Saturday, September 29, 2012

The Sound and the Fury.

No stadium to report this time. Sometimes I get in a mood and I just like to write, and I had a nice outing today so I thought I'd stop in and say hi, and try to explain a little about myself, and why I love baseball and solitude so much.

Today I went to a nature center nearby, equipped with my camera as always, to seek out some nature. It's kind of sad that we have to do that, but that's a post for another time. It always strikes me how we live our lives (most of us, anyways) in a tight little concrete circle, and the amount of people, money, and time we spend to bend nature to our will. When if we let it go for just a few days, it would start to overtake us again. That's just the power of nature.

I drove to the nature center, and anytime I go to places like this, my senses are always attuned. I turn off the car, get out, and start walking. Slowly, the thud of the car doors, the screams of the kids, the people complaining about how their cable guy was late, the phones, the shouts, the client demands...it all starts to meld together into a general hum. And then the hum lessens, and lessens...until all you hear is silence. When you first emerge into your place (I cannot tell you where your place is, and I will not tell you where mine is, but when you are there, you will know) there is just silence. Nature is wary at first of your intrusion. But if you sit, and relax, and respect what is going on around you, and understand that you are there to be with it, not to tame it...then the sounds come back, and you have been accepted and can start to truly disconnect.

The slow melding of the external sounds into the sounds of nature is great, but that's not why I go. If I wanted that, I could buy a CD. It's mostly to meld the interior noise into...something, anything else. I am an analytic mind. I like to count, to organize, to figure things out. That served me well in my previous life as a scientist, and serves me well at my current job. But I don't know how to turn it off. It is probably the cause of most of the difficulties in my life, and I have found few things that can temporarily cage the frightened rat that is my mind. One of them is breathing the cool breeze as it blows through the trees, another is travel, and another is baseball.

I have not found anyone, really, that understands that. Football is awesome, and I love my 'Canes. But when I go to a baseball game, and the national anthem is sung, and the bats start cracking...there is a hypnosis to the rhythm of the ball being pitched, and returned...a rhythm that you can't find anywhere else. There is certainly no lack of sound, but there is a big difference between sound, and noise. Suddenly, there is no worry about work, about situations, about people, about money. There is just. Pop. Crack. Cheer. Smile.

I may be able to hit another stadium this year, which will leave 13, and at this rate I should probably be able to finish in a few years. Part of me doesn't want to ever finish, because I don't know what would come next. But if anything up to this point is a guide, it should be interesting.





Saturday, September 8, 2012

16 down, 14 to go. (Nationals Park-Washington DC)

Hello again!

So this past Labor Day, I figured, I don't get a 3 day weekend very often, I might as well do something fun, so I picked up and went to DC. It's an awesome place, I saw a ton of sights, but there are enough things to do there to keep you busy for many moons.

Of course I made it to Nationals Park, which is really a cool place. It's right by the Metro, in an area called the Navy Yard, which has been recently revitalized by the park. When you get in, you can't help but notice the wide variety of food (oh yeah, and the field is great.) I particularly recommend the strawberry smoothies. I also had a wickedly delicious crab cake sandwich. See?

The game itself was pretty entertaining, Strasburg pitched well, the Nats beat the Cardinals, Teddy Roosevelt lost the race, and I almost had my head taken off by a foul ball. All in all, highly recommended. Pictorial evidence follows. 









Monday, May 14, 2012

15 down, 15 to go. (Safeco Field-Seattle)




Well hello again! Welcome back to this lovely slice of cyberspace. Last week I got a chance to go to Safeco Field in Seattle and get to the halfway point of my journey.

The park is really nice, it's right next to the football stadium, you can see it out past leftfield, (see the third picture above). It has a retractable roof, perfect for those unpredictable Seattle days. I didn't get to sample a whole lot of the food, but the pizza was surprisingly good for ballpark pizza.

Public transportation is awesome in Seattle, (not something I'm used to in South Florida), any number of buses will drop you off right in front, there is also cheap light rail that goes everywhere.

I also got to see a good game, as the Mariners pulled it out in the ninth inning against the Tigers.

Great park, great town, definitely recommended.

Monday, April 23, 2012

Still 14 down, 16 to go. (Marlins Park-Miami)



Hello again baseball fans!

So I was able to take in a game at Marlins Park, (i.e. we're holding out for a better naming deal that will never come Park.)

Whatever you may think of the politics behind the building of the park, most people, myself included, would probably admit they did a great job. The architectural lines just give you a contemporary feel, and the retractable roof is definitely going to help in the long, sweltering Miami summer.

As for food, there's something here for everyone. Cuban sandwiches, steak sandwiches, pork sandwiches, plus a feature of representative food from the visiting club's city.

The park is built on the grounds of the former Orange Bowl, and they pay homage with a nice plaque and the lettering pictured above. There's also a bobblehead museum inside.

With the lime green outfield walls and the aquarium behind home plate, there's no mistaking this is Miami's park. If you're ever in South Florida, I definitely recommend you give it a shot.

Monday, March 26, 2012

Spring has Sprung.




Well hello and happy 2012!

Baseball season is almost here, you know what that means, Spring Training time. I don't have any grand ballpark tour plans this year, (I actually plan to go to London 2012, no baseball there though). I'll just see what happens but I definitely hope to squeeze in at least a couple this year. 16 to go...I should have that cleaned up in 7-8 years, no? We'll see if the internet even exists in its present form by that time.

But back to Spring Training...one great thing about living in Florida is, Grapefruit League time! Over the past couple of weeks I have made it to a few parks. A couple of weeks ago I went to Digital Domain Park in Port St. Lucie to see the Mets play the Marlins. Then this last weekend I went to see games in Hammond Stadium in Fort Myers, and Charlotte Sports Park in Port Charlotte. A lot of these Spring Training parks are pretty standard fare, but I'll take whatever I can get after being without baseball for 5 long, cold months. Digital Domain was about average. Hammond Stadium was pretty on the outside, but boring, hot, and metallic on the inside. Charlotte Sports Park was probably the nicest of them all, and it's been recently renovated. You can't help but love the kids dressed as fruit in the fruit race.

I'm not really trying to see all the Spring Training parks, but I'm not ruling anything out! Enjoy the pics. (#1 Hammond Stadium, #2 Digital Domain Park, #3 Charlotte Sports Park.)