The Daily Parker

Politics, Weather, Photography, and the Dog

Geas continues

My 30-ballpark Geas continues into its second season. Just booked: Houston, April 7th, against the Cubs (of course).

Astute observers will note that I've visited the Houston ballpark before, when I was on a consulting assignment for a well-known energy trading company that no longer has naming rights to the park. But I decided at the beginning of the Geas that parks I visited before the Geas started didn't count. (This makes New Yankee Stadium and Citi Field problematic, so I split the difference: Old Yankee Stadium counts for the Yankees, and Citi Field for the Mets.)

My first Cubs game will be April 19th.

Update: Since I already had a trip to San Francisco planned, I've also booked Oakland for the April 25th.

Cubs-Astros series in Milwaukee

Stuff that makes you say "huh:"

The Cubs and Houston will play two of their postponed games at 7:05 p.m. Sunday and 1:05 p.m. Monday at Miller Park in Milwaukee, Major League Baseball announced late Saturday night.

The third postponed game will be played only if it affects the postseason situation, and not until the day after the end of the regular season. Brewers officials said they encourage fans heading to the games in Milwaukee to purchase tickets online and use the print at home feature to expedite the game experience.

...

Until Saturday afternoon, Houston Astros owner Drayton McLane had refused steadfastly to concede that rescheduling games in a hurricane-ravaged area was unfeasible, insisting the Astros deserved to keep their home-field advantage. The Cubs, meanwhile, continued to push for a switch to a neutral site, with Miller Park—aka "Wrigley North"—being their first choice.

Um...with the Brewers within spitting distance of the NLC pennant, I hardly consider Miller Park "neutral territory." But it is a good compromise. And, if I get my act together, I might go after all (once I figure out the Astros' rain-check policy).

Update: I may actually go to Milwaukee on Monday...

Blowin' in the wind

I have tickets to see the Cubs play Houston this Saturday—in Houston. This graphic just released from the National Hurricane Center suggests that even though Minute Maid Park has a roof, the game might still be rained out:

(For those of you without a handy map of Texas, Houston is just about where the "2" is in the phrase "2 PM Sat.")

At the moment, Ike is expected to make landfall just around the time my plane is supposed to land, just about where my plane is supposed to land, as a Category 1 or 2 hurricane with 95 kt winds.

Crap. I'll be watching this only slightly less than I'll be watching Friday's weather, if only because my life depends on Friday's weather and not on Saturday's.

Update: At least I would get a refund on my airfare if the hurricane hits.

Oy, Wrigley

My cousin and I went to Wrigley Field last night, and as expected, we had seats like you can only get at that park:

That was the only bad part of the evening, though, because thanks to Aramis Ramirez, the Cubs came back from a 4-2 deficit against the Phillies to win 6-4.

This put the Cubs fully 6½ games ahead of the Brewers. It's beginning to look a little like October...

There is one sad bit of news to report. The Mariners (50-83, almost the exact inverse of the Cubs' 84-50) yesterday became the first team to be officially eliminated from the post season. Maybe next year, Seattle.

Cubs best season since 1969: Tribune

There, they've said what I only hinted at: the Cubs are on track to win 100 games this season, and their current record (81-50) is not only the best in baseball right now, but also the Cubs' best since 1969:

Perhaps it would be fitting for the Cubs to win 100 games on the 100th anniversary of their 1908 world championship.

After Monday's 12-3 romp over Pittsburgh at PNC Park, they were on pace to finish with that nice round number, a mark the Cubs haven't reached since 1935.

...[Yesterday] the Cubs moved to 31 games over .500 for the first time since the end of the 1984 season.

If they win on Tuesday, the Cubs will be 32 over for the first time since, gulp, 1969.

Baseball. October. Wrigley Field. Mmmmmm.

Cubs sweep Atlanta

I wrote this post on my flight to Dallas listening to the Indigo Girls. Fitting, because having an extra day to spend in Atlanta, my cousin and I went out to Decatur to have lunch with one of my oldest surviving friends and her wife. As my cousin said while we were poking around the interesting kitsch in Blue Moon (below), "Ah, here's the Community."

