One of my goals in life before I die is to visit every Major League Bllpark in country.  Now during a lifetime, this is nearly impossible in that teams change location, stadiums and even their own existence.  Needless to say, I probably won’t be able to get to some current stadiums before they are replaced.  So in that case, I’ll put it this way, I want to see every Major League team in the home ballpark.  To this point, I have seen the Mets, Yankees, Red Sox, Phillies, Orioles, Marlins, Diamondbacks, Athletics, Padres and Rockies.  I’m 1/3 of the way to my goal with plenty of years of baseball left in me. 

 

I actually tried to accomplish all this in one summer out of college.  I had even had the trip mapped out to the date and location of each stop.  It was perfectly organized.  Unfortunately, grad school and a lack of funds got in the way.  Since at that time, however, I had 5: Mets, Yankees, Red Sox, Orioles and Diamondbacks.  So since college, I have doubled my number.  I still have a ways to go. 

 

Two weeks ago, Mike, J-Schiblé, Griff, Bear, Lopey and Me traveled to Chicago for our buddy Ryan’s bachelor party.  Side note, Bear was living in Chicago at the time, but was planning to move out on Sunday.  The bachelor party consisted of bar hopping, Rock Band, pizza, beer, liquor and a Cubs game on a rooftop on Waveland Avenue.  I couldn’t think of a cooler way to send a guy off...

 

1)      Okay, here’s how the first part of the trip transpired, Schiblé, Lopey and I landed at around 9:45 local time, by the time we got situated, met up with Ryan, Bear and everyone else, it was closer to 11, meaning it was midnight back home.  After a full day of work, sitting in traffic, and a short flight, I had my first beer at about 11, midnight back home.  Then we went out.  We didn’t get home til about 3, meaning 4 back home.  We didn’t stop there, oh no, we played Rock Band for at least another hour to 4, 5 back home.  (Why am I telling this?  Well let’s just say this was a preamble to the day ahead.)

2)      I forgot to mention that Schiblé played golf Friday morning, then picked up Lopey and drove to LaGuardia.  He was hung over at about 7:30 PM Friday night, then started drinking again at about midnight.  (This is key)

3)      Saturday morning, we woke up at about 9:30-10, meaning I only got about 4 hours of sleep.  After showering and getting dressed, we walked from Ryan’s one cousin’s house to another’s.  They lived about a mile apart.  This was fine except for the fact that it was 90 degrees and 180% humidity.  (Somebody turned on the sweat machine.)

4)      Just got a text from J-Schiblé at 10:14 AM: “First beer. Mmmmmmmmmm.”

5)      So not only am I getting heckled for wearing a “Yankees shirt to Wrigley,” which I wasn’t by the way, it was my grey FDNY 2008 All Star Game t-shirt, but I’m also getting ripped apart for sweating through my t-shirt.  (This is not a good start.  I’m a mess.)

6)      “Guys, if you see a store that sells undershirts, let me know”~Me

7)      I knew it too, I knew it as soon as I looked at Mike and saw his undershirt sticking out from underneath his t-shirt, that I should have gone back.  I SSSSSSSSSSSSSTINK!  (Literally and figuratively.)

8)      When we got to his cousin Mike’s house, I immediately went to Cousin Mike and asked for an undershirt.  I will give this back to him washed at the wedding.  (Catch where the forshadowing from my last post comes into play here?)

9)      Anyway, now it’s time to talk about my Wrigley experience.  This place is friggin cool.  It’s literally right in the middle of the city.  You turn a corner and there it is.  (I love places like this)

10)  Of course I took a picture of the local firehouse.  (I’m a smacker)

 

11)  Waveland Avenue.  The famous Waveland Avenue.  (Ranks right up there with Lansdowne Street in Boston, or I should say the street formerly known as)

 

12)  So here’s the deal, for $185, we got seats on the rooftop at 1032 Waveland Avenue, and all you can eat and drink during the duration of the game.  Beer service, of course ends after 7 innings, but that’s neither here nor there. (We were better off)

13)  2 Miller Lites, please.  (We’ll be back here often, don’t worry)

14)  Wow, this is awesome

 

15)  The Griff makes an appearance wearing the Fukudome t-shirt (Pardon my French)

16)  “Lift up your sunglasses, I can’t see, is that Fukudome?  Oh!  It’s Griff!”

17)  Holy crap, Anderson Hernandez is in the lineup for the Nationals.  (Yes, THAT Anderson Hernandez)

Why is Anderson Hernandez batting .556?  Must be his first week.

 

18)  Just as we got done talking about “Rookie of the Year” we see a dude wearing a Henry Rowengardner jersey. (Gardenhoser!  Rosenbagger!)

 

19)  2 Miller Lites please.  (It’s so hottttt.  Milk was such a bad choice.)

20)  Schiblé is not in a good place right now.

21)  I swear, no matter where we go, we can’t get away from the friggin Yankees.  (Posada shirt in the next rooftop over.)

 

22)  The fans in left certainly have a solid relationship with Soriano.  They love this guy out here.

23)  Looking at the out of town scoreboard, we were trying to figure out who wore 7 and 9 for the Red Sox and Jays respectively, as these seemed to be very odd numbers for pitchers.  (Yeah, whatever was going on there, it was wrong.)

HUH?!?!?!

 

24)  YYYYYYYYYYEP there’s a dude rockin the Milledge t-shirt.  (Oh, Nationals fans.)

 

25)  There’s our boy Lastings.

