Friday, February 20, 2015

Batdad goes to the Stadium Series: Los Angeles Kings vs. San Jose Sharks at Levi Stadium

I am taking a road trip. So, I am gonna try something. I am going to live tweet while I am on the trip.  If I have any spare time I will elaborate on my blog.
Tomorrow morning I will be getting up bright and early to go to the NHL Stadium Series game between the Los Angeles Kings and the San Jose Sharks. This will be an interesting experience.
I have never been to a hockey game (match?). It is on my bucket list (keep an eye out for that post). My friend bought me a ticket for Christmas after I expressed interest, but was unable to make the budget work for tickets.  Another thing I get to cross off my list is visiting another NFL stadium. It may be a new one. But, I can tell my grand kids about it in the same way my grandparents refer to Fenway, Ebbets, and Wrigley field. Wrong sport, same concept.
The plan is my friend, the Golden State Lantern, (having an unfortunate predilection for certain Bay area sports organizations ) is picking me up at 430 A.M.  Then we are off to pick up a friend and coworker of his I have never met. I have been assured that we will get along just fine.
We plan to drive all morning to meet his dad for lunch at 2 P.M. The game starts at 7 P.M. So we may have a little time to kill. Then I get to witness my first real life hockey game.
After the game we hop back in the car. We will do the road trip in reverse. Did anyone else get a fun mental image of that? All of this so that I can be back in time for work at Noon on Sunday. My friend, like Hal Jordan or Kyle Rayner, is always willing to shine his light into my darkest nights. For that, I thank him.
If you are interested in following  along on Twitter, my Twitter handle is @fatdad2batdad. Here we go:
I worked until 10:30pm and got home around 11:00 and was in bed with a 4 a.m. alarm set close to midnight.

That 4a.m. alarm didn't do so well. My wife came into the living room where I was sleeping (so I wouldn't wake her up at 4 a.m. OOps!)and told me GSL (short for Golden State Lantern) was outside. I asked what time it was
"5 A.M." she said.
My ass flew off the couch as I scrambled to get everything I would need for the trip together. I had prepared a little the day before. My wife called GSL and told him he could come in and wait for me. I apologized profusely in the background. My lovely wife talked me down because I felt like I was ruining the whole trip. I got in the car and we went to pick up GSL's friend. He got in the car and we were introduced. The guy had a jacket with a Clash patch and a Batman button on it. I was sold. We hit the road and I tried to figure out some things on how to live tweet on my phone. The tweeting portion went great. The posting tweets to my blog portion not so much.
We stopped at a small place named BeaBeas Breakfast Kitchen. I would recommend it for anyone in the area. We had nice conversation and great breakfast. I got an omelet and fruit with a side of bacon. I felt it was a good healthy choice for a long day.

See above.

On Facebook there is a few pictures to go along with this. We walked into Harris Ranch and a huge counter of cookies and cakes and chocolates. I had thoughts of getting carrot cake but it was huge. Then I thought maybe one chocolate chip cookie. But, my willpower got me through and I had beef jerky and Seaweed snacks I packed to go with me.

It is usually a very sad sight driving through this part of California. It was still quite brown. But, this time the trees all had white blossoms which looked kinda cool. The signs begging for water  to come to the area were still ever present, reminding us of the drought our state is in.

I knew this was gonna be rough. I was heading into enemy territory. I had on a Kopitar T-shirt and a Kings hat. I might be a little antagonistic. I might have a death wish. I am definitely looking forward to feeding off the rivalry.

 Part of my new years resolution was to play games more. I will elaborate on this in another post. But, we sat on a bus bench and a childhood boy scout friend of GSL's arrived and we started playing Fluxx ( an excellent short fun game for anyone) until his dad arrived so we could go to lunch. I thought I tweeted about lunch. But, maybe not. Maybe I was feeling guilty. We went to a place called Antipasto's. The staff seemed a little rude, but not mean. They seemed like family busting chops. The food was delicious. Each of us got half of our meal to go. Only two of the six of us left with any food. Only one of us had any left when we got to the stadium, and that was because he put his meatball sandwich in the car and didn't have access to it. I got an Italian sausage with peppers and onions to eat there as a side. I got tortellini with alfredo sauce to eat later. later happened about 10 seconds after I finished my sausage. I would definitely recommend this place if you are in San Jose.

We got on the train at Alum Rock station and we were to transfer to another train at Tasman Station. There were maybe 4 other people on our train to begin with. when we got to great mall it was packed. When we arrived at Tasman station there was a train across the platform that was headed where we wanted to go. But, it was also packed. So we waited for the next one. A man with a bullhorn came over and let us all know that every train coming our way was full, and that the buses across the street would get us there no problem. So we rode a bus the rest of the way and stopped just before the bridge to the stadium.



I stopped at the top of the bridge and stepped out onto the platform that would have led up from the train we were supposed to be on and snapped a picture of this new Stadium. Definitely nice looking outside. Though I suspect it was teeming with combinations of teal and red and gold inside. I prepared myself for the line to get in that usually accompanies these things, and it never came. We were inside almost immediately.

