Deth

This year, we had no plans to go away for vacation or anything. Molly decided to get us Phillies tickets for my birthday.

It would be the first game I’ve been to since the 1990s, when my dad would get tickets from work every so often. That was an adventure. His radiator host burst on 95, so home we went, and then Aunt Alice went down with me while he fixed it.

We had tickets for the first game of yesterday’s double header. We’re somewhat limited by the timing of the last AMTRAK train back home, unfortunately, and we had no plans to stay overnight in Philly.

We left here early to walk over to the train station so that we could get down to Philadelphia early. I’m rusty on SEPTA, and why not take some time to look around? We could kill time in Philly for sure. Of course, I had a drink before we left.

The train ride down was smooth, and we could just relax and enjoy the last of the cool, air-conditioned air. It was already very humid when we left and starting to heat up. By the time we got to 30th Street Station and went outside to get to the El it was hot and very humid. The subway reeked of piss but at least it was cooler. It was just nasty outside when we got to the stadium. We looked around and grabbed a virtual cache.

Once we got in, we looked around a bit inside, grabbed a beer, and headed to our seats. Three rows back from the field, right near the Phillies’ dugout, were especially good seats. Molly said if we’re doing it once, we have to do it right. It was an enormous difference from when I remember going to the Vet. We were right there. It was also much louder than the Vet was, but this year the Phillies are doing well, unlike the 1990s.

The game was Johan Rojas’ debut, and what a debut it was. His first play was an outstanding catch at the wall, and he threw out a runner for the second out of a double play. This guy could be fun to watch!

Manny Machado hit his 300th home run early in the game. Boo. It was pretty cool to see it.

Later in the game, we got to see our first live Schwarbomb! Just by the sound of that hit, there was never a doubt. Later on, he drove in the winning run. It was awesome to see Kimbrel close it out.

Given that our seats were right near the dugout, we got to see the daycare do the dump the water thing on Schwarber while he was being interviewed. We had a lot of fun at the game, and now Molly wants to go to more games.

I’ve been wanting to go and we’ve talked about going while tickets were readily available when the Phillies were doing shitty. It was certainly more fun to go when they’re doing well than it would’ve when they sucked.