Day 103- August 23

By Al

Today was Sally's day to head back to Minnesota.  I would like to have gone to the airport with her, but today was my last chance to go to see the New York Mets with a senior ticket.  They have a senior ticket special that allows you to purchase half price tickets in certain areas of the stadium for day games.  There were only two day games left in the season.  We will be in Japan for the one game in September, so I had to go today or not at all.  The website says that the tickets are available after 9 AM.  I got there at 10 AM and was told I had to wait until 11:10 to get the half price tickets.  I went to the ticket window at 11:15 and was told that there was only one section of the stadium for senior tickets.  Since I had invested so much time, I decided to get a ticket, even though it was in the top deck in left field.  There is one main entrance to Citfield, which is strange for the crowd that they might get.  Anyway, you go in through Jackie Robinson Rotunda.  It is a very nice dedication to Mr. Robinson.

 

 



 

 

The Jackie Robinson Rotunda with people going into the game.



 

Without people.

To the left of the escalator.

To the right of the escelator.


There is a museum and store inside also,  It has some memborabelia that is interesting.  In the store, they sell game used things, such as balls, bases, bats, etc.  I have not seen this before.

Jackie Robinson's glove and bat.

1969 World Series Trophy.

1986 World Series Trophy.


So, I go up to my seat and this is what I see of the field.

 

I was 4 rows from the top.  I was pretty disappointed since I would have paid more for a better seat and thought I could do so based on their website.  The game was not sold out and there were many empty seats in better parts of the stadium, so it was not unavailablity of seats that limited the senior choices.  While I was watchin a pretty boring game, I sent an eamil to the Mets complaining.  Read the August 24 entry to see their response.  The game was boring primarily because the Rockies pitcher was soooooo slooooow.  I started timing him and he would take up to two minutes between pitches.  Never less than half a minute.  I left after the third inning.  Life is too short.

Citifield is about 2 blocks from the US Tennis Open and about one mile from the Unisphere.  So, I decided to walk over.

 

 

Cityfield and the subway stop.

 



Looking the other way toward the entrance to the US Open

The Open hadn't started yet, but things were being set up.  Not much seemed to be happening, but to get to the Unisphere, I had to walk by all the press trailers.  There were a lot of press trailers.  There were a lot of security people around, but nobody stopped me.  It was a public sidewalk and it was not blocked off. 

I got to the Unisphere and it was bigger than I had thought.  People who have seen the first Men In Black will remember the space ship at the end.  I saw those too.  There are three of them, but I only remember one from the movies.  Of course, they did not film it at the park. 

The Unisphere.

The Unisphere with the towers in the background.

The towers.

I found that I was pretty close to the New York Hall of Science.  I have a membership in the Science Museum of Minnesota and they have a reciprical relationshipwith the Hall of Science, so I could get in free. I only had about an hour, so I didn't see everything.  Everything I saw was very nice.  Like most science museums, it tended toward things children would like.  Howeve,r I enjoyed what I saw.  There ws some pretty intersting history of science discovery exhibits.

From there, I walked to the train and came home.  I had walked about 5 miles and was ready to have supper and rest.

Sally's Day
My day was taken up with packing and travelling.  I had a free ticket on AirTran (hooray), but AirTran flies through either Milwaukee or Atlanta to get to MN.  So any trip to MN takes a long time. I left our apartment at 1:30 and arrived home at 10:00 p.m.

Our lovely daughter had a bed made up for me.

Sally