Bucky Badger owns this town, part 2: a sea of red.

As I've said before, Bucky Badger owns this town. He's everywhere: in stores, on cars, and gracing the packaging of locally made foods.

When my mom and our friend Pat came to visit, they had the privilege of meeting cardboard Bucky at Hilldale Shopping Center:

Wisconsinites love their Bucky, and the Hilldale skeleton greeter shares in the spirit:

Even this ghoulish bag of bones is supporting Bucky with a UW hat.

I live in the land of Bucky and I have gotten used to his constant presence (and hey, red is my favorite color). With that said, after 2.5 years of Madison residency, I should have known better than to drive to the West Side of Madison on the day of UW's homecoming.

I just wanted to go to Trader Joe's. My intentions were honorable.

But instead of a breezy 10-minute ride on a Saturday, I wound up in a 40-minute ride through a sea of red-clad Badger fans.

Badger fans crossing the street and heading for the stadium.

Badger fans tailgating in the parking lot of my doctor's office
(I later found more in the parking lot of my veterinarian's office).

Some may wonder why I didn't just turn around and go home, but here's how I saw it: I'm a busy gal. My weekdays are packed with working full time, skating practice, and still managing to socialize with friends. Saturday afternoon is always errand time for me, and with the sunny 70-degree weather, I was perfectly happy sitting in traffic with the windows down and enjoying some Alt Nation. It was a nice breather, and I found the extreme fandom fascinating. Thankfully I drive a red car, otherwise I would have been very out of place in my black Madonna T-shirt.

Just as I had planned, I made it to Trader Joe's and got my groceries. It just happened to be by way of a leisurely, interesting drive.

My friend Michal is a huge Bucky fan and she snapped a great shot from Camp Randall Stadium:

100 yards surrounded by red, red, red. 

Although I don't follow football, I try to stay in the know on whether Bucky won or lost. Living a block away from One Barrel Brewing Company helps, as the style of screaming from the bar clearly indicates glory or despair. This week? Glory screams in celebration of a UW triumph.

It's Bucky's territory (I just live in it).

We don't fit in here: my day trip to the land of cheese heads.

When I read that the US Collegiate Figure Skating Championships were coming to De Pere, WI, I knew I had to go watch. A 2 hour drive to watch a day of great skating would be well worth it, and my friend (and fellow skater) Katie was happy to go along for the ride.

When Amie (my supervisor and a De Pere native) heard that I'd be spending the day on her home turf, she recommended that we stop at Lambeau Field to visit the Packers Pro Shop. We didn't have to be at the rink until 1:00, so we left Madison with time to visit the historic football field.

Wow. That's really all I have to say.

Okay, I'll say a little more. I had never seen Green Bay Packers fans in their native environment. Even though it was just "family day" during Packers training camp, the entire venue was an intense sea of green and yellow. Katie and I felt very out of place in grey. I didn't dare utter the phrase, "I don't care about football," because I feared I would be attacked.

This was the line for temporary team spirit tattoos.
It wasn't even a game day.

Let me just get this out in the open: I have never been to an NFL football game, nor do I ever plan to go to one (Close your mouths! I'd rather spend the cash on major figure skating events... sorry, football fans).

The vibe was all Packers, all the time. Everyone wore green shirts had such a sense of pride in the team. Total strangers were sharing this common bond of Packers Pride, and it was unlike anything I had seen before. The city felt like one big family: one big spirited, beer-drinking, green and yellow family.

Once I settled into my culture shock, Katie and I explored the venue.

The Lambeau Field logo at one of the gates.

A lot of fans were posing with this statue, so I felt like it was the right thing to do.

I don't know why this buffalo was wearing a team jersey, but it seemed worthy of documentation.

The Packers logo (saw a huge one on the side of a house, too).

A view of the atrium.

And then, we arrived at the Packers Pro Shop. The fandom in here was overwhelming. If anyone needs to buy Packers clothing, toys, or home decor, this is clearly the place to go. The shop gets so busy that they have one door devoted to entrances, one door devoted to exits, and security guards directing the traffic.

A view of the shop.

And, well, you knew it was coming:

We found some cheese hats to wear! Finally, we were fitting in.

Now THAT was a true Wisconsin experience. It was definitely new for me to experience the Packers to this level of intensity, and I can only imagine how wild it gets on game day.

Daily sconnie fix: check. Then, we were off to the Nicolet Restaurant, followed by the competition at Cornerstone Community Ice Arena. Two skating competitions and a dog show were happening simultaneously at the venue (pretty hilarious that dogs and skaters competed in the same place). The event was great, and we saw a near-clean program from 2008 US Bronze Medalist, Stephen Carriere. Awesome day!