Once we were in the stadium my friend and his father took us over to the 49ers museum. I was a little unsure on whether I wanted to spend $15 to see a museum about a team I am  less than thrilled about. But, GSL got in front and bought my ticket. I am glad he did. any sports history is fun to learn about. We watched a short movie on the history of the 49ers complete with crowd reactions to Marie DeBartolo and Jed York. Then the actual museum had a mini hall of fame vibe to it, with statues of the players in action poses that you could take pictures with. There was an interactive section on the lower floor where you could test your combine skills, kick field goals, do a touchdown dance, dance with the niners cheerleaders, get yourself put into a virtual uniform, and be a booth announcer. The most impressive thing there was a hallway lined with memorabilia. On the ceiling were a bunch of footballs from one end to the other. These were Jerry Rice's touchdown balls......with the 49ers. It was truly a sight worth seeing.There were also some trophies and rings.

On the way in to the museum to the right was  the hockey sweaters for the Stadium series game we were about to witness. I took a picture of the Kings one.

As we walked into the stadium, which was  as gorgeous, maybe even more, on the inside as it was outside I started noticing the vendors for food. The first sighting was a Vegan Dog cart.  Then I took this picture of the Seafood stand next to the Curry stand. They also had hot dogs, beer, pizza, garlic fries, Italian sausage, brats, cracker jacks, [peanuts, and other traditional fare. But, I got a chuckle out of some of the more Bay area choices.

I didnt count them. But, I am guessing the amount of stairs I climbed to the 300 section was roughly 5 billion. i have to applaud the marketing team or whoever makes the decision to put a beer cart at the top of the stairs though. I bought a beer and whiskey and diet coke (still trying to watch my girlish figure).

There wasn't a bad seat in the house as far as I could tell. If anything, for a hockey game the lower seats that were so far from the ice may have had worse views.

Here we go. My first ever actual live hockey game. It was so cool watchign the Kings skate onto the ice. My heart started beating faster.  I was very excited.....then this happened:

I didnt even see the puck go in. there was no buzzer. there was no light. some people were cheering and some booing. but it wasn't very loud. I think a lot of people didnt know what happened until they saw the players slow down. It seemed like the first ten minutes of the game they were getting some kink s out of the sound system and scoreboard. The goal was reported on the scoreboard roughly 5 minutes later.I was still excited though.

Here is the beer and cocktail I mentioned. I got 2 so I wouldn't have to leave my seat.

The sharks scored a goal late in the period and it stayed tied until the end of the period.

I was very excited for this. It was a pleasant surprise. I love CCR. That is music my mom and dad played a lot when I was a kid. I sang along to every song. I wiggled in my seat a little. He put on a good show.

He did have the worst racoon eye tan I have seen in a while.

They announced that Melissa Etheridge would do a special tribute to Janis Joplin at second intermission. I was looking forward to it. Unfortunately my bladder got the better of me. I heard a little bit of  "come to my window". But, I missed the Janis part.

The second period was BOOORING! The Sharks seemed like they were dominating. But, they couldn't land a shot behind Johnathan Quick.

The third period was way more exciting. The sound issues had been resolved and when the Kings scored myself and every King fan in the place (which wasn't many) exploded. The rest of the period was fast paced and exciting. The Sharks gave a great effort and Quick just kept saving shot after shot.

ummm the game ended. Kings won. As, I was walking down the billion stairs, just before I reached the concourse I saw a slow moving sea of teal. I felt for them. I have experienced the agony of defeat. I am glad the game was close. I enjoyed the hell out of it. Then I got a text from GSL. His seats weren't in the same section as mine.

"start walkin"

I chuckled a little and met up with him on the concourse where we made our way out of the stadium.

Remember the guy with the bullhorn earlier? He told us it should be better when ya leave. People will be trickling out. I doubted him then. Turns out my doubts were not unfounded. since when do people trickle out of an event. People can arrive anytime they want for something. But, the thing happens and when it ends they have no reason to be there anymore. Mass exodus. The crowd getting on the trains creeped forward slowly. At first we had trouble figuring out whether we were going to the trains or the parking lot. Neither was clearly marked. We finally arrived at the barricaded line for the Alum Rock train. Once we got to the front we found out that we were getting on buses across te street. There was a little confusion as to which stops the bus would make. But we were assured they would hit all stops. So we got on a bus and headed back to Alum Rock station.

We arrived at the car and acquired caffeine at the nearby liquor store. When we couldn't find a bathroom we lived out our lifelong homeless bum fantasy. (this is the first time I have ever peed in an alley... promise)

I had time for one more post before shuffling off to dreamland. We did make the stops, and I barely woke up a little at each one. I sadly do not drive manual transmission. SO, I slept almost the entire way home.

Once we dropped off GSL's friend and got to my house I thanked GSL for the trip and dragged myself in the house. I climbed into bed and slept  for about 2 or 3 hours and woke up to go back to work. WORTH EVERY SECOND!!!!!




[Evidently I cannot embed tweets from my phone. SO, as soon as I have a few minutes to sit down at a real computer the commentary  will have to wait. But, if you are interested the tweets and facebook posts are up there on my pages for your viewing pleasure]
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