Take one dose of The Beautiful Game: chris_walsh

Got out. Saw crowds in two places for Portland Timbers-Seattle Sounders. First crowd: at the Bagdad, which showed the game in the theater (and, I'm guessing, the Backstage Cafe). I'd wanted to try watching the game in a new-to-me place, though, so I walked up to the Belmont Inn. Not a crowd: one TV out of the six or seven in the place was tuned to the game, without sound. I wasn't really "feeling it" there, so I took Sabrina Miller's suggestion and made it to Spirit of '77, a sports bar across from the Convention Center that's named in honor of the season where the Portland Trail Blazers won the NBA Championship. I "felt it" there. So did the crowd. Second crowd of Timbers-watchers I joined tonight. (Not including the crowd that actually made it to Qwest Field and was LOUD for the team, because I only saw them on TV, not around me.)

We got a 1-1 draw. Getting closer to a road win, Timbers! And I enjoyed myself in non-soccer ways, too: explaining my Trek in the Park T-shirt to a patron who hadn't heard of it before, appreciating how one Spirit of '77 server could win in a Martha Quinn lookalike contest (yes, I'm a member of the first MTV generation) and also playing some rounds of basketball hoop-shooting. I also laughed ruefully at how the Spirit of '77's receipts include the message "Both Teams Played Hard." I'll explain later why that's funny to me.

Anyway, I got out, saw a good game, better appreciated how quickly a soccer game can change so that there's so much the players have to be ready for when playing, and felt better. After the bar, I went downtown for a bus ride back to my neighborhood (the easier option that time of night) and visited briefly at Big-Ass Sandwiches to say hi to its late-night Saturday crew. Then home. Now sleep. Or at least soon sleep. If I fell to sleep now it would

Take one dose of The Beautiful Game

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