Last week we enjoyed a night out with the kids and some dear friends. We decided to meet and take in a baseball game of our local farm team. I love going to baseball games...the atmosphere is fun and you just can't beat the sound of the bat cracking the ball out into center field!
The friends that joined us have been our amigos for about 20+ years and whenever we get together, it is always a great time....laughs, stories and more laughs. Tonight would be no exception.
Our seats were past the 1st base line...primo spots for foul balls. I started off the evening by saying "I'm listening, even though I may not be looking at you." because I would carefully watch each pitch thrown across the plate. I will say that it was a wise move on my part. As the night progressed, I witnessed a person catch a ball -(with their bare hand mind you!) that came whizzing past our heads. By the sound of the smack, I'm sure his palm stung for a while. I also saw the guy behind me take one straight to the gut. Good thing he had a lot of cushion (it was $1.00 hot dog night after all) because it just made a "thud" and rolled off. There were plenty of other close calls but I lost count after 10.
Soon it was time for the Mascots to take to the field between each inning. We had the mayors of local towns race...the team Mascots raced kids around the bases..."Ketchup", "Relish" and "Mustard" raced down the baseline, "Mustard" being the winner that night. Remember, it was hot dog night! Then came the litte cars tossing out t-shirts to the crowd. We all stood up waving our hands....and two shirts were thrown our way...one landed in my hand and bounced behind my seat before I could close my grip. The next second, another was flying over my head and I could see our son out of the corner of my eye grabbing it out of the air. When I looked behind my seat, I could see my husand with one end of the t-shirt, playing tug-of-war with a little girl. He let go and said "Oh, you can have it" with a smile.
The best part came as my son unrolled his prize....expecting a t-shirt with the home team logo, we were all surprised to see that it instead read...
"Kidney Walk".....AND it was from 2009! This threw us all in a fit of laughter...are you kidding me? You couldn't spare a team t-shirt? The jokes started flying..."don't wear that on the black market, cuz they will walk!", "are you sure it doesn't have dotted lines on the back?" "why am I sitting in a tub full of ice?" all playing on those wild internet stories that people email to you. These jokes are off color and are not meant to offend anyone...(I have friends, yes plural, friends that have had transplants..so I am very aware of the serious nature and cause behind the shirt-they would have laughed too.)
It was a fun night and we look forward to our next game.
Maybe next time, we will change our seats.
