I am now going to try to recollect those three wonderful days of Black and White Bliss. No and is not a 3 day Specials Listening Marathon.
Day 1 - Friday I am in Love
At 4 o'clock on the 14th of October I ran from my cube to my car to race across this great county of ours to witness Game 3 of the ALCS. Again I would like to thank Bucky for giving up his ticket and for the King of the Desert Hooligans for getting the tickets.
At first things were not going as I hoped. The freeways sucked, so it was surface streets. Nothing like racing through Irvine and Tustin on a Friday. Since I was caught in traffic I thought was going to be screwed. My friends were waiting at the Block in Orange and walking over. At 4:30 I realized I was not going to meet them. So it was now a race just to get there before the second inning. Thanks Fox, you had to have this one start at 5 on a Friday. But thanks to my back roads travels I was able to get to less crowded section of freeway and was able to get to the Stadium around 4:50. As I saw the stadium I let out a war cry, since I was not going to be able to do it in the stadium. So I plunked down $10 bucks got a spot that I think may have been techincally in the Santa Ana River. Put on my White Sox shirt and said a prayer. Hey any little thing helps. Started my walk through the lot, which I got a couple of quizzical looks from Angels fans and got one, "Fuck the White Sox" from a moving car. Nice. But got to the gate and pulled out my freshly printed Ticketmaster ticket, which is nice in that my friends could e-mail it instead of waiting for my punk ass. But the downside is not having one of those cool ALCS tickets one that I could frame or burn depending on the outcome. The one thing I did miss and I regret is the team intro. I wanted to hear Harold Baines over the P.A. and be able to stand and cheer.
As I and my group of cherpas may the accent to our seats. I kind of went into a pregame panic/peep talk for myself. By the time I had gotten to the Hillary Step, I was getting light headed, sweating, heart racing and mouth dry. Either I was getting too worked up or I might be suffering from typhoid not sure. But grabbed a drink and met up with my friends and settled in for some fall baseball. Which did not feel like fall at all. It was broiling all day, so now as the sun was beginning its decent it was nice. It felt I was at a game in July, wish I had shorts.
So now it was game time and could we get the offense going and could Garland give us more than 5 good innings before the Angel bats wake up? Well those questions were soon answered and both were a resounding yes. Bam, the Sox get three in the first and Garland was simply fantastic. Here I am having little faith in the guy. Right now I have to do something I thought I would never do. Thank Paul Pressler. Who? He was the asshat who practically ran theme park operations into the ground and other crap. But he was the man who had final say on the Angels until they sold to Moreno. His one brilliant decision was nixing the Darrin Erstad for John Garland and Chris Singleton trade. Thank you, thank you thank you. Other than the Caberra HR in the 6th the Halo's did nothing. Speaking of Erstad how about them gunning him down at third. Garland like Buerhle, got a head of almost every batter ( I am sensing a theme). He was efficient and made the Angels pounds nearly everything into the ground. I should have been more relaxed toward the end, but not until out 27 was registered, I was not going to be at easy. That is life as "the glass is half empty and it could broken then then used to cut me" kind of optimist. For me watching the Sox the past few weeks has been getting me so wound up. I just don't watch, I go Rainman. I sit and rock back and forth. Constantly moving my hands and uttering things like,
"get on top stay on top"
"come on base hit"
"get there"
"go get it"
"make 'em work"
"oh crap, oh crap, oh crap on crap cracker"
"54 - 40 or fight!"
But tonight as much I as worried and fretted the played brilliantly and the Angels could not do anything. Not even the feces flinging monkey could not do a damn thing. Finally, shortly after 8:00 PM pacific time I witnessed the White Sox win in October, in person. Amazing.
Called the Better Half and listened to her scream with joy. I had not heard here yell like that since she got accepted to go aboard for her last semester. After bidding adieu to my man the KODH As I wander through the crowd. Walked out of the stadium and stood out front of the stadium at home plate and paused.
Could we actually do this?
I walked to my car and pondered that question. I watch the Angel fans trickle out of the lot. I listened to the fans on the post game show savoring every second of it. So much so I even went to the National Sports Bar, took a lap around the place and then headed home. Dumb, I know but when am I going to be in Haiti again.
Got home to the BH who was revved up about the game. She was nice enough to TiVo'd it. So after spending the last few hours seeing it, what do I do? Watched it, I watched the hell out of it. The win was so nice that I ignored Lou Pinella. During the viewing the BH and I began to talk about these crazy kids. To which, I came to the conclusion that they need to win, not for me, but for her. She was not a baseball fan before she met me, but she fell down the rabbit hole and became a fan, a White Sox fan. She has been really excited for this team since they hired Ozzie last year. She loves that she is seeing the players she watched in the beginning coaching the team. That this is a family and these are people who want to be here and be White Sox. Sorry I have something in my eye. She has grown attached to this team and has been the opposite of me. I still can remember a 96 game when she asked Ozzie why he tried scoring on a ground ball in the 6th the night before, in Spanish mind you. I found a gem in this one. I told myself I was not going to cry.
As I finally put head on pillow I went to sleep knowing that this was not going to be the typical White Sox post season run.
10/20/05
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