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PAST ENTRIES
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MSU Reunion
Ocean to Ocean
Out On The Town
Getting a Break
Before The Storm
Happy Dad's Day
Colorado and Back
On the road again
Home For Now
Off to the Bronx
Catching Up
157 More Games
Stuck in Jersey
MSU Reunion, Here I go again -- blogging the night before I hit the road again. I guess that's become my routine. I'm on a plane to Cleveland tomorrow morning and then I'm off to Boston later this week. I wanted to briefly throw up some pictures from my last trip. My last road trip felt like a college reunion. First, I went to Minnesota, where an old classmate of mine covers the Twins. Then, it was off to Tampa, where another person I went to college with and worked at a newspaper with in Michigan now helps cover the Devil Rays. After that, Kelly and I drove to Grand Rapids for the wedding of one of my former college housemates. Here is my usual shot -- taken inside the Metrodome:
Here are some photos from the wedding reception:
Here is Kelly and I at table No. 1. I stood up in the wedding for my friend Jon, who also stood up in our wedding. He lived in the room next to mine in the Cambell Hall dorm at MSU. Then, he and I were two of 12 guys that got a house together off campus.
Here is Jon with his new bride, Erin. They live in Cincinnati, where Jon works.
Here are a lot of my friends from MSU. I'll work clockwise from the lower right. That's Justin -- who nows lives in New York -- my roommate in an apartment off campus during our last year at MSU. He also lived in the dorm and in the house with Jon and I (and the other guys pictured). Next to him is his girlfriend, Kelly. Then there's Mike, who lives in Minnesota -- I got lunch with he and his fiancee Brit (sitting next to him) when I was in Minny, too. Then there's Bob and his wife, Laura. Laura went to Michigan, which I guess is forgiveable and they still live Michigan. Bob was Jon's roommate in the dormroom next to mine freshman year. You got all this straight? Then there's Peacock (yes we refer to him by his last name) and his wife Kayla. They also live in Minnesota now, but I didn't get to see them when I was up there. Peacock bailed me out of many broken-down-car jams throughout my four years in school. The best time being when he drove up to Kelly's college and helped me throw the transmission for my Explorer in the backseat of my truck -- then selling the lemon for $90 to an Iraqi (more on that some other time).
I couldn't get everyone in the group shot. Here is Chad and his wife, Julie. Chad was the best man in my wedding and was my best friend throughout college. He is a cameraman for a TV station in Detroit, covering sports. They live in Michigan still.
Here is my buddy Steve, who lived in the dorm and in the house with me. That's his girl Shannon sitting with him at table numero uno with Kelly and I. He's still in Michigan, too, working as an engineer like most of the guys I lived with in college.
The last buddy I got to see was Yoop. OK, his actual name is Dan, but he is from the Upper Peninsula, or the U.P. for you non Michiganders -- thus the nickname. He lived with us in the dorm and was at our house frequently. Yoop now drives a Mustang, which surprisingly hasn't been stolen by Kelly yet! It was good to see all my friends from college. Our days at MSU weren't that long ago, but it sure feels like it sometimes with how we're all now working all over the country (countries, in my case). One cool thing about my job is I do get to see some of them each year because I travel so much. We were lucky to find such a good groups of friends when we were in school. Anyway, after the wedding, Kelly and I met up with her family in Grand Rapids. We don't get to see them very often any more, either, so it was nice to just get lunch and hang out.
Here is Kell and her family after we got ice cream at Coldstone....mmmmm. I said I'd keep this post brief and I think I failed. Ah well, there were too many pictures to add on here. Well, I have to run. I'll try and update this thing quicker once I'm back from my next seven-day journey. Stay tuned for more... Posted at 10:49 p.m. Ocean to Ocean, As has become the usual routine with this blog, I'm posting the night before I hit the road again. I've been back in Toronto for six days, but bright and early tomorrow morning I am catching a flight to Minnesota, where the Jays will take on the Twins. After a four-game set there, I'll be heading to Tampa for three games, and then I'll head back to Toronto on the 18th -- only to pick up a rental car to head to my friend's wedding in Michigan. Life doesn't seem to slow down much. My last trip was fun, though. I stayed in San Francisco for four days because Toronto was playing Oakland. I hadn't been to SF since I was a kid, so it was fun to go around and see some of the city. After that trip, I caught a redeye flight from SF to New York, which just so happened to be in the middle of a terrible heat wave. The games in NYC were night games, though, so I got to go around the city some, too. I hadn't played tourist there since I was a kid, either. First, I'll take you through some pictures around San Francisco:
My first day in town, it was actually pretty cool outside. This was the first road trip that I didn't pack a sweatshirt (I read California was having temperatures over 100!), but the heat wave was over by the time I arrived. My first stop was Coit Tower (above), which I think my dad took me to when I was younger. From the top, it has a nice view of San Fran.
I didn't actually get out to Alcatraz (above), but I did take this shot from Fisherman's Wharf. I took the tour there many years ago and remember being surprised at how small it was inside. This was as close as I got to The Rock this time around.
My second day there I decided to hoof it from my hotel, which was near Chinatown (which was also very cool), and head to Lombard Street -- the crooked street. The pic above is from the base of the hill, which is pretty steep. I guess they originally built the street this way so that early automobiles had an easier time getting down the slope.
After stopping at Lombard St., I headed down to Fisherman's Wharf and then caught a cab down to the Golden Gate Bridge (above). It was pretty foggy when I was out there, but it was still cool how you couldn't see the top of the bridge at times. This was my last stop before heading over to McAfee Coliseum in Oakland, where the A's were taking on the Jays. I almost was late on this day because it took me an hour to get a cab back out to where I was! Apparently, "under the Golden Gate Bridge" isn't a good enough address to get picked up at!
Here is my usual shot taken at McAfee Coliseum. I only have Seattle, Anaheim and Cleveland left to see in the American League. That'll all be taken care of by the end of the season.
After San Francisco came New York. Here is a photo I took outside of Yankee Stadium on the first day I worked there this trip. I love the contrast of the city baseball diamond sitting beneath the towering facade of The Stadium. I actually arrived in New York the morning of July 31, which is the non-waiver trade deadline in the Majors. I didn't expect Toronto to be making any moves, but I had to be in town early just in case they decided to make a last-minute deal by the 4 p.m. deadline. That meant catching a midnight flight out of California to New York. That wasn't that much fun, but the lack of activity once I got to NYC allowed me to hit the sack pretty early.
Here is a picture of Times Square (above). If you look closely at the building in the middle, you can see a round clock hanging on the right side of the building. That is the entrance to the hotel I was staying at in New York. Needless to say, there was plenty for me to do around town.
