Best. Layover. Ever.
· Jun 27, 10:26 AM
Yesterday was a day of layovers. Three and a half hours scheduled in Detroit, four and a half in Seattle. The plan was for a day leaving 6 Acacia in Cambridge at just after 5 and getting back to Bend around 8. That’s an 18 hour day right there. Not cool. So, in a moment of inspired brilliance, I figured out how to make it all worthwhile. Bump myself off my 6:20 flight in to Bend and take the 10:50 instead. Get home at quarter to 1 and make it as close to a 24 hour travel day as possible. Oh, the reason to do this was the Red Sox – Mariners game last night in Seattle.
It took two tries (and an intervening trip in to Pike’s Place Market), but at 5:30 I did manage to get myself on the late flight in to Bend (Ticket Agent: “You want to take a later flight?” Me: “You have no idea how happy this will make me.”). When I’d initially failed to get bumped (a little after 2) I was incredibly disappointed. I resolved to make the best of the layover which is why I went downtown the first time, but it was too good a plan not to work. When I headed back to the airport and the bus went by Safeco where all the street vendors were starting to set up, it was a bit of a tough pill to swallow. I was chiding myself for thinking that I could pull it off.
When I got to Sea-Tac and was able to turn back around I got nervous/excited like it was race day. Concentrating was impossible, and seeing as it was my first game since the ‘03 playoffs (!), I guess it’s not that surprising. I spent a little while trying to recruit friends to come down, failed, and then went and bought a ticket. Less than $40 for a seat 5 rows up on the third base line in left field? Sold. More than I like to pay, but how often do I see the Sox these days?
To say the game was pure enjoyment would be a lie. I was riding the emotional roller coaster nearly as badly as watching those Yankees games in the fall of ‘04. (Sometime I want to have a season where I go to lots of games, but it might not be good for my health. Too stressful.) Hernandez was not real good, but did a great job of pitching himself out of jams and stranding runners, while the rookie up from Pawtucket did just the opposite. He gave the M’s very little to hit, but he did it by refusing to throw strikes, which is an interesting strategy. Not one that’s usually recommended.
I left during the top of the 6th with the game tied at 6, Ortiz and Youkilis on, and went to catch the bus back out. At the bust stop I was a bundle of nervous energy like I haven’t been in a long time. Dizzy from wrapping myself around the support pillar again and again. I think I’m just as excited to go watch baseball now as I was when I was 6. They lost in the end (I must have killed the rally when I left), but it was so worth going. As the MLB campaign would like me to say, “I live for this.”
And Leevs, sorry you didn’t get the message and spent so long at the airport. I might owe you one.
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Geez Brayt, you make baseball sound interesting! Not enough to get me to go watch a game, mind you. (I did try once, five years ago, and thought one of your cousins summed it up nicely at the middle of the first inning when she asked “is the other team going to practice now?”)
— William Heller Jun 27, 01:15 PM #
With an attitude like that there’s no hope! Though, I do get a pretty good laugh out of the “practice” line. I can’t imagine how much worse this addiction would be if the Sox hadn’t won in 2004.
— Brayt Jun 28, 12:18 PM #
That looks like a pay-attention seat. Did anyone near you get clocked?
— Tom Jul 1, 10:43 AM #
The only hard hit ball nearby landed about 15-20 rows above us. It passed pretty much directly overhead, but still 10-15 feet up in the air. There were a few gloves near me and people generally paid attention. I was ready to drop the camera at a moments notice.
— Brayt Jul 1, 11:46 AM #