My Decatur friend suggested the most appropriate (and, in fact, tastiest) place to have lunch in these circumstances: Watershed, which the Indigo Girls' Emily Saliers co-owns. In for a dime at this point, I put in my dollar by having shrimp grits and a mint julep. I know what my fellow Northerners may think right now: "grits? Ew." But what are grits? Nothing more than pieces of corn pan-fried in butter. Well-prepared grits—at Watershed, they prepared them well—are quite tasty, and these, paired as they were with possibly the best-made mint julep I've ever enjoyed, completely ended any reservations I had about this Southern staple.

From there, my cousin and I got back on the MARTA (Atlanta's cute little ol' light rail) and headed next to the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., National Historic Site. Wow. Intense. I've studied the Civil Rights Movement from the distance of 20 years and 1000 km, but standing by the Ebenezer Baptist Church and walking past King's tomb truly moved me:

We wrapped up the day at Turner Field, where we got to watch the Cubs sweep the Braves with 29 runs in two days. The park hardly contained any Braves fans at all; it sounded like a home game at Wrigley, complete with "Let's-Go-Cub-bies!" chants and mocking the Braves' tomahawk chop. Milwaukee also lost last night, increasing the Cubs' first-place lead to 4½ games. This year, the post-season is ours to lose.

It was, I kid you not, NASCAR night at the park, with actual stock cars lekking around the warning track during two inning breaks. Occasionally one of the cars would rev at us, causing some in the crowd to cheer. I really don't have anything against NASCAR, but there is something of a cultural gulf between my crowd and theirs.

I did find the two local-beer vendors, and had some Sweetwater 420 Ale. Good pale ale; I recommend it.

From Dallas I'm on to San Francisco, mostly to see family, but also to visit park #15 on the 30-Park Geas, Oakland's Cisco Field. The As are playing the White Sox, which means rooting for the home team (and wearing a Cubs hat) are doubly enjoyable. That's Sunday; tomorrow, it's beer and curry at Kennedy's. I can't wait.

Atlanta, wishing the Cubs had never come

My cousin and I are in Atlanta, which works well with the 30-Park Geas because we saw the Cubs play. Tuesday's game got rained out so we got to Turner Field for the second half of a double-header. The first game went to Chicago 10-2; ours, 8-0. We're going back again tonight to see what should, by averages, be a 9-1 Cubs victory.

From our seats we had a great view of the field:

Including the gilded dome of the Georgia State Capitol and what the hell is that cow in the baseball hat? Oh. It's a Chik-Fil-A advertisement that does the Braves Chop when, as we found out, any Braves player makes it to any base even if it's a walk.

Brewers over Nats, 7-1

The 30-Park Geas continued yesterday with a trip up to Milwaukee, the charming and colorful city only 90 minutes away from Chicago by train:

All right, it's not that bad everywhere—just in the road-contstruction hell near the Amtrak station that made me walk nearly a mile out of my way. Downtown Milwaukee has improved in the past few years, and even appears to have something like a skyline:

Of course, I've been to Milwaukee many times, and I have even gone to Miller Park. But, because of the rules I put down for myself, and because it's so close (I was gone from home less than 11 hours), I went up yesterday to see the game.


Where Washington has a Presidents Race, Milwaukee has the original Sausage Race:

For those keeping score at home, Polish won yesterday—and so did the home team, which brought them to 3½ games behind the Cubs, which is getting too close for comfort.

Off to Milwaukee

The 30-Park Geas continues this afternoon with Washington at Milwaukee, my second trip to Miller Park but first as part of the geas. Milwaukee is in second place, 4 games behind the Cubs, and has won their last 5 in a row. This game counts, in other words. (Washington is still in last place, and could stay there until the 2015 season.)

Still, it's Milwaukee, and I can never get out of my head the speech a Russian defector gave in an episode of Barney Miller, explaining what the Soviet Union was then like: "Imagine you're in Milwaukee. You walk in any direction, one hundred miles, and you're still in Milwaukee. No matter where you go, you're still in Milwaukee." At which point, Wojo begins screaming.

Milwaukee has changed since then. Really.

Game photos probably tonight, or tomorrow morning.