Musings on the Most Ridiculous Band I Can't Stop Listening To

Tag: Soldier Field

Green, Lantern

dead50-blurry

This is about where we were sitting, Chris and Martin and I, for the second show; in real life, the stadium didn’t get this blurry until later in the evening. They were better seats than we’d had for the first night, as we did not have any seats at all for the first show and therefore any seats would be better: overturned paint bucket, half-deflated beanbag, one of those chairs that looks like hands and is excruciating to sit in. Seats: the promise of America! You could ignore them, stand up and boogie and get real loose with it, but you could also take a load off; just having the option was a balm to the frazzled mind and aching calves.

Seats are nice, but a view is worth something and ours was vantageous: the stage, and the crowd, and Chicago’s skyline over Trey’s shoulder. There may or may not have been a moon, but there was definitely a blimp. The mass on the floor was tight in the middle and scraggly around the edges like penguins huddling against the cold, but with fewer eggs and more Jewish guys.

We invented a game–it was one of those games you need to be in the right frame of mind to find interesting–called Colors. (It wasn’t called that at the time, but I just decided to, and if Martin or Chris disagree with the name, they can start their own blogs.) One of us would say “red” and all the Enthusiasts on the floor in red t-shirts would leap from the background into HD focus, and for a second they would really mean something, maaaan. And then “green,” and ZZHWOP out would bounce the groovy guys and gleeful gals in emerald. It was a good game.

It was during the second set–perhaps–that we fully appreciated our perch. At the back of the floor, right around where that scrum at the bottom left of the picture is taking place, two Deadheads tried to kill all of us. Maybe “try” is the wrong word; their intent was almost certainly not sinister: let’s say that two Deadheads attempted to create a situation in which all of us would die. Much better.

The two had a sky lantern, which the Chinese invented, because it is a thing and the Chinese invented all the things. They look like this:

sky-lantern

You’ll notice the open flame, and I cannot remember which of my friends said, “Oh, that’s a bad idea,” but I do remember the quiet fatalism he said it with. The only thing worse than an open flame in a football stadium full of people surely must be an airborne open flame in a football stadium full of people, and the worst thing of all must be an airborne open flame in a football stadium full of people on acid.

But in our doom lies our salvation. That which would have killed us all (being incapacitatingly high) instead saved us. Here I paraphrase Shakespeare: acid maketh you to think that launching a firebomb in an enclosed crowd would be a good idea, but it also removeth the ability to get the sucker in the air. The candle-thingy wouldn’t stay lit, and then one of them stepped on the whole rig, and then the other one tried hurling it into the air, and there might have been some running with the contraption held aloft like a kite: it was a mess. A good analogy would be North Korea or Trump: were it not for the possibility of everyone dying, it would have been hilarious.

Even at a Dead show, you can only play volleyball with a flaming laundry bag for so long; an authority figure came and confiscated the lantern, but it seemed like he was cool about it.

We were a little sad for the for the loss of our secondary show, but the Dead (kinda) was playing, so no one dwelled on it. Later on, we discussed the forethought and planning that must have gone into Operation: Mrs. O’Leary’s Cow. The security wasn’t strict, but they did check bags and pat people down; they must have hidden the fire balloon on their person. Before that, they had remembered to pack it and bring it to Chicago, and first they had to buy the damn thing at all, which I would expect was not an impulse buy: you make a special trip for a sky lantern. You don’t buy a dozen eggs, some milk, a lottery ticket, and a Chinese sky lantern.

There was a process, is my point.

And nowhere along that magical ride from idea to confiscation, did the question “Will my actions turn Soldier Field into a Michael Bay movie?” come up.

I don’t know why I remembered that; memories pass me by like joggers in the rain.

Soldier Field: A Guide

With all the attention focussed on the Santa Clara shows happening–wow–48 hours from now, Enthusiasts attending the Chicago shows might have let down on their preparations.

Luckily, Soldier Field has a Facility Guide ready for you to tell you the do’s and don’t’s of today’s new, improved super-fun and family-friendly Branded Experience©. In case you don’t feel like clicking, TotD has reprinted the document in full and with no changes below.

FACILITY GUIDE

What You Must Know To Avoid Being Tased And Disappeared

Attention People Coming to Bears Games: We Feel the Same Way About Jay Cutler, Trust Us

ADA Stuff

Soldier Field is ADA-compliant and wishes to accommodate all of our guests. Separate seating is available for people in wheelchairs and their companions. If you’re just a spaz, we can do nothing for you. Try not to spill stuff, spaz.

Alcohol and Illegal Drugs

It has gotten to the point with you filthy animals that watered-down, twelve-dollar beer can only be sold for the first quarter of the game due to the booze riots that break out in the poor people seats, so obviously you cannot be bringing your flakka up in here.

