FAN MEMORIES AND MY PLAN

This morning I was browsing through my normal assortment of Packers sources online. On the Packers official website, there was a link to a feature they will be running called Packer Fan Memories. It's self explanatory. Basically, fans can submit up to 100 words and a picture that tell of their best memories as a fan of the green and gold, and the organization (or the people who run the website) will choose a certain amount of submissions each week to feature on the page. I've only been to one Packers game, and that was at Giants Stadium in 2007 when Brett Favre broke John Elway's career wins record for quarterbacks. This section of the website, however, prompted me to submit my plan that will hopefully result in many memories, a plan that I came up with back in January. I will now share that plan with you, my readers (or lack there of).

Next year I will be finishing my undergraduate degree, so my time in the "not so real world" is coming to an end. I have always enjoyed traveling, especially driving. While I was back home in January I decided that I needed to do something crazy before I have to enter the real world. I've never made the typical college spring break trip, I haven't really made trips to visit friends from high school at the colleges they attend, and I have constantly wondered if I made the wrong decision by not going to a big time school with division one NCAA athletics, ie Wisconsin. My passion is for sports, and I want to work in the sport industry after graduation, and Ithaca, NY and Ithaca College's small-time division three athletics just have not filled my appetite for big time college sports. I knew what my "something crazy" during college would be: A roadtrip to Wisconsin over my four day weekend (Fall Break) in October, praying that both the Badgers and Packers have home games for me to attend in Camp Randall Stadium and Lambeau Field. How would an extremely poor college student like myself pull this trip off (considering I pay for all of tuition, rent, utilities, car insurance, repairs, etc. by myself)? Yes, that's right, piggy banks.

Over my winter break I realized that I had a collection coin banks that I have been accumulating since I was a baby (one was even actually a blue plastic pig with my name surrounded by stars in teal, clearly something I got when I was very young). Another was Mickey Mouse. Another, a Green Bay Packers helmet. I would break all of these piggy banks, count the change, and continue collecting as much change as possible in order to finance my planned trip the weekend of October 17th and 18th.

The next step, once I came up with this crazy idea, was to see if the plan would even work. My break begins on Wednesday the 14th after classes, and it would end on Monday the 19th when classes resume in the morning. I needed to check the team's schedules. Wisconsin's works out perfectly. The 17th is the Badgers homecoming against Iowa. What about the Packers? The NFL doesn't release schedules usually until some time in April, so unfortunately, going to Lambeau is still in question, but I pray every day that the NFL wants this trip to work for me.

So the trip to Madison is a definite, Lambeau is in question, but next was calculating how much the trip should cost and then counting the money I had in those banks.

According to Mapquest, the trip from Ithaca, NY to Madison to Green Bay and back to Ithaca is 1837.79 miles, so I figure about 1900 miles in traveling, through finding places to stay, hopefully with family. The calculated total estimated fuel cost, also according to mapquest, is $169.56 for the 1837 miles. However, I estimate about $225 to be safe (1900 miles, 23 mpg even though my car is supposed to get 25 highway, and gas at $2.75, while the national average is currently much lower). Because my best friend from college has agreed that this is something he wants to experience as well, splitting that in half means about $115 per person for gas. The next step is finding tickets to each game.

Currently on StubHub, the least expensive ticket to Wisconsin's homecoming game against Iowa is $111, which is more than I'd like to spend, but I have vowed to make this trip. While I will work on trying to find someone within my family, or a friend of the family who can get these tickets for cheaper, I need to assume for my own purpose that I will pay around $125 for my ticket. That raises the cost to $240 for the trip. While the Packers haven't actually announced their schedule because the NFL is still sorting them out, if the Packers do play at Lambeau on October 18th, I have looked at the range of the lowest priced tickets for each home game on StubHub so far. They range from $127 to $234. This could therefore move the trip to potentially between $380 and $480. Just like with the game in Madison, I will try to find a less expensive way to find tickets to this game, although I know that will be hard. Adding in food and other assorted costs, the trip should be somewhere between $450 and $550 dollars if paying full price for tickets to both games. But how much do I have set aside so far?

As of the last time I counted the change, I had approximately $450 between the few coin banks I have had. So if I assume I can amass together $50 more through saving all change I get from all purchases I make and paychecks I receive this summer, I can account for $500 to put towards this trip. Here is my breakdown of potential costs of the trip, moving from least expensive to most expensive:

IF WE CAN FIND SOMEONE WITH TICKETS TO BOTH GAMES THAT WILL GRACIOUSLY GIVE THEM TO US: $185-$200.

IF WE CAN FIND SOMEONE WITH TICKETS TO THE PACKERS GAME THAT WILL GRACIOUSLY GIVE THEM TO US: $225-$325

IF WE CAN FIND SOMEONE WITH TICKETS TO THE PACKERS GAME THAT WILL GIVE THEM TO US FOR FACE VALUE: $285-$425

IF WE CAN FIND SOMEONE WITH TICKETS TO THE WISCONSIN GAME THAT WILL GIVE THEM TO US FOR FACE VALUE: $305-$355

IF WE CAN FIND SOMEONE WITH TICKETS TO THE WISCONSIN GAME THAT WILL GRACIOUSLY GIVE THEM TO US: $325-$425

IF WE SPEND FULL STUBHUB PRICE ON TICKETS TO BOTH GAMES: $450-$550

Ah, well, quite a post here. Maybe it will actually spark some interest and attract some readers! Or some help! I think it's an interesting story, but who knows. We'll see! What's most important is that the NFL makes the Packers play a home game on October 18th so this whole trip can come together! Please Roger Goodell, I'm begging you...