A fan is born

Stupid Blogger (the site, not me). I started this post last week and then it disappeared so I've had to start it all over again. Grrr.

Weekend before last, the husband and I headed up to that bastion of baseball, Fenway Park. I don't honestly know how anyone can attend a ballgame at Fenway and not leave a Red Sox fan. I have had the pleasure of attending baseball games at several major league stadiums: Kaufman, back when it was just Royals' stadium; Shea; Yankee Stadium; Dodger Stadium; and Angel Stadium when it was Anaheim Stadium. I have also attending a number of other major league sporting events at a number of venues, from football in glorious Arrowhead to hockey in the pit that was Reunion Arena. Fenway Park puts all of them to shame.

It starts with the pregame spectacle. The streets are filled with fans in Boston regalia of every sort, from sweatshirts and caps to jerseys, jackets, and possibly underwear (we saw some in the extremely overpriced fan shop, but thankfully not on anyone. Though I actually would have been pretty thankful if the woman two rows in front of us had been wearing some. Shudder.). There are restaurants of every flavor lining the streets around the stadium -- we went for Mexican. I choose poorly off the menu, but Kit reports that his BBQ was quite tasty. Everyone is friendly, and not everyone is obsessed with the upcoming game, though enough are that if you want to have that discussion, you can.

When you enter the park, you are met with the sight of more concession stands than you have ever imagined, serving everything from Fenway Franks (highly recommended) to Fried Dough (exactly what it sounds like, and definitely not recommended -- a zeppole, it ain't) to Dunkin' Donuts to pizza, nachos, ice cream, and on and on and on. If you have a yen for something, they probably have a concession for it (unless it's cotton candy on the first day of Kids' Weekend -- ask me how I know). I don't think there's a piece of wall that's not covered with a concession of some sort, except where the bathrooms are (speaking of, A++ on cleanliness and non-grossness, especially for a sports venue).

You take your seats, and it feels less like a big league venue than any other major sporting event I've ever been to. It's like going to a Little League game, only with really, really excellent baseball. Everyone's in a good mood (mostly), there's singing along with things and cheering and it's just so much fun. Even the loud obnoxious guys behind us -- standard in every ballpark bleacher section -- were funny rather than truly obnoxious. They had been heckling some guys in MIT sweatshirts down front when we got there, and a little later on I overheard this conversation:

Guy 1: Hey, you know what we should ask those MIT guys? If a tree falls in the forest and there's no one to hear it, does it make a sound?
Guy 2: That's really more of a philisophical question.
Guy 1, after a long pause: You're right. Let's find some Harvard guys to ask.

That would have been the conversation of the day, had not the grandmother of the little boy in front of us come back with four beers (for three adults) and apologized to her grandson for not being able to get him the soda he had asked for because her hands were full. Really, now, I like my beer as much as the next fella, but come on, people -- take care of the children first, please.

As far as the game itself goes, the Sox won 8-0, but instead of being boring the way high-scoring shutouts often are, there were some really nice catches by Manny, and Big Papi hit us a homer. If it had been ten degrees warmer and sunny, it would have been the perfect baseball game. We were thrilled to get to share the afternoon with a couple of our favorite people, Dave and Ab -- both of them are just tons of fun to hang out with, and they've got a lovely little girl just a bit older than Becky, so we can trade war stories, which is nice.

We got a double treat when the couple we were house/dog sitting for (it was coincidental to the game -- they happened to be at another event that weekend but were sweet enough to let us crash at their pad) came home in the middle of the night and we got to spend most of Sunday hanging out with them. I had been so disappointed that we weren't going to get to see them -- they're another couple of our favorite people -- so it was really a nice suprise that they made it back and we could spend some time with them. Kevin, thank you for not making too much fun of my sense of direction. It is appreciated.

posted by Laura Y. @ 4:57 PM