Take Us Out to the Ballgame
/
A perfect night for baseball!
While we were chatting over a glass of wine a couple of weeks ago, Mary suggested we go to a baseball game. None of us has been in years. Our local minor league team, the 51s, are a AAA affiliate of the New York Mets and based on their record, they’re pretty good. The team name, the 51s, refers to Area 51 in Rachel, NV, the subject of alleged secret research projects, aliens, UFOs and endless conspiracy theories.
We actually drove along the Extraterrestrial Highway (NV-375) to Rachel, NV a couple years back and stopped at the Little A'Le'Inn (Earthlings Welcome) for lunch. There’s not much to see at Area 51, although we’re told strange things happen at night. Hmmm … guess we missed out. I digress … back to baseball…
A quick on-line search and I found that tickets for a Monday night game against the El Paso Chihuahuas (yup, the dreaded and ferocious Chihuahuas) were available and all agreed this might be a fun outing. Tickets were $12.50 each in the reserved seats right behind first base. I started singing ‘Take Me Out to the Ballgame’ while purchasing the tickets on-line. As corny as it sounds, we were all pretty psyched for the game.
Aliens vs. little Mexican canines … quite the showdown.
Cashman Field, about 30 minutes away to the north of us, seats about 9,300 people. For a Monday night in April with no special promotions going on, attendance was about 3,000 enthusiastic fans. We took our ‘reserved’ seats which were really bleacher seats behind the good chair-type seats and settled in to watch the game.
Cosmo, the 51s mascot, entertained briefly to warm up the crowd. Between each inning, there were kid competitions and prizes awarded. It was a perfect spring evening in Las Vegas … about 80F with a light breeze.
Finn, the black Lab bat dog.
We got a kick out of the black lab, Finn, the official team ‘bat dog’. He dutifully retrieved bats after each hitter took a base. He also retrieved balls and a cooler a couple of times.
Sadly, our team lost to those vicious El Paso dogs. After nine innings on the bleacher seats, our ‘tushes’ were sore and our legs were a bit stiff. Our spirits, however, were not dampened. We decided this was an awesome way to spend an evening. We’ll do it again some time … maybe upgrade to the more comfy seats.