(Babe Ruth at bat)

We were parked on River Ave in the shadow of the new Yankee Stadium. Scrappy D had his hind legs on my thigh and his snout was against the window. I ran my fingers up and down his back.

Sitting next to me, my lady friend(LF) hoped her sister wouldn’t be mad at us. We were supposed to be at her apartment in Greenpoint an hour ago. “She made dinner, homemade perogies,” my LF said tonelessly.

What had happened to me and my friends a few short moments before was too mind-boggling to talk about.

We drove off with the pizza delivery guy behind the wheel. The Chinese delivery guy was riding shotgun. Neither showed any interest in either my LF’s current cellphone conversation with her sister, or what Scrappy D was doing, which would be their main concerns under normal circumstances.

Just moments before we had seen the ghost of Babe Ruth. He put on an otherworldly hitting display at the new Yankees stadium. Only he didn’t look exactly like The Babe, and the place we had just come from looked Dali-inspired. It was nothing like the new ballpark.

It had been the Sultan of Swat  himself who persuaded a guard to let us in. We had followed Ruth through a tall steel gate on River Avenue. He wore slacks and a blazer with a derby.

Once we caught sight of the field, there came a steady breeze that was full of light-hearted voices. The sky and the crowd seemed interlaced.

The Babe was a hulking figure though his features were flatter than I remembered. Plus he was bone white and vaporous. Each time I tried to stare at him, I could have sworn multiple people were staring back.

I had turned my attention to a snarling, accusatory voice. It took a few seconds to realize he was repeating the words, “Getcha Coney Island red hots, here!!!”

Thank goodness I had enough sense to scoop up Scrappy D and zip him up inside my jacket. Actually, I can’t say I did it out of fear for his well-being. It had probably been out of habit. Inside my jacket is one of his favorite spots. He knows it’s the only way we can bring him inside stores or out to eat.

There was no scoreboard or signs anywhere. And the fans had been perched at unreasonable heights, some hanging precipitously over the field. They were cartoonish and feral. Their motions had made me think they sat atop some sort of inflated platform.

The moment Ruth replaced his derby with a Yankee cap, it became clear that he was already wearing the pinstripes.

Seconds later he set foot onto the field, holding a bat in his left hand. The crowd rose higher into the air. I cowered and looked directly up, half-expecting to see something falling down on us.

I was full of fear and anticipation as I dropped my gaze. The outfield looked like a pond of green water, set before a mountain of jittery people.

The Babe handled the bat like it was a two by four—and he was getting ready to brawl. At the plate, which was the highest point on the field, he took a practice swing. I felt the breeze and then perceived something standing very close to me though I couldn’t see it.

I had no idea where my friends were, or who was close-by.

“Hey Red, your time is coming!” the Babe called out to a man just as he stepped through a blaze of light onto the pitcher’s mound.

I squinted and saw the words “Red Sox,” written across his chest. The rest of the players in the field were hardly more than stick figures.

The pitcher raised a baseball glove that was hardly bigger than his hand. He put it to his ear so he could hear the Babe.

“O’ forget it, Red,” Ruth cried, “you’ll find out someday.” Then he leveled the bat over the plate, and winked at the pitcher. ”Just don’t try and jip the fans.”

Red wound up and delivered a pitch that zipped in with a high arc as if slung by a machine. Ruth didn’t budge until the last possible second. His hands and torso whipped around and there came the crack of the bat, and for a full moment, I realized an ineffable joy. It was like I saw God.

The ball sailed high and looped way out over the stadium walls.

The crowd erupted and thereafter never stopped hooting and howling. The Babe went on to knock one ball after another out of the park. Some travelled up, and up, and up, never showing a downward trajectory.

Soon, over the the right field fence I saw the NYC skyline outlined in black and covered with thin gray clouds. It must have been from the 1920’s, because I didn’t see the Empire State Building.

The next thing I remembered, we were all back in the car out on River Avenue. I sat, mystified.

For some reason I found myself searching the street ahead, under the elevated trains. A few people caught my eye and I knew they were sensitives just like me and my friends.

Yet we were the ones that had been “lucky” enough to see the vision at Yankee Stadium. And it was bigger than The Babe . . .

I pulled Scrappy D to my face, not wanting my friends to see that I was trembling.

—

Here are all the posts in this series: Episode Twenty-Three – December 2009

Daydreaming on Morningside Drive

“It’s always Ruth!”

