Elliott and I went to the Padres game last night with his mom, uncle jbox, uncle Jonny Dub and auntie sbeck. Here we are in front of the Tony Gwynn statue:
It was my first time seeing that Tony Gwynn Statue in person. I was impressed. I made a rubbing of the entire thing to commemorate the event.
If you've never gone to a baseball game with Elliott... I highly recommend it. We got in with tickets to our semi-usual seats in section 122, but hung out mostly at the Park in the Park. Elliott could not get enough of the Tony Gwynn statue. He kept crawling over to it and staring and making a motion with his hands like he was swinging a bat and then making another motion with his fingers like he was tallying hits. He made the tallying motion 3,141 times.
It obviously wasn't a sell out, but there was a pretty good crowd. The Gerut home run was nice because the fireworks shot and E watched them enthisiastically. He also watched seagulls enthusiastically.
One of the interesting things about having a baby at the park is realizing how baby friendly Petco Park is. E and I went down to the playground and I was really surprised to find things that worked for his height. The whole thing had that fancy rubber stuff for flooring and we could still hear the call of the game and see the TV for the park. As it worked out, we were still within sight of where we decided to set up our spot, just in front of the Tony Gwynn statue.
We eventually made our way down to the seats for a couple of innings, and just in time to watch the Pad Squad do the slingshots. We got to see Pad Squad Andre do his thing with a bunch of Pad Squadders I had never seen before. I realized it was probably the first time I had ever seen Pad Squad Andre in person.
The very best thing about park employees like Pad Squad Andre (and the usher who was manning the 122-124 stairwell) is that they're not just friendly, but that they make you feel like a regular. Before we moved, we'd hit anywhere between 20 to 30 games a year. Enough so that we'd remember regular employees, but not quite so much that we'd expect them to remember us. When they do, it's a nice feeling. If you see Pad Squad Andre (or any Pad Squadder that you happen to recognize from the blog), I highly recommend going over and saying hello.
Anyways, I had a great time taking Elliiott all over the park. We were all paying so much attention to how he was reacting to everything that it managed to dull the pain of another sloppy loss.
I didn't buy him a ball cap even though one of them was specifically labeled "My First Ball Cap", just because he didn't want to keep them on his head and paying $18+ for what really would just amount to be a few photographs for my own benefit didn't make much sense. When he's a little bit older, I'll get him a ballcap that he'll really want to wear and it'll be a good memory for the both of us.
For now, I'll be content with chasing him around the park while sneaking peeks at the scoreboard.
