Saturday, St. Patricks Day:

We all slept in a bit this morning. The room stays very dark with the curtains pulled tight. We got down to breakfast and eventually got a table. The breakfasts have been pretty good and each day has different main selections. Today they had some sort of poached egg with black beans.

Our game was at Peoria Sports Complex, the Mariners home park and our favorite. The ball park is about 25 miles away from the hotel and is the same exit as the one you take for the Surprise stadium. There was a long line on the freeway waiting to exit, unlike the day before. After we got onto the exit and down a ways, Yvonne could see down to the lights and saw the signs indicating there were two lanes going both right and left. We wanted to go left so I went out of line thinking there was another lane I could get in. Wrong! I turned into one of those people we love to hate and had, in fact, just been bitching about!

It wasn’t like I was purposely trying to get ahead of the line, I really thought there was another lane. Nope, I was stuck at a stop trying to get into the left turn lane. The only good thing was that the right turn lanes were wide open and I wasn’t backing up anyone else. Otherwise, I would have just gone right and found a place to turn around. (Sounds like I am just trying to justify myself, huh?)

Yvonne and Jennifer were trying to pretend they weren’t in the car and had no idea what was going on while laughing the whole time. I was laughing in horror as well. The guy behind me to the left very reluctantly let me in. We all waved happily but you could see them shaking their heads.

The light is a huge intersection with cars going in six different ways and I had just gotten into the intersection when the traffic in front of me stopped and the light turned yellow. Oh, shit, here I go again! I couldn’t back up as the same guy had pulled up to the stop line. I managed to pull alongside the truck in front of me and when he moved was able to get into a lane. This was the most appalling driving I have ever done down here but my friends tried to make me feel better.

We were playing the Angels today. We had good seats just to the right of home plate where there was a big 25 painted for the 25th anniversary of the stadium. We have been here for the 10th and 20th so think we have been coming for 16 years. I seem to remember having a shirt from 2002.

The sun was out but the temperature at the start of the game was only 68. In other words, perfect! We could sit in the sun and not sweat or be totally wiped out after the game. Thanks to Jennifer for taking some pictures of the stadium, I totally forgot.

We always seem to see people we know at the games. Today, Jennifer’s college roommate’s brothers and their wives were there and found her as soon as we came into the stadium. We talked with them for a while. Then a couple of my yacht club friends, Teresa and Gary Nelson, came by our seats. I hadn’t seen them for a while so we caught up a bit. Then a pharmacist who worked for Yvonne stopped by. We had seen her there a couple of times in the past.

Jennifer’s friends came by the seats in about the 5th inning again to chat and told us there was a bee swarm on some stairs out in the concourse area. I took my phone and went out to check them out and take a picture. It was a fairly large swarm and they had the area taped off with caution tape. Pretty odd place for a swarm to come to but everyone was pretty impressed.

It was a split squad today so there was another game at the Athletics and the Mariners won both games! Our game was good and the Mariners had 9 hits and 7 runs while the Angels had 3 hits and 0 runs. Marco Gonzales pitched over 5 innings and did a very nice job with only one hit. Hadn’t heard of him before but maybe he is in the running for starting pitcher rotation. So, we are 3 for 3 which we can’t remember ever happening.

When we left the ball park I avoided the area where I had done such a poor job of driving as it is always a traffic madhouse. I went the opposite way about 1 1/2 miles but there was little traffic and we got right onto the freeway. The rest of the drive was uneventful, thankfully.

Every year we always have a steak night and a Mexican night. Well, since it was St. Patricks day on Saturday I figured it would be hard to get in anywhere for dinner so I had made reservations for The Stockyards Steakhouse. We had been there before on a recommendation from Gary Nelson and enjoyed it plus it was fairly close to the hotel.

The restaurant is supposedly “Arizona’s Original Steakhouse” started in 1947 and the emphasis is on beef. Their special of the night, which came highly recommended by the waiter, was the bison ribeye. Jennifer and I decided to go with that and Yvonne got a beef ribeye. The waiter also recommended a Napa Malbec-Sauvignon blend which was excellent.

As we waited Jennifer noticed an framed and worn flag above us. There was a sign but we couldn’t quite read it without getting up. One of the owners, Gary, saw us squinting at it and came over to explain that it was a flag from World War I that came off a mine layer that was sunk. It was frayed on the edge and only had 48 stars.

The dinner was excellent. The bison came with a side of hollandaise and mushroom butter, asparagus and their Parmesan Stack potatoes. The mushroom butter was soooo good and added a great umami flavor to the steak. The potatoes also were excellent.

I forgot to take a picture until I had already dug in.

The rest of the evening was quiet and we all got a good nights sleep.