sometimes the dog gets you.. and sometimes...

Tuesday May 19^th, 2009

Philadelphia Phillies @ Cincinnati Reds.

What do you expect on nights like these? The reds had just come off of a road trip where they had gone from 4^th place to 1^st place and back to 4^th all before they even got back home, and now tonight they face the Phillies.

Today was my birthday, and also this thing called bark in the park. For those not familiar, IAMS sponsors a day where you can take your dog to the game. Your dog gets a seat, a treat, and most of all, the price of the tickets is so outrageous for the entire package.. how can you not pass it up? Theres even a chance for you to go out on the field with your pooch for a puppy parade and its generally a good time. They started this program 2 years ago and I have been both years with my boston terrier Donovan.. this year, I figure due to the success of it always selling out, they decided to have two. One in May, and one in September.

Now I love my dog… a lot.. maybe too much. I would however never go to the extremes that some people do in how they dress their dogs up. Ive been known to throw a baby sized shirt on my dog or a pair of socks for a cheap laugh, but Ive never done this…

I often wonder what dogs are thinking, if at all. If I had to take a guess… I would say these dogs are thinking “we are going to smother you in your sleep tonight”.

As I said before.. its my birthday.. and I made the mistake of telling our “lunch lady” Denise. Denise is like that grandmother that your cool friend had when you were kids. You would go over to her house and she would always have fresh cookies made for you, and would also give you a word of life wisdom even though you might be too young to understand. The kind of gramma that would go collect the mail in one breath and be smacking that darn dog for getting into the pie cooling on the table the next.

Denise then proceeded to turn me toward the entire dinner crowd and lead them in a singing of happy birthday which was thoroughly embarrassing to say the least. Everyone gave it a half hearted attempt, and then laughed at me. So it was a good night right?

The game went well, and for a crowd of 12 plus thousand, it was a great night. Cueto was on it mostly (despite one home run shot)… and the team came out like they were in the mood to end a losing streak. Bruce railed

one out of the park, as did hairston, but my highlight would be in the bottom of the 9^th when Laynce Nix came up to bat. With Janish on first and in need of 2 runs to win, I knew that Laynce was the man to take care of the job… except he walked, leaving it up to someone else who ended up popping out and ending the game. Tough loss.. tough play.. we’ll get em next time.

One thing I did yesterday was mount a small tripod to the frame of my bike. Some people have been inquiring about the bike, seeing me write about my journeys (including my not so nice ones) in the downtown area and wondering what its all about… so I decided to start posting some videos of my rides to give you a different perspective on what I go through to get to and from the stadium each game.

This first one centers on the after game for may 19^th,… I did try and record my journey to the stadium, but for whatever reason the camera cut off… so that ones lost in the books. This night ride though, is enjoyable to watch and really shows you a different way of looking at downtown I think. So enjoy.