After a bit of a GPS snafu, we finally arrived at the ballpark. As I approached the ticket window, a woman came over, asked if we needed tickets, and said that she had two extras. Not being a regular attendee at baseball games, I wasn't sure if she was offering them for free or trying to sell them to us -- and didn't know how to ask. After a bit of confused conversation, I decided to just buy some tickets from the ticket seller -- who was waiting throughout this exchange. (Later Christopher told me that he thought she was trying to give the tickets to us for free.) As I began the purchase process, a man approached and offered us two free tickets. It seemed that we were fated not to purchase tickets from the patient man at the window, so we accepted the freebies and went in.
As soon as we entered, we saw a Beatles cover band -- Hard Day's Night -- hanging out and taking pictures with some people. I went over and asked them to pose with Sal. I asked that "George" be the one to hold Sal, since the real George was such a uke guy. "George" began to strum Sal and the whole group began to sing. :)
 |
| Thanks, lads! |
We took our seats and began to watch the Aeros versus the Reading Fightin' Phils. After a while, I decided to take some Sal shots with the game in the background, so I went to the front of our section and put Sal on the wall. I was taking several shots in hopes of getting one with a good play going on, when a girl asked me to move Sal because she (the girl) couldn't see. I guess there are several ways of looking at this. One is that Sal was blocking the girl's view and it was rude of me not to notice this. Two is that if the girl had scootched a little bit to the right in her seat or sat up straighter instead of slouching down, she could have seen just fine. Overall, I guess I should be glad that this young lady is being raised to be assertive, but politely so. I of course removed Sal immediately and went back to my seat. As you can imagine, I didn't attempt to take any more photos of Sal on the wall -- at that location or any other.
 |
| The offending ukulele blocking a person's view of the field. :( |
Later in the game, Christopher helped me by taking pictures as I held Sal up in the air to get the shots below. I didn't want to make anybody else mad at me by using the wall as Sal's foundation, so to speak. (It is very possible that a different fan might have taken a more hostile tone if he/she felt offended by Sal's position in his/her line of sight.) There were no people sitting near us in our row at various times during the game, so I don't think we bothered anyone. Lots of people seemed to spend most of the game going up and down to the concession stands for more popcorn, nachos, hot dogs, pretzels, ice cream, fries, beverages, etc., so maybe nobody even noticed.
 |
| Nobody complained about me holding Sal up while Christopher took a few pictures. I think this one is neat. |
 |
| Isn't the sky beautiful? It was truly a great night for a baseball game. Not too hot, not too cold, not raining -- and a beautiful sky as the sun went down. Perfection! |
As you may recall from the first paragraph of this post, my goal was to get a picture of Sal with Orbit. We did not see him walking around the ballpark -- only on the Jumbotron posing with kids who were having their birthday parties at the game. I kept looking around for him, but didn't see him anywhere. Finally, during one of the last innings, I saw him all the way on the other side of the park. I grabbed Sal and the camera and rushed over there as fast as I could -- zigzagging around all the people waiting in line at the concession stands and strolling along. (Why weren't these people watching the game!?) As I approached I saw that Orbit was getting his photo taken as he was being hugged by various people. I waited for him to be free, and asked if he would pose for a picture with my ukulele. His handler said that Orbit had to go and started to lead him away. I, not being as assertive as the young girl mentioned earlier, stood aside. Two other families rushed in and got their pictures taken with Orbit! One lady was posing with him forever it seemed, as her family member fumbled with his camera phone. The handler finally whisked Orbit through a doorway and he was gone. This whole outing had been intended to get this photo -- and I didn't get it. Phooey! I consoled myself with the thought that I had a photo with the Beatles band. Thank goodness they were there! But seriously, we had a great time at the game. It was a lovely evening and I had very pleasant companions (Christopher and Sal). But, doggone it, I wanted that picture!
 |
| I cut and pasted this image from Google. If you try to imagine this guy holding Sal, you may understand my desire to take a photo of that -- and my disappointment at having victory snatched from my grasp. It was, as they say, so close and yet so far... |
After the game -- which the Aeros won 5-3 -- there were fireworks to Beatles music. The display was really great, but how to take a picture of fireworks AND a ukulele at the same time? I ended up laying Sal in my lap and shooting across her. Most of the photos came out pretty bad. If the fireworks were sharp, Sal was very blurry. In some of them I was holding the camera crookedly so that wasn't good. (Couldn't actually see what I was shooting because the screen was not facing me.) And in some of them just one person's head was sticking up from behind Sal, which looked very odd. I've included the one I like the best. Experimenting is fun! I want to go to another game so I can take another shot at the fireworks. (Pun intended, of course!)
 |
| Sal enjoying the Beatles fireworks. |
No comments:
Post a Comment