Now although I'm a big sports fan, baseball moves a bit too slow for me to actually watch it on TV. I've always been more of a basketball or hockey kinda gal. So, I'll admit it...I jumped on the Giants bandwagon last year and I challenge you to find me anyone living in the Bay Area who isn't an "A's" fan who didn't! It's great to live in a city when a local team wins a national championship. It's the one thing we can all get behind and the one common denominator for making small talk with the stranger sitting next to you on MUNI...and for that reason alone, I say "GO GIANTS"!!
We San Franciscans are lucky enough to have one of the most beautiful stadiums in all of baseball. The Giants Stadium (I'm sure it has an official name like Starbucks Park or Purina Pet Chow field, but I can't keep up with the ever changing corporate names that adorn our beloved park, so I just call it Giants Stadium) sits right on the water and our home runs are actually called, "splash hits". You can literally sit in the stands and see boats out beyond the outfield waiting for one of these so called, "splash hits" to come their way! They also serve things that other ball parks don't like Gilroy garlic fries, sushi, beef brisket, crab sandwiches, and something called a "ChaCha bowl".
The only problem I have with Giants Stadium (other than the fact that they are always changing their name and that they do not have the Weight Watchers Point Plus Value listed next to every food item on the menu) is that because of its proximity to downtown, most fans take MUNI to get to the games. Now it's fine if it is an afternoon game, but evening games usually mean overly crowded buses and trains during the rush hour home. True that those going to the game are coming inbound while those of us going home are going outbound, but there are always those amateur riders who can't grasp the concept of one side of the platform being for inbound trains and the other side of the platform being for outbound trains....which worries me when I think of these same people trying to drive on a two way street. Same concept. So because they can't seem to wrap their brains around this, there are always a few who are on the wrong side of the platform and end up going the wrong way, not unlike salmon swimming upstream. Game nights, although crowded, are always a source of frustration and amusement for me. Frustration in that there are four times as many people on the platform...and amusing when I can see that the trains going inbound are just as crowded (if not more so) than the ones going outbound. I get a certain satisfaction when I peer across the platform and see all of those amateur riders decked out in orange and black with the same tired and frustrated looks on their faces as those of my fellow outbound passengers.....it reminds me of a yin yang symbol...perfectly balanced. There might also be a bit of "schadenfreude" (look it up! or listen to the YouTube clip of the original song from "Avenue Q" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCQGQ5qBQTA&feature=related) on my part as well.
I also love to see the looks on the faces of those Giants fans when they encounter the same creepy riff raff that I'm subjected to on a regular basis. There's the barefoot dreadlocked guy who sleeps on the New Montgomery inbound platform, the toothless woman who is a dead ringer for Janis Joplin (should she have lived to her mid seventies...or maybe she did...I'm just sayin'!) who tells people to "give me a seat", or the guy who dresses in clown makeup every day and wears half...no, make that quarter shirts that barely cover his man boobs! But I guess that maybe it's just conditioning them for seeing the Giants pitching staff...a la "The Long-Haired-Pot-Smoking-Hippie, Timmy Lincecum", Brian "Fear-The-Beard" Wilson, and some guy we just call "MadBum" (Madison Bumgardner). Ah, yes, just another example of why I love this city so much! PLAY BALL!!
Here's your SAM of the week:
Yours Truly
