F.S. Player: Britt

How can I describe Britt's Farm System performance? The man had Fat Tire beer lined up in the fridge, a designated Mass Transportation route picked out to get us to and from the game and Downtown, and even went so far as to let me shack in his apartment two nights while he was out of town. Of course he was at the Nashville Steeplechase, sporting the traditional V-Neck t-shirt traditionally worn at horse races, so don't pity him.

Rockies vs. Giants May 10th

Taking the Light rail from Southeast Denver to Coors Field was a packed ride overflowing with baseball fans going to boo Barry Bonds. Surrounded by individuals garbed in Baseball attire of most every team in the big leagues it seemed that Britt, my farm system accomplice, and I were on our merry way to an All Star Game. The slight disposition to wearing Rockies made the team the most prevalent, but not the majority by a large margin. And when is the last time something of consequence was won by anything but the majority vote?

After a quick Sunshine Beer at Fado’s, the deceptively unique nationwide pub franchise, Britt and I headed into Coors Field. The Rockpile bleachers in the far centerfield section of the stadium cost only four dollars. Four dollar tickets usually puts you in a roiling mass of “Those Guys,” with drunkards yelling catcalls exclusively to be heard by the audience around them, girls oblivious to the game being played in front of them, and me. Denver, of course, is not usual. Sitting on the aisle of the Rockpile allowed for the click-clack of the Rainbows and Chaco’s trudging past to be heard intimately, to smell the faint aroma of smoke wafting by in inconsistent intervals, to see the eternal 3 day stubble of the men and the mandatory ankle tattoos of the women. Were a Widespread Panic song to play on the JumboTron, the Rockpile would have become a Rockslide from the noodling and candle dancing that would have occurred. This brings us to the Fan of the Game: The baseball-loving earthen Denverer.

Aside from the eclectic Earthen Denveritians, the most prevalent site in the ballpark was the Purple Row, a line of seats four rows from the top around the park signifying the one mile marker above sea level that Denver is known for. If you’re looking for a picture of me in the purple seats, keep looking. The air is too damn thin to be hiking that far up the steps for a damn picture.

The Rocky Mountain High of Colorado now isn't the same as when John Denver was singing it.
More bad news sports fans. I’ve lost my second scoreboard race in a row now, and I’m none too happy about it. This time around the race was three Hogs on Harley Davidson motorcycles. Once again my choice, the purple hog with the big tusks, obviusly, got out to an early lead dooming him to imminent failure. Britt’s pick held back, letting the others wear out their tires, sapping up gas, drafting off the rear bumpers before rubbing them (rubbing is racing) and putting himself ahead when it mattered most, at the finish line. In addition to losing, I was also generally upset with the quality of the race. With no decided course for the CGI Hogs to race through, it was hard to know when a hairpin turn was approaching and when the end was in sight. I just re-read this passage because I had gotten too riled up writing it, and have come to the conclusion that I am taking these scoreboard races far, far too seriously. Damn Purple motorcycling feral hog.

As far as the rest of the game, I nearly missed Bonds cranking out a Home Run, which despite it all, I would love to have seen. As for the Hero of the Game goes to Rockies Leadoff man Jamey Carrel who, as Britt so astutely pointed out, looks like a pedophile. 8 year olds, dude.

He's a sex offender, Dude, with a record.

Denver

Of the now five different places that I’ve visited during my Quest, Denver is the first to truly have its own distinct personality. The people, lifestyle, and general makeup of the entire metro area has a vibe that is in marked contrast to the largely homogenous flavors of Houston, Dallas, St. Louis and Kansas City. That flavor is one of the Earthen working class. I hesitate to use the word hippie, it seems to cliché and inappropriate for Denverites. Earthen is my end word choice of the intersection of 90’s alternative, 60’s hippie, and 50’s work ethic. The men of Denver all look as if they are in between fishing trips or in training for a triathlon. As for the women, they all look as if they are in between fishing trip or in training for a triathlon.

