Wed, March 1, 2006
Dodgers vs. Suns—8:54 AM
Yesterday was a lovely day for baseball, so the office ducked out early to attend an exhibition game between the L.A. Dodgers and their AA farm team, the Jacksonville Suns. As you can imagine, I was torn apart! The ultimate showdown between my two "home teams," neither of which I've ever managed to care about one whit. Fortunately, the Suns won 8-3. I'm going to pretend this validates my decision to move from LA to Jacksonville, because so far nothing else has.
(I keed! xoxo Mom!)
Since I last attended a Suns game (sometime in the Truman administration), they've built a fancy new stadium, which looks like a smaller, cheaper Turner Field. It's quite nice, and I bet the Dodgers were jealous because it's ten times more attractive than Dodger Stadium.
Also, the Suns mascot is a big puppy. Presumably because nobody wants to shake hands with a huge plush sun – or maybe the Kellogg's Raisin Bran lawyers came after them. Anyway, as you can imagine, his name is "Southpaw." Also unsurprising is his jersey number: K9. Nevertheless, this brought a tear to my eye, since yesterday was my first McRace away from the poker table and seeing "Belush" waved in front of me between innings seemed to drive the point home.
Brandon — Thu, 3/2/06 7:25pm
By the way, I'm extremely jealous of you having MLB Spring Training baseball in your backyard (both in this one-time situation and the more relative statewide context). Thank you for providing pics - that is a gorgeous park.
Were I in your shoes, I would have spent February carefully and tirelessly contructing a life-size replica of myself, made of old pillowcases stuffed with fine, aged cheeses (to give off that life-like smell), to take my place at the office throughout March, allowing me to constantly make the two-hour drive down to the bevy of Spring Training sites in the Orlando area, interspersed with the occasional five-hour drive to Ft. Myers to see my beloved Twins.
Not that I endorse such behavior for yourself. No, I certainly would never encourage you to skip work and zip on over to another game, where you could take more glorious, life-giving photos and post them here on your website for people to see; people that might even, you know, hypothetically, live in California. No, sir. Would not encourage that at all.
"KOTC" — Thu, 3/2/06 9:51pm
Don't forget the "World Baseball Classic", just 2 hours away... and my favorite team? The New York Yankees... 4 hours away! Ahhh (contented sigh), baseball...
Bee Boy — Fri, 3/3/06 9:02am
He he! If you can stave off the Spring Training picture withdrawal for a few more weeks, I should have some pics of Braves vs. Dodgers from Vero Beach!
(Braves Spring Training is nearer, in Orlando, but last time we took in a game at that Disney-owned park, the Mouse wouldn't stop trying to sell us pricey weekend Epcot passes. But the spirit of simple, local Spring Training lives on in Dodgertown.)