All Aboard The City Of New Orleans!
Joe Gillis
ALL ABOARD
Fans board the storied City of New Orleans bound for Chicago to cheer
on the Saints
Saturday, January 20, 2007
By Brendan McCarthy
Staff writer
ABOARD THE CITY OF NEW ORLEANS TRAIN, SOMEWHERE NEAR MEMPHIS -- The
champagne corks popped and the confidence flowed mere minutes into the
20-hour train ride north.
Mark Vath, 39, sat in a swivel chair, swigging a sweaty Bud Light and
belting out, "The City of New Orleans," the song named for the train
that rumbled beneath his feet. Across the train car, past some elderly
folks in Saints jerseys and men sipping whiskey, a dance party kicked
off with an off-key chorus and awkward dance moves.
This is how more than 100 Saints fans plan to invade Chicago and the
biggest game in the Saints history, the NFC championship. But at this
point they're only one hour into the long ride. The men wearing black
and gold plastic necklaces call it better than any bachelor party
they've ever attended. The women in baggy black-and-gold jerseys call
it once in a lifetime. For the legion of fans aboard this Amtrak train,
it felt like an escalator to heaven.
After four decades of losing, no more pain.
"Man, I've suffered for so many years," said Vath, a nurse in Jefferson
Parish. "I remember kids with 49ers jersey just picking on me in
elementary school. It was nasty. But guess what, look where I'm going
now -- and we're almost there."
Actually, the train had barely left Louisiana.
Vath and three of his buddies boarded the train in New Orleans on
Friday shortly after 1 p.m., the kickoff to a three-day weekend that
will culminate in a football game in a city considerably colder than
home. Vath and his friends say the season has been quite a ride so far.
They're not familiar with such long rides.
'This year's different'
Billy Shanks brushed aside his necklace of fake plastic shrimp as he
unloaded bags into his sleeper car, a box only slightly smaller than a
FEMA trailer. He's riding with more than 30 friends, including sisters
and sisters-in-law.
"I've said before, 'It's over. It ain't happening for the Saints,' "
said Shanks, 39. "I used to watch games at Tulane Stadium. This year's
different, though, and that's why I'm on this train."
With that, Shanks popped open a beer.
"That's what New Orleanians do, at least on this train," he said,
accurately describing the already well-lubricated crowd of passengers,
many gathered in the bar car.
Come 5 p.m., the whiskey bottles in the lounge car no longer brimmed
with brown liquor, and trash bags bulged with empty Bud Light bottles.
Inside the car, a loud French Quarter-like escapade started to brew.
Armloads of discarded cups littered the floor. A couple of women in
Saints jerseys swung their hips to the raucous anthem, "Who Let the
Dawgs Out?"
A few tables away, Cati Smith, a 6-year-old blonde in a pink Drew Brees
jersey, slept soundly through the din, her head on her father Glenn
Smith's lap.
"Ain't this somethin'?" Glenn Smith asked, an ear-to-ear grin spreading
across his face.
Smith boarded the train with his wife, Lisa, and son, Robbi, a
wide-eyed, freckled 14-year-old. The Metairie couple run a textile
manufacturing company and have friends in Chicago.
"We wouldn't be doing much work anyway," Glenn Smith said.
They made the decision to head north as a birthday present for Robbi.
"It's pretty fair, dude," Robbi said.
A previous family vacation had been to Disneyland, but this seemed more
like a fantasy. While his sister remained asleep, oblivious to the
party, Robbi and his dad played cards.
'I've had a lot of bad Mondays'
Within arm's reach and earshot of the Smiths, childhood pals Mike
McGill and Glenn St. Amant, both 53, sipped cheap whiskey, "aged 18
years" but smelling like Robitussin. They laid out grand plans for
Chicago: pizza, seafood, steak, skyscrapers and a Saints shellacking of
the Bears.
The plans came together Tuesday morning, when McGill called his Little
League baseball buddy.
"We got to go," he told him.
"It's been 40 years waiting for this," McGill said on the train. "I
don't want to wait much longer."
St. Amant grinned.
"I've suffered the lowest of the lows with this team," he said. "I've
had a lot of bad Mondays. Sundays are good because LSU probably won and
the Saints have yet to lose."
But this year, in a remark heard this night nearly as often as train
whistles, many agreed: "It is different."
"Before, if there was time on the clock, then there was time to lose,"
St. Amant said. "A 20-point lead with three minutes left meant
nothing."
St. Amant, an engineering consultant from River Ridge, said he has
never worn a bag over his head, as so many long-suffering fans did in
the lean years, but that each loss "still hurt inside."
"Oh, man, tell me about it," said McGill, a Luling resident and owner
of a glass company.
At a stop in Jackson, Miss., a giddy young couple got onto the train.
Within minutes, they were found out.
"They're Bears fans!" somebody shouted.
True, the pair acknowledged, adding they bought tickets on Ebay for
$500 each.
An announcement then broke in: Amtrak dinner would be served, and red
beans and rice would be served.
Next stop: Miami?
Dinner caused a brief lull as the train pulled near Yazoo City, Miss.
The red beans drew mixed reviews, but the riders understood the train
isn't a French Quarter café.
On a table stacked with spicy slim jims and strong cocktails, not far
from an i-Pod station blaring Saints-related tunes, a man called "The
Wizard" was leading a game of Pedro, a Cajun card game, which was
interrupted at times with call-and-response barking.
A man with the last name of Bordeaux was winning.
"I saw some Eagle feathers stuck to the back of this train," he said.
"When we come back we'll be laying on Bear-skin rugs."
A stranger walking by, then started screaming, "Who Dat!"
Shortly after 7 p.m., with the train rumbling toward Greenwood,
Bordeaux and friends had cleared the better part of a case of 12
champagne bottles. As a reserve supply, they toted water bottles filled
with vodka.
It was unclear when or if the party would stop. As everyone on the
train was quick to point out, the next stop might be Miami.
In that case, the party would last through Mardi Gras.
. . . . . . .
Brendan McCarthy can be reached at bmcc...@timespicayune.com or (504)
826-3301.
Dale
>> anthem, "Who Let the Dawgs Out?"
Rock the train girls!!
!!GEAUX SAINTS
Frez
"Dale" <da...@cox.is.over.rated> wrote in message
news:jnDsh.1035$pg2...@bignews2.bellsouth.net...
Dr. Winston O'Boogie
TXRhody
Bleaux me!
Frez
"TXRhody" <sta...@myway.com> wrote in message
news:PaKsh.35094$QU1....@newssvr22.news.prodigy.net...
Kato
deaux!!!!
SlobbyDon
>>>>
>>>> !!GEAUX SAINTS
>>>>
>>> Oeaux Noeaux!
>>
>> Bleaux me!
>>
> That's leaux
How many bleauxn plays doux youx think there will be in the game?
--
GUEAUX SAINTS! (GEAUX sounds like "Zho")
mr dude@harvarduniversity.edu
Joe Gillis wrote:
FEMA trailer. He's riding with more than 30 friends, including sisters
and sisters-in-law.
Come 5 p.m., the whiskey bottles in the lounge car no longer brimmed
with brown liquor, and trash bags bulged with empty Bud Light bottles.
Saints jerseys swung their hips to the raucous anthem, "Who Let the
Dawgs Out?"
POTY!!!!!! This guy has 'em doing everything except picking cotton and
eating fried chicken watermelon!!
Electrician
Floating...@hotmail.com says...
>
>Fans board the storied City of New Orleans bound for Chicago to cheer
>on the Saints
>
Go Saints! I hope they make it to the SB, unlike the Dolts who are a shitbag
franchise.