This perception was reinforced on two separate days when I drove past the most popular hub in all of Denver—the downtown REI building. Like Cabela’s for hunters, REI is a mecca for the Earthen outdoorsmen of Denver, who arrives in droves wearing all manner of sport sandals, precisely shagged out hair, and the eternal three day stubble. The walk alongside or behind their tanned and toned girlfriends, so eager to get inside that she is racing ahead of the boyfriend to the front door. Just as they would race ahead of me in any sport competition we might compete in. To beat everyone to the punch, they would finish ahead of me by a far wider margin than the other women of America who would also beat me in a race. Happy?

Other highlights of the city include the 16th street mall. Very commercial, with five Starbucks within the walk, this place is an American version of Barcelona's Las Ramblas. Unfortunately, Denver's strip was not quite as authentic as the real thing. Sure, there's the bongo drums and euro-styled wifebeater, but the bongo drums were a bit cheeesy. As for the human robot, he didn't even act lke a robot. When I walked by him he was walking around non robotic talking to people non robitic, which basically reduces him some guy with a painted face and silly outfit.

I was sadly turned down at my microbrewery tour I had hoped to go on, as the Great Divide Brewery was hosting an American Home Brewer’s Association tasting on that very afternoon. Deeply crushed and lingeringly sober I cursed, not the tasting, but my own incompetence for not being a home brewer at this point in my life. The only home brew I’ve ever tasted was of swig of Lud’s Sud’s, which was as deliciously as the namesake is attractive. I think when I do get around brewing my first batch, I am going to make a beer with a hint of Bar-B-Que Sauce. For some reason it seems to me that this would be delicious if done correctly. And by correctly I mean it turned out to be potable, cold beer.

As for Denver, the bar scene is nicely coordinated around the stadium, which is nicely coordinated around a light rail line, which is just slow enough to let you sober up a bit before crashing after the bar scene. And after $1 you call em’s at the Sports Column, one of the top five sports bars in the Nation supposedly, I needed to have a lot of time on my hands. All in all Denver is my favorite place so far, and I am eagerly awaiting my return trip.

Contemporary Christianity Church Services

This trip is about more than just baseball games, hot dogs, and ice cold beer. More than driving and taking pictures, writing posts, and visiting friends. I'm not sure what the "more" is, but I'm looking for it. Sunday I went looking a Denver Lutheran Church during their contemporary church service. Despite all of the things that the church had going for it, whatever "more" I was looking for wasn't in that building.

I was big on religion when I was younger, even leading my high school's chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes my Senior year. Always had, and still do, have a great relationship with the big man upstairs, mainly because he always listens. For me religion is a personal thing, whereas church is a place to go to meet other like minded people, trade gossip, and have an automatic social network to be plugged in to. As such, my relationship with churches is hit and miss. Even the best of sermons, which I do enjoy, are inevitably punctuated by children's cries or an important Sunday Morning Cell phone call--usually not from God. Reciting a prayer someone printed out for me to repeat doesn't inspire me, and singing unattainable pitches to fairly redundant hymns certainly doesn't do it for me.

Contemporary Christian services, therefore, really don't do it for me. Denver's pastor, a solid speaker with a good sermon, just didn't carry the same gravitas when, upon completing his lesson, proceeded to strap on his ax and go over to shred some sweet licks with the rest of the band. My problems with these services most certainly aren't helped by one of my favorite T.V. shows of all time's take on the growing trend.

This led me to thinking, if there are contemporary Christian services, are the fringe religions doing the same? What's the Dalai doing to keep it real? Why haven't rabbis started teaching about Yawehzuuuuppppp? And if there to be a balance in the world is there Contemporary Satan worshipping? If so, does it look like this?

I may try a service again, and will continue to try services. As it is right now, I'm going off to camp out in the Sequioa National Forest for the night. It may not be a Church building but, not everyone keeps the sabbath going to church.

(Denver Posts to be up tomorrow)

Royals vs. A's May 8th

Apparently the Usher had taken these pictures before. And apparently his last job was at Burger King.

