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Wrigley Field, aka the nation's largest outdoor bar, opened in like, 1916. The place is almost aggressively old school.

Here's that new guy or something. I dunno. The Cubs suck, and I don't have WGN anymore. They are irrelevant to my life. Except Derek Lee. That man is awesome.

Nearby rooftops kept doing this, so the Cubs went out and said, 'hey, give us a cut, or we're raising the bleachers so you can't watch.' I'm pretty sure the Cubs get a cut now.

It's a nice park.

D7P2

The first thing you see before you enter Busch Stadium is a bunch of statues with cool names. Stan Musial. Enos Slaughter. Cool Papa Bell. These are the players, now cast in bronze, who brought St. Louis 10 championships.

The next thing you’ll see is a huge stadium full of Cardinals fans, but the third thing you’ll see are all the signs celebrating those 10 championships.

Don’t think that legacy doesn’t escape those legions of sports fans. Those red-clad fans really get into the game, often reacting to the game instead of texting on their phones, and once, they even successfully completed the wave six and a half times.

Seriously, this place was packed.

The stadium itself was pretty big, too. This was taken on like, the 10th floor.

D7P1

At the St. Louis Gateway Arch.

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Here are some photos from a sculpture garden our tour guide dumped us at.

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We were given two hours loose in New Orleans. Did I wander off on my own and do my own thing? Yes.

I bought this man a coke, but seriously, he kinda sucked.
Hint: the cheap food's at the farmer's market. The expensive food is there too. The trick is to find the cheap ones.
Tobias Funke, I thought we told you to stay out of that diamond cream!

On Bourbon St., believe it or not.

D5P1

Tonight, we went to a New Orleans Zehphr’s game. As the Florida Marlin’s AAA affiliate, it was a chance to see the prospects who, for some reason or another, aren’t ready for the big leagues. Oh, and Mike Lamb. Mike Lamb plays for the Marlin’s minor league team now. That's one less mystery in life, I guess.

There was a pool in right field, which you could get into if you were part of the private party, which I wasn’t. It wasn’t really that big of a deal anyway, getting kicked out of the pool, because Kaupang had bought everyone on the bus suite tickets.

We actually got to watch baseball inside, in a private room, with a buffet, a keg, TVs and everything. The keg was pretty popular amongst the crowd, and in the middle of it all was a stout little man with a white beard and a grin like an old prospector: Fred Eckhardt, instigator of most of the night’s follies.

This is Mike Lamb, who is tragically the best third baseman we've had since Corey Koskie.

The stadium was quite a bit like the Marlin’s big league stadium: old and empty. In fact, there were so few people at the game that I was able to secure my first foul ball ever. I had to run a hundred or so feet to get it, but it was one of my prouder moments, actually.

D4P2

Today, we went to Minute Maid Park, which instantly became one of my favorite stadiums. It's a retractable roof, which is insanely expensive, but it helps keep the cool air in while also pretending to be a real baseball field. The best of both worlds, really.



Today, the roof was closed. The whole place is designed wackiness. There's a random hill in center field, and the left field, center field and right field fences are all different heights, with weird angles thrown around for good measure. The quirkiness pays off, I think, because the place genuinely looks cool, and you'll always wonder if someone's going to get hurt on that center field hill.

They have a little train that does things whenever the Astros do something good or Carlos Lee does something athletic. The train doesn't move much, actually.

During the seventh inning stretch, after take me out to the ballgame, the whole stadium sang along to "Deep in the Heart of Texas," a song about the merits of Texas. I just don't feel comfortable singing along to southern anthems, but the song was actually pretty catching. As far as anthems go, this would be my rankings as of now:

1. Waltzing Matilda
2. La Marseillaise
3. Battle Hymn of the Republic
4. O Canada
5. America the Beautiful
6. God Save the Queen
7. Deep in the Heart of Texas
8. The Star Spangled Banner
9. That scary soviet one/the Tetris song
10. The chicken dance

As you can tell, I have actually have a very small reference pool in regards to this question.



The layout of the stadium was superb and added to the quality feel of the place. Going through Target Field is like going through a subway station, all hustle and bustle. Going through Kauffman Stadium is like going to a corporate softball game; everyone's not really paying attention to the game, the kids are off playing in the playground, and the team sucks. The Tulsa Drillers game was high-school baseball team-esque, and the Texas Rangers stadium was like going to the state fair with all its stands. Minute Maid Park, on the other hand, felt like a indoor mall, a nice suburban one, and you never felt like the non-game distractions overshadowed the baseball diamond. I give it 8 thumbs up.