Now, I've seen the Blues play live twice before... in Chicago at the United Center. I lived up there for a few years and my former company had a skybox there.  I've never seen the Blues play a home game before.  ("And you're how old again, Papes?" "Shaddap!")  Anyway, I decided to fix that problem and finally got a ticket to a game in St. Louis.

So, how does Section 320 of the DrinkScotch compare to a skybox at the United Center?  Well, for one, I could see the entire game.  When you miss a fight for the puck in a corner due to all the people standing up, you are at a bad angle to the game.  I also got to see exactly how shiny the back of Darren Pang's head really is. It's glorious in its albedo.  The steps aren't too steep and I was surrounded by mostly Blues fans, even though I sat next to a Canadian family who was more of a Halak fan than anything.  The Quebecois really doted on our goalie, I think.   I sat across the aisle from three very unhappy-looking fans of Canadian extraction, wondering why an Ottawa Senators fan would show up here.  Eh, hockey's hockey, so I guess it makes sense.  In all, it was an okay crowd, except for the one college freshman/ hipster douchebag who couldn't stop screaming at random points in the game.  Maybe someone was lighting his skinny jeans on fire or something.

The food is what I expected: hot, fried, and somewhat pricy.  It wasn't bad, though.  The bottomless cup of soda?  For what I paid, you better believe I took multiple advantages of the refills.  After three or four drinks, it almost comes in line with a restaurant soda.

Let's go back to the sightlines.  I was really impressed.  I was able to see the puck clearly throughout the match without guessing, saw the pucks go in the next pretty much each time, and could read the names on the players' backs when they were at the correct angle in relation to me.  Wow.  I never had a sightline like that in Chicago.

The game?  The Blues won 4-1 against Montreal.  But you know all that already.  It's definitely a lot more fun to see the game live, if only to watch all of the stuff that goes on during the broadcast and the time outs.  Hats off to the ice crew:  they were paragons of efficiency out there in taking off that layer of snow in the short time allotted during the commercial breaks.

If there's a bad seat in the house there, it's not in the nosebleed seats.