“I’m hungry,” says Heather, and I am ready to deal with that. Did I not solve the very same issue for a different Heather, with a crab sandwich and, later, garlic fries, just two short nights ago? Did I not, in fact, facilitate Michelle enjoying one of everything only this last Friday? I did. So I know how to handle this. We have arrived a little early at the park – I always build in some extra time in my journeying – and we have an hour before first pitch to explore the options. “Garlic fries!” she says, just inside the gate, and it is made to happen. She wants to have the garlic fries to take the edge off while she decides what she’s going to have for dinner, and we take a slow lap around the park, including a trip up to the third deck to see the view from 301. By the time we get to 152, the garlic fries have taken their toll, and Heather admits she might be done with food for the evening, allowing that a bacon-wrapped hot dog outside after the game might be a possibility (NB: in the event, nope).
It’s not freezing, but it isn’t the warmest night of the year. The Hufflepuff-themed Giants scarf (or Giants-themed Hufflepuff scarf, if you want to look at it that way) that she brought turned out to be more useful as a seat cushion than a neck-warmer, and a hot chocolate (I have now had three hot chocolates in four nights) rounds out the amenities for the evening. It is a good night to be cozy.
In spite of remarking last night that a 737 flyby was an odd thing to schedule so close to 9/11, I have forgotten what day it is, and I am in the bathroom for the moment of silence. Fortunately, (for a lot of reasons, I guess) I am not in the habit of making a lot of noise in the bathroom, so I observed it, if unwittingly. Even with the moment of silence and the fact that a guy near my seats asks, petulantly, “Where are the jets?” I don’t put it together until the seventh inning, when we are asked to stand, take off our hats, and sing “God Bless America,” at which point I am so annoyed by the jingoism that I put on an extra hat in protest. Petulantly. When the guy asked where the jets were, my first thought was to say “New York,” thinking of football, and only now as I write this do I really think through the implications of what that might have started.
It’s a pretty good game – not a shellacking like the last couple, but still featuring a fair amount of offense. The scoring is slow but even – a Giants homer, a two run (lower-case) splash hit for Cleveland in the top of the third, two answering Giants RBIs in the bottom to take the lead; Civil War general John Brebbia gives up a run in the seventh and it’s all tied up. “I don’t think I have extra innings in me,” says Heather, who nevertheless manages to sit through the one we have to endure, which sees one run for the Guardians and two for the Giants, and we walk away with a fourth straight win after a game that feel like it ended much later than 10.06.
There’s a guy nearby who insists on calling the Guardians the Indians; it’s not by a long chalk the most offensive thing he says over the course of the evening, and I take a certain amount of enjoyment in the fact that, even if I have to listen to his sixth-grade vocabulary and his 1950s homophobia, I know things aren’t going his way society-wise. Having him there sounding dumb all night long does make me think, though; I had a friend once who declined an invitation to the park because she didn’t want to be around what she assumed was going to be the kind of pervasive toxic masculinity that sports fans are often attributed; I’m glad to be able to reflect that the incidence of loud, dumb jerks is pretty low here. I don’t know if that’s just San Francisco, or if the culture has just changed, but I’m happy to be here most of the time. I am not normally a confrontational person, and I am both relieved but also a tiny bit disappointed that although he tries to stare me down a couple of times after he has said something especially crude, that when i say “If you’re going to let our beer do the talking, you should be buying smarter beer,” it’s not right to his face.
A much better quote, from someone in his vicinity who finds his company less distasteful than I do: “If you’re here on a Monday night watching the Giants and not having a good time, you should get a better therapist.”
What Did You Think of the Evening, Heather?
“It’s always a good feeling watching the Giants win, even if it means going into extra innings. My highlights were: garlic fries and hot cocoa, a pickle and a bunt, and always your warm presence.”
81 Dates 