One thing I wanted to make sure I did was head downtown to ground zero -- the site where the World Trade Center was attacked. It's definitely sobering to stand there and just stand, staring into the two giant "footprints" left by the twin towers. It's a place that shouldn't exist, but it's most definitely a place you should go see if you get the chance. They have started construction on a new building called Freedom Tower on the site. The one thing that stuck out the most for me was there was an original beam still standing from one of the towers. One beam, sticking up with the massive hole only feet away. I took a bazillion more pictures around California and around New York, but I didn't have the time, nor the patience, to post them all. I'll post on here again once I get back from Michigan on the 20th. If you want to read what I'm up to while I'm on the road -- and what's up with the Jays -- I started a Blue Jays blog on MLB.com. That's located at: http://mlbastian.mlblogs.com. I also updated my schedule for the rest of the year and put it on the site here. On another note, my sister Melissa, her husband Keith, and their kids Tricia and Parker came up to visit Kelly and I in Toronto this past weekend. Kelly and them took in the Blue Jays/White Sox games while I worked and we all went out a couple times. It was fun having some family come up to see us. Oh, one more thing. I had my first scoop as the Blue Jays beat writer recently. Here is the link to the story: Jays notes: Frustrated Molina speaks out. It wasn't the biggest story in the world, but all four Toronto papers cited MLB.com during the next two days. I felt that was a big step for me as a rookie reporter. Anyway, I guess that's all for now. Sorry it takes so long in between posts on this site. I'll try to update as soon as I get back home next time around. Stay tuned for more... Posted at 10:01 a.m. July 26, 2006 Out On The Town,
Kelly and I just got back from a wonderful night out in Toronto. I leave for California tomorrow, so she and I wanted to have a nice date before I hit the road for a week -- a trip that takes me from Oakland to New York. In case you were wondering, the image above was made from a photo I took of Kelly and I tonight. I always have fun altering pics in Photoshop. Anyway, ever since we heard about it last summer, we've wanted to go see the Lord of the Rings play they have here in Toronto. It's a multi-million dollar production of the J.R.R Tolkein novels and it's only running through September. So we wanted to make sure we squeezed it in before it shut down. It kind of turned into a now or never thing for tonight, so we bought our tickts this morning and saw the three-hour play tonight. It was really good, but very abbreviated. Consider that the three LOTR movies are about 11 hours combined. They tried to squeeze all of that into just three hours, so a lot was left out and many scenes were more like summaries of sections of the books. The special effects were sweet, though -- you could see where all the money went. It'd be really hard to describe here, so you'll have to take my word that it was worth every penny -- and it took quite a few pennies to go! I don't typically like taking pictures off other Web sites and posting them on mine, but it's worth it to show you the character that played Gollum. He did the best job by far and got a huge round of applause when the show was over. Here's a look at how Gollum looked in the play:
It was the first time that Kelly and I headed to see a play in a few years. We thought it would be fun to take advantage of the opportunity to get a little dressed up. I busted out a suit and tie, which is something that I don't really like wearing very often, but know Kelly likes when I do. She wore a nice black dress, so we were quite the pair heading to the show. Actually, we were dressed a lot better then most of the Lord of the Rings nerds we saw there. Ah well, we had fun.
Here we are about to take off for the play. This is the picture I pulled the image above from. Seeing Lord of the Rings put a nice finishing touch to the two days I've had off. We didn't do a whole lot yesterday, but we did go out to dinner at one of our favorite restaurants downtown. I have quite a hectic schedule for the next two months, so taking a little breather and spending some time with Kell was a lot of fun. For those of you who don't follow the Blue Jays regularly, I did have an interesting week of coverage. Toronto had a bit of a falling out with one of its players -- Shea Hillenbrand -- and that kept myself and the rest of the reporters quite bust this past week. Here are some links with the stories: July 19: Blue Jays cut ties with Hillenbrand That's plenty of reading material to keep you busy for a little while. Well, I'm off for now. I catch a flight to San Francisco tomorrow night and won't be back to Toronto until Aug. 4, when my sister Melissa and her family will be in town for the series against the White Sox. My busy week won't get much calmer this week, either, considering that the trade deadline is coming up on July 31, when I'm in New York City. As usual, I'll be taking plenty of pics in California and New York. I'll post them on here as soon as I get back here in August. Until then, stay tuned for more... Posted at 12:51 a.m. Getting a Break, Finally! I'm getting a nice four-day break because of the Al-Star game. I didn't have to work the Midsummer Classic this year and the Blue Jays don't play again until Thursday. So Kell and I have a whole lot of nothing (with some chores in between) planned for the next few days. Since I'm lounging around in my PJs without a care in the world, I'll catch you up on my latest road trip. During the past week I traveled to Texas for the first time, to Kansas City for the first time in a long time, and the back home after being away for what felt like an eternity. Toronto didn't play especially well during the trip, which made it feel that much longer as a writer. I had a good time, though. I enjoyed Arlington, spent a day in Dallas, went to the Negro Leagues Hall of Fame in K.C., and loved both ballparks. In Texas, I stayed at a hotel located just down the street from Ameriquest Field, the home park of the Rangers. So every day there was a game, I trucked it on foot in the Texas heat (which I was told was rather mild while I was in town) up the hill to the ballpark. Here is a picture I took on one of my walks to a game:
Here I'm a little closer:
Here is the view from inside the park:
There's not much else to say about the park except I liked it alot. My brother in law actually does some part-time work for a financial business, which has its offices located in center field. Pretty cool. I liked my view from the pressbox a little better, though. While I was in Texas, I had a number of people tell me that I should make the trip to Dallas to go see the Texas Book Depository, which is the building in which Lee Harvey Oswald was in when he shot and killed JFK. The sixth floor, where Oswald was at the time, is now a museum honoring Kennedy and his legacy. It also has a detailed breakdown of the events that occurred on Nov. 22, 1963. Here is a picture of the building as it looks today:
The window that Oswald was in is the corner window -- second from the top -- on the left facing of the building in the picture above. You can see the window propped open. That corner of the sixth floor is recreated as it appeared when the cops discovered it in '63. There are piles of book boxes in the corner and two boxes stacked by the window. Oswald apparently used those two to lean his rifle on. Here is a zoomed in look at the window. You can see one of the boxes in the corner:
It was definitely worth going to see the museum. You can't help but get an eerie feeling as you look out at the street from the sixth floor or as you look up at the sixth floor window from the street. There were a lot of interesting movies, photos, and artifacts inside the museum, too. Probably the most memorable part for me, though, was outside the building. The area around the building is just as it was 40 years ago and it was strange to walk around where it all happened. Below is a picture of the grassy knoll (under the trees across the street) and where the Zapruder Film was shot (on the hill by the building on the right):
