weirdest consequence of the patriot act EVER

Jesse went to last night’s Nationals game (by the way, it figures that the one game I decide not to go to is the one game they happen to win) and had an interesting conversation with one of the concession stand employees.

It went a little something like this:

Jesse ordered a bottle of water. Concession stand employee (CSE) takes the payment and then gives Jesse the bottle. Jesse pauses.

Jesse: Um, aren’t you supposed to take the bottle cap off?

CSE: Oh. Oh yeah.

CSE takes the bottle back and removes cap.

Jesse: Hey, why do you take the bottle caps anyway?

CSE (with a straight face): Man, it’s because of the Patriot Act. You see, people make missiles and bombs with these things.

Jesse (confused): Huh. Ok.

Later, after Jesse tells me his story I tell him that I’m pretty sure they take the caps off of bottles at sporting events because throwing a bottle full of liquid at someone would hurt way more than throwing an empty plastic bottle at someone.

But what do I know?  It's not like I'm some undercover employee for DHS working a night job at Nationals Stadium.

east vs. west: a tale of two baseball games

I recently had the opportunity to attend two baseball games on opposite coasts within two days of each other. I'm a huge baseball fan so this really shouldn't surprise anyone. The first game I attended was on the 3rd at Angel Stadium, the first Angel game following the tragic death of pitcher Nick Adenhart. It was the first game of their series with the Red Sox, a rematch of last year's AL Championship.

The game was awesome but incredibly sad. Before the game, I visited the Adenhart memorial set up by fans right outside the main entrance. There were multiple Adenhart tributes before, during, and after the game. His image and number had been put up on the outfield wall and, on their way out to the field, players touched the image on the wall.

 

  

 

 Needless to say, the Angels played some inspired ball. It was a great game, offensively and defensively. The Angels won and eventually took the series that weekend, 2-1.

I flew the red eye to DC Sunday night and got in Monday morning (the 6th). After a quick nap, Jesse and I headed to Nationals Stadium for the Nats home opener. The Phillies were in town and there were tons of Phillies fans there.  

I like the Nats and want them to succeed but I will always be an Angels fan first.  The Nats can be a very eye-roll-inducing team.  There was a lot of offense in the game, but there were a couple of Nats errors that were a bit frustrating to watch.  After a string of frustration, Jesse and I took a tour of the stadium to see what was new this year.

Besides the fun presidential bobbleheads and the addition of another Ben's Chili Bowl concession stand, there were these incredibly creepy looking statues. I think they were supposed to be old Senators players in motion. Well, it's really hard to recreate motion in a statue, but someone thought this would be a good idea. Maybe in theory. But in practice, we've got these monstrosities greeting you upon entering the main entrance:

 

  

  

 

Thankfully, I saw the presidential bobbleheads soon after that nightmarish sight.

The Nats eventually lost the game after a late rally fell short. I have a feeling it's going to be very long season for the Nats.

Maybe not for the Angels though...

stuff on my cat: OC girl edition

My kitties are trying to tell you something.





Gracie and Nicky's mommy will be at the Angels/Nats game tonight and tomorrow. Naturally, I will be cheering on my beloved Angels, just as I did last night from the comfort of my own home (Angels came from behind to win, 3-2).

I'll return to the blog on Thursday.

Until then, here is a gratuitous kitteh photo to hold you over:

I caught my babies cuddling. Awww...

an OC girl living in denver?

I've been in Denver for the last few days, finally getting back into
town yesterday. It was a whirlwind trip with lots of stuff to do and
see. Jesse, who gets sent to Denver frequently for work, asked me to
meet him there on his latest work trip so that he could show me
around. He's really enjoyed the Denver metropolitan area and was
excited to show me all the cool stuff.

Little did I know that Jesse was trying to convince me to move there
with him someday. Jesse, who has lived in various parts of the state
of Virginia his whole life, is kinda over living here and wants to try
something new. Me? Well, I've already been there, done that when I
moved here from Cali. Although we don't anticipate moving there any
time soon (we're going to wait until we can sell the condo and not
lose any money on it), I'm not entirely opposed to it. It's a nice
city. The views are awesome. And apparently the cost of living is
way cheaper than here (but then again, so are a lot of other places).

But if I'm going to move West, I might as well move back to Cali.

