2002 Wings Stanley Cup Parade
Sunday, June 16th, 2002, 4 pm
I was supposed to work till 5 that day, and then I was going to drive to Willi’s house, since we were spending the night so we could leave early the next morning for Detroit. Well, I got out at 4 instead, and as I got into my car I realized I had forgotten my sandals. Was I ever pissed off. During the entire playoff run I couldn’t wear my sandals, unless I was taking the dog out or just doing a quick errand across the street. The reason was whenever I wore my sandals on game day, the game did not go well. So, finally! I was able to wear my sandals again, and I had left them at home! Grr. So I call Amy to see what time she and Coo are getting to Willi’s, and I find out they’re not getting there till like 12:30 am or so. I also found out that the Wings rally at the Joe was that night at 8 pm, which I had not realized. So instead of driving to Willi’s as originally planned I went home, bought a blank tape for the rally, and two pieces of poster board for signs. As I was driving home I had thought up a plan for a sign. So to make this part of the story short, I programmed the VCR for the rally, made my brother promise to tape the parade for me the next day, had my mom draw up part of my sign (since I am not artistically blessed), and left my house about 10 pm and listened to the rest of the rally on the radio. Later that night I finished my sign. (As soon as I get my pictures all developed, I’ll scan them onto the site for all to see) Basically, my mom had drawn a picture of a pirate in the middle of the poster board and had glued Steve Yzerman’s head on. He had a peg for one leg, and instead of holding a sword he had a hockey stick. There was also the Wings symbol in the center of his shirt. The top of the sign read “Aye aye Captain!” Then down the right I had written “Our One Legged Wonder” and on the right side it read “I love you Stevie!” lol.
Monday, June 17th, 2002
Let’s see. Around 2 am, Amy and Coo arrived, and soon after we all went to bed. * Snicker * Well, we at least TRIED to go to bed. Willi, Shannon, and I shared stories of the wonderful folks that come into our workplace. Or just the people we work with. I really only contributed one tidbit, but hey, that’s okay. The funniest story of the night, and not to be mean here, but it totally cracked me up…. was the blind bagger. Lol, I’ll just leave it at that. So, around 2:30 Willi told us that it was 4:00 and her alarm would be going off in 20 minutes. Soon after that, everyone shut up and tried to sleep. I think I got about 1.5 hrs of sleep haha. We got up at 4:30 or so, and left her house around 5:20. We had to pick up Jen Jen across the street, whose alarm didn’t go off or something. I can’t quite remember anymore, it was very early in the morning. So, we were off.
After a quick stop at the McDonald’s in Brighton, (Burger King wasn’t open yet) we made very good time to Detroit. Oh yes, I must make a reference to the car that pissed us off for some reason. Okay, so we’re driving along, do be do be doo, and I think this dude cut us off. His license plate said “QAM” or something close to that. So, I being the brilliant Krista, scream out “Damn you, you stupid Kwam!!!!” It is spelled Quam, but pronounced Kwam. hehe. And that is how the word ‘qam' was born. It can be used in many different ways. Instead of calling someone a bitch, you can say, qam, and they won’t even know you’re insulting them. There are other ways as well. It’s a rather universal word, so feel free to use it in any situation that you feel it can be applied to. Spread it like wildfire.
6:30 am
We’re arriving in Detroit about this time. We parked at the Joe Louis Arena parking garage – it was only $3.50! Good deal. So as we’re leaving the car, I ask Farr A if she thinks I’ll need my umbrella. She said we’d be cool and wouldn’t need it. Okay. So I left it behind. When she asked me if I thought she would need her sweatshirt, I said, no, you won’t need it. Oh, how these words would come back to haunt us.
It took us probably twenty minutes or so to get to the corner of Woodward and Cadillac I think it was. We walked along the Detroit River, past the Joe, and came through Hart Plaza, past the Spirit of Detroit, and found an empty spot along the curb in front of a bus stop. So we sat there, all 7 of us. And started our wait. By this time, it was close to 7 am. The parade started at 11:30. Anyone who knows me probably realizes that I am a VERY impatient person. So for me to do this, you can see how much I love that team lol.
It was sprinkling off and on all morning. After probably a half hour or so, we decided that we needed to buy the Detroit papers, so Coo, Jen Jen, and me went off in search of some. On our way we made a pit stop in the port-a-potty. It was kind of scary, yes, but when ya gotta go ya gotta go! Simple as that. We finally found a newspaper vendor dealio on the corner that had plenty of papers, so we got the News and the Free Press and headed back to our spots. It was also at this time we came across an unexpected surprise. An unwanted one as well.
