Lisa's Lines

My 4-year-old Ellen was sitting on my lap, munching popcorn and watching her first Major League Baseball game, when I happened to look up at the stadium’s big screen...

Ellen’s face with a BIG, long, green booger hanging from her nose to her top lip, filled the giant screen.

A general “eeeeww!” sounded throughout the stadium.

Without thinking, I wiped the giant boogie off with my bare hand, which was also caught on camera and caused a groan of disgust to reverberate through the stands.

The lady sitting next to me scooted to the far side of her seat, and I sat there with a booger-filled palm while the cameraman adjusted his angle to capture my entire family. Ellen was all smiles watching herself on the big screen--totally clueless of the booger. Anna jumped up and started dancing, enjoying her moment in the spotlight. John waved and smiled. I tried to smile. Really I did... But, waving was not an option.

Finally, the next batter stepped up to the plate and the focus returned to the field.

It was yet another shining moment in motherhood.

I won the 4-pack of tickets to last week’s Twins vs. Braves game by correctly answering a Twins trivia question. The question was: What baseball commentator was the first to say “Holy Cow” during a baseball broadcast? I threw out the guess: “Harry Caray.” Wrong.

Then, Jack Webster walked in, and wow, that Webster sure is a whiz! Without skipping a beat he gave me an answer. Ding! Ding! Ding! Halsey Hall first said “Holy Cow” during a baseball broadcast. And, guess what, Jack remembers the broadcast! If you get a chance, ask Jack about the broadcast. It’s a fabulous story (one that probably isn’t appropriate to publish here).

Anyway... back to my family’s baseball adventure.

It was an evening game, which was a little worrisome since the game started at bedtime, but we figured there’s enough cotton candy at Target Field to wire a few hundred kids every night... so we loaded our girls in the car and headed to the game.

First, it was the skyscrapers. Ellen knows there are skyscrapers in Minneapolis, and since we were heading there, she wanted to see them. NOW. The “Where are the skyscrapers?” and “Is THAT a skyscraper?” questions began in Shakopee. Of course we encountered some traffic, which prolonged our drive and the skyscraper buzz. When we finally saw the skyline... “Does it hurt when they scrape the sky?”

We parked a few blocks from the stadium and enjoyed our little walk to the game. There’s just so much to see in the city--especially for small town girls.

Anna and Ellen were reluctant to hand over their plastic watermelon purses at the stadium’s security checkpoint. (They thought the security man might swipe their oh-so-precious packs of gum.) But, it worked out.

Then, we ushered the girls through the concourse to our seating section, which is easier said than done. Anyone who brings young kids to large events knows this. There’s just too much to see to focus on walking!

Our seats were located about halfway-up, just to the side of home plate. We sat and took in the scene for a bit and then the “I’m hungry” complaints started... most likely induced by all the food venders we had just walked by.

Hotdogs, french fries, a canoe full of cheese curds, cotton candy, and popcorn were the eats of the evening. Only the cotton candy was dramatic. We told the girls they needed to wait for the man who was selling cotton candy on the steps to get to our aisle. He was about six aisles away at the time. The girls waited patiently, watching him go up and down the steps... getting closer and closer... with all that hot pink sugary goodness... When he was just one aisle away, they dug out their money. (There might have been some drool when he disappeared in the concourse just prior to his expected appearance in our aisle.)

But... he didn’t come.

They waited and waited. Anna speculated that he had to go refill his load, so they waited some more. And then, that cotton candy man popped up on the other side of the stadium--at least 10 aisles down from us! I thought my kids were going to fall out of their seats. Thankfully, Daddy saved the day by buying two hot pink cotton candy cones from the concourse.

We cheered on the Twins.

We found Jay Schneider in the crowd.

Anna learned that Joe Mauer’s number is 7. Well, she’s 7, and of course that’s pretty darn cool.

We rode the stadium’s escalators one whole inning and then departed for home prior to the 8th inning.

It was a great, memory-making evening, even if I did get slimed with boogers and the Twins lost.