Yankees 5, Twins 1

Today was Lee Jr.'s first Yankee game. If you read weather.com, you wouldn't have thought the game could possibly be played today. They were wrong.

Mizz Mazz was working today, so either I was taking the tyke myself or I needed to call for backup. Who you gonna call? Heath Bieferman. Heath was good enough to shlep up to my place, help me carry the damn stroller all over Harlem, and "lend a helping hand". Friends, he did just that. [click here for background info on Heath Bieferman: scroll down to "Art Patrons Duped..."]

Thanks to Heath (and Jon Pauley for the tix and Ms.M for, you know, letting me do it...), Lee Jr. got to see the Yankees play in The Final Season. Kinda like Final Destination 3, right? (Funny enough, some lunatic speed-walked into the Stadium in front of us while pointing at the New Yankee Stadium across the street, shouting, "There is no New Yankee Stadium because there will only ever be one Yankee Stadium!!!" Apparently the guy still thinks there's monuments in center field.)

Things went as slick as shit through a tin goose, as my friend Heath might say. LJ slept most of the trip up, and barely made a peep otherwise. We got him in the side entrance of the back gate, thanks to the kind security guard that whisked us in like the rock stars we once were. She even made sure the little guy got his "Final Season" t-shirt. I don't know why this seemed so special-- they were supposed to be for the "first 18,000 fans 14 and under", and LJ easily qualified for both criteria. This is how desperate Yankee fans have become for anything free.

I quickly whipped up a bottle of formula for Lee and fed it to him wedged between a garbage can and a steel girder. He loved it. We tried to take a picture of me holding my son against the majestic backdrop of the field, but ended up with something more like a production still from Close Encounters. This one came out a little bit better, I guess.

We finally made it up to our seats sometime near the top of the 2nd. Actually, I have no idea when it was. We might as well have been playing the Globetrotters for the attention I was paying to the game. I did notice that a jerk and his kid were sitting in our seats, which were right on the aisle. I'm standing there, dripping in sweat, holding LJ like a football in one hand and my ticket in the other, explaining to the moron that seats 5 and 6 are never on the aisle (unless you're paying five or six hundred dollars for your tickets). Seats 5 and 6 ARE THE FIFTH AND SIXTH SEATS YOU CRETIN!!!!!!

Jr. and I lasted until the middle of the third. Here's the boy's-eye view:

Yes, it was probably that blurry for him and No, that's not my head right above my blurry knee that Lee's sitting on.

I decided to take him for a stroll through the corridors of history, which consisted of six ramps, a diaper deck and a folding chair. Thank G_d for the folding chair, which was the second gracious act by a Yankee Stadium employee today. That's exactly two more gracious acts than we received the time I brought the missus when she was biggo pregnant and they wouldn't let her sit in a dry empty seat during a rain delay. Seriously.

No complaining today, however. I called Heath somewhere near the fifth inning to tell him I was taking the kid home. He seemed fine, although covered in a slimy sheen of sweat and starting to slump in his stroller (I'm talking about Lee Jr., not Heath). Yep, time to go.

Got home pretty easy: two trains (D to uptown 1) and about six or seven set of stairs. Fucking tired!!! Let's just say the old gray mare just ain't what she used to be...ain't what she used to be...ain't what she used to be...

Also got home just in time to watch some schmuck named Hawkins ruin Moose's shutout. I put Jr. in his swing, sat down on the couch and burped loudly. Lee started cracking up, and so did I. It was a good day.