Living on a Thin Line

Bigger than The Babe

 —

Here are more Yankee Stadium photos along with a set from Citi Field. It’s where the Mets play–

The Stadium

Yankee Stadium

citi FIELD

Mullaly Skate Park in the Bronx (next door to new stadium)

Here are my STORIES and PHOTOS

(Photos by Bald Punk – Yankee Stadium)

 From the peak of the large hill on Morningside Drive in upper Manhattan, I had heard what sounded like a bat hitting a ball and the roar of a crowd. All I knew was that it was coming from far off . . .

Twenty minutes later we pulled up outside the new Yankee Stadium, under the elevated trains on River Avenue. We parked our old Camry just up the block, across from the skateboard park. We got out and for the umpteenth time, marveled at the monumental stadium worthy of ancient Rome.

It was an overcast December day though still very bright. The light seemed uncanny, but I thought it had something to do with the mythical nature of the new ballpark.

From the old stadium across 161st Street, we could hear the pelting of heavy machinery, breaking up the cement.

While in the wind I detected whispering voices. Clearest of them all was a deep-toned voice. For a half-second I thought it was that of a wayward spirit.

Not far behind us was a bearded homeless man with a heavy overcoat, drinking from a brown bag. It was his voice that I heard.

The others had already lost interest in finding the source of the sounds I professed to have heard miles away on Morningstar Drive. My lady friend(LF) was on the phone with her sister, whose apartment in Greenpoint we were supposed to be at already. The pizza and Chinese delivery guys(aka num and nuts) were both holding our dog, Scrappy D, who probably wanted to strut around and scope out the territory. It was only his second time there.

I put my hand on the stadium facade made from blocks of limestone-faced precast concrete. They are smooth and felt wonderful to the touch.

I abruptly lifted my head.

For a few seconds, just above the distant jackhammering, came the sound of a cheerful-stadium crowd. It was breezy and light–melodic without structure.

“There are people . . . inside?” my LF said disbelievingly.

We walked around the entire stadium, aware of the crowd-buzz. Yet all the gates were all locked. And we only saw a few cars parked in the private lot, but none were the high-end luxury models that the players’ drive.

We came back to the north east corner, where we had parked, and I pointed to the clouds over the stadium, which seemed to reflect fluorescent lighting from the ball field. “The lights must be on,” I said.

My LF gasped! I swung around to find the homeless man had snuck up on us. He had both hands out. Red rings circled his eyes and it looked like he was wearing two or three jackets. He smelled like he hadn’t bathed in a month. And he was absolutely still.

“Are you okay, mister?” my LF asked.

I looked to her, and then at Scrappy D, who had a look of curiosity on his mug. He is a very smart dog.

“They never talk about anyone else,” the homeless man said, with a vacuous gaze like that of a reality TV star.

“I bet they don’t,” I said, grabbing my LF’s arm, trying to steer her off toward our car.

“None of ‘em seem to remember Fiorello La Guardia,” he said, breathlessly.

With those words he had our attention. La Guardia was arguably the greatest mayor in NYC history. If the homeless guy was going to reference him, at the very least he deserved a modicum of deference.

“I never heard even a whisper of the four-term governor, South Street’s own, Al Smith,” he continued with a frightful look in his eyes. “Nope, un-huh. What about that poet. Not one of them ever speaks his name–”

“–Walt Whitman,” I cried, knowingly.

“Yup, and forget about those who cursed Hudson or lauded the Roosevelt’s, or any of the tramps who skirted through The Great White Way. It’s always him,” he said, and his eyes opened wide. It looked like he was going to scream. He put both hands on his head and wail. “It’s always ‘Ruth!’ The voices love Babe Ruth!”

“What’s wrong with that!” someone behind us cried out.

We turned to see a mountain of a man with broad shoulders and conical legs. He was chomping on a cigar, looking at us from under the brim of a woolen derby that shadowed everything above the tip of his nose.

The homeless man yelped and ran off, his footfalls smacking soundly on the pavement.

“Babe Ruth?” I said with a tremor, and glanced aside to num and nuts, who were motioning like bobble-heads. “You’re the Babe?”

“I sure hope so!” he said in a riotious manner. “They’re not waiting in there for some two-bit runt like Cobb!!! Ha! Ha! Ha!”

I got a whiff of an alcohol-laden aftershave.