We'll see. Anything can happen and I want to keep an open mind about it.

And now, scenes from Denver:

We went to the Rockies' opening day at Coors Field








We also went to Roosevelt National Forest and Estes Park




SHEEP!!!


And we went to RoMo (what the National Park Service calls Rocky
Mountain National Park)





ELKS!!!


there's a lake under all of that snow and ice:


And we went up Lookout Mountain and saw Buffalo Bill's grave




And we went to Red Rocks




And we saw fossils at Dinosaur Ridge


All in all, Denver was nice. And as much as I talk about how I hate
DC sometimes, I can't imagine leaving it now. I finally found a job
that is perfect for me. It took me so long to find it. And I can't
imagine walking away from it any time soon (unless we run out of
funding, in which case, I have no choice but to leave).

So maybe someday, Denver. But not now. Or soon. I'm not done with DC yet.

let's go Nats!!!

Sniff, sniff. Can you smell that, peeps? The fresh scent of pine? The smell of soft, supple leather? No, they're not opening a new S&M club in DC. It's baseball season!!! Woo hoo!

So what's a baseball fan in the nation's capital to do?

Well, you show up on opening day of the season at the new Nationals Park! With tickets in hand of course.

Here are some shots of opening day.




























The entire set of photos can be viewed here.

And here's a video of Bush's warm reception at the stadium before the first pitch:


I have to say, I have mixed feelings about the Park itself. Thankfully for the Lerners (the Nats' owners), the bar was set really low with RFK Stadium being the previous home of the Nationals. RFK was a dump and that's putting it nicely.

Nationals Park is nice, with it's many, many beer concessions and cherry blossom trees. But it's no Petco Park. Unfortunately, I've been to a number of new ball parks* and I mentally compared them to Nationals Park while I was walking around yesterday. But San Diego's Petco Park captured Southern California culture so perfectly (yes, I'm usually biased about all things SoCal, but I am not a Padres fan), that I was hoping Nationals Park would do the same for D.C.

However, I could barely see the Capitol Dome and the Washington Monument, and I thought that was the whole point of the views. There were lots of opportunities for drinking, from the many beer concessions to the Red Loft and Red Porch bars to the beer pen on the 2nd level terrace (behind the scoreboard). So it was very fitting that they captured the drinking nature of this town.

Also, the architecture of the stadium is supposed to be some kind of homage to the monuments but I'm not an architecture aficionado so I can't really speak to that.

I know they still have some kinks to work out at the stadium, but I have to mention the total lack of TV screens at the concession stands. Considering how long the lines were to get food, it was impossible to keep track of the game while waiting in line for grub because there were no TV to keep you in the loop.

And about the food, they really needed to provide some seating areas for those of us who wanted to buy food, but not eat it at our seats. Please see Petco Park on how to do this right. I thought it was kinda sad to have a band playing on the terrace behind the score board, but not provide any seating for us to enjoy the music while eating some food.

Finally, I heard the Metro was a pain. So Jesse and I decided to drive to RFK and take the Nats Express shuttle to the game. I highly recommend it. It took us less then 30 minutes to get home last night and I'm sure it would've taken us a lot longer had we taken the Metro.

Still, the game was lots of fun. And it was nice to see so many Nats fans in one place since I usually see more of the opposing teams fans at Nats games.

Will I go back? Hells yeah. I love baseball too much not to go and appreciate the game. Jesse and I already have tickets to the Angels series in June (I'm an Angels fan first and a Nats fan second, so I'll be decked out in Angels gear for that series) and I'm sure we'll go back before then.

*For reference, here are the parks I've been to:
Angel Stadium (home of my Anaheim Angels)
Dodger Stadium (ugh. please avoid at all costs)
Camden Yards (home of the B-more Orioles)
Wrigley Field (home of the Cubs)
Yankee Stadium (home of the Yanks, obviously)
Citizens Bank Park (home of the Phillies)
PNC Park (home of the Pittsburgh Pirates)
Petco Park (home of the San Diego Padres)
At&T Park (home of the SF Giants)

I will be going to Coors Field on Saturday for the Colorado Rockies' Opening Day

angels take flight

Woot, Woot! My Angels have finally won the AL West.

Up next: PLAYOFFS! Destination: World Series!

image courtesy of the L.A. Times

P.S. My college football update is coming up!