Friday, November 30, 2007

Winner Winner, Chicken Dinner!

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Okay, not really a chicken dinner. But I've been winning a lot lately. Since August I've won:
a camcorder from Dr. Pepper,
24 pairs of jeans for the kids from American Eagle,
30 shirts for them from Aeropstle, (along with assorted accessories)
72 free movie rentals from Hollywood video
4 iPod nanos
a Happy Feet cd
a Wii game
the World Series trip from Pepsi!
2 Dell computers from Coca~Cola (one for home, one for the school)
$450 cash for me
$100 cash for my grandfather

Not bad for the last few little months sitting at home with the new puppy.

Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Final Game of the World Series - Thank You Pepsi!!

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Luis Velez  Tammi Velez - World Series 2007
Pepsi took us to the final game of the World Series!!

We rode to the hotel with another winner from Pepsi. He had read the posts Jacqueline and I had made at Sweepsheet and knew who I was.

We got to the hotel hungry so we walked across the street to Jose O'Sheas. They served potato tacos, so of course I had to try one. And a raspberry margarita. The food was great. According to our shuttle driver it's the local favorite. I can see why. We ate a week's worth of food and went back to our room for a while.

The hotel shuttle took us to an outlet mall which is a circular mile. I found Spanx in NM and found Jelly Belly beans in Dr. Pepper and A&W rootbeer for Mike and Zack. Then we went to eat at the Keg. http://www.kegsteakhouse.com/ We've had steaks as good - but never a meal better than this. It wasn't even crazy pricey like some steakhouses. The bill for the two of us was just under $90 before tip. The bread was great, the Caesar salad was great, the salmon spring rolls were amazing and the steak and potato were fantastic. They do a cheddar cheese butter on the potato which made me even more stuffed than usual.

We went back to our hotel for the night after dinner.B y the end of this day we'd eaten 3 meals = about enough to feed a family of 4 for a week.

Sunday was game day and we had to meet downstairs at 2:00. I woke up at 5 a.m. starving. I never eat breakfast. The altitude or something made me ravenously hungry. I stared at my husband until he woke up. He wasn't ready to get up and eat so I paced around, read, and went crazy. Finally, we went downstairs and ate breakfast.

We stayed here .

There was a china convention going on in the hotel. The old ladies were interesting.

After breakfast we went back upstairs and got ready to go. We went down to the desk to ask for a shuttle and they said we had to wait an hour. So we went to the internet cafe and used some computers for 20 minutes. We met other Pepsi winners at the front desk. We were able to help them with their reservation information. The hotel didn't have a room ready for them so they offered us a ride to the outlet mall and we left with them. On the way back they showed us some sights we wouldn't have seen otherwise. They live about 40 miles away from the Denver.

I bought another pair of Spanx, and so did Linda, and I bought candy from Harry & David's and we went back to the hotel. We pretty much grabbed our bags to take to the game and went downstairs to meet the group in the lobby.

In the lobby we met the grand prize winner. She was a 22 year old girl who didn't realize she'd entered. This was one where everyone who used their supermarket card and bought Pepsi products was entered. She didn't believe it was real when the people called her so took three days calling Pepsi, etc. to verify it was legitimate. She took her father with her to throw out the ceremonial first pitch. When the MLB reporter interviewed him he cried.

The bus gave us a little tour of downtown and took us to Via for the pregame party.
We were here in the red room for our private party. There was a grand prize winner, 8 first prize winners, and the winning Pepsi sales guy. They had door prize drawings and Jacqueline and I each won a $50 Dick's gift certificate. Other people mostly won baseball caps, except for the grand prize winner, who won $100 gc to Dick's.

Speaking of Pepsi swag, they had lots of Aquafina sent to our room, and frito lay chips. They sent them up in a nice Pepsi messenger bag with a World Series t-shirt, cap, official ball with a serial number, a high quality golf shirt with a Pepsi logo, and some Quaker snack bars. We also got a $250 Visa gift card.

We all took coats, scarves, layers of clothes in our Pepsi bags because the weather was supposed to be even colder than the night before. We didn't end up needing the extra gear. A coat alone was enough.

Via is a block away from the stadium so we walked over and went in for the game. We found our seats, which were all the way to the top (2nd to last row) on the first base line and directly across from the jumbo screens.

I cannot begin to tell you how emotional it was. I wasn't expecting it to be emotional at all. From our seats we could see the jumbo screen, the city behind it, and the mountains behind that. Beautiful. We got in our seats about 20 minutes before sunset. Our guy threw out the Pepsi ceremonial first pitch, Hank Aaron presented an award, they brought out the biggest flag I've ever seen, they told about two police officers assisting at a scene where another motorist crashed into them and both police officers were hit. The little boy they were trying to help and one officer died. The other was in critical care for a while. He was at the game in a wheelchair. That officer, the 7 year old son of the officer who was killed, and the father of the little boy who was killed all threw out another pitch and I started welling up with tears. After that Air Force fighter jets flew over the stadium in formation and tears started streaming down my face. Trisha Yearwood sang the Star Spangled banner while I wept and watched the sunset.

Some time during the game Lonestar performed America the Beautiful. I rooted for both teams.

When the Rockies would score they'd shoot off fireworks When the Red Sox WON THE WORLD SERIES - nothing. No music, not fireworks, nothing. There were Red Sox fans there cheering, but that was it. I cheered along with them. It seemed strange there would be no fanfare, but there wasn't.

On the one block walk to the game we'd been asked to sell our tickets quite a few times. We joked about selling them to get $$ to take a cruise together. (Luis and I/Jacqueline and Dave) On the way out people were trying to buy our ticket stubs. I guess there really is a market for everything!

We went back to the restaurant and waited a few minutes and boarded the bus again. The driver showed us more sights and even stopped the bus at one point when people asked to get out and take pictures of the big bear at the convention center.

When we got back to the hotel I packed our stuff. Our flight was leaving at 10:05 and our ride was arranged for 6:00 am. We got up at 5:00 and got ready and left. We got to the airport, checked in, went through security, and had breakfast at a little bistro. It was wayyyyy better than the hotel restaurant. After breakfast I got a 20 minute massage from a giant man and we went to our gate - B82. Yes I said EIGHTY-TWO!

We didn't have to wait too long for our flight to leave.

When we arrived in Cleveland the girls and Tony Blair were waiting for us!!!

Thank You Pepsi!!! We had the time of our lives.