Game 70
Cheap beer.
Now that I’m single again, nights out have come to mean several things. One, that the Mariners are pretty much going to lose, despite superior individual performances. Two, that the beer will be plentiful and cheap.
Cheap beer starts early tonight, as we cook up the remainder of fake holiday cow, and drink some remainder tailgating beer. Despite my strongest jedi mind tricks, neither the Ricker or the Dancey are swayed to the dark side of Sodo.
I do get a free ride downtown out of the deal, so that much is working for me.
The helpful young men are once again not interested in my lonely, newly single second ticket, even on a sold out night. Like the rest of Seattle, they don’t want to share the experience of losing Mariner baseball with me.
Bleep ’em. Although I miss meeting with Mark and Meghan at the beer garden, I catch up with them inside. Pleasantries are exchanged, and yet another of our friends discovers that I am newly single.
I’m okay, really. This has happened to me before, and I’m sure that despite my best efforts, it will happen again.
What I would like not to happen would be home runs given up by Jamie Moyer in the first inning. As astute readers may recall, the last time Mark and I went to a game, the story was pretty much the same.
And although we do not have Kristen, Trant, and David L. Robbins with us tonight (not that I didn’t try), the Mariners put up a similarly lackluster performance. Moyer just can’t catch a break in this town, but to be fair, he’s not making it easy on himself.
And neither is Bronson Arroyo. For his second appearance at Safeco, this young man again dominates the lackluster Mariners offense, including a mini-slump by Ichiro. I say mini-slump, because in a season where you win the batting title in early August, the occasional off night is not only acceptable, but expected. Even two bad nights. But again, rule 10.06 is a contributing factor.
Nonetheless, as the Mariners march onward away from mediocrity, I stay the course. Even after trying to comfort an embattled Sox fan, only to find out (nastily) the drunken bleep giving him crap is his buddy. That’s two nights in a row now I’ve had kindness rammed back down my throat at the ball park, the place which is supposed to make me calm and serene.
Then it happens. Of course, you all know what day it is. So they have to trot out that freaking song, so we’ll all feel happy and patriotic.
The camel’s back, has broken. I don’t want to sing this bleeping song anymore. I have healed. The country has healed. Move the bleep on.
Not only do I not stand and “join our voices, as we honor our great country,” but I stew further, and for the first time in 30+years of baseball fandom, I do not stand for the stretch.
I sit. Silent, and angry.
Silent and angry was going to put me in an early grave a few years ago. Silent and angry caused me to make major changes in my life, so that I did not become bitter, friendless, and alone in my dotage.
And after yet another 9-0 loss, silent and angry makes me wander through Sluggers in search of one group of friends, and then walk past my bus stop an additional mile to meet up with another, knowing that it includes the reason I am single again.
Beer is cheap. And plentiful. Silent and angry becomes loquacious and mellow, and awkward social moment #2 passes without incident.
Yay.
Me.