The Jewel is still The Jewel if it is a bad game and cold

I don't go to many SF Giants games. It's not cheap (but there are ways to make it cheaper), it's not that close (but still, just a 45 minute train ride), and it's in San Francisco, which means it can be 90 down here and 55 up there. But when I do go, I am reminded of just how stunning the place is, and I tell myself not to be such a stranger.

Mush and The Great Plotnik (TGP) have already written about last night's outing (Blogmaid was also there, but she is still in denial about whether she has a blog or not) - if you look at their reports you will see some of the same pictures and hear some of the same stories, but I'll try to come up with something new here and there.


This is Mush and Blogmaid. Due to surprisingly light traffic and the decision to just go ahead and pay the $30 for parking (as opposed to trying to scam a free space behind a dumpster somewhere), the three of us got there about an hour before the agreed upon time to meet TGP (who had the tickets). So naturally we went shopping. I got a $22 t-shirt for $9. Blogmaid bought an outfit for RR (her 5-year-old daughter who gave up on baseball when Barry left the team - you can see the outfit over at Mush's blog).

TGP did the green thing and took Muni (motto: "On Time! Well, once in a while.") to the game. It took him about 90 minutes to go four miles. So we had a lot of time to shop and stand around waiting for him.

The Giants mascot, Lou Seal showed up for a photo op.


Blogmaid wanted a picture while Mush and I were too cool to go over there.


So she had to get some stranger to take this picture (which probably is the only thing, other than the new outfit, that will impress her daughter about this game).


OK, this is totally unrelated to the game, but look at this plant. Yes Mrs Notthat, I'm specifically referring to you. This is exactly the plant that you and your plant expert friend deemed a weed. There are a number of these in front of the stadium, and they looked great. (I had to take a moment to compose myself. It was a little embarrasing.)


Here are TGP (wearing that stupid Dodgers hat - there were a LOT of Dodger fans at this game - and a Warriors jacket, which just confused people that otherwise would have heckeled him), Mush, and Blogmaid (wearing the stylish radio headphones that both her and Mush used to provide important information to us, such as how to contact our local Pipe Fitters Union for professional pipe fitting).

I've added a special arrow to call out a guy that went from mildly annoying to really annoying over the course of the game. This guy loved to yell. Loudly. He tried to be clever, but he failed almost every time, and most of the time was completely impossible to understand. After a while he settled on just yelling "CHEEEEEEZE booger!" over and over again. His little group thought this was hilarious (I assume they did, otherwise they would have offed him). There's one (or more) at every game.


There are also these - people on their cell phones. (To settle a bet, I used my iPhone and the free internet there to do some important baseball-related research - I was amazed at how many people I saw with iPhones last night, all of them browsing the internet, shopping for winter gear.)


This was a nice romantic couple sitting in front of us. He had a great time. She shivered the whole game, studying some sort of textbook. Wearing a pink Dodgers hat. If it hadn't been for the hat, I would have felt sorry for her. He's still a jerk for making her come to the game. And for being a Dodger fan.

How cold was it? We were in the third deck and were fairly sheltered. So it was cool, but with no wind. At least until the 7th inning or so, when the wind changed direction and it got a bit nippy.


Blogmaid took this picture of me. They seemed to get a lot of humor out of my gloves. My fingers loved them though.


The other thing that happened about then was that the seaguls showed up. A LOT of seaguls. And since we were up pretty high, they were flying at about our level. They were amazing, although if you had any sort of bird-phobia, you would not have been very comfortable.

So it was a fun night. The cold was survivable, the annoying guy could be (mostly) ignored, the sausage and garlic fries were great, but the game was a bummer. Not only did the wrong team win, but it dragged on forever with lots of walks, errors, and pitching changes.

But now I'm feeling a bit hungry. Maybe a CHEEEEEZE booger....

That's it - move along...