Sober Baseball???!!!

The funny thing about American sports (particularly Baseball and American Football) is that they can make 40 minutes of actual sporting action last longer than 3 hours! How do they do this? Well by the time you change, on numerous occasions, between the offence and the defence teams, have various time outs, advert breaks (yes even at live events) and just generally fannying about (Scottish term for wasting time) a baseball game can last hours and hours and hours.

Every time you are fooled initially into thinking it will be a fast game as the first three innings uisually go quite quickly. The seem so unimportant that about a third of most of the spectators only arrive during the third inning!

In the past I have enjoyed these sporting events but, I must admit, they have usually been helped along by a few beers as everything seems more exciting and interesting after a couple of beers - even when the said beers cost $8 a bottle. So, it was an experiment in itself when Jarlath and I went along to see the Washington Nationals play the Baltimore Orioles at Baseball and, of coruse, I couldn't help the game along with any beer. A local derby match so the turn out for fans was very good on what turned out to be a lovely warm Friday night after a rather wet week. It was an event organised by his company where they booked a block of seats and it only cost us $9 a ticket.

I must admit it turned out to be a good night but that was more to do with the company and the guys from his company that I was chatting to and then the after game fireworks than the actual baseball action itself. I don't think I will ever call myself a baseball fan and would not choose to go regularly but if you get a chance to take in a game, do try it just for the experience. The halftime show itself makes it worth it - in Washington they have the Presidents race where guys in large president heads and suits race around the track being tripped up by the mascot bird - bizarre but a laugh out loud moment.

In summary a fun night out but, if you can, do have a few beers to make it more enjoyable.

Some photos of the night and spot the, now rather sizeable, bump that is Junior. Xx

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