There’s this annual tradition members of my family take part in each Thanksgiving. It involves a bunch of the guys getting up early and playing football at an elementary school in Milwaukee. I didn’t know a lot about it other than they do it every year. It’s called the Turkey Bowl.
Back in 2012 my wife suggested I take part in the Turkey Bowl. As someone who doesn’t like to play football, or watch football, I remained unconvinced. Instead, I offered to come and film the game. Unfortunately, I somehow forgot to go, and did not film the game. So this year, I made up for it.
The kids and I headed out, stopped for hot drinks, and got to the school just in time to capture about 15 minutes of action at the end. (Oops! Based on televised sports, I thought football games lasted about 4 hours.) Well, I did manage to get some good group photos when they were done, which was much appreciated. I then told them that I needed interview footage, but they were all headed to a bar (it is Wisconsin) to watch football and drink beer. (Again, I don’t do either of those things.) So I made a plan to take my gear to the Thanksgiving dinner at my sister’s house, and after the meal, I did a bunch of interviews.
I then declared it would be ready to watch by Christmas. I then did a bit of editing the next week, and a little more the next week, and then I just pulled an all-nighter Christmas Eve and stayed up past 4am to finish it for Christmas Day. Merry Christmas!
The quality is not quite to the level I’d like, but it doesn’t matter. They loved it. It does a pretty good job of documenting the game and what it means to them. The audio is rough, the lighting and camerawork is not top notch, but that’s not what matters. Nobody paid me to do this, and I really enjoyed doing it.
What, you want to watch Turkey Bowl? Please do…