On the street, there is a white "X" where Kennedy was shot. I stood on the curb a few feet away from the spot and took this picture looking back up at the window. Standing nearly in the line of fire was another odd moment in the tour:
If you're ever in Dallas and get the chance, I would highly recommend going to see the museum. It's something that sticks with you once you've done it. After that, though, it was back to work for me. The next day, I was off to Kansas City for Toronto's four-game set with the Royals. Here is a picture of Kauffman Stadium:
As I wrote in a previous post, I had been to the park before -- back in 2001 with a high school friend of mine. One thing I didn't do then that I wish I would have was spend some time behind the waterfalls in the outfield. So during the fourth and fifth inning on Sunday, I took a break from work and spent some time out in right field Kauffman Stadium is an older park, but it's really been kept up nicely. It's a very unique ballpark and one of my favorites, actually. I love how open it is behind the outfield. Here is a shot of the waterfalls in the outfield:
Here is a shot of home plate from behind one of the waterfalls in right:
Here is a picture of the George Brett statue outside the front of the stadium:
While I was in Kansas City, I also visited the Negro Leagues Museum with another Toronto writer. It's also worth seeing if you're ever in K.C. and are a baseball fan. It was expecially cool to go when we did because the day before Buck O'Neil and Stachel Paige's son were at the Royals-Jays game. WALKING AROUND DALLAS: This last part is added with my bro in mind. He loves taking picture of buildings from unique angles in cities. I've done much of the same in many of the places I've been. After I went to the JFK museum in Dallas, I spent some time walking around the city and snapped a few photos. Not to often you see a pyramid-shaped building:
I thought this was a pretty cool sculpture:
I'm standing behind the building on the left in the shot below:
As I was walking by, I couldn't help but notice the stark contrast of the old and the new. The building on one side of the street was falling apart, the bricks looked very mismatched, and many of the windows were boarded up. Directly across the street was a towering, glass office building. I thought it was interesting to put the bricks and the glass together in a mesh of different time periods. Anyways, blame my mom for the artsy side coming out every now and then. That's all for now. I'm off for the next few days and I'm going to be enjoying it. There's nothing quite like simply hanging out at home with Kelly and Barkley. Toronto is home for a couple weeks before I hit the road to Oakland and New York. Stay tuned for more... Posted at 4:12 p.m. Before The Storm, That's what it feels like right now: The calm before the storm. That's because it is 6:30 in the morning, it is dead quiet in the Bastian residence, and I'm a few hours away from -- what's sure to be -- a very hectic day at work. I leave on an early flight tomorrow to Texas and have a boatload of things to do before then. Today is the always fun All-Star team announcement day. So, on top of the game against the Phillies (which I'm having my intern help cover ), I'll have to be on all the All-Star stuff. Plus, I have to finish up a mailbag and this whole midterm report assignment that's due tomorrow. The game taking place in front of me will be a secondary event for me today - always interesting when that's the case. The fun won't stop there, either. I have an a.m. flight to Dallas and, thanks to a connecting flight, will be arriving in Texas with just enough time to get to my hotel, throw my luggage in my room, and catch a cab to the ballpark. That is if there aren't any delays in the process! I'm looking forward to this trip, though. True, it's going to probably be one of the hottest road trips I go on this year (three days in Texas followed by four in lovely Kansas City), but I've never been to the Rangers' park and I haven't been to Kaufman Stadium in K.C. since I was a senior in high school. A friend of mine and I drove the roughly 600 miles from Colorado Springs to K.C. in 2001 to see Cal Ripken Jr. play one last time. It was the closest American League park to Colorado. We did the trip in one day (left in the morning, caught the game, spent the night in the worst motel on the planet, and headed home the next morning) and all we got for our quest was an 0-for-4 showing from the Iron Man. Ah well. We made the trip to see him play, and play he did. My only road trip of June went well. I visited Atlanta for te first time and had a decent time. It wasn't the best city I've ever traveled to, but then again, all the stuff that looked fun to do were things I would've wanted to do with Kelly tagging along -- not by myself. I guess that'd be the way to put it: Atlanta was a city that I'm sure I could have a good time in if I had someone else with me. I spent most of my time in or near my hotel, which was very nice, and only ventured around downtown once. I did see the World of Coke -- a museum that features the history of Coca Cola and lets you taste samples of Coke products sold around the world -- but I didn't go in because I would've felt lame sipping pop with a bunch of strangers. I did get to see Turner Field for the first time, which was cool. Here is a pic I took:
It was definitely cool to see all the pennants hanging up in left field, representing all the division titles the Braves have won. The park was pretty plain, but it was a lot nicer than some others. As of right now, I have 11 National League stadiums and 6 American League parks left to see. I'll have all the A.L. ones knocked out by the end of this year, so my list will be down to just those 11. That number would've been 9, but St. Louis and San Francisco just HAD to go and get knew stadiums. Anyways, that pretty much sums up what's been going on and what's coming up for me right now. Sorry I haven't posted in a while (to those select few loyal readers I have who actually care to see what the heck Kelly and Jordan Bastian are up to), but you know, blah blah blah, I've been busy with work, blah blah blah. The usual reasons for not blogging. I'll try to post pretty quickly after I get back from this next trip. No excuses -- it'll be the All-Star break and I'm not working the game in Pittsburgh. Speaking of which, I posted my schedule for July up on the site. It should be a busy month, especially as it gets closer to the July 31 trade deadline. I have a nice red eye flight from Oakland to New York that morning to make sure I'm in NYC with the team in case anything goes down. Well, I think I'm going to go hop back in bed for a little bit before I have to head to work. Today is the series finale against the Phillies. Yesterday was Canada Day, which brought back memories of when Kelly and I first moved up here last summer. Actually, I wrote my first blog entry on this site on June 25, 2005 -- so I've officially passed my one-year blogging anniversary. A lot has happened since then. Stay tuned for more... Posted at 7:03 a.m. Happy Dad's Day, Well, after reading my bro Karl's Father's Day post at PastorKarl.com, I wanted to let people know that he wasn't the only son in the family. Maybe I came on to the scene 13 years after Karl did, but I grew up with the same cool Dad (Actually, being the youngest, I've heard that the old man I grew up with spoiled me more than my older siblings, but I wouldn't know anything about that!). The one thing I do know is that I grew up with a great Dad -- a guy that, despite being a little older than the father's my friends had, never hesitated to try to keep up with his youngest son. And one thing he always did was always put my interests ahead of his -- whether that meant finding out he was a little more athletic than he gave himself credit for, or planning a family vacation around a Cubs game in San Francisco, or heading to grungy music shops so I could pick out the latest Rock album I wanted. I had a Dad that was a lot different than the one my bro and sisters knew. Here's some pics of My Dad and I:
Little did he know that hauling me around on his back was getting him in shape for the years of sports activities that I would put him through.
