From six years of bowling on the same team with Steve Vicik Jr., I knew that my fellow Mets fan and his wife Kristen would be great traveling partners to hop in my Chevy Cruze with my dear wife Karen and I for the daylong journey from Syracuse to Citi Field on Saturday.
First good crack in Gibson, Pa.
Steve lived up to his dry sense of humor when we took a gas-and-more break just off the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
“Think you can get fireworks there?” he said, as we pulled past the place with the inflatable gorilla in front.
Take what you need, the rest leave in the trunk.
He and his wife — a Yankees fan who we had to talk out of wearing that shirt to the Mets stadium more than a month ago — were good sports when we next stopped, in the parking lot of Citi Field, when we planned what to bring with us to our seats for the rainy day.
Yes, we are.
Now we know what’s up.
And they were great sports as we marched around the stadium. Steve and I posed for a shot outside. As soon as we got through the gates, he decided he wanted to buy a souvenir program.
Bring it on.
And, yes, they were good sports as it rained through the six innings and the Mets and Reds played to a 1-1 tie before the umpires waved the teams off the field and the tarp on.
Yesterday: The Game
Tomorrow: Mets Museum
Wednesday: Rain, really
Have you ever traveled out-of-state and brought home fireworks? What souvenirs would you look for at a game? What’s your favorite photograph, and why?
Mark Bialczak 
It’s always fun to meet up with friends. 🙂 My state has fireworks on every corner, so I do not need to leave the state to get them. 😉
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I don’t think you buy them anyway, right, Rachel?
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CUTEST DL EVER!!!!!!
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Thank you, LR. 🙂
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me too, i just buy the fun ones )
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i like your happy smiling faces in yellow the best. we used to cross the border to ohio to get fireworks, until michigan recently passed a more liberal fireworks law and now we just go down the street –
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Be careful with your fireworks is all I ask my friend, please and thank you. I am afraid of those suckers. Deal, Beth?
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Fun, we just went to a S.F. Giants game and that was fun.
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MDW Karen and I really liked the Giants stadium, Dora. On the Bay, what a beautiful setting!
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Good friends are more precious than gold Mark – love this story and you look cheeky in that last picture! ❤
Diana xo
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Thanks, Diana! ❤ Cheeky is good, right? 😉
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You bet! 😉
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love that photo of you guys in your ponchos! looks like a great time. Buying fireworks does not tempt me at all. I loved sparklers as a kid
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Thanks, Lisa. We were having a blast at the beginning of the game in that photo. 🙂
I loved having sparklers as a kid, too. :
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Now that’s called being a die-hard Mets fan, Mark, all that driving to a rain out. We once had friends come in from Utah who wanted to see an MLB game..they were rained out all across the country. When they met up with us in Michigan, we drove them to 3 Rivers Stadium, Pittsburgh, for a Pirates game. Sat for almost 2 hours, game was postponed. They were off to Baltimore and finally got to see a game the next day. The ends we go to ….☺
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Well, we saw six innings, and they picked it up in the seventh the next day, Van, so it was a game game! 🙂
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As a Phillies fan…sigh….I’d like it this year if they quit early, rain or whatever. ☺
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Drove Ryne Sandberg out of the dugout, Van. That’s sad. Sigh.
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Your smile is contagious, cuz! Good for you determined to go to a ballgame even in the rain!! It hasn’t been doing much of anything but that here all weekend, and of course, here it is Monday and the sun is out! LOL Have a good day today and keep smiling!!! (((HUGS))) cuz for the west ❤
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Thanks, Amy Rose. I hope your sun travels to the east. Still gray here in Syracuse. 😦
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We have patchy clouds today with the sun breaking through. My poor Roses are just getting poured upon and now some of them are very sad with black spot. *sighs* Today I must get out there to prune and to spray for both insects and disease. I just cannot keep up this year due to this rain. Grrrrrrrrrrr …….. YET!!!! It is beginning to look like we live in a tropical land everything being so lush. I also saw some trees on my walk yesterday beginning to turn colors and I just said outloud NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! This rain and now cool temps are mixing everything up. 😦
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Yes, it is a mixed up year, for sure, cuz. Oy.
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*eye roll* Don’t I know!
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I buy a scorecard at every game I go to and keep a record of the proceedings like all of the old purists. I have a huge stack of them… and they used to be a nice reference for recalling details of past games before the play by play of every game ever played became available on the internet. Well, I guess for games like the one you attended, I would always be able to remember the rainy games due to the condition the scorecard would be in. You can’t get that from a Retrosheet boxscore…
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Yes, the dried, curled scorecard would be an excellent memory-jogger, Bill. Your old-school ways are fantastic. You remind me of what I had to do when I had to cover first high school baseball/softball and then concerts outdoors in wet weather: bring a plastic supermarket bag with me and take my notes inside it so I would be able to read them and write my story/review immediately afterward. I had dozens of warped notebooks in my file cabinets, probably like your scorecard collection from rainy games. 🙂
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Cool pictures Mark. That stadium is gorgeous, isn’t it? Love the brick work in the front walkway. I used to bring fireworks back to Canada but they are generally illegal here now. There are certain times, like Canada Day when they are legal for a short time but there are a lot of rules around them. Ha! The kids wanted some fireworks one year and i relented and bought them. My intention was to fire them off over the river where it was safe but I called the police to check the law first. The officer was quite funny and he told me that they could only be used on private property. I told him we had a small yard with the neighbor’s trees hanging over and i was concerned we would set the trees on fire. His response was; “Does your neighbor have a hose?” Ha! Funny man. We eventually paired up with a hockey friend who had a big rural lot and we added our fireworks to his. The kids were pleased.
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You try to do right, Paul, and see what you get? A wise guy policeman. As long as the kids were pleased. And yes, they really built a pretty stadium down in the city.
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You 3 in the yellow ponchos still looking sunny made me smile. Tied score game isn’t that bad and your road trip sounded great 🙂
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It was a worthwhile trip, Robin. Now I have to work really hard to catch up. I have no chance, really.
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