Well, yesterday I happened to attend probably the biggest cultural event this side of the mason-dixon line. It was here on campus, too, what luck! What are the odds of this very awesome event coming to Knoxville? Probably pretty high. I mean the concentration of followers in the surrounding area has to be staggeringly high. Knoxville was just the logical place to gather all of this unique people.
So I guess by now, you've either heard of "Monster Jam," so you know what I am talking about, or you are still in the dark and wondering what the heck I am blabbering on about. Well, if you live in the East Tennessee area, and have come in contact with a television set in the past month, then you've heard the all framiliar voice in the all framiliar tone telling you "Sunday, Sunday, SUNDAY!" (Except for the fact that the event took place on Friday and Saturday.) monster trucks would be taking over Thompson Bowling arena for one of the biggest rallies in Knoxville, probably ever.
You know, to my knowledge as a loyal television watching American, if my memory serves me well, I believe that there was also a monster truck show at the Civic Coliseum last weekend, but who knows. I just hope that if there was, that it wasn't half as cool as the one I witnessed, or I should be saddened.
Well, 'twas I and two of my friends. We met up last night around six in the famous 'courtyard' on campus. We walked in the freezing weather over to TBA (haha) and went to the unaptly named "Will-Call" window to pick up our tickets.
So why is it that it is called the "Will-Call" window. I assume it's really an outdated term with some archaic meaning, but really, it doesn't make any since. Just as the use of the word 'since' in that past sentence didn't either. Frankly, that was just the wrong word. So what makes that any different? We weren't planning on calling that window, nor anything else of the sort that had anything to do with will or calling. We just needed to pick up our tickets. So wouldn't it be better named the "Pre-Purchase" line or the "Internet Order" line, or even better, just give the company a plug and call it the "Ticket's Unlimited Pre-Order" line. Anything, really, except the "Will-Call Window." That's just ignorant, but enough about my rant, back to the ultimate truck rally.
So I had never been to TBA save once or twice in my life half of those times being in the pre-pubescent time when facilities larger than a small ranch style house seem larger than life. Point being, I really didn't know how big the place was. My friends and I, after collecting our "will-call"ed tickets, made our way to the top side of the building to stand in line with a large collection of other men, women, and children from all walks of life except that of upper-class to await the opening of the doors.
When the clock struck seven, our heroic Knoxville Police opened the doors and greeting everyone with the beeping of metal detectors as they scanned all event-goers. Once inside, we made our way to our seats, Section 104 row 14. However, after resting our gludious-maximus-es (maximi?) into our relaxing hard plastic seats, we look out into the center to see nothing but a small floor with a couple cars at one end.
Our hopes of having mud slung on us and tired coming inches from our face were squashed by a large "safety zone" around the parameter and oh, yeah, the absence of mud. How can you have a monster truck rally without mud? It seems sac-religious. I really had no idea that such lame things existed. The commercials, at this point, had done nothing but mislead... but I guess, that was exactly what they were supposed to do. I mean if I had seen video of a previous rally in TBA, I would have most likely not bought a ticket.
Having already missed the "Pit-Party" which I was downed about, we proceeded to lounge in our seat for the remaining hour before this awesome (still hopeful) spectical was to begin. The announcer made his way out to the floor every few minutes with interviews with the drivers and some behind the scenes infomation about the event. There was even some early dialogue between the "quad-racer" team captains. These scripted events were nothing but mildly amusing as the "Team Florida" and "Team-Tennessee" faced off in quad races throughout the night. For those of you unframiliar with quads, imagine with me a crossbreed, a hybrid, of an ATV and a go cart.
Once 8 oh-clock rolled a-round, the show got started with large 10000 lb trucks and extremely loud 1500 hp engines. Smashing cars and launching into the air pulling wheelies and donuts, the night seemed to at least fill my expectations. My favorite event had to be the donut competition. Huge trucks breaking loose atop the concrete floor spinning in circles... that may not sound like anything special to you, but it sure made my day. One truck driver even managed to do some kind of special move during the freestyle and jump the line of cars backwards. Crazy, sheer ludicrous.
Of course Team Tennessee ended up winning the quad races at the last minute, defeating the cheating Team Florida throughout the wrestling-like-scripted exchanges between events. One of the coolest things of the night was the jetquad they brought out at some point. It was a quad, but not a normal quad. It had a turbine from a helicopter to use for projection. They put some kind of other special device in it, that allowed for huge flames to come shooting out of the back. Wow.
If you've never been to a monster truck rally and anything above peaked your interest, I would highly suggest heading over to a Monster Jam near you.... It's just too bad that Grave Digger couldn't make it. =(