Here is one of the first looks I got of the old man. That bundle of blankets is me.
Here he is retaliating after I probably called him ugly or something. Little did I know that I'd end up looking more and more like him as I got older. Luckily, I got some of my looks from my mom's side of the family!
We spent a lot of time traveling when I was a kid. Here is us after hunting down Bastian Road. I'm sure this tradition will live on -- it already has. Last summer, I made Kelly go with me to the town of Jordan, which was on our way to Niagara Falls. Little memories like this one are the ones that stick out the most for me.
Whether he was catching behind me...
Pitching to me...
Or hitting the road to see the Baseball Hall of Fame, my dad tried to get as much into baseball as I always have been. Even last month, when I was in Colorado, he made sure to be at Coors Field while I worked in the pressbox.
He has always been an adventurous dad. Like the time he tried to go water skiiing. I stayed in the boat to catch some pics of him cruising across the water.
Everything was going great until he waved...
That's when he displayed his impressive coordination.
You could always count on dad to bend over backwards for you. He did that this time, too, except he did it down a flight of stairs. Don't worry, I helped him up after snapping the picture.
Knowing I wasn't the greatest swimmer, my dad and sister thought it'd be a good idea to teach me.
Unfortunately for him, I remembered and it came back to bite him years later.
My dad loved to go out in his boat. I suggested he put it in the water...
Here he is taking my sister and I out onto the mighty Fox River.
He was an incredible fisherman. After hours in the river, he always came home with a big catch.
My dad would always go to fight for you...
And he'd teach you how to fend for yourself, too.
And you could always count on him recording all the big family events.
He he is showing off our brand new car.
And dad watching as I kicked his butt in horseshoes.
While I was out just being a kid, he'd spend hours in his office keeping our life in order.
He was a man of the church.
But always a family man first.
Here is three generations of Bastian men -- minus my brother...
Karl and I with our Dad.
One of my favorite pictures of my dad. All of us kids have a lot to thank Dad for. That's as true for me as it is for my siblings. If I had to pick one bit of advice he gave me that sticks out from the rest, it came when I was trying to pick a college. I had a small Christian school that wanted me to play baseball for them and I had been accepted to Michigan State, where I would have to give up baseball. He encouraged me to think about what I felt was best for me, not what I felt others would feel was the best for me. That helped me realize I wanted to go to MSU. As a result, I was able to maintain a strong relationship with Kelly, who is now my wife. I was able to cover baseball at the city newspaper, which led to my current MLB beat job. That's just one of the many things I have to thank my dad for. Instead of listing all the others, I'll keep it simple and just say "Thanks. Have a happy Father's Day." OTHER NEWS: I leave for Atlanta tomorrow for a few days. I'll post pics and update when I get back. Posted at 8:52 p.m. Colorado and Back, I know, I know -- the last time I posted on here it was nearly a month ago! I've already heard it from my dad, who has been checking the site every day, but seeing the same ol' entry. Well, since I've been home, I've been keeping busy with the Blue Jays, getting some time off to spend with Kelly (we celebrated our one-year anniversary on May 27), and now I'm getting ready to get back to work. I want to keep this as quick as possible, so as promised, I'll be taking you through some pictures from my last road trip. I headed to Colorado Springs, where I spent a few days hanging out with my dad, Doug, and my step-ma, Patty, at their new house. I lived out there during my last two years of high school, but the house I lived in was much older and much smaller. I hadn't been out to the Springs in four years, so I had a good time seeing how the area that used to be fields, was now covered with new homes -- one of which was my dad's. The first two days out there were pretty laid back. I caught up with my dad, went to the old Chinese buffet restaurant I frequented years ago, and spent a lot of time doing nothing -- and it felt great! On the third day, though, what started as a "Hey, we should drive up Pike's Peak!" half-joke, turned into an all-day adventure. My dad, Patty and I all climbed into my rental car and headed for the Rockies (not the baseball team -- that came later). The trip to the summit of Pike's Peak takes about an hour in the car. When you finally get to the entrance gate to the Pike's Peak Highway, it's 19 miles to the top -- 19 very steep, edge-of-cliff, miles. The drive is probably shorter, but we ran into road crews on the way up and had a slow drive. Anyways, let's get to some pictures. About 20 minutes into the drive, we stopped at a small lake and snapped a few photos. I walked down a steep hill, to the edge of the water, and took this shot:
Since Kell complains that I come home from all of these road trips with lots of pictures, but none with me in them, I had my dad snap a shot of me with Pike's Peak in the background:
Fast-forwarding to the drive back down from the summit, we stopped at an area named "The bottomless pit." If you saw the steep drop-off and how far it went down, you would get the pun. Before we jumped back in the car and finished our drive down, I took 20 minutes to climb to the top of a very rocky, steep, hill. Some of the boulders were twice as big as me and I had some fun trying to climb up and over them. Eventually, I made it to the top, where I collapsed and laid on a big rock for five minutes to catch my breath. Here is a pic of me at the top:
Can't see me? Look at the top of the mountain peak on the left. My arms are in the air, can't you tell? Still no? Well, here's a zoomed in look:
Here is a picture of my dad and I on the summit of Pike's Peak. That's Colorado Springs in the background:
OK, so these pictures aren't in the best order. We're back at the bottomless pit now. My dad had a little trouble with some of the loose rocks on the path and slipped and nearly fell. Luckily, he was able to grab hold of the edge of the cliff before testing out just how bottomless this pit was. Instead of rushing to his aid, I thought I'd get a quick pic. Don't worry, he made it out alive:
After the three days off, it was back to work, which meant a 45 minutes commute each day of the weekend into Denver to cover the Blue Jays-Rockies series. It wasn't nearly as cool for me as sitting in the pressbox at Comiskey Park -- one of the fields I went to a lot as a kid -- but it was still neat to be working at a stadium I used to come to games to as a fan. I went to a lot of Rockies games when I was in high school, but this was the first time I didn't have to pay admission. Here is a shot of Coors Field that I snapped from the 'box:
