Tuesday, August 15, 2006

metsgrrl tours the safe, part 1

I have this odd, unintentional history with the Seattle Mariners. I moved to Seattle in March of 1995, which should tell you more or less what you need to know: I was in the right place at the right time, and I had friends who were baseball crazy. I remember being at work at Internet Startup #1 that fall and listening to the Mariners game over the INTERNET. I remember our IT guy Steve, diehard fan with season tickets in the upper deck first row behind home plate, asking people if they would cover for him and allow him to work untraditional hours when the Mariners started to head into playoffs, because (and I quote), “Who knows if I’ll ever get that chance again?” I knew nothing about baseball but I sure understood faith and devotion, so I was more than happy to help him out.  Steve was The Guy Who Kept The Boxscore. Again, I had no idea what he was doing, but as the woman who writes down setlists of concerts as they happen, I certainly understood the concept and found it to be completely logical.

I also remember my first Mariners game at the Kingdome in the fall of 1995. It was a company event with the aforementioned startup. I remember all 13 of us (again, remember, it was a startup) being there, and how the three of us from the East Coast were booing a questionable umpire call. Someone actually reported us to an usher who walked over and lectured us about how we certainly weren’t from around here but at the Kingdome things are done differently. As the usher walked away, one of my compatriots muttered, “He’s lucky I didn’t bring the D batteries.”

Baseball was a social thing. Baseball was what I went to when Steve would offer his season tickets to friends and I’d go with a girlfriend and we’d sit there and pretend to swoon over Joey Cora’s picture (if you think Miguel Cairo or Chris Woodward have ears, you clearly never saw Joey Cora).

My biggest baseball friends were Alan and Sarah. Alan proposed to Sarah at Safeco. They have a baseball room in their house. They have season tickets, charter tickets, if you ever need a ticket to a Mariners game, Alan can send a series of emails and can get you get you whatever you need.  It was from the two of them I learned what I know about baseball ticket buying strategies, and seniority, and it is, essentially, Alan’s fault that I put the money down in December for our tickets.

When I first started dating TBF, Alan and Sarah’s first reaction was to inquire which New York baseball team he was a fan of. Once that piece of information was ascertained, they started trying to feed me lines to drop into conversation in order to impress TBF.
“You can just casually mention that you think Mike Cameron will really improve their defense up the middle,” Alan said.
I looked at him as though they were insane. “*I* can’t just casually drop that into any conversation, EVER.”
“Well, if you’re going to a bar, and Sportscenter is on, they’ll definitely mention the Mets, you could say it then,” Sarah offered.
“No bar I hang out at has 1) televisions 2) ESPN on,” I insisted. At the time, it was true. Great jukeboxes and ex-members of various punk rock bands bartending, but no sports.

Alan has wanted to take TBF to a game for a couple of years now, but the timing never worked out. WHen the Mets were in Seattle last year, there was no physical or financial way we could make it out West. But this year, there is time and there is money and TBF made a comment about wanting to go to Seattle, so I dutifully sent email off to Alan, who came back with a long list of dates. At the top of that list was an event called Albabe Day At The Mariners, when Alan buys about 100 tickets in the center field bleachers and invites basically everyone he knows. At $7 a seat, it’s a pretty good deal. It’s not much about watching baseball, but it is a big part of what baseball is to some people.

And, he added, he had “some really good seats” for the Sunday game.

We used some of my Alaska Airlines miles and set our sights for Seattle, and the first TBF/MG out of town baseball-related excursion.

Saturday was bleachers day. Saturday we got there early enough to drop off the tickets at will-call (you manage getting 1-year-old twins to the game in time for first pitch and drop off 100 tickets for various people).  It was there that we noticed the ticket windows marked TICKET EXCHANGE, and marveled at the concept: switch your bad tickets for better seats, and you’re actually encouraged to do it?!

We also marveled at the concept of ONE ATM IN THE ENTIRE BALLPARK. Sure, it’s free (Boeing Employees Credit Union), but the fact that there is only one (okay, two machines, in one location) and it is located behind home plate, made us long for Banco Popular.

We did a circuit and a half of the main concourse. Keep in mind - I have been to this ballpark before. Hell, my former employer, a large multi-national software concern located near Seattle, used to hold their company meetings at Safeco. (No, the beer stands were not open for the meetings.) And I even took TBF on the tour during the winter when we were first dating. But I have never been in the Safe as a baseball fan.

