It's Magic time! 5..4..3..2..1..

Last Sunday I ticked another activity off the 'experiencing Americana' list, by going to see a basketball game.

Central Florida is quite well-stocked with professional sports teams, but only one of them is in Orlando. Tampa Bay has the Buccaneers in the NFL and the Lightning in the NHL - and Orlando has the Magic in the NBA. Even better, they are actually a decent team, making it to the semi-finals of the playoffs in 2009 and into the playoffs again this year. This definitely makes a change from your local side being Middlesbrough.

Anyway, Jason's dad won 2 tickets to see the Magic play the Chicago Bulls, and I was the lucky girl who got to go with him - even if I knew absolutely nothing about basketball before we went. Literally, in the car on the way, I was looking at the NBA's "Hoopipedia", trying to figure out such unfamiliar terms as technical fouls and free throws.

It was a fantastic experience. Loud, brash, and spectacularly over the top.

The first thing I noticed was the Amway Center, the Magic's home arena. It is less than a year old and is about as technologically advanced and shiny as it is possible to get.

From our seats in the Amway

It is an entirely pillarless structure, so even from our second-from-the-back seats, it was obvious that there isn't a bad view in the house. Not for vertigo sufferers though - those stairs, and the 3 escalators we had to take to get to our seats, were steep.

I don't even know how to describe the game itself except that the atmosphere was unbelievable. People from all walks of life were there - families, couples, guy groups, girl groups, school groups, and yes, the occasional (loud) Bulls fan - and the acoustics of the arena amplified the chants of "DEFENCE!!" and "GOOOOOOOOOOOO MAGIC!!" into an ear-splitting roar. It helped that it was a great game - with Jameer Nelson scoring an amazing "buzzer beater" (meaning he got the shot off before the buzzer went for the end of the quarter) from the half-court line at halftime, sending the home crowd completely wild. He did the same thing at full time, to tie the game, but unfortunately it was disallowed because the ball did not leave his hands before the buzzer. And the Magic therefore lost. But still, it was great to celebrate with the crowd in that 30 seconds where we thought we'd pulled it out of the bag.

Much to my hubby's distress - he's not a sports fan, least of all basketball - I think I could definitely get into live basketball, and I intend on going again. It's playoffs season now, so might actually get to see a game that counts next time.

I also started my new job this week, hence the tardiness of my latest blog post. I can't really go into much detail, as my new employer has strict rules about blogging (if you're friends with me on Facebook you know who I'm working for!) and until I understand them better I'd rather not risk getting fired when I've only done 4 days. So for now all I will say, is that I have met some great people so far, and I'm looking forward to getting more into it and seeing what I can do to make myself shine and just get on and be successful. On-the-job training starts next Wednesday...