Sunday, June 17, 2007

Take Me Out To the Ballpark.....

Some father's would be irate to learn that someone else had made plans on their big day. As Father's Day isn't a high priority item on my life list.. it never dawned on me when I was ordering tickets to the game. When the Fisher Cats sent my confirmation email and mentioned that the first 1,500 dads would get Golf Visors it finally clicked. I panicked. I told The Boy what I had done, and he was fine with it. I asked him about eleventy hundred times if he was sure, and he insisted it was OK. While I was inclined not to believe him, based on past experiences with other dads (mainly my own).. he really was OK. He's a pretty easy going guy, and it didn't matter to him one bit that I got tickets to the ball game on Father's Day and he wasn't going to get to decide what to do. He wanted to take the kids to a game, and this was the perfect chance.


Some father's would be irate when they heard there was crappy weather predicted for the day of the game. Temps near 90.. thunder storms. Steamy. Hot. Not-His-Favorite-Weather. Some father's (mainly my own) would complain about how they didn't want to go anymore and make everyone miserable. Not my Boy. We packed a picnic lunch, slathered on the sunscreen, got our water and hats (well some of us) and left. He shelled out $10 for prime parking near the park in case the weather got too horrible and we had to make a run for it (my cheap arse would've parked for free in the Mill Yard). It was hot, there is no denying it. The kind of hot that makes sweat run down your back and pool at the top of your shorts. The kind of hot that beats down on your head and burns the part in your hair. The sun shone down on us with no mercy until they threw out the first pitch.

A breeze blew across the stadium. I commented out loud how nice it was, and The Boy said, "No it's not... this isn't good". Of course, he was right. The sky got darker, and darker, and darker. No sooner had the top of the first inning ended, when the sky opened up. BIG, FAT rain drops. At first we were all like.. well.. this feels good. And then they got bigger, and fell harder, and everyone made a bolt for the back of the stadium under cover. They rolled out the tarp and we all waited. The rain lasted about 10-15 minutes tops. We used this time to check out the souvenir spot.. Ms. Thang got some soft serve ice cream. The Boy went off for some nachos and Mr. Man took his money and went on a search for fried dough. I stayed behind to be the "meeting spot" and watch the action on the field. The field crew has obviously had lots of practice putting out and taking off this tarp.

After the rain ended, they shook the water off the tarp, rolled it back up and then the crew got to work getting the field ready to play again. They had to rake out the sand, add some dry sand around the base line... re-line around home plate. A lot more work than I would have figured, considering the field was ready to go before the rain came pouring down. The rain knocked 7 degrees off the thermometer in less than half an hour. It was a heck of a game. It rained briefly again about halfway through the game, but we stuck it out in the seats. It was a refreshing break from the heat. I had managed to get us some great seats right behind home plate, and there were some amusing people sitting a few rows in front of us. They might have heckled the other team a little toooo much, but it was still funny. To top it off, our team won 11-5.

We didn't stick around for the next game (it was a double header) even though it was a collegiate game with our own local team playing. It's still a school night (2 more days.. 2 more days!) and we didn't want to be out that late. We went out to dinner on the way home and let The Boy pick where we ate. We had a great day and it was nice to do something fun all together. It has been a little nutty around here and we needed some fun. The next few days will be crazy, and then hopefully things will calm down a bit. I can use some calm.

Happy Father's Day.

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