America’s Veterans

Built to honor the heroes of WWI (the Stupidest War,) Soldier Field will never change its name, unless the offer for the naming rights is really, really, really big. To show our veterans what we think of them, a 15-foot-tall Doughboy statue is located by the east end of the stadium, right next to the 18-foot-tall Michael Jordan statue.

Automated Teller Machines (ATMs)

First off: you’re welcome for the acronym help. Second: what do you need cash for? It’s 2015 and no one requires cash except drug dealers, bookies, and whores. None of these things are allowed in Soldier Field, which is sponsored by Visa and wired up like a modern place, so there is nothing you cannot buy without a credit card unless you are a criminal.

Bag & Personal Search/Scan

Fingers will be up asses. Let’s leave it at that.

Code of Conduct

Do not drink yourself insensate; nor vomit on a child. Racial epithets should ne’er be hurled. Teach no one a lesson; fling nary a battery; grab not a stranger’s tit. In short: honor your city of Chicago. Do you want to be Philadelphia? No one wants to be Philadelphia, so just try to behave yourself for three or four hours.

Banners/Flags/Signs

Well, one’s definitely not allowed.

Bike Parking and Racks

You get your hippie bullshit out of my office or, so help me God, I’ll choke you to death with my hands. Not a movie-type thing: it takes a long time and you would shit yourself and you would totally, absolutely know it was happening. You would be staring into another human being’s eyes as he murdered you. It would arouse me sexually to murder you in that fashion if you ever bring up bicycles again, okay?

Binoculars/Cameras/Video Equipment

Binoculars are awesome and don’t get enough love and if someone was a collector of binoculars, that would be wonderful and hip. If you let me play with your binoculars, you may bring whatever ridiculous sniper-scope bullshit you want into Soldier Field. Obviously, you cannot bring big-ol’ video cameras in here; that is foolishness.

Closing Times – Alcohol, Club/Suites, Parking Lots

The Imperial Deck, the Skyline Club, and the Praetor’s Suites will stop serving alcohol whenever everyone has had enough alcohol. Bleacher, Cargo, and Ballast-level kiosks shall stop serving Coors Light after they are set on fire by the violent, drunken rabble.

Ejection

If you fuck up, your ass gets tossed like a salad, or an ass.

Elevators/Escalators

The easy way to remember the difference between elevators and escalators is that elevators hang from the top of the cave, and escalators live in South America.

All the elevators are ADA-compliant, which I would feel should go without saying. Clearly, there’s not going to be one of those death-trap tenement elevators with the balky grate you have to shove with all your strength: this is a football stadium, not student housing in the 12th arrondisement.

Electric Vehicle Charging Stations

Soldier Field has three SmartStation charging points, which is not enough, so feel free to enjoy white people having slapfights with one another over power sockets. Soldier Field: The Future, Today!

Emergencies

In any emergency, DO NOT notify the nearest usher, as the odds are that he is not an actual usher. Soldier Field has been having a small problem with people imitating ushers to direct people to the wrong gate while pickpocketing them and involve guests in Ponzi schemes. Some of the fake ushers are just what we call “tacklers,” more instinct than man, now. Also, a few of the ushers are baboons in yellow jackets and whatever problem you have, introducing a baboon will make it worse. Settle your own shit, is what I’m saying.

Evacuation

Whether it’s of the bowel or of the crowd, no one wants to evacuate at Soldier Field. I might actually choose being in a terror thing over taking a doody at a football stadium because at least I might die in the terror; the doody, I would always have to live with.

Unless you’re in one of our Praetor’s Suites, where the Japanese-import toilet will wash your balls and anal area while telling you how thin you look from this angle.

Firearms/Fireworks

Are you shitting me?

First Aid/Medical Services

An ambulance is parked at Gate 17, and roving medical teams will be present at every game. Please do not steal the ambulance again. Really: that is some Philadelphia-level foolishness and Soldier Field has made it perfectly clear how he feels about that.

Soldier Field does not have dialysis facilities. No transplants can be performed. Dentistry is not practiced here; orthodontics is out of the question. If you are a Bubble Person, you cannot come here: Soldier Field is filthy.

It should also be noted that the BloodMobile outside Soldier Field is NOT registered with any reputable blood banks and may in fact be run by draculas.

Lost and Found

More like Lost and Mine, Now.

Prohibited Items

(See Attached)

Public Transportation

Is for poor people to go from their apartments to their factories.

Recycling

Is for rich people to go from their kitchens to their heaven.

Re-Entry Policy

Seriously? Re-entry? Never. Never has anyone been allowed to re-enter anywhere that wasn’t a failing theme park. You’re on the bus or off it. Man.

 

Restrooms

Depending on what you define as a bathroom, there are anywhere from forty to infinite bathrooms in Soldier Field. Please poop where we ask you to, or, preferably, not at all. There are also a number of baby-changing stations, the best one of which is located at your home, or work, or any place that’s not a Bears game or a Kenny Chesney concert.