“See ya’ inside fellas!” Ruth bellowed, and tipped his cap to my LF.

A man dressed in an old wool suit opened an eight-foot-high steel gate for the Babe. The Sultan of Swat paused for a moment, and looked down the sidewalk to his left, over in the direction of the old stadium. He bent down and exchanged a few words with the man, then to our surprise, gave a backwards nod in our direction.

The guard waved us into the new stadium right behind Babe Ruth.

—

To be continued . . .

Here are all the posts in this series: Episode Twenty-Three – December 2009

Daydreaming on Morningside Drive

“It’s always Ruth!”

Living on a Thin Line

Bigger than The Babe

 —

Here are more Yankee Stadium photos along with a set from Citi Field. It’s where the Mets play–

The Stadium

Yankee Stadium

citi FIELD

Mullaly Skate Park in the Bronx (next door to new stadium)

Here are my STORIES and PHOTOS

(Photos by Bald Punk – Morningside Drive and Park, Manhattan)

The other day I was walking Scrappy Doodles on Morningside Drive, daydreaming that I was a musical prodigy.

I saw myself onstage at the Central Park bandshell. My bulky frame was hunched over a miniature piano, and my thin fingers glided about the keyboard as I played the “Linus and Lucy theme” from Charlie Brown.

The crowd was on their feet and dancing like wild cats. People were up in the trees. Every once in a while I threw my hands up high, just like Schroeder does when he plays the piece in the cartoon.

There wasn’t a person in sight on Morningside Drive, so that’s probably why I felt I could get away with such a wild fantasy.

(“Linus and Lucy Theme” from Charlie Brown Christmas Special)

Plus Scrappy D and I strutted along with our heads high. This way if anyone from the apartments on the west side on the Drive saw us, they would know we were los hombres duros!!!

Oh, here and there I might have been talking to the Scrapster. But that’s only because he’s a smart dog, and when he looks at me, I’m pretty much convinced that he understands. Yeah, pretty sure about that fact, pretty sure . . .

All of a sudden I heard a sustained noise shot that sounded like “craaa-aaack!” I was near the peak of Morningside Drive where the noises carry like few other places in NYC. That’s because it’s situated on a cliff, reinforced by a massive stone wall.

There are so many building projects in the area, plus the Columbia University kids are always doing whacked out stuff in the name of science and engineering, so I didn’t give the sound much consideration.

“Craaaa-aaack!” came the sound again. It seemed to breeze over the apartments and treetops below.

Scrappy sniffed the nook between the stone wall and sidewalk, while I gazed up to Harlem and beyond. Morningside Drive is a nice place to clear your head.

I heard the “craaa-aaack!” again and listened closer. There followed what sounded like the “whooo-ooo” of a crowd.

I spotted a student reading on one of the benches. I was about to say, “good book,” when I noticed it was a textbook and that he was deep in study. There seemed little chance for small talk. So I came right out and asked him–

(Morningside Park)

“You hear that?”

He looked up. “Hear what?”

“That sound,” I said, trying to give a friendly smile and not seem like a psycho. “Sounds like a bat hitting a ball.”

“No,” the student said.

“You don’t hear that?” I asked, a little excited as the sound came again. My eyes flashed to the Bronx that was a mile or so uptown.

“Sorry, no,” he said and went back to his book.

“No, wow,” I said and squinted, wishing I could see all the way up to Yankee Stadium on E 161^st. It was overcast. I thought that if it was baseball season and the Yanks were playing, the lights would be on.

I lifted my head.

“Craaa-aaack . . .  whooo-oooo . . . “

“That was a good one,” I told myself. “A homerun ball.”

Scrappy D wagged his tail and I turned to the street. A horn beeped. My lady friend(LF) and the pizza and Chinese delivery guys wheeled up in our not-so-late-model Camry.

(Scrappy Doodles)

I jumped in the back seat with my LF. Scrappy vaulted into her lap. We were going to her sister’s house in Greenpoint which is always fun. Her husband is a Pole who grew up on a farm in the shadow of the old Soviet Union. Few people drunk or sober can tell a story quite like him.

“What is it Baldie?” my LF asked, holding her chin high as Scrappy licked her neck.

“You mind if we make a little detour first?”

My LF gave a sweet smile and her eyes twinkled.

I leaned forward and spoke to the pizza delivery guy who was driving, “Take us to The Stadium, I gotta check something out . . .”

