What a fun trip!! One of my besties - "Chicago Jen" - is a Chi-town native, so it was my turn to visit her this go-round and we decided to stay in-town and do the touristy thing. You know, stay in a hotel (not her house), eat deep dish pizza and Chicago Dogs and at a Top Chef restaurant, go the Sears (not Willis!) tower and Navy Pier and shop on Michigan Ave, all that jazz. And obviously, I wanted to go to my first game at Wrigley Field. You can see above how that turned out, but it's okay, we won the series!
I flew in Friday after work, we checked into the hotel, unpacked a little, found some dinner, and we window-shopped on Michigan Ave afterwards. The next day we found some breakfast at Trader Joe's and did a little real shopping. I saw the Wife of one of my favorite Braves at a big department store, but obviously didn't stop and say anything to her. She was by herself, and we've not met before, so it might have been weird for a fan of her husband's to go up to her in another city and start talking to her. Her husband got a good hit later that day! Way to go! ;)
Before the game, we went to Portillo's for a Chicago Dog. Jen warned me I didn't want a hot dog inside the stadium, I took her word for it, and told her to order for me. The Chicago Dog was delish! Are they all that good? I don't know, but this one sure was! Mmmm mmmm...
We took the El to Wrigley (as everyone does there), and there was a super-cute guy on the train wearing a "FLEE" shirt. I asked if I could take a picture of it, then we asked if it meant "flee" (run away) or "F"-Lee and he got kinda embarrassed and said "flee! ...I didn't even think about that!" Oops! Sorry, we didn't mean to make you uncomfortable, cute guy. Thought it was a legit question!
When you step off the train, here's what you see!
Harry Caray statue!We walked around outside a little looking at allll the Cubs merchandise (TONS compared to Atlanta), and Jen bought a new Cubs jersey. Afterwards, we were walking around the outside of Wrigley and as we were looking up at the rooftop seats, I looked into the stadium and saw the Braves were already doing BP! And people were in the stadium! It was 2pm already; let's go!!
There are 216 pics in the full album, and I don't have stories about all of them, of course. So here's the link, and there will be the usual bullets and videos below...
- McCann taking BP
- Is this Ken Rosenthal, talking to Hinske? He was at the game, according to the broadcast.
- Brooks took BP with batting gloves on. Does he usually do that?
- Wrigley's press box, with the Harry Caray caricature (so cute)
- The pitchers in the outfield were too far away for me to see what they were up to. Hi JJ! I did see Moylan dancing at one point -- that was fun.
- The historic scoreboard
- Braves walking in from BP! 1 ~ 2 ~ 3 ~ 4 ~ 5
- Banners inside Wrigley: DLee ~ Dempster!
- Foul ball sign
- Bullpen guys go to their area on the side of the field: 1 ~ 2 ~ 3
- Prado stretching, Huddy laughing like he's got eyes in the back of his head
- Hey! Let's all watch Tommy warm up! 1 ~ 2 ~ 3 ~ 4
- Hey, let's stop stop watching Tommy warm up and look in the stands. Odds they were looking at a girl? ;)
- Rossy had a nice long convo with the home plate ump. 1 ~ 2 ~ 3
- First pitch!
- Standing ovation for D-Lee
- Hits off Heyward's bat and Prado's bat
- Prado! Infante! Totally different guys!
- Jonny was supposed to be protecting bullpen catcher Alan Butts, but with the glove like that? It might not work so well, hon. :)
- Eric O'Flaherty warming up for his first game back in over a month!
- The lights were on for a bright day game. Making up for lost time, Wrigley?
- Love Me Tenders! The official chicken of the Cubs! They were SO tasty!! Thanks to Jennifer H for this awesome pic of former Brave Mark DeRosa (♥♥♥) wearing a Love Me Tenders tee, and while I was typing up this post, I got a notification that Love Me Tenders is following me on Twitter. Follow them here!
- Take me out to the ball game!