 

26)  Schiblé is REALLY not in a good place right now.

27)  Speaking of Fukudome shirts, how about the guy wearing the Fukudome t-shirt and the Nationals argyle cap on ¾ backwards and flat-brimmed.  (This guy’s got STYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYLE!)

28)  And right next to him is his good buddy wearing the green trucker hat sideways.  HIS hat was pre-beat up.  This is something that I never got.  By the hat that’s ALREADY beat up.  I’ve come to the conclusion that these people are downright lazy, or don’t get their hands dirty enough or both, in that it is known that the beat up hat is a cool look, but what really makes it cool is when you ACTUALLY BEAT IT UP YOURSELF.  (Ulch, don’t get me started.)

 

29)  MY-NEW-HAIR-CUT!!! Clap…clap…clapclapclap!

30)  Oh, look, on the other side of our friend is as Mike called him, the Albino Soriano.  (Yeah.) 

 

31)  This guy just got booed so immensely for leaving his shirt open.

32)  “2 Miller Lites please,” ~Me “You guys are rock stars.”~Girl behind the bar.  (Granted, I was feelin my performance on this day and the way I look at it is, when’s the next time I’m gonna be at a rooftop at Wrigley Field?)

33)  Time for food.  This was awesome, a floor down from the rooftop, there was a dining room with a full bbq buffet complete with burgers, dogs, sausage and peppers, steak sandwiches, cookies and more!  (Oh yeah and there was beer too.)

34)  The burger exceeded expectations, but the steak sandwich?  To die for.  Get some of this.  (Really)

35)  The Cubs just LOVE to leave the bases loaded.  (Wow that makes me feel a LOT better about being a Mets fan right now.)

36)  You do need to remember one thing, Odalis Perez is pitching, he’ll melt down somewhere around the 4th inning.

37)  RBI Single by Lee and a 3-Run blast by Aramis Ramirez and there’s your 4-run meltdown by Perez in what inning?  The 4th!  (I am all that is man.)

38)  That girl down in the last row of the bleachers has been taunting us for the last three innings.  You can’t look back at a group of drunk bachelor party guys and shake your hips, this is not going to end well.  (Eventually, Griff took matters into his own hands, lifting up his shirt as a signal for her to do the same.  Alas, it didn’t work)

39)  And that’ll do it for Odalis Perez with 1 out in the 5th.  (Oh Manny Acta.)

40)  Hey, uh, where’s Schiblé?  (Really, no one knows where he is)

41)  Just got a text from Schiblé: “DEAD”

42)  In response to my text asking where his, Schiblé writes back, “Ditch.”  (Okay, now we’re worried.)

43)  2 Miller Lites please.  (I just bumped into a guy from Jersey, Bergen County no less, that was here for a bachelor party.  Huh, what are the odds?)

44)  So, I don’t know what happened, all I know is Mike came walking up the steps and said to the My New Haircut dudes with the really gay looking sunglasses sitting behind us, “You’re gonna heckle me with those sunglasses on?”  (Mike has no fear when it comes to these fools)

45)  We are now rooting for the Nationals to keep the top of the 7th going.  They have cut the limit to one beer per person.  We need to keep the bar open.

46)  Damn Nationals, can’t put a rally together…wait..THE BEER!!

47)  1 more Miller Lite please?  (Ah….that was close.)

48)  A One!  A two!  A three!!!  (There is no rendition of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” quite like that of Wrigley’s.  Thank you Harry Caray, wherever you are.  HAAAAAAAAYYYY)

49)  I can’t get over Jeff Samardzija being in the Cubs bullpen.  As an Irish fan, this still seems weird to me.  (Which reminds me, we had a blast all day imagining what Cubs games would be like now if Harry Caray were still around.  “Here’s Koh-sook-key Fook-you-dome….And so Lou is gonna hand the ball of to Samar-Samar-Same#$%asdjjrkjl;jza….Alfinzi Sorianio hitting .295 on the yearrrrr…And so here’s Reed Johnson, now THERE’S a nihce easy name youuu cahn remehmber”)

 

50)  And here comes the rain…and there go the pansies...Mike, Griff, Lopey, Schiblé, etc. run for the hills from the rain, while Bear, myself and a couple other tough it out.  (We wanted to sing “Go Cubs Go!)

 

51)  CUBS WIN!  CUBS WIN!! CUBS WIN!!!!

 

52)  “Hey Chicago, whatd’ya say?  The Cubs are gonna win today. GO CUBS GO!  GO CUBS GO!”  (This is probably one of the coolest post game celebrations out there, between nobody leaving during the sing along to the raising of the W banner.  All good things.

 

All good things.  You know, I don’t think I could come up with three better words to describe Wrigley Field and my experience there.  If you get a chance and you’re out in Chicago for a weekend, take in a game on a warm Saturday afternoon.  There really is nothing like Wrigley Field.  We eventually found Schiblé.  He needed a nap badly.

 

Here are some more pics from the day...

 FU Crew: Lopey, Griff, Bear, Mike and Me.  (Notice no J-Schiblé)

 

Me and Mike hoisting up Griff

 

So, 11 down, 19 more to go.  Looks like 2009 is gonna be a busy year.  Up next, my final preseason update from the season ticket seats at Giants Stadium.  I gotta do this every two weeks?  Jeez! 

 

Big thanks to Ryan's family and friends for setting all this up for us and being so accommodating during the trip.  This was an awesome time.  Thanks everyone!  See you at the wedding!