Cardinals and Sand
I hopped the Royals Express bus at 6:15, over by the steam drills and orange construction fencing at Barney Allis Plaza. The bus was immediately packed. I have taken it several times before, but I had never seen it this crowded. It turns out that when the Cardinals come to town, the game draws a huge number of fans. Especially Cardinals fans. Many devotees actually travel to KC to see the game. I like this very much. SO, as I was saying, the bus was crowded. People were standing, and making snide comments about how much KC sucks, and how the bus was taking "forever," to get to the K. That's what happens when you build a ballpark in the middle of nowhere.

Anyway, I met Jeff there, and we were able to take our seats with beers in hand after the scoreless first inning was over, and just as the Cardinals went down, in a one-two-three fashion in the top of the second. Right away, the Royals racked up five runs, including a 420-foot two-run shot by Reggie Sanders. It was very exciting. Then, a couple innings later, Albert Pujols hit his 20th home run of the year, a solo shot to put the score at 5-1. For no good reason, the Royals brought in a relief pitcher in only the fifth inning, and the Cards took over from there, scoring eight more runs to win the game.

In the eighth inning, a spirited young man in a section near ours stripped to his boxers, and sprinted out into left field. A ballboy, of all people, chased him down, tackled him, and grappled on the ground with him for perhaps twenty seconds before a cadre of stadium security people and KCMO Police converged on the spot. The crowd cheered as the offender crawled among the pileup and grasping arms, on all fours and waved up at the stands. The most amazing part of the hilarious display was that the ballboy, the hourly-paid stadium lackey, was the one that brought it to a head.

We walked backwards out the gate, toward the bus, watching the postgame fireworks, but this proved much more difficult than I had expected, as I was more intoxicated than I realized, and walking backwards and looking up at a dizzying fireworks display while intoxicated is not easy. Police should use this exercise as part of field sobriety tests. Maybe they do. "Pretend you're watching fireworks, and walk backwards." "Oof!" "You're under arrest, rummy!"

On the bus back, Jeff and I talked to the visibly drunk Lindsay and her friends about suburbs and how they suck. Then she proceeded to say that she was from Lees Summit, but that didn't count for some reason, owing its nonsuburban status to not being in Kansas. She was easy on the eyes, though, so we humored her.

In a flurry of text messages, we had established over the evening, that we were going to meet up with Heidi and some of her friends at the Peanut in South Plaza. This was very agreeable to Jeff and me, as it's almost directly between our apartments. Our glee was short-lived, however, as the rest of Heidi's texts arrived. Our reactions went on a rollercoaster ride, with each new text. First, she said they were going to the Peanut at 50th and Main, then the Peanut at 75th and Metcalf in Overland Park, then Tanner's in Waldo, and finally, Lucky's Brewgrille on Johnson Drive in Mission.

I finally texted back something in the vein of "to hell with you, we're going to Waldo. Join us if you wish to return to civilization." Lindsay and her friends went to Kennedy's, just up the street from 75th St Brewery, where we were meeting Josh, and encouraged us to join them. We sat down with Josh, and told him the situation, and he said, "well what are we doing here?" Interest tapered off from there though, as alcohol tends to blur the memory. Also, it was way too much fun to watch Jeff get annoyed and abstain from our repeated glass-clinking toasts, "to Jesus!"

After a beer or two, Josh announced that he needed to pick up Callie at the theater on the Plaza, and take her home. From there, the sky was the limit. Jeff announced that the sky held no sway over him, and went home. I informed him that he needed to extract the sand from his vagina.

Josh and I rode his rental minivan up to the Plaza, where Callie was waiting, and dropped her off at home. We encouraged her to come out with us, but she wasn't feeling well. As we rolled down Main, in a downtownward direction, we decided that all roads lead to Grinders. We walked in, and had a couple beers, including some maibock they just got on tap. It was very tasty. They chased us out at about 1:45, forty five minutes after closing, and we went to Anthony's, down on Grand.

We talked and drank 1664 beer from chalices as we watched the sterotypical Italian scene around us. There were large middle-aged men sitting in quiet booths with 23-year old braless beauties, and at the bar, there were well-dressed obese men talking animatedly with Joe, the bartender. At about 3:30, we were chased out, a half hour after closing.

That was that, for the evening, and Josh dropped me off. I slept through a nasty hangover, until about 1pm, today.

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