In front of the bus stop, in the seats (when I say seats, realize that I mean the spots that we were sitting on the curb. We did not have chairs. It was a rather numbing experience, if you know what I mean) that we had vacated was sitting a slightly old, slightly drunk looking fellow, holding a beer inside a paper sack. As we sat down he explained he’d leave if we needed the extra room, but since half of our ppl were now standing, it would have been pretty obvious to say we needed the room. After some time, a few of the ppl in our group went over to a cop to report that he had an open bottle of alcohol, thinking the cop would make the dude get the hell away from us, or at least make him get rid of the beer. I’m not exactly sure what the cop whispered in the guy’s ear, but boy did it piss him off! After the cop was gone, he started saying stuff to us like you know, if you wanted me to move I told you to just ask me and blah blah blah. He said something to Willi and I was just like back off, you drunken asshole. Okay, really what I said was “Hey, back off!” lol.
After that, a few more hrs passed with him (sitting behind us) muttering about stupid girls making him move and not wanting to open up any alcohol. It was not amusing. I was pretty pissed off. But we’ll get back to that later.
Around 9ish, we decided to go for a walk. At this time it was still just sprinkling off and on. So off we went, me, Jen Jen, and Coo again. We walked past this new building being built. At the time we wondered what it was – I discovered later that night it was the new Compu Ware building. The significance of that? The owner of the Carolina Hurricanes also owns that company. On the other side of the building there was a big sign congratulating the Wings and stuff. So we kept walking and came by the court house, which had a big Stanley Cup sitting near the doors, so we took some pictures with it. On to Starbucks we went. There was a huge line in there, so we burned good ‘nother hour or so in there. By the time we got back to our “seats,” it was getting close to 11. The crowd was huge. What had started as a single line sitting along the curb had turned into a crowd of people like 10 deep to the building. And now, back to the drunk guy.
It’s been hours since our encounter with this guy, right? Maybe it was just his drunken state of mind, but he starts saying to Amy and me, “Why couldn’t you just ask me to move? Why’d you have to go call the cops?” And all this, so I was like, “Dude, we didn’t have anything to do with it. We sat here the whole time and didn’t move.” He kept going on and on about how yes we did have something to do with it and everything, so I just said, “It was 2 hours ago! Just shut up.” Basically, he said, “No, I won’t shut up. It’s bullshit. Why don’t you just go back to Howell?” or something like that. So, me being me, and unable to control my wonderful temper, turned and said “Well, I’m not from fucking Howell, so shut the hell up.” And what does he say to that? The best comeback line I’ve ever heard. “Well, maybe you should be.” Okay?? Yeah, what an intelligent fellow. That was basically the end of that with him. Although his bratty little kids kept trying to take pictures of us for some reason.
Okay, I know I’m boring you all with all of this, but you have to have the build up before you can get to the best part! And finally, we are at the best part. The parade. 11:30 arrives, and the Detroit All-City High School band comes along, and they were pretty good. We saw some other floats and stuff, and then here comes a car with Mickey Redmond inside. All the guys were either in convertibles or on the back of pickup trucks. A float came by with a bunch of kids on top waving pom poms and stuff, and this one girl threw hers, and I swooped in and grabbed it. It was just one of the ones they have at Joe Vision, but on the handle it said Stanley Cup Finals. When we were at Joe Vision for Game 4 of the Finals, I couldn’t find one so I have one now. Someone threw one to Willi, too. Karen Newman, the anthem singer, came by doing her thing. As the cars and floats were going by, we were probably like 6 feet from them. That’s the advantage to getting there so early – let that be a lesson to ya, kids.
Soon, we saw this float coming, it had an awning type thing over it, and we could see Vladdy and Sergei M sitting there. As it approached, Willi yelled, “Johnny’s there too!!!!” Of course, we had brought a sign for John Wharton, our hero. It was pretty simple, just saying, “CMU loves John Wharton!” I had also cut out a picture from one of the brochures I got from Central, of him holding the Cup. We glued that in the center of the heart on the sign. So when the float came by, Wharton was on the other side, video taping the fans. We started screaming “Johnny!!! Johnny!!” He looked over, saw us, and smiling, immediately walked over to the other side of the float and taped us. Then he reached down to the side of the float where these roses where stapled on, and yanked off a white one, handing it to Willi. Then I was like “Can I have one too?” And he pulled off a red one for me. It was so cool. The flower is hanging in my room right now, drying out. I got a few pics of him, hopefully they turn out good. Coo said she got a picture of him handing us flowers. Awww. The whole crowd was chanting “Vladdy Vladdy” as they went by, too.
*Note: I am just finishing this story at the end of August, so if I leave anything out due to memory lapses, I apologize.