On Saturday, we left Cincinnati and headed to Indianapolis for our last baseball game, a AAA game between the Indianapolis Indians and the Syracuse Chiefs. The drive was rather uneventful and we just killed time in the hotel room before the game (due to the excessive heat and desire to not spend money).
We headed downtown a bit early and made sure to load up on sunscreen before heading into the 95° heat. We explored the stadium a little bit, and I came away pretty impressed. It was actually the first AAA game I had attended (all of my previous minor league games were Low A ones). The stadium was the biggest of the minor league parks that we attended, which was to be expected in the biggest city and at the highest level of play. Not too much stuck out during the game. It was cool seeing some former big leaguers like Gregor Blanco and Jesus Flores playing (I'm easily impressed). The game also featured a return of the Zooperstars. The characters were different, but the act was mostly the same. This time Roger Clamens ate the umpire (who had suddenly been added to the 3 normal umps usually on the field somehow...) instead of Mackerel Jordan eating the bat boy in Dayton.
The real excitement started though when the temperature seemed to drop about 20 degrees all of a sudden and the wind started to pick up. While the cooler temperature was nice (and made me feel ridiculous about being so concerned with the sunscreen), it was also pretty obvious that we were going to get some rain. It held off for a while, but they announced in the 5th or 6th inning that thunderstorms were on their way, and sure enough in the 7th it started to come down pretty hard. Karl and I figured we would wait out the rain since we had nowhere else to be. Over an hour into the delay, the rain was still coming down, and we overheard an usher tell a man and his two children that the game was called off and that they had to leave the stadium. The phrasing sounded a little weird to me, but I figured we had better head out. After the family left, the usher saw us looking back and explained that the guy wanted to leave, so he convinced her to lie to the children. For shame... Anyhow, we kept playing Words With Friend, which was our preferred method for passing the time. About 20 or 30 minutes later, another usher informed us that the game actually was being canceled, and then reiterated that he wasn't joking this time. On the way back to the car, we saw two horse drawn carriages hanging out at a gas station. I worried for the sake of the horses that the owners may not understand that that form of transportation did not require fuel.
Since Karl's car broke down on the way to Iowa City, we had to swing through Madison on the way back to Iowa City to drop him off, so we hit the road around 8 on Sunday morning. Due to hitting almost no traffic driving through Chicago and no other real holdups, we actually made great time and got Karl back to Madison around 1 and me back to Iowa City before 5. (Karl's car troubles aside) The trip was a big success and may have set the standard for road trips to come. Without much baseball in Iowa, it'll have to tide me over for a while now that I'm back.
My song for the final road trip recap post is "One Fast Move Or I'm Gone" by Ben Gibbard and Jay Farrar. Gibbard (of Death Cab for Cutie and Postal Service fame) and Jay Farrar (from the bands Uncle Tupelo and Son Volt) teamed up to record a record with lyrics based on the novel "Big Sur" by Jack Keroac. The whole album is a pretty good on the road album, and this song in particular seems to do the trick. Enjoy!
(The audio was cutting out a bit for me. I'm not sure if that's my computer or the file)
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