The Royals Stadium has the unfortunate distinction of being separate from the city by about 15 minutes putting it, like The Ballpark in Arlington, in the middle of nowhere. Also like The Ballpark, it was surrounded by overpriced empty parking lots and no bars or restaurants.

So far as the stadium itself, it is my favorite by far. Sunk into the ground with fountains spurting in the background and a large scoreboard, it had everything that you could ask from a Major League Ballpark with the exception of a Major League caliber team.

Even at that, there were some cool things about the game, most notably was a play at the plate in which the catcher was creamed by the charging A's baserunner, but held onto the ball for the out. I know all this because I scored the game, the Solitaire for baseball fans. For anyone out there who claims that baseball is a slow game, try sitting in the stands and scoring a whole game, keeping track of strikes, balls, outs, walks, rbi's, etc. I'd imagine it is the only way that a true Royal's fan can muster sitting through an entire Kansas City game.

Most of my diversions from Scoring came from the heckling of the usher in our section. The poor kid could not have been older than 17 years old, and was doing a damn good job of keeping the riff raff out of the third base line section that, for some reason, he let me sneak into. So diligent was he in keeping the brave 10,000 fans who suffered through their team's game out that it was the only lower section barren by the end of the 5th inning. It was at that time that the drunken "those guys" decided that they'd had enough of simply razzing the usher for kicking out every last person who moved in, and moved in a drunken mass into the section. This apparently broke the kid, who sat dejectedly in the corner for the rest of the game.

Fan and Hero of the Game: While Royal's leadoff man David Dejesus's leadoff music was a rap song about needing money because of all the kid's mouths he has to feed, he paled in comparison to the young burgeoning superstar who sat in front of me. Resplendent in his Jorts and mesmerizing with his precision dance moves, this little tyke stole the show.



As for the Royals, their losing and spoiling my perfect home team record was not nearly as disappointing as the fact that I lost the Scoreboard race. Mustard beat Relish, and Ketchup wasn't even close. I knew it was over when my horse got out to an early lead. The early leader never seems to go wire to wire in these things. It was a tough loss for everyone.

Lastly, after the game I talked Trevor, the Royals guy who throws t-shirts into the stands and is largely ignored because of the surrounding girls he works with that, into taking me to the Bar scene of KC. He took me to Tom Foolery's, your average big name bar, which just so happened to serve the best beer I've ever drank. That's a lot of beer to compare to, I mean, ALOT, and I stand by my verdict. If you are ever able to get your hands on a case of Boulevard Wheat Beer, take it and run. And call me.





Trevor the K-Crew guy gives Boulevard Beer a big thumbs up.

Kansas City

Pulling in to Kansas City took me past the ballpark on the Eastern side of the city, but I had plans before I went to the stadium. The Negro League Hall of Fame and Museum, located in Historic 18th and Vine and next to the American Jazz Museum, is a small and intimate place that is nonetheless very cool, as any place that has an introductory video narrated by James Earl Jones, whose voice is the embodiment of cool. Satchel Paige, Negro and Major League Badass, is a fixture throughout the museum and rightfully so. His charisma is evidenced just by the signature windup, pantomimed by looney tunes pitchers and five year olds around the world. A must see for baseball fans or not, but if you are a baseball fan, you might even run into a visiting ballplayer there, like I did with Milton Bradley of the A's.

I bet Milton Bradley sometimes wishes his mom had named him something normal, like Dontrell or JaMarcus.

Contrary to his reputation, he was as polite and helpful as a person who gets their picture taken all the time can be. He even had me check my first shot to make sure that I got us both in it when we took it (I hadn't). Oh, and his watch was so weighed down by Diamonds that it would have ripped my arm out of socket.

After the museum, I made my way down to Arthur Bryant's, a bar-b-que place that Kansas Citians (?) are rightfully proud of. Expensive, with heaping portions to match, I ordered the burnt ends and doused it with the Spicy Sauce. It was greasily delicious both meals it made for me.