It's Been One Week, Volume 4

Ok, this would have to rank as one of the best baseball days of my life.

We went out to Queens for an afternoon game between the Pirates and Mets. It was a crisp, sunny day.  The Bucs laid the smack down 13-1. We bought a couple of cheap tickets and sat behind a hippie who aired twenty years worth of grievances against the Mets. He was a funny guy though and it was like having a tour guide from an era when Strawberry and Gooden were kings. This was my 100th big league game that I attended and it was a perfect afternoon for it.

Afterwards we took the 7 train to Grand Central Station where we connected to the 4 for another trip up to the Bronx. Our seats for this game were in the top row of the stadium. I lasted for all of about fifteen minutes before I had to come back down a little closer to the earth. Holy hell is it steep up there. From our seats in we could actually see the Empire State Building!

I scurried down to section M16, where I seat hopped for the first few innings. I finally ended up sitting across the aisle from an older Yankees fan. He struck up a conversation when he saw my Mets bag of goodies (program, a 2008 Topps Mets team set, with their special logo silver foil embossed, and a nifty wool cap with said logo on it) and we ended up chatting most of the game. For the record, I can now say I've met one (1) cool Yankee fan. 

The Tigers won 6-2. The Tigers were trailing 2-1 after four innings, when I decided that I needed a rally beer. I hadn't taken three swigs when Marcus Thames homered off of Ian Kennedy. I hadn't taken three more swigs when it dawned on me that Andy Pettitte was pitching, and not Kennedy. You see.....Kennedy was supposed to start.....I wasn't paying attention during the pre game lineup announcements.....I've never seen Kennedy before and didn't know that he isn't a lefty......well you get the gist of it. I didn't know until we got back to the room that night that Placido Polanco had hit the home run that I could've swore Pudge Rodriguez hit. I even thought it was Pudge running the bases. I learned two lessons here. One, start wearing my glasses to games and two, start drinking before the first pitch.

I'm pretty sure I consumed 6 hot dogs throughout the day. Which is about the same number of beers I took back on the train to Irvington, NJ after the game. My last night and finally found out that little tidbit. Sure would've made the first night easier if I had've known.

For the rest of my life the Tigers will have a 2-0 record in games I attended at Yankee Stadium. That's pretty hard to beat on my all-time list of baseball memories.

It's Been One Week, Volume 3

Ok, so last Tuesday was a little bit better.

I finally got to go to my first game at Yankee Stadium.

I was underwhelmed.

Yes, the Stadium was cool and it was neat to go there and all, but because of the remodeling done in the 70's, it just didn't have the feel of an old time ball park like Wrigley Field or Fenway Park. Instead of feeling like I was in the House That Ruth Built, I felt more like I was in the House That Reggie And Billy Fought In.

That being said I had great seats and got to see the Tigers win 6-4. 

I also picked up a program and a 2008 Topps Yankees team set that had a silver foil embossed stamp on each card commemorating the final year of Yankee Stadium. 

My only real beef was that nowhere on the ticket stub does it say that you can't bring in a video camera. But it sure says that on the signs outside the park and they frisk you down before you go in. Where did I hide mine? I'll never tell.

I really don't have much else to add, and that kind of sums up how it felt to finally visit Yankee Stadium. We did manage to make it back to the hotel by 1:00 a.m. this time, which was just about as big of a highlight as the game......

It's Been One Week, Volume 2

The first of our three days in New York turned out to be fairly miserable. 

We arrived at our hotel in Irvington, NJ to ominous looking skies. That's right, I said Irvington, New Jersey. You see, while shopping around for a great deal on Expedia I came across what appeared to be a REALLY great deal. Three nights for $170. So I looked on the map and it looked like it was pretty close to a NJ Transit train station. I figured this was going to be easy.
  
This turned out to be false. 

We were nowhere near a train station. After some investigating, we discovered that we could take the free hotel shuttle to the Newark Airport, catch the Air Train to the Newark NJT Station, and then take the train on into Penn Station in Manhattan. Which we did with relative ease, except for the part where it costs $15 to ride the train one way from the Newark Station to Penn Station. This was also the same price it was going to cost to get back. As we were going to have to do this for 3 days, my brain began cramping as I was figuring out just how much $$$ we were actually going to save by staying in Irvington.  

But we managed to make our way to Times Square to enjoy an afternoon of walking around the city. Of course, we exited the subway to a torrential downpour. We were meeting one of Chris' friends at the Public Library later that day, so a strolling we went in that direction. By the time we made it the eight or so blocks over there, we were drenched. Lucky for us, there was a Mets team store across the street where we were able to purchase a couple of Mets rain ponchos. We looked like a couple of bizzaro portly Jedi with a big NY logo emblazoned on our chests. I am thankful there are no pictures of this.  

We strolled back up to Times Square, because we had seen a Yankee store when we got off the Subway. We were inside all of about two minutes when we both became physically ill from seeing that much Yankee stuff and bolted for the door. We were stopped by one of the clerks who asked if we had any plans for the night. We told him that we were going to the Mets game and that we didn't have tickets yet and BINGO! He produced four tickets to box seats at Shea!! Our first break of the day!! 



Feeling pretty good about the score, we headed back towards the Library for a few pre game beers. Our euphoria ended pretty quickly upon our arrival as we learned that the game had been cancelled!!! 

So...pre game beers turned into rain out beers, and rain out beers seldom turn into good things. This was no exception. After consuming many fine beers at a cool little place called The Ginger Man, we called it a night around 11 p.m. and went back to Penn Station to depart back for the hotel.  

This is where it gets a little fuzzy. Evidently Penn Station is one honking huge place, with more than one entrance. Naturally, we didn't go in the one we'd come out of earlier in the day, and were completely lost. We walked around for what seemed like a good 30 to 45 minutes trying to find out where we were supposed to get our return tickets, what train we were supposed to catch, what stop we were supposed to get off at, etc.  

Note to self: Pay more attention in the future to how you got somewhere in a strange town if beer is going to be on the agenda that day. 

The events over the next hour are a little blurry, but somehow we made it back to the Newark Airport. Unbeknownst to us, there is a stop on the Air Train SPECIFICALLY for hotel shuttles. P4. I will never forget it. We did not know this though, and got off at Terminal C, where we had been dropped off that afternoon. We waited in line out in the rain with about 50,000 other people who were waiting for cabs out of the airport. Eventually we got a cab ($23, yay!!!) and when we walked in our hotel room it was 2:30 a.m.
  
I am pretty sure on the next trip I will not be in charge of making the hotel reservations. 

But you live and you learn (thanks Alanis!) and we were hopeful it would get better.