Monday, September 22, 2008

Sports Fan Dream Month

In a space of just over 21 days, thanks to family and friends, I lived a true sports fan dream. 1. August 20-22 five sessions of U.S. Open tennis at the National tennis Center in NYC (with Grandma, Craig, Kathy and Holly) including a late night Arthur Ashe Stadium match involving Andy Rodick that went so late (match ended at 2:45 A.M.!) that fans from the loges (that's us) were allowed to move down to court side. 2. August 23, afternoon, watched (with above mentioned family) the New York Yankees play the Blue Jays in fabled Yankee Stadium (one of the last games played there). We sat in the highest section right behind the visitors dugout. Toronto won when A-rod hit into a double play with the go ahead runs on base in the 8th inning (The headline in the paper the next morning "A-Rotten does it again"). How high up were we. We had a little trouble finding our seats so I saw a policeman and ask him where I might find an usher. His reply, "Do you know what part of Yankee Stadium you are in? There haven't been ushers up here since the 70's". I loved the atmosphere and am fortunate to be able to attend a game there in its final season . 3. September 6th watched the BYU/Washington football game with Roger and his friend, the most rabid Husky fan in the world (He showed me a phone picture of his truck and house - both painted in Husky Gold and Purple). We were about 8 rows up on the goal line where the (in)famous "celebration" penalty was called on the U of W Quarterback as he scored to make it a 28-27 ball game with 2 seconds left in the game. BYU blocked the long (after the penalty) extra point kick and escaped with the win. I will say no more. 4. September 11th. Now in Boise with our friends Glen and Mary Potter we spent the day at a PGA Nationwide Tour Golf event that just happened to be going on in Boise that week. Only one comment for you would be golfers -On a 399 Yard par four all the pros were hitting fairway woods off the tee - And hitting them right down the middle 300-310 yards! In addition to the above, and during that same period of time I played golf in Alberta, Washington and Idaho, swapped sports stories with family and friends in person and by e-mail and celebrated my 53rd wedding anniversary by driving 800 miles from Boise to Cardston with my very favorite traveling companion - Jean! Thanks to everyone for helping in such a great adventure!

1 comment:

Holly said...

I was just going to add that the loge ticket holders were actually welcomed down to courtside by only a few gate people. I had the fortune of running into a number of the not so welcoming gates people, but I did manage after a few tries.
Also we weren't that high in Yankee stadium. I thought the seats were actually pretty darn good. I just think that people back in the 20's must have been real skinning because there was not much room in those eilse (how do you spell that?)