For the past two years I have been lucky enough to go to four New England Patriots home games with my brother and his friends. My brother Tom is good friends with John Skelton who owns an old 21-foot Grumman Olsen Step van that was completely stripped and reworked as a New England Patriots Tailgate machine called the Touchdown Lounge. My brother is a “master mechanic – electrical engineer” who can do almost anything when it comes to building, fabricating or fixing stuff and has become the “Chief Engineer” of the Touchdown Lounge. Recently, Tommy has been spending more and more time maintaining the Touchdown Lounge so John decided to upgrade the Touchdown Lounge and purchased a new Airstream Motorhome for use next season.
When it comes to going to games, I am on the wait list however I was lucky enough to go to the Patriots Ravens playoff game this past Sunday and I took my new Ultra Flip video camera with me. The football game was disappointing as the Patriots were blown out, however the tailgate party both before and after was great.
Given the fact that this was going to be the last Patriots’ Tailgate for the Touchdown Lounge, John got up to say a few words honoring all the hard work of Tommy and the others. Also, Lou DiMauro and John’s cousin Dan Whalen got up, said a few words and read a great poem. It was very touching and moving for me and I am not one of the regulars however I did capture it on tape so I thought that I would share with you …
So now it is on to next year for the Patriots, and the real work begins for John and Tom as they invest time, money and effort into building out the new Touchdown Lounge II. We are all grateful for your efforts.
