great!

Time for some football! We got there early so Henry could drive me right up to the gate.

Not sure who these guys are but they stopped after the game outside while I was waiting for Henry to make sure I was okay. Nice of them.

It was fun to watch the set up and warm up from so close by.

Pigskin Pete was the was the only "mascot" I didn't get a picture with but I got one with both tigers!

This tiger pose was for me!

Let the game begin! I have a ton more pictures and video that I will be turning into a movie.

They were playing against Calgary. I'm really more of a Toronto Argonauts fan than the Ticats so the fact that they lost quite badly wasn't that painful but after all the fun I had yesterday I am a fan for life of the Hamilton organization too. It really felt like a family. A lot of the players and staff and even referees came over to talk with people in the handicap section where we sat and seemed to know them which was neat.

Here's the kicker who did lots of practicing after he missed a 25 yarder.

I didn't mind at all sitting where we were, didn't care that the best seats are in the middle of the stadium. I was just glad to be so close to the field. However the frustrating thing is that they were hardly ever in our end despite the fact that they change ends every quarter! Oh well.

Yeah sometimes it was a little hard to watch.

But I didn't care, I was having the time of my life. When Henry was out getting this…

(Meatball Poutine) So good it gets two pictures.

This happened. I asked Stripe's handler for a selfie.

Stripes can't talk but he got across to me to get ready to take another picture!

Did I mention I'm a fan for life now? Man it was fun!

Oh yeah there's a game going on isn't there. But first enjoy this bonus picture of my niece from a few years back.

Never mind it's halftime

The cheerleading kids to me were really impressive!

Okay so they dropped the littlest one...

But she got right back up!

Look I'm just not going to say anything about this particular group other than that they had a heck of a lot of fun!

I'm sure play resumed after halftime and lots of football happened. I may even have taken some pictures of it but we'll leave that for the movie shall we?

Henry and I had more fun things to do. Like try to get in the shot on the Jumbotron. These people waited around in front of us for break in game action so that this lady's husband could not catch three footballs in a row. Happy ending was that she bet on him not to catch any so it was all good and they won the prize. He was a terrible actor. I guess it's harder than it looks not to catch something.

So while the game is in a commercial and this lady's husband is running around the field not catching the ball, Henry is moving around casually dressed like the Unabomber trying to get in the tv shot and I'm taking pictures of the giant screen. See him?

Calm down guy you get the prize!

I felt sorry for the sign holding girls who stood around with just T-shirts on for almost an hour waiting. It was getting chilly by then.

Selfie op!

This guy was funny especially when he walked on his hands. However due to the condition of the game he was not given a lot of opportunity to celebrate.

So he ate one of the T-shirt shooting girls.

Yep right through the mouth which I guess logically is the exit and entrance after all.

Sadly I missed him ingesting her but she's inside with him here:

Then he squatted down:

And she popped out...

And ran back to her T-shirt shooting duties.

Speaking of T-shirt shooting I don't think we had any fatalities.

Whoops it's all over...

but the praying.

One of the players came over to talk to a fan nearby and I don't know what came over me but I stood up and stuck out my hand and sure enough I got a handshake!

Perfect! My only regret is that we did not fill up our thunder sticks. Not sure how I would've use them though considering I was taking a picture every 32 seconds!

Could not have had more fun! Thanks Henry.