My dad and Patty got tickets to the game and spent a lot of the time walking around taking photos -- mainly of the pressbox, with me in it. It was nice to have a small collection of photos of me working. It's hard for me to take those! That's me in the second row, fourth person from the left, wearing a dark blue shirt and sitting with my arms crossed:
Here is a nice picture I took of my dad and Patty on the porch of their new house:
Here is their new home:
Again, sorry for the random ordering of the timeline. Before I went to Colorado, I covered three Jays games in Florida, where they met up with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. Here is a picture of Tropicana Field, which wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. You can see the three catwalks in this picture. Tampa Bay's Jonny Gomes hit two balls off the catwalks during the series. One landed on the highest one you see in the picture, rolled around for 11 seconds and finally dropped into the glove of Toronto's shortstop for an out. The other one hit the second ring and therefore was ruled a homer:
One of the cool parts of the Florida trip was I had the chance to meet up with my friend Dawn, who is an intern for MLB.com this year (the same job I had last year, but with the D-Rays). She and I both went to Michigan State and worked in the sports department at the Lansing State Journal while in school. Now, we're working together for MLB.com. Small world:
Now, I'm back in Toronto and am about to get back to work tomorrow. A couple of Kell's friends from college are coming up here this weekend, so that should be fun. I've had most of the last week off, except when I had to cover the First-Year Player Draft from the Jays' end. When I wasn't working, I spent a lot of time reading. Since the weather is so nice, Kell and I have been spending a lot of time on our balcony, where we do most of the reading. We finally have a use for the three folding chairs I accumulated throughout college. I sit on the Michigan State one, Kelly occupies the Cubs one, and Barkley, well, he's supposed to sit in the old, crappy, blue one, but he steals Kell's chair most of the time. Here's Bark on the balcony:
Here's the little dude stealing Kell's book:
That's it for right now. I will be working at home most of this month. I only make one road trip to Atlanta in June. Other than that, it's some time off and a lot of home games. Next month I'll be traveling more. I'll try to get a little better with posting on the blog more often. Then again, I say that a lot don't I? Stay tuned for more... Posted at 12:15 a.m. On the road again, I feel like I just got back to Toronto, but I'm heading right back to the airport in a few hours. I should really be in bed -- as Kelly just pointed out -- but here I am at my computer finishing up some last-minute stuff. The Jays are off to a 10-day, nine-game road trip and I'll be covering six games in the process. Tomorrow morning it's off to Florida to cover the Devil Rays/Blue Jays series and then I'll head to Colorado -- skipping Toronto's trip to face the Angels in California. I'm excited to go back to Colorado, considering I haven't been there in four years or so. For those of you who aren't aware, I graduated high school in Colorado Springs and my dad still lives out there. I'll get to see his new house and spend some time off with Pike's Peak in the background, maybe see some old friends in the process. We'll see. I'll be seeing an old college friend/coworker down in Floriday this weekend. So that should be fun, too. Anyways, I'm off for now. Some good news on the Toronto front: Kelly and I FINALLY got an entertainment center for our TV, which is no longer on the floor. Our apartment is starting to feel like a home. Pics from my visit to Florida and Colorado will be posted when I get back. Stay tuned... Posted at 1:04 a.m. Home For Now, I've been back in Toronto for a few days now -- back from the seven-game roadrip that sent me packing to New York to Baltimore to Boston and back. I saw Yankee Stadium for the first time, watched the Yankees put a historic beating on the Blue Jays, met up with my old college roommate, accidentally took a tour of the New York subway system, almost lost my wallet in The Bronx, took the train to Baltimore, saw the writer I worked with last summer, met up with another old college classmate, visited Fort McHenry -- birthplace of our naional anthem -- walked through the house where Babe Rith was born, caught a flight to Boston, worked for two days on two hours of sleep, nearly got rained out at Fenway Park, saw a huge car accident, and finally ... finally got back to Toronto, where I took my first day off of the season and slept like a baby. FIRST STOP: Yankee Stadium
I hadn't been to New York since I was around 14, so I was really looking forward to my first trip back there. Unfortunately, the timing of the weekend series didn't allow for any site-seeing. I arrived in NYC just an hour or so before I had to hit the subway to Yankee Stadium, and the next two games were day games, which didn't allow any time when the sun was out to go around town. But, I got to see Yankee Stadium for the first time, and it was awesome.
I got to the park especially early my first day there because I wanted to check out Monument Park in center field. Here are the three plaques that greet you when you first walk in. Lou Gehrig is on the far left, Miller Huggins is in the middle and Babe Ruth (more on the bambino later) on the right. There is a wall of plaques behind these three. It was definitely cool to be one of a handful of people in the entire stadium, walking around and soaking up the atmosphere before the fans arrived.
During the game, I snuck down into the stands and took my standard shot from behind home plate. I have now been to Yankee Stadium, Camden Yards, Fenway Park, Rogers Centre, Wrigley Field, U.S. Cellular Field (still Comiskey to me), Miller Park, Kaufman Stadium, Coors Field, PNC Park, Comerica Park, old Busch Stadium and the Giants' former home, Candlestick Park. The list will keep going as the season wears on. I guess various parks in Spring Training and Oldsmobile Park -- home of the Lansing Lugnuts -- doesn't really count. The Yankees took two out of three from Toronto and one of the games they won, 17-6. New York scored in every inning -- the first time they had done that since 1939. Needless to say, I was quite busy that weekend and was one of the last to leave each game (us MLB.comers have a whole lot of content to push out each day). On my last day there, I was in a cab on my way to the train station when my cell phone rang. Luckily, I was only about five minutes down the street because a fellow scribe found my wallet in the pressbox. That would NOT have been a fun situation when the cab driver went to drop me off.
On the Saturday night I was there, I met up with my friend Justin (pictured below) in New York. He was one roomates in the dorms my freshman year at Michigan State, one of the 11 guys I lived with in a house for the next two years, and my roommate for my senior year in an apartment off campus. He works in New York now, which is cool because I'll make more than enough trips there throughout the year.
