from the Coliseum...the first was taking bff to a game there and sitting by a rather obnoxious Cavs fan who wouldn't stop screaming at one of the opposing players (the Atlanta Hawks' Jon Koncak). JK had a mustache at the time...bff finally had had enough of the screaming and screamed back at the Cavs' fan "Knock it off! You're nothing but a popcorn kernel in that guy's mustache!". It startled the fan into silence and caused me to bust out laughing. For a long while, bff and I used the phrase "a popcorn kernel in a mustache" to signify someone who was of little importance but was an irritant.
My second favorite memory was at the very end...the Cavs were moving to their new arena downtown, and on a non-game day, they held a fan appreciation event. On the concourse, they had various exhibits set up but the real thrill was they allowed fans onto the court to shoot a single free throw. Now from the time I was in junior high to maybe a decade after college, we had a basketball hoop attached to a gutter above the garage, and Dad and I would go out and play a game of H-O-R-S-E or shoot layups...but what we mostly did was shoot free throws. Dad even spray painted a foul line on the driveway, much to Mom's consternation. He and I probably shot at least 10,000 free throws in the driveway, and I probably made about 70% of them at the end...so of course I shot a total air ball* when standing on the floor of the Coliseum.
* for those of you not into "sports ball", an "air ball" is when you miss EVERYTHING: the backboard, the net and of course the shot.
