The Baseball Trip 2018

Day 12   Friday, July 13, 2018

Traffic in this town is horrible. It takes you three hours to cross an intersection. I spent more time driving in LA than watching baseball games. I thought Chicago was bad. Hell, I thought Boston was bad. This is an automobile nightmare. And everybody wants to go fast. If you are in a 30 MPH residential zone, you must go 50. If you are in a 45 MPH zone, you must go 70. Everybody wants to be the first one to the next red light. Speed up, break hard. The Dodger fans were just as rabid; they go crazy for every walk or hit batter.

Random observation from Randy: This whole town is on speed.

Our first objective was to meet Kristen, my old friend from our video days in Chicago. She is now a producer for an advertising production company here in LA. Unfortunately, she had some recent surgery and is still in some pain. But I will probably never get out here again, so we stopped in for a visit. It was good to see her again.

After that, Randy and I went down to Santa Monica to take in the pier and the beach:

Beach revelers.

The Ferris Wheel at the pier.

The road along the beach.

It only took us three hours to get to Dodger Stadium from Santa Monica. About 12 miles. We didn't get there until 8pm, but there was trouble with Stub Hub, so we didn't get in until the fifth inning.

Here are some shots of Chavez Ravine at Dodger Stadium:

Outside the main gate.

Right field videoboard.

Home plate from right field.

Behind home plate.

Does it all look familiar? These parks are starting to blur together.

I swear to God, this is right out of "The Californians" from Saturday Night Live. I was talking to some people who asked how we got to the ballpark. They said, "You should have taken Wilshire Blvd. I told them we did, but that was backed up, too. So we went a little further past and took Pekoe. They all went, "Whoa, dude, super cool."

Yeah, super cool. By the way, There were two dogs, a fox terrier and a chihuahua, running wild in the parking lot of our motel this morning. Instead of leashes, they were trailing some kind of ribbon. Attached to the ribbon of the terrier was a Hello Kitty fanny pack. I cannot make this crap up. I could, but I didn't.

Favorite town: Pico Rivera

Random observation from Randy: Didn't he used to play for the Angels?

Tomorrow: Vegas, baby!