Therefore, there was much to wonder at, observe and document:

The espresso stands. (This is Seattle, after all, but as an avowed coffee snob, I would have to be majorly hungover to drink this swill.)

Toto, we’re definitely not in Kansas any more, if we’re seeing listings for where we can listen to the Mariners in Butte:

The multiple microbrews on tap.

The acceptable conduct guidelines. “Obscene or indecent clothing” is how they get away from banning the YANKEES SUCK or A-ROD SWALLOWS shirts sold at my old haunting ground, the Five Point Cafe (whose motto was: “Alcoholics serving alcoholics since 1929”).

The field-level bullpens, a detail I certainly wouldn’t have ever cared about before.

The expansive beauty of the Safe on one of the three weeks of summer Seattle gets.

The old-school touches, such as the manual scoreboard and the league flags, arranged in order.

The obscene amount of food offerings (local barbeque, grilled salmon, and the legendary Ichiroll - sushi at the ballpark).

Amongst these - or rather, in the forefront - you haven’t been to Safeco unless you’ve experienced:

Forget peanuts and Cracker Jack. You haven’t been to a ballgame until you’ve eaten chocolate covered strawberries on a skewer for brunch. Of course, this is a food offering we will never, ever see anywhere near a New York ballpark: food served on a sharp stick? Yeah, right. Seattle is possibly the only place where this would not result in immediate riots.

Thanks to our friends’ largesse, we were in the front row of the center field bleachers, with tickets assigned to other friends around me. TBF, stubbornly, insisted on keeping score. He exhibited considerable disgruntlement at how no one, repeat, no one (and I mean literally in a full ballpark) claps at the second strike. Sometimes TBF would do it just because he couldn’t not do it.  Sometimes the scoreboard would read ‘CLAP!” and the crowd would make noise - but then would stop before the windup. The Seattle baseball fan’s need to be given permission to make noise is one of my friend Sarah’s biggest peeves about the city.

However, I am happy to report that Seattle has learned to boo. That’s right. A behavior I was reprimanded for at the Kingdome in 1995 is now acceptable, thanks to Lou Piniella - at least for questionable ump calls. They won’t boo anything else, though, and they - wait for it - applaud the effort if someone tries to make a play and misses. We were aghast.

The seventh inning stretch is just about the same as it would be anywhere else, except that the followup song is - wait for it - “Louie Louie” by the Kingsmen, who originally hail from Tacoma, Washington. I don’t even know if this is a new innovation or if whoever programs the music knows this (they must, there’s a whole Kingsmen exhibit at Paul Allen’s Jimi Hendrix muse—oops, The Experience Music Project), but I certainly enjoyed the song and the reference.

Somehow, it amazed me that our bleacher seats at Safeco were 1000% times more comfortable than our mezzanine seats at Shea. “Yeah, our seats were put in in 1962, honey,” TBF said, as I attempted to prevent one of the twins from stealing his scoring pen. (Jake was awfully interested in the boxscore, and I did try to get him to wave and yell “Konnichiwa!” at Ichiro - because I’m quite sure no one has ever sat in the outfield at Safeco and done that before.)

And finally, the Mariner Moose, my first true (mascot) love. TBF was grumpy at first, and then started pointing him out every time he saw him. By the end of the game he announced that he wanted to have his picture taken with the Moose if at all possible.  Sweet, sweet vindication.

I do not remember much of the game; the Mariners lost, and they did not play well. I had a lot of friends to talk to, and was happy with my ability to socialize and watch baseball, while my friends tried hard to deal with my apparent transformation.  From our vantage point, I did appreciate the bleacher bums from Oakland who ensconsed themselves out in the standing room in the outfield, and acquitted themselves nicely, rooting for their team. I liked the sunshine, playing with the twins, seeing my friends, eating garlic fries, and not having my butt ache after the game. And, I loved that I had baseball as the background for all of it.

On the way back to Alan and Sarah’s, TBF tried to call into the local sports radio show. He actually got past the screener before he had to hang up because it would have been anti-social. (He was going to bitch about the lack of noise.)

Part two, where we sit in Alan and Sarah’s charter seats, and actually watch the game, next.