—

Here are all the posts in this series: Episode Twenty-Three – December 2009

Daydreaming on Morningside Drive

“It’s always Ruth!”

Living on a Thin Line

Bigger than The Babe

—

Morningside Drive & Park (Pics only)

Here are my STORIES and PHOTOS

(Photos by Bald Punk)

Yankee Stadium is amazing. My only compliant concerning the design was that my seat was too small. I had no place to put my arms. We sat in the upper deck, behind the right field foul pole. Calvin Klein must have designed our chairs. I took a picture–

Here are more Yankee Stadium photos along with a set from Citi Field. It’s where the Mets play–

 citi FIELD

The Stadium

Here are my STORIES and PHOTOS

(Photos by Bald Punk – click twice to full enlarge)

I went to Yankee Stadium for the first time yesterday. I expected to be impressed though also a little disappointed. There was no way it could be as fantastic as I had heard.

—

“Yankee Stadium is spectacular,” I must have said to twenty diffenet people today. Everytime I said it the words rang true. How true? ‘Hemingway true‘.

I have no idea how many photos I will post, but it will take a few days.

Here are more Yankee Stadium photos along with a set from Citi Field. It’s where the Mets play–

 citi FIELD

Yankee Stadium

Here are my STORIES and PHOTOS

I’m in the Money!!! I’m in the Money!!! I just joined Twitter last week and watching all those people tweeting about how to make money is wearing off. Because, drum roll please . . .

 I’m making 500 hundred bucks tomorrow night for doing absolutely nothing. And that’s the fact, Jack!

I’m sitting here at the computer telling my lady friend while I type. But she’s not paying attention. She and the pizza and Chinese delivery guys(aka num and nuts) are watching that Real Housewives of New Jersey crap, and she has no time for her Baldie.

Num and nuts are the only two guys in the entire world watching it. That show doesn’t even play in Greenwich Village.

Did I ever tell you that my lady friend is secretly a NY METS fan? Of course num and nuts are . . . “They would root for Boston if she did!”

She’s booing and now so are they, but they all know it’s true.

Now she’s paying attention–

She says “hello” to you and so do num and nuts do, but only because she did first.

Now that everyone’s listening, here’s the dealio:

I told this guy at work about how we have a ghost and we’re all friendly and shit with it. Low and behold he gets his landlord on the phone and zip bang boom, I’m going over to his house in Marine Park Saturday night to exercise his ghost for $500 bucks!

Yo! Who’s better than me!

I’m spending every last dime on food and beer and plan to pass out from beer-austion.

I figure me and Scrappy D can handle it.

I’ll let him loose in the guy’s house and he’ll run around like a nut. I’ll point shit out, maybe bring a tennis ball and some chicken skin. Scrappy loves that shit. He’ll tear the place up.

He’s gonna exercise that ghost so good that the bastard who owns the place will bring us back all the time.

Hold on while I get up and do a little dance called “I’m in the money, I’m in the money . . .”

Brb!!! I’m dancing like a nut.

–Baldie

Btw, here I am on Twitter: http://twitter.com/BaldPunk

Let’s go Yankees!!!

—

Here are all the posts in this series: Episode Twelve – June 2009 (Ghost Crushers!)

Twitter Money Millions

Bald Punk THE EXORCIST

Ghost Crushers Are On The March!

BACK FROM MY FIRST EXORCISM

Date With The Devil

Here are my STORIES and PHOTOS

Me and my lady friend along with the pizza and Chinese delivery guys are all upset about the passing of Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett.

We’re watching the Yanks play the Braves and listening to Michael’s music, and not really saying all that much.

See Easy Site Navigation if you are new to BaldPunk.com

 (Picture of a real ghost that I found on the Internet)

I saw the ghost again in our apartment last night. That’s it. That’s the end of this post. I have nothing else to say.

It passed right by me. Okay . . .

I think it’s a guy. He was dressed in see-through black. It was the second scariest moment of my life. But I can’t tell you about the first time right now. (It was when I almost got rolled in Central Park. The guy had a knife and the devil in his eye.)

And this ghost–I’m not here to change your mind about them. Believe me, I don’t want one in my apartment. I’m not some Internet sick-o.

I don’t wanna even talk about it.

To tell you the truth, I’m thinking about packing up and going somewhere else.

It’s so bad I would even say goodbye to you for good, and that’s tough, because we’re mofos.

