Let's Go Eat

Last night, Megan and I screamed like teenage girls. I'm pretty sure I acted the same way that most of my freshman ladies would have had they been in the same 100 mile radius as One Direction (1D, as the kids are calling them these days). 

We went to the Astros game, and not because the Phils were in town (that's in 2 weeks, woohoo!). The Astros were playing the Giants... and many of you know, there are few teams I like less than the Giants. However, during the trading period, my Phils traded Hunter Pence to the Giants, and while I'm still really upset about it, the Astros fans are still upset that THEY lost Hunter to the Phillies. Megan and I wanted to see Hunter while he was in town, and while we're pretty sure there were more Giants fans than Astros fans at the game last night, we were not Hunter's only fans. People of Houston and San Francisco love him, and we got to the park at 5:45 for a 7:15 game to go to batting practice.

Of course, we had a clever sign with us. Two, actually. Megan made a sign before she went to bed on Tuesday night (Ms. Tully needs to go to bed early) that read "Phans transplanted from Philadelphia, PENCE-sylvania," and I had 3 papers, each with one word on them: Let's Go Eat. If you're not a Phillies phan, this probably sounds weird, but Hunter Pence's tagline refers to his habit of eating a big meal after a big win. It's kind of taken over in Philadelphia... remember the excellent Liscio's Italian bread commercials where he is using the bread to measure the height of his socks and to row down the Schuylkill?

Our seats were in section 409, and there was one other family sitting there by the time the game started. We didn't really care too much... we paid $10 for a ticket to the game, a hotdog, a soda, and a bag of chips. Good deal, huh? We were sitting enjoying the game and cheering louder than the rest of the stadium for the Astros during the first inning, when a man in a shirt and tie came up to our section. He was an intern with the Astros, and he happened to have 3 extra seats in section 113. Would we like them? (Did I mention that Cassie, our communitymate who is actually a Giants fan, came with us?)

YUP. AGAIN, we got magically moved down close to the field, and found ourselves right behind the Giants dugout. It was amazing to be so close to the players! Megan and I knew this was our chance- we were in direct eyeline of Hunter, if only he'd look up coming into the dugout! We worked so hard all night, trying desperately to get his attention. I'm pretty sure we each tweeted at him, and we were starting to get sad as the game went on. All we wanted was some acknowledgment! The fans around us loved our sign, and they wanted him to acknowledge us too... people kept stopping to read our sign up close, and we had lots of conversation about how sad it was to lose Hunter. The Astros fans were very sympathetic.

In the 8th inning, when we thought it was hopeless, we tried to get his attention. As Hunter was running into the dugout, we screamed and held up our sign... AND HE LOOKED UP! And read the signs... and smiled... and waved!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Megan and I were jumping up and down like 12-year-olds, screaming and laughing. Everyone in our section loved it, and they were all very happy for us and our success. So much so that they insisted that we try to move down closer to the dugout so that he could sign our poster at the end of the game... and one guy actually went down to try to distract security so that we could. We found ourselves in the second row, and while we didn't get Hunter's autograph, I was less than 5 feet away from him.

All in all, an awesome night. We're not sure how we'll be able to handle the upcoming Phils game... we plan to be there when the park opens at 5. We're bringing tissues.

I'll post pictures later... let's go teach!