On the last Friday before Thanksgiving break, the broskis and I wanted to do something other than cruise the strip—so we drove up to see some high school soccer in Kansas City.

                The Final Four was being hosted at Blue Springs and Blue Springs South high schools in Kansas City—the first time it was ever hosted outside of St. Louis. We were going to watch history be made; I guess you could call us trailblazers—or the Lewis and Clarks of our time.

Nick Mills, Abel McSomething and I left Rolla around noon without Nate “Dr. Love” Kramme or Sven Olberg because they both had better things to do… according to them.

                After three and a half hours of listening to   “Now That’s What I Call Music 23,” we had arrived. Logan “The Handyman” Houf said he was going to drive up to the Final Four with his lovely mother in his super cool and fast and stylish and aerodynamic Infiniti g35 Coupe, but he had lied. Houf Pouferly was nowhere to be found in the stands. He might be a liar—but he’s still single, a great guy, and has a sweet ride.          

                The stands were packed with soccer fans, all of whom were wearing warm clothing, not shorts like the brozillas were—but that just means we’re much tougher than them. It was colder than the pig hearts the anatomy classes recently dissected, for four and a half hours; I’m surprised it didn’t start snowing.

                We got to Blue Springs South High School around four and didn’t leave till almost 9:30, and got to see both Class 3 semifinal games (Lee’s Summit West vs. Desmet and Oakville vs. Rock Bridge). But I think that all three of us would agree, the highlight of the evening was when we got to eat at The Olive Garden after sitting in the cold for nearly five hours. We were ecstatic when the waitress brought out the never-ending tossed salads and breadsticks, I was so super-duper hungry I ate each of my breadsticks in about one bite.

                We left The Olive Garden wondering why we didn’t have pleasant, joking conversations at the table like in the commercials, but we were so pleased by the endless breadsticks and our wonderful tossed salads that we didn’t think anything of it. We didn’t get back in to Rolla until about 2:30 A.M., and our sleep schedules were more messed up than this really short, cruel, unfair, anti-Christmas, ridiculously short Christmas break, but hey, it was worth it.