Security

In addition to the Officers in red jackets, there are undercover police and intelligence agents in the crowd at Soldier Field. It would be helpful, and good for you, if you informed Soldier Field of any possible subversive activity going on in your section. Or perhaps you are the subversive, comrade?

Smoking Policy

You many not smoke in Soldier Field. Don’t try sneaking off for a quick one: we know all the places you’d go, and even if we don’t catch you, we’ll smell your fingers and then you will be in trouble, mister.

E-cigarettes, or “vapes,” are allowed, but you look like a turd doing it.

Smoking is permitted in the Praetor’s Suites

Soliciting/Sampling

Soliciting is permitted in Soldier Field as long as one wears the wig; sampling is okay if it’s creative. None of that weak-ass shit on my aux cord. My mixtape is so fire I named it Great White Live in Rhode Island, fam.

Taxi Cabs

You never feel more like you’re in a movie than when you’re slightly drunk in the back of a taxi late at night.

Trespassing
Anyone caught trespassing will be shot on sight. Sure, you might ask, what gives me the right? Castle Doctrine, that’s what.

Will Call
Whenever we get a particularly dopey intern at Soldier Field, we tell him to “Go find Will Call.” It’s a hoot.

Wi-Fi
Is free for guests in our Praetor’s Suites. All other guests will have gossip yelled at them.

There Will Be Poop

Dear Chicago (if that is your real name),

We here at Thoughts on the Dead have read your latest decision to not allow camping near Soldier Field during the Farewell Shows. Soldier Field Spokesman Luca Serra took time out from being something an Italian widow would yell at you if you took her parking spot to issue this statement:

Whaddayou think-a you doin’, you wacky-a Deadheads-a, you! You jussa wanna poop in-a da parkin’ lot!*

Mr. Serra has a point. TotD did, just weeks ago, offer a plea to Chicago to allow public and semi-public defecation during the weekend. There was also a petition that skirted the issue of doody to concentrate on safety and money and boring stuff like that. Both were ignored.

So, Windy City: we now race past the “asking” section of the program, to find ourselves at the “telling” portion.

Chicago, we will be pooping in your parking lots.

For twenty-five years, the Grateful Dead toured America. And for twenty-five years, a sizable contingent of dirty, but friendly, people followed. And pooped. Deadheads have copped squats in Miami, provided DNA in Austin, and left turds in San Diego. This is not to mention the rampant public pooping in San Francisco that was probably not related to the Dead at all and continues to this very day.

We weren’t asking you permission, Chicago: we seeking your blessing. The pooping will commence, undaunted by official ban. In fact, you’ve now made the act of leaving a loaf in a bush forbidden fruit.

Are you still in America, Chicago? I’m pretty sure George Washington killed Hitler so that we could freely and publicly (or semi-publicly) poop outside football stadia.

Deadheads pooping in your parking lots: you can’t stop them, you can only hope to contain them.

Sincerely,

TotD

* I am both paraphrasing and being racist.

Sign Your Name

A Petition to Allow Deadheads to Poop in Soldier Field’s Parking Lots

This is a petition to allow Deadheads to poop publicly and semi-publicly in the lots surrounding Soldier Field for the duration of the Dead’s 50th anniversary shows this July Fourth weekend.

The Grateful Dead is widely regarded as one of the most patriotic of all rock bands: after all, half of them are dead from lifestyle choices and the remaining ones are violent capitalists. The 50th anniversary shows will be a truly All-American event: inclusive of all races, tribes, and cultures (that are college-educated white people.)

It would be the safest thing for everyone involved to let us poop in your parking lot, Chicago.

The city of Chicago estimates these shows will have an economic impact of $50 to $100 million over the long weekend. We will drink your Old Style beer to wash down that backalley abortion of a tomato casserole you so hilariously call pizza.

And then we will poop. Please let us poop in your parking lots for 24 hours a day for the entire long holiday weekend.

Camping at the venue before and between shows is a long-cherished Deadhead tradition. And camping, as we know, is just a euphemism for non-civilized pooping. You can sleep in a car or in a chair; food can be brought or prepared easily. It’s the number twos that are number one on everyone’s priority list and it is in this intricacy that the love of taking doodies right outside a football stadium took hold in the Dead family.

Allowing Deadheads to poop in your parking lot is also the safest course of action. As nostalgia will infect even the most rational of people, many of us will indulge in a kind burrito or the dankest grilled cheese, like, ever. We will recall the weeks we spent living off nothing but these tin-foil wrapped health code violations and the wonderful things that happened to us while we maintained this diet and forget that we are now old and the parking lot food will make us sick and we will need to poop.

Please let us poop in your parking lot, Chicago. One last time.