Surprisingly not freezing cold and a WIN for the Jets!

On Sunday the Jets played the Bills. Mike was nervous as usual on the days leading up to the game since the team had to win this one to even make the next game worth playing. Fortunately the day started off well with an ablsolute superfeast in a nice warm tent and then ended happy for the Jets. The in between parts - between the tailgate and the end of the game - not so pretty. It was an ugly game with all kinds of interesting twists and turns. Besides the gift that the Bills gave the Jets in the 4th quarter, it was surprisingly not miserably cold in an open stadium in NJ in mid-December.

I am not a sports writer and I am sure that by now if you were interested in this game, you would have already read the reports and watched the game or highlights. So I'll focus this blog on the other highlights of this day.

First of all, no one will ever starve hanging out at the Clifford's tailgate party. Nor will you ever go thirsty. And this year if you are male, you need not walk all the way across the parking lot to the public port-o-potty (which you will have to ask others, ahem Jimmy!, for pictures of).

Mike and I arrived around 8:30. The tent was already upand the cooking had begun. Check this out - Jimmy had 3 separate propane tanks to power the grill, an oven and a heater. And two tents with walls. These were real luxuries in this weather and I didn't see any other tailgators with such fancy comforts.

Peter brought a Playstation for the younger boys to play in the backseat of the car and plenty of ring dings for the kids (that mostly the grown-ups ate). The adults restrained themselves until 9:30 a.m. before cracking open the ice chest, but then there was no holding back.

By then we had finished "breakfast" of fresh biscuits baked in the oven with bacon from the grill. Delicous! The mid-morning meal began cooking as soon as the bacon biscuits were served - cut sausage medallions, grilled peppers and onions, chips and queso. Lunch was cousin Johnny's homemade turkey chili along with Jimmy's grilled brats and sausage on rolls. Johnny is a fireman in the Bronx and gourmet chef and everyone really enjoyed his chili on this chilly day. All of these meals were consumed within a 3 hour timeframe. Like I said, no one goes hungry!

For my birthday Mike gave me a Jets jersey with my name on the back. To keep it balanced, he had also bought me a Redskins hoody which I removed before taking this photo. Because it's December I really wanted a Jets Santa hat so we bought one from one of those guys who sell knock-off gear in the parking lot and usually run faster than the parking lot security guards.

Peter's son Peter Ryan got his face painted on the way into the stadium.

We had a special guest in the row in front of us!

I had had my heart set on getting a green Jets Santa hat and I ended up finding the very last one in the team store on the complete other side of the stadium. Can you believe I have all this Jets gear now?! Well, seeing as the 'skins are done for the year, I am out of excuses and might as well dress up and root for the Jets. :)

Walking back to our cars we saw that someone even brought a Christmas tree for their tailgate! Notice the beer cup tree-topper.

After the game Jimmy cranked up the gas heater and we found ways to amuse ourselves while waiting for the parking lot to clear.

The sunset was gorgeous. You can just see a hint of it in the background of that photo. All in all it was a really fun day and we were so lucky with the weather.