We were going to go to the oldest bar in the city, which Justin said served two kinds of beer: "Dark, and not as dark." It was pretty packed, though, so we went to another bar down the street that was a small cozy sports bar. We stayed there for most of the night, considering that the bartender was giving us free drinks after midnight, when Justin celebrated his 24th birthday. After that, we grabbed some New York pizza down the street, then hit up one last bar before heading back home. It turns out that bars are open until 4 a.m. in NYC -- so, naturally, we HAD to stay out that late. Fun times. Before I met up with Justin, I actually got lost on the spiderweb that is the New York subway system. Apparently, I wanted to go "downtown" and not "uptown" from Yankee Stadium. I ended up way in the north Bronx and had some lady that spoke barely any English explaining to me how to get back to where I wanted to go. Not the best place to get lost for future reference. NEXT STOP: Oriole Park at Camden Yards
After New York, I took an Amtrak to Baltimore. I intended to do some reading on the train, but the seats were so comfortable that I ended up crashing for two hours. Baltimore is where the former Blue Jays writer works now for MLB.com, so we all went out one of the nights and had a good time. Camden Yards is definitely up there as far as baseball stadiums go. I loved Yankee Stadium, I think Fenway is sweet, too, but Camden Yards is a beautiful park.
Here is a shot from behind home plate and, no, I didn't have to head into the stands for this one. The pressbox is actually this low to the field, which is cool, unless a line drive foul ball decides to take out your laptop. The fans are also literally right in front of you, which is a little odd at first when you're used to being perched way above them.
Before one of the night games, I decided to do some walking around town. I snapped a few photos around the stadium on my way over to the Babe Ruth Museum, which is just a few blocks from the ballpark. Ruth's dad actually owned a saloon in Baltimore, but it's gone -- replaced by center field at Camden Yards. The museum is located inside the row house that Ruth was born in.
Here is a statue of a younger looking Ruth outside the stadium.
Here is the Babe Ruth Museum. It's not very big -- just a few rooms with a handful of Ruth memorabilia. The best parts were probably the rooms that looked "exactly" as they might have when Ruth was a child, and the baseball that Ruth gave to little Johnny Sylvester. Johnny was the sick boy in the hospital that Ruth gave a baseball with the message, "I'll knock a homer in Wednesday's game for you." Ruth went out and belted three homers, Johnny got better, and gave the ball back to Ruth when he was older.
I ran into the Babe while I was in the museum. He looked a bit pale and not very happy. He probably thought I was just another media member coming to both him about Barry Bonds closing in on his 714 home run mark. He didn't appear to be too happy about the whole thing. After the museum, I headed back downtown and stopped at Best Buy to get the new Pearl Jam album, which is quite good, by the way. Maybe I'll post a review on here later (I'm a huge PJ fan for those who weren't aware). Once the cd was in hand, I called up my friend Keely, who I had many classes with at MSU. She and I went to the Hard Rock Cafe and spent time catching up. One thing that's nice about having gone to a big school is I have a lot of friends in a lot of different cities. Makes it a little better when I'm on the road all the time. Keely had to go back to work and I still had time to kill before I had to be back at the park, so I flagged a cab and headed out to Fort McHenry, which is where Francis Scott Key saw the "star spangled banner," "by the dawn's early light," and all that jazz during the War of 1812. It was fun to walk around the fort and read more about the history -- even if I couldn't get the anthem out of my head.
The fort is built in the shape of a pentagon in a style that was leftover from the French, if I'm remembering correctly. The five sections that jut out are referred to as "bastions," which I found to be especially cool. Too bad that they spell it wrong. I had fun standing on the bastions, looking out towards the ocean, trying to imagine seeing an army of ships heading my way. You can see all the paintings and movies you want, but until you stand there and try to imagine it, it just isn't the same.
They had a lot of cool cannons around the entire fort and it was a picture-perfect day for checking it out. I lucked out with the weather in Baltimore, where it was about 75 degrees on my last day there. Then I went to Boston and was met with bitter coldness and pounding rain. The first game at Fenway was nearly rained out, but they squeezed it in during a steady mist that night. I didn't do much in Boston due to the weather and also because I was dead tired. The night before my flight, all us writers went out in Baltimore and I had to catch a really early plane. Yes, it's my fault, I know, but I ended up not getting any sleep that night. Once in Boston, I took a two-hour power nap before the game, which I didn't get home from until aftr midnight. Two days and two hours of sleep. On my way to the airport to catch a flight back to Toronto, I nearly was in a pretty bad accident. The cab I was in stopped, so I could grab some money out of an ATM, and while I was getting back in the taxi, two cars hit head-on just a half-block behind us. One was trying to turn left across traffic and the other was pulling out of a parking spot on the other side of the road -- a bad combination that ended up with two totaled cars. I don't think anyone was hurt too badly, though. So I'm back in Toronto now. I will be here for a few more days and then it's on the road again. I head to Tampa for three games and then to Colorado to spend a week with my dad in Colorado Springs. I haven't been there in about four or five years so it should be fun. I have my tentative schedule for May and June on the site now, so feel free to see where I'll be heading. Anyways, I think that's it for now. ... heh, that's it. That was a book! But a lot happened on my recent roadtrip that I felt was blogworthy. If you stuck with me this long, I hope you enoyed. Stay tuned for more... Posted at 11:59 p.m. Off to the Bronx, I'm writing this from my living room in Toronto, but in a few hours I will be in New York City and on my way to Yankee Stadium. Needless to say, this is going to be a quick entry. I'll be on the road for seven days -- three games in NYC, followed by two each in Baltimore and Boston. I haven't been to New York since I was a lot youngers (well, actually into the city. I've been to the airport a bunch of times now), and I've never been to Baltimore. What's nice is I have friends in both cities that I plan on getting together with, so it should be fun. Anyways, I'm off for now. Just like in Boston, I'm sure I'll be taking a lot of pics. In the meantime, Kelly and Barkley will be holding down the fort in Toronto. To bad they can't come on road trips. Stay tuned for more... Posted at 6:13 a.m. Catching up, You ready to see a lot of pictures? Some of you family already saw some of these, but I figured I'd post them up anyway. I'm back in Toronto and my first road trip as a MLB beat writer is in the books. I went to Boston for the first time and had a few spare hours to play tourist. Then I went to Chicago and got to see family and get some Easter dinner. As I'll be doing in all these cities I've never been to, I took a gazillion pictures in Boston. I went around and looked at a lot of the historical sites and buildings, which was very cool. We'll start at the best building of them all: Fenway Park.
I arrived in Boston on Toronto's day off and decided to take advantage of the free time. I was staying roughly 1.5 miles away from Fenway Park, and since I knew there wouldn't be a huge crowd around the park on the off-day, I figured it'd be a good time to go see it for the first time. I walked around the outside Fenway, which isn't that spectacular from the outside. The one side on Yawkey Street (pictured above) was the coolest looking side, but the others weren't that spectacular. I'm biased, but I think Wrigley is sweet all the way around -- partly because you can get a glimpse into the park most of the time. That wasn't so at Fenway.