–Since you got me going, I’ll tell you what happened.

I fell asleep on the couch watching Yankees’ Encore, and when I woke up the Cartoon Network was on. The pizza guy must have changed the channel. Remember I told you he liked cartoons.

Him and the Chinese delivery guy were asleep next to me. Somehow they both were clutching Scrappy D, and he’s tough to hold. You know the little guy is nutty. He probably likes the smell of stale grease.

I stood up and rubbed my gut. I wasn’t looking for a ghost, but there it was–

He was as near to me as you are–or at least as two people that are real close.

So when I saw him I froze solid. It was his face that really got to me. I see sad people all the time, but this guy’s eyes were full of silent agony.

But all the same, he looked right through me. I couldn’t help him, and he knew that even before it occurred to me.

I must have made some noise because the pizza and Chinese delivery guys(aka num and nuts) woke up, and they both looked real scared.

My lady friend came into the room and said, “Baldie, what is it?”

I just said, “The Yankees stink.” I couldn’t tell her.

I’m afraid to admit that she-and of course, num and nuts would make the situation worse if I told them I saw the ghost again.

Man oh man, it’s bad.

The worse part, I’m only good at fixing things with my mouth. I don’t think yelling at a ghost will get rid of it.

I can’t talk to him, can I? I don’t even know his name.

I’m sorry if I let you down, but I just don’t know what to do.

Bye for now,

–B

P.S. Thank god num and nuts didn’t see the ghost. They would have jumped out the window (4^th floor) and took Scrappy D with them. They never think of the consequences.

— 

Here are all the posts in this series: Episode Eleven – June 2009 (The Ghost!)

Guess What We Have In Our Apartment???

We Are Ghost Watching!

I saw the GHOST Again!!!

Our Apartment is Ghost Friendly

Here are my STORIES and PHOTOS

(Picture by Shanna Ravindra)

I’m going to keep my posts short from now on, as that’s what you’re supposed to do.

Plus the UK hates me and I don’t want to lose the people that check out my site from Moldava. I get tons of hits from there. It whacks me out.

Here’s what happened Friday night. I went out with some of my mofos to kick-it big time at McSorley’s Ale House and then to Planet Rose, a karaoke bar on Avenue A and 13^th Street. It was nice.

See the video I took that evening here.

That’s the end of this post.

–Baldie

P.S. Will one of the mofos from Moldava please email me? You people must be cool as hell. Email: bp@baldpunk.com

P.P.S.S. -  Okay, I hope the BlogGod doesn’t mind, but I have a little more to tell you about Friday night. My lady friend didn’t go, and neither did the pizza or Chinese delivery guys(aka num and nums).

The cast was Barney, Dizzy D, Polar Bear Dave, film editing guy, Louie Trips, Rockhead, and a guy with a Redsox hat on backwards that we all know but ignored.

Nothing extraordinary happened. Just your average bar fun, shooting the breeze, watching the Yankees host the METIES at The Stadium, and some wacky singing at Planet Rose.

Did you see the play at the end of the game? I felt bad for Luis Castillo even though I root for the Yanks and they won—

Barney who was all dressed in his METS regalia was really bummed out. He and I were taking pot shots at each other all night. I can’t remember what he said though I know his lips were moving.

I was in a winsome mood, and hit Barney with stuff like “The METS are to baseball, like what karaoke is to singing. . . The METS are to NYC, like what the Dodgers(‘Dem Bums’) were to Brooklyn.”

I was laughing my head off, and Barney was making whiny faces like George from Seinfeld, saying “you’re killing me, you’re killing me . . .”

It was good to see Louie Trips, who’s a travel agent and has been living in Hilton Head, SC. He was telling me how he fools his ninety year old mom into believing that Hilton Head is really the Canarsie section of Brooklyn. When she sees crocodiles in the front yard he said it can get a little difficult.

Dizzy D really needed the night out. Lehman Brothers, the company he used to work for went out of business and he lost a lot of money. Now he’s at Barclays Bank, where they have him teaching people in India all he knows about his IT job. He said once he’s done they’ll can his ass.

Polar Bear Dave and I seriously talked about how we needed to write tunes for BaldPunk.com. I did at least, and he yessed me to death.

Btw, I’m like Flea on the bass guitar–not really, but I can play pretty good with my fingers. Polar Bear Dave plays the drums, guitar, keyboards, and sings. We’re gonna write songs for you. They will be awesome. If they ain’t, blame him, because the bass part I write will be super duper.

