I meant to blog about this in a more timely fashion but since it's already late we'll do it in bullet point form.
- Jon and I were part of the crowd that attended Oktoberfest at the ballpark last Friday night. The event and the beer flowed smoothly. There was a nip of Fall in the air and reason to wear a large Padres parka if you get cold easily. Here's a YouTube video I found that gives a good overview of the event for those that weren't there.
- We arrived about 45 minutes before game time. To be sociable we both decided to buy one beer. I don't know or want to know anything about beer, so I just followed Jon around and trusted his taste buds. I think we made our purchase from the Pyramid Breweries and it tasted like you would expect beer to taste.
- The Pad Squad was out in force giving surveys and recording results on 90's era PalmPilots. After walking back and forth in front of Pad Squad Erin she finally recognized us and agreed to give us the survey. She asked us to rank the festivities and we gave it high marks but that could have been our half a beer talking.
- I guess there were a lot of Padres bloggers out and about, but Jon and I only ran into RJ's Fro. He tipped us off that he was thinking of throwing an end of season event at Randy Jones Grill. It might happen during a playoff or World Series game, so try and keep all of October open just in case.
- We also bumped into Padres Senior VP of Brand Development Laura "The Brandmaker" Broderick. We interrogated her about the rumored uniform changes coming next season. The only thing that she'd say was that they were going to "make the uniforms more uniform". I think that means that we won't be seeing any drastic changes, they'll just be using the same fonts and color scheme across all the uniforms.
- The only thing I remember about the game itself was Orlando Hudson making a diving stop that knocked down a ball that was going up the middle. Then he just laid on the ground and acted out his disappointment that he didn't make the play. While doing so the Diamondback batter took the extra base and jogged into second. It was just another example of Hudson not having his head in the game.
- Towards the end of the game we sat next to an off duty Pad Squad Elizabeth and her friend. I like that we've seen quite a few off duty employees out at the games this season, it shows that they too are fans. When Heath Bell came in to close out the game, they both talked about how Bell's One on One with Jane Mitchell brought them to tears. I still haven't seen it, but will have to, since I love a good tear jerker. In the waning moments of the game we entertained ourselves by trying to come up with a Padres themed drink. I think we settled on some sort of brown liquor with the lip of the glass covered in mustard. It'd be called the Padres Throwback.
- On the way out of the ballpark we congratulated Pad Squad Alicia who was awarded Employee of the Month prior to the game. It was Jon's last game of the season so I watched as he and Pad Squad Andre had an awkward moment saying goodbye. Good times.