Here is the back of the scoreboard and the lights that tower over the Green Monster.
Here were some fans camped out -- literally. If you look closely, behind the guy wearing red all the way tot he right, there's a tent. There were a few tents for these fans, eagerly awaiting Opening Day. As one person put it, "They're probably out-of-towners that don't want to spend the money on a hotel for just one night." Or they're just crazy Red Sox fans.
OK, flash forward. This is Day 2 in Boston and I'm actually inside the park. There is the famous 37-foot tall wall: The Green Monster. When you're close to it, you can see the million dents from many a baseball over the years.
Here is a closer look at the manually operated scoreboard in the bottom of the Monster. Being there for Opening Day was fun. Minus the fact that the introductions lasted forever, they had a fly-over with some fighter jets, which was cool to see.
Here is the pressbox at Fenway. The windows all the way to the right and two rows up is where I was sitting for the game. It's quite a steep view of the action, but I'm not complaining.
During the game -- since it was the only day game of the three I was at -- I went down into the stands to snap a few photos. As many of you know, I take a standard shot at every stadium I go to so that one day I'll have every ballpark in a large frame hanging in my home office. This isn't the exact shot I use, but this was one I took at the game. After the game, he media has to actually walk through the crowd to get to the visitor's clubhouse. You feel like a trout trying to swim upstream.
Now, we're traveling back to Day 1 in Boston. This is a picture of a statue of Ted Williams, who is placing a baseball hat on a little kid. I saw this while I was on my walk around the stadium.
After I saw Fenway for the first time I decided to keep heading towards downtown, but I headed north to the Charles River. When the taxi was taking me from the airport to my hotel, I saw a nice jogging/walking path along the river, which runs alongside the downtown area. It was a nice hike, but I made my over there and enjoyed a nice stroll. The picture above is of MIT. You can see a sailboat in the river there -- there were a ton of boats out on the river that day.
This was taken while I was still walking along the river. It was great to be able to enjoy a quiet walk when you knew the city was right across the street.
Here are some docked boats in front of the Longfellow Bridge.
On my last day in Boston, I decided to follow the "Freedom Trail," which is a path that leads you to a lot of the old historical sites in the city. It's about 3 miles long and winds in and out of downtown and then takes you across a river over to Bunker Hill. This picture was taken in Boston Common, the park where the trail begins.
This is what the trail looks like. When it isn't bricks like the ones above, it's just a thick red painted line that you follow. I liked the fact that I could just pick up a map, head on this trail, and didn't have to fork over any cash for the tour.
This is the first stop: The State House. From here, you go by the Park Street Church, which has a small cemetary next to it called the Granary Burial Ground.
Here was the burial ground. Some notable headstones in here were Benjamin Franklin's parents, Sam Adams, John Hancock, Mary Goose (Mother Goose), those who died in the Boston Massacre and Paul Revere, among others.
Here's a better look at some of the old headstones, which dated as far back as the 1600s.
Paul Revere's tomb.
After the burial ground came King's Chapel, which had another old cemetary and is also notable because it has the oldest pulpit in continous service. Down the street from the King's Chapel was Old City Hall (pictured above) with the statue of Benjamin Franklin.
The Franklin statue was first portrait statue ever made in the United States.
This is the Old South Meeting House, where (as the name implies) many meeting were held leading up to and during the Revolutionary War.
Here is the Old State House, which was the headquarters for the British Government in Boston. At one point in time, this was the tallest building in Boston -- a statement to the people that no one had higher authority than the King. Outside this building is where the Boston Massacre took place and from that balcony on the front, the Declaration of Independance was first read to the people. Cool, huh.
Next up was Faneuil Hall, which has been a marketplace since the late 1700s or something like that. That's a statue of Sam Adams outside the front of the building. After this stop came Paul Revere's house and the Old North Church, where Revere hung his lantern to signal that the British were coming.
This is where the British landed when they headed for the Battle of Bunker Hill (more on that in a minute). This ship is the U.S.S. Constituion, otherwise known as "Old Ironsides," and was the ship you read about in history class when studying the War of 1812. It was also near here that the Boston Tea Party took place, I believe.
This is the monument at Bunker Hill.
Bunker Hill was the first major battle of the Revolution in 1775. The famous line you may recall from middle school history class is "Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes." Or something to that effect. I always enjoyed reading about that battle as a kid and it was interesting to be standing on the site where it took place. On one of my next trip's to Boston, I want to head out to Lexington and Concord to see the battlefield there. I'm a big history buff in case you hadn't noticed. If I wasn't a baseball writer, I probably would've been a history teacher. Anyways, this was probably my favorite picture (above) that I took in Boston. There is a little museum on the site and you can actually walk up to the top of the tower. It has about 300 steps -- steep, colonial style steps -- and I thought my kneecaps were going to blow out on the way up. My legs were hurting for the next four days after I climbed to the top. I'm not in monument-climbing shape anymore!
Here was the view of the city from the top of the tower.
This was something else I found in Boston: A statue of Arthur Fiedler, who my dad informed me was the conductor of the Boston Pops orchestra. I just thought it was a cool statue because of how it was made. Take a closer look:
The statue was made with large slabs of stone placed on top of each other.
From Boston it was off to "Sweet Home Chicago." This was a picture that I took from the window on my airplane. It was fun to be home because I got to see my family and Kelly and her family on Easter weekend. There turned out to be big family news, but more on that later.
Here is Wrigley Field from my airplane.
Pictured here is (from left) my brother-in-law Keith, me, my sister Melissa, and my brother Karl. My dad and them came to the first game of the White Sox vs. Blue Jays game. I snuck down from the pressbox and allowed my goofy family to embaress me for a few minutes. They were very excited because it was my first time covering a game in Chicago -- something that was very cool for me, too. My bro came decked out in Blue Jays gear, even though I tried to explain to him that I'm not a Blue Jays fan, just someone covering the team! I told them they're allowed to embaress me for 1 game out of 162 games each year. It was just nice to get to see them after spending so much time on the road, or in Toronto, or in Florida, and not anywhere near Chicago.
Here is my dad, me and Karl with the pressbox in the background.
Karl actually took this picture. If you look very closely, you can see me (wearing a green shirt and with my hand to my chin) sitting in the second row.
Here was a picture Karl took when they first got to the game. That's me, in the green shirt in the second row on the left, on the phone talking to my sister Melissa. Karl gets credit because these were the first pictures I've ever had taken of me working.
This little guy is where the big family news comes in. My brother and his wife Sara are in the process of adopting this smiley little boy named Luke. The logistics of it all will probably take some time, but Luke is already living at Karl and Sara's house and the wheels are in motion. This answers years of prayer for them as they have been wanting to become parents for a while now.