I wish you could meet my buddy, the film editor guy. He’s a good man.

He works on one of the most popular primetime TV shows out now. On his phone he had a picture of him and a couple of blonde chicks from the show. How cool is that!

His job basically involves him and other mofos sitting in a dark room from seven to eleven at night, cutting down the footage shot that day for the director to see the next morning.

But only one day out of the year does he get to party with the blonde chicks, and it drives his wife nutso.

Anyway, in total honesty, the night out was kinda fun but not great-great. Maybe I should see a doctor and get a prescription to help me through such nights. I know “that guy that lives on your block has the remedy–”

–Ha! Ha! Ha! You remember this post? I told you I hate drugs.

Friday night I was a little bummed because my lady friend wasn’t with me. When she’s around I almost don’t mind num and nuts stepping on my tail. She’s so cool, everyone loves her. Plus she does the impossible, she makes me look even better!

You might not believe it, but I’m a real softy. I’ll post a short story I wrote called THE SOUNDS WE MAKE. You’ll see what I mean. I wrote it to balance out DARK CHILD.

I’ll put it up a little later.

Bye for now,

Baldie in the punkalicious Big Apple

—

Here are all the posts in this series: Episode Ten - June 2009 (Mofos Night Only)

Mofos Night Only

Friday Night Music Video

Partying on the Lower East Side

THE SOUNDS WE MAKE (Short Story)

Here are my STORIES and PHOTOS

On an unrelated note, I hope everyone in the US is having a nice Memorial Day weekend. Never forget.

Also, thanks to all the mofos outside the US for giving me lots of hits. I see traffic coming from far and wide. I sincerely appreciate it. You have a nice weekend too.

–

The fam is gonna chill tonight. I had to work today and am going to watch The Magnificent Seven with Steve McQueen and Yul Brynner. It’s on PBS at 9pm. Those were were two super cool dudes. Maybe too cool, because they both smoked themselves to death.

Now I’m watching the METS play Boston.

My lady friend is in the kitchen making cookies and the pizza and Chinese delivery guys are basically standing on the hem of her dress. They’re worse than dogs.

‘The conversation (if I can call it that) they are having is like a soundtrack for a whacked out foreign film. Though a lot of it I don’t think makes sense in any language.

—-

Update: Way to go METSIES!!! They came back in the 9th to give Papelbon his first blown save. But what happened in the bottom of the inning was more miraculous. The Mets were stellar defensively. It was a bit of a shocker given how they have been playing.

Oh! I saw a sign behind home plate that read: “Fenway Family Hour.” Anyone know what that’s all about? Maybe the Boston fans act civilized for an hour. I doubt it. Those bastards have been unmanagable since 1620.

Now that I think about it, if it wasn’t for those rowdy New Englanders everyone in the US would probably be living comfortably on the dole and have free health care. There would be no need for Obama to change America into England. But I digress.

Speaking of crazy Boston fans, I went to see the Mets play the Yanks at the old Stadium… I’ll finish this in a bit. LF is calling–

–it was ages ago. Me and my mofos sat all the way up in the right field wing at Yankee Stadium. I remember my seat as four rows from the top and four seats from the end. I was so far away I felt like I was watching the game from Shea. I think David Cone pitched that day and the Yanks won, but because of my seats???

Anyway, before the game we are having fun taunting the Met fans, just some really good natured ribbing and all, when out of the blue two guys start walking up to their seats wearing Boston Redsox jersey.

They never made it. People stared throwing peanuts and stuff. I don’t think they got hurt too badly, but they never made it to their seats.

One last thing on nutty fans. I once went to Camden Yards and I swear to god it was like I had gone to outspace. The people from Baltimore were like Martians. I kid you not.

They were the nicest darn people I ever met, and I had a Yankee hat on, too. That went for people we met in the bars afterwards at Fell’s Point. I never met so many freaking nice people. Even the girls were sweet as pie. Wow!

The only problem I had was when I went to the john at the ballpark. There was this piss drunk Yankee fan making a scene. It was embarrassing. He was yelling all sorts of stupid stuff at the Oriole fans, then he started yelling at me because I wasn’t on his side. Ugh!!! I think I owe an apology to New Englanders, though don’t consider that one. Just hold your breath while I muster it up . . .

So . . . I tell you – God blessed Baltimore. He really did.