- Random: I love this fan's shirt and want a Braves version. Their merchandise options blew ours out of the water, and the unofficial stuff was hilarious. (Update: Here's the shirt - no Braves options yet. Thanks for the tip, Cal!)
- Brooks Conrad on deck. Glad all my talking up of Broosky to the surrounding Cubs fans paid off -- his 2-out, 3-RBI double gave us a lot of hope towards the end of the game (as usual!)
- I talked up Jonny Venters too; glad to see he pitched well. I may have been just as excited to see Eddie Perez in full catchers gear, catching again! Look!
Love my catchers. :D
- Heyward got hit, Bobby ran out.
- Hey Wrigley, Hinske ≠ Diaz. Just so you know.
- McCann pics for SJ and her mom: 1 ~ 2 ~ 3 ~ 4 ~ 5 ~ 6 ~ 7
- Final pitch to Mac and the "Go Cubs Go" song
- Attendance: 41,099
Jen and I did not photograph well the whole trip. This is a horrible pic of us -- we were hot and tired at the end of the game, and we're usually way cute, of course -- but it's the best of us both. Yay, Wrigley! I'll definitely be back!
PS -- I updated Twitter all weekend with pics and little notes about my trip. Are you following? :)
5 comments:
Hey Hey! It's Chicago Jen :-)
I love Wrigley Field so very much and all the tradition that goes along with it. So, here are some Wrigley Facts that I either forgot or didn't know: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrigley_Field
Some favorites:
Many times a ball has been lost in the ivy when hit towards the outfield fences. An outfielder will signal that a ball is lost, by raising his hands. When this occurs, the umpires will call time and rule the play a ground-rule double.
The Lakeview Baseball Club, which sits across Sheffield Avenue (right-field) from the stadium displays a sign that reads, "Eamus Catuli!" (roughly Latin for "Let's Go Cubs!"—catuli translating to "whelps", the nearest Latin equivalent), flanked by a counter indicating the Cubs' long legacy of futility. The counter is labeled "AC," for "Anno Catuli," or "In the Year of the Cubs." The first two digits indicate the number of years since the Cubs' last division championship as of the end of the previous season (2008), the next two digits indicate the number of years since the Cubs' last trip to the World Series (1945), and the last three digits indicate the number of years since their last World Series win (1908).
Along with Fenway Park, Wrigley is one of the last parks to maintain a hand turned scoreboard. The clock, which sits at the top center of the scoreboard, has never lost time in its 69-year existence.
And you didn't get to meet one of the greatest fans, Ronnie Woo Woo, but here are some pics: http://www.chicagonow.com/blogs/redeye-photography/2010/05/ronnie-woo-woo-cubs-photos.html
He's awesome. I danced with him once and took a photo with him at Spring Training.
Thanks for visiting the Friendly Confines! Go Cubs!!!
hey lauren, have you seen the mlb collection victoria's secret has now? that "love love love cubs" shirt you posted looks like it might be from there, but i can't check online from work to verify. i'm dying for them to get braves gear, though - their stuff is adorable!!
Oooh, is that where it was from? It totally looked Vickie's - I'll check there. Thanks Cal!
Found and updated the blog post with the link - thanks so much!
Also, thanks for all the extra tips, Chicago Jen! I'm sad we didn't see Ronnie Woo-Woo. When you come to ATL during Braves season, I'll make sure you see Chief and the dancing usher and the special Chipper fan in section 216. :)
Wrigley is on my list of places I need to see before I die! (it alternates with Fenway for #1 & #2 on my ballpark list)
I would totally be afraid to stick my hand in that ivy though...you have no idea what could be living in there...siders...bugs...homeless people...dead bodies (although I guess the dead bodies wouldn't actually be living there)
I would say the Love Me Tenders look great, but after seeing Sweet Lou in one of those t-shirts I'm a little frightened. More DeRo please! :D (preferably smothered in chocolate ;) )
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