Here is my bro and his new son, Luke. Anyways, I know that was a lot of pictures and a lot of catching up that I had to do, but there it all is as promised. My next road trip takes me to Yankee Stadium in New York, Camden Yards in Baltimore and back to Fenway in Boston. I'm sure I'll have plenty of pics to blog after that journey. I have to get running for now, though. I have to be across the street for the Jays game against the Red Sox in about an hour. Stay tuned for more... Posted at 2:00 p.m. 157 More Games,
Well, five games are in the books for Toronto. Three wins. Two losses. A good first outing by 2003 Cy Young winner Roy Halladay. A pair of homers each for Vernon Wells, Troy Glaus and Alex Rios. Some good bullpen work. Some bad bullpen work. One player gone. Another off the disabled list. Basically, plenty to write about. For those of you who have been sitting on the edge fo your seats, waiting to fid out if I ever made it out of New Jersey and to Toronto in time for the team workouts...well, obviously, I made it back. I have been pretty busy with the game coverage this week and that's why I haven't had any blog updates in a few days. As far as the trip back to Toronto, I had my flight delayed again. This time, though, it was a good delay. When I go to the airport, I asked the lady at the counter if she could make sure my luggage made it onto my new flight. After typing away at the computer in front of her for a few minutes, she responded with, "Hmmmm. I can't confirm that your bags are here." That seemed like airline lingo for "You're screwed buddy." But the pilot made an announcement after we all boarded the plane that we'd be delayed while they tracked down some bags leftover from missed flights the day before! That meant me and I gave an apology to the passengers around me. The one cool thing about my flight, other than the fact that the plane did take off with my luggage underneath, was that we flew over Niagara Falls and the pilot was nice enough to let us know ahead of time. It was a clear day and it was very easy to spot the Falls:
Anyways, I have one more game tomorrow, then Toronto is off on Monday and then in Boston on Tuesday. It will be my first ever trip to Boston -- thus, my first visit to Fenway Park. It should be fun. It's actually going to be the Red Sox home opener. After that, I'll be heading to Chicago, where the Jays face the White Sox. The cool thing is it'll be Easter weekend, so I'll get to see the family and have some leftovers! Kell's dad is actually heading up to Toronto tonight to pick her up, so I'll get to see my lovely wife on Easter, too. Back to baseball, though. I actually got tickets for Kelly to go to Opening Day at the Rogers Centre. She sat in left field and was excited because Blue Man Group did the national anthems. We saw Blue Man Group in Chicago for our one year anniversary back in 2000. Also at the game was my friend Kelly from Michigan State. She covers the Twins now, so it was fun to be covering MLB together. It was a little different than our days covering the Class-A Lansing Lugnuts baseball team. My Kelly, me and Kelly went out her first night up her and got dinner and had a good time. We joked that our old sports writing professor at MSU is probably telling all her classes about us. "Two students from this very class are now covering Major League Baseball for MLB.com!" Small world, I guess. Here is the Rogers Centre during Game 3 vs. the Twins:
On my commute home from the stadium today -- you know, walking across the street -- I had to stop and take yet another picture of the CN Tower. If any of you are loyal Bastian blog readers, you'll remember I took a gazillion pics of the tower when we lived up here last summer. Well, this time, I caught the reflection of the tower in our building! Yeah, I'm a big nerd, but ah well. It doesn't take much to entertain me. Check it out:
Anyways, that's it for now. I'll take plenty of pics in Boston and Chicago and I'll blog all about it when I get back to Toronto. Stay tuned... Posted at 9:02 p.m. Stuck in Jersey,
New York City from my airplane window God teamed up with Continental Airlines to pull one huge April Fool's joke on me today. "Jordan thinks he's going to Toronto today? Wait 'til he gets a load of this one!" Everything was smooth sailing today up until I got on the plane in Tampa. Once I got all situated and buckled in my seat, the pilot got on the intercom to tell us we were going to be delayed a half hour. Sweeeeet. I only HAD a half hour to catch my connecting flight in Newark. We ended up being delayed by two hours, sitting at the gate, all cramped on the plane and watching some not-so-funny sitcoms in the mean time. The guy sitting to my left was heading to Halifax, Nova Scotia and when the pilot announced the initial delay, he also said he'd check on the connecting flights to see what some of the passengers would be facing once they got to Newark. He got back on about five minutes later with this one: "It looks like everyone should be in good shape, minus those going to Toronto and Halifax. Greeeaaaat. After about an hour and a half of waiting -- and in the middle there having the sitcom tape player break (what else could go wrong?) -- they called all the people heading to Canada to the front of the plane. We had the choice of spending the night in Tampa or spending the night in Newark. Since I have to be at the Rogers Centre for the Jays workout tomorrow, I opted to head to Newark, where I would only be one plane away from home. Would I be accomodated by the airline? "No, because it was an act of God," replies the boss lady, referring to the storm in Newark/New York that caused the delay. Anyways, the man next to me decided to stay the night in Tampa, so I had a little extra room in my aisle. Then, when I FINALLY got to Newark, Continental did in fact take care of me -- providing me with a very nice room at the Holiday Inn and with some meal vouchers, which I cashed in tonight for some pizza and cheesecake while I watch the Final Four games. I'll start eating better tomorrow I swear! I was going to try and meet up with my friend Justin, who lives north of the city, but that was prior to having a hotel given to me. Originally, I was going to meet up with him in NYC, go out to dinner, and get a hotel before heading back to the airport tomorrow morning. Since I ended up staying right by the airport, we decided to wait until I come back to NYC when the Jays lay the Yanks in a few weeks. I stopped by Knology Park this morning before heading to the airport. Toronto was playing Triple-A Syracuse in their last game of the spring and I had an intern -- err, "associate reporter" -- covering for me and I wanted to go early to make sure he was all set up for the day. The irony of this whole day was that, originally, I planned on flying to Toronto tomorrow and I was going to cover the game today solo. Instead, I was encouraged to move my flight to today in order to make sure I got to the workout on time tomorrow. Well, I had to call my boss to tell him I'd be flying out tomorrow anyways. At least it'll be early in the morning. There went that long nap I was looking forward to. That's about all I have for now. The hotel gave me a toothbrush and I'll be wearing the same clothes tomorrow, but what can you do? Ah well, it could've been a lot worse, I guess. I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that my luggage ends up in Toronto with me tomorrow! We'll see what happens. Stay tuned for more... Posted at 9:16 p.m. |
