Part Three: Mets game with Keith & met Zack again, 2 more Met games to end the year, Postseason Baseball, Trip to Yankee Stadium, Marist Alumni Weekend
Part Four: Thanksgiving, December fun and Christmas.
Also links to all the posts are previously chronicled on my web site or others. I tried my best.
I’m not going to lie: 2009 was a great year. However, it’s almost over so I’d like to recap it. What better way than through blog posts and photos?
Unfortunately, I’m going to start to try to tell stories about how well the year went fully knowing that my awesome girlfriend Jenna is probably way better at telling every single story than I am.
November
This was the first month I ever found out that I was going to be an Uncle. We got to watch Kim and Justin reveal it to the world at Thanksgiving time.
Last year my parents moved Thanksgiving to Connecticut at Matt’s house but this year we changed it up. For Thanksgiving, Jenna and I got to spend it with her family in New Hyde Park where we got to watch Jenna’s brother Keith’s performance in the band event at Hofstra. We also got to have dinner there and man, I’m still full from eating there. They had a whole lot of food and it was a great time! Then we went down the road to Westbury to see how my family was faring. We met Kim and Justin there for dessert as well and had a fun time. After dessert, there was a sudden urge to shoot thousands of our family photos at their house. This led to a few off the wall statements and then led to a few nice pictures.
December
December was busy. People got sick after Thanksgiving but got better after a week. Then it snowed.
Okay well maybe this wasn’t a good idea. However I took care of my Christmas shopping and finished 10 days before Christmas. Here’s what I gave:
Mom: Digital Photo Frame
Dad: Massage Gift Certificate for 1/2 hour massage
Matt: iPod nano running band. iTunes gift card.
Justin: Sports Authority Gift Card (that’s what he wanted)
Kim: Saphora gift card.
Mom & Dad: Wine Glasses
Jenna: Gold and Diamond Necklace, Bath and Body Works, iTunes Gift Card, it goes on like this.
I’m not going to lie: 2009 was a great year. However, it’s almost over so I’d like to recap it. What better way than through blog posts and photos?
Unfortunately, I’m going to start to try to tell stories about how well the year went fully knowing that my awesome girlfriend Jenna is probably way better at telling every single story than I am.
September So on 9/8/08 I took Jenna’s brother Keith to a baseball game with me. Little did I know… I’d meet Zack Hample out there with Keith. So we got to go see Zack at work and we were able to grab a few baseballs ourselves. We also got to see Zack pull off the glove trick which I swear took under 30 seconds. I snapped three shots not because I could but because that was as many as I was going to get.
Oh yeah and Zack got the lineup card… Also covered at Zack’s site and here on my site.
Two days later, I went with Adam and Chris, and I got 7 baseballs and Adam caught one. Chris met up with us after batting practice. I still am short a Citi Field baseball but I’m supposedly not missing much.
Later in the month Jenna and I made a fun trip, up to the American Museum of Natural History. We went to the Planetarium show, Jenna’s favorite, as well as saw all the dinosaur exhibits they had. It’s a nice little museum but we underestimated the fact that since it was a school off day, there would be so many kids roaming and screaming around. Plus the place is big, it’s a long walk around the exhibits.
October
October was time for a lot of postseason baseball. This meant I got a little busy at work. I got to go to Yankee Stadium for the first time to record some entertaining video on a flip cam. The Yankees opened up the stadium for the fans to watch game three, here’s some video. I learned two things: flip cams work really well, I thought they would be bad with the lighting and audio (a very small mic) but they were able to capture everything I shot very well. I also learned how nice the seats are at the new Yankee Stadium. I made a mission of it to get to the row behind the dugout and I sat in the row. It’s a nice view and I know I won’t be paying for it anytime soon.
However the baseball season would soon end, in November. With the baseball season over, I can show these photos of my baseball collection so far. Click to enlarge the images.
Also during October, we went back up to Marist for homecoming. That let us have these funny photos as we walked around Marist. I got to watch some football with our friends, we went around to talk to Jenna’s friends still in the band. I’m sure if I understood this story, I’d be laughing too. It was good for us to see most of her suitemates from senior year and we got to see the usual team of Danny, Chris & Erin. Before the game, I made a point of it that we had to go to the Everready Diner so I could get some pancakes and their strawberry butter. In a complete surprise move, we went to the Olive Garden for dinner. Then it was back home, driving home was easier than finding a place to stay, especially there.
Finally this funny photo to wrap up October. I have no idea when it was taken but it is a funny photo.
I’m not going to lie: 2009 was a great year. However, it’s almost over so I’d like to recap it. What better way than through blog posts and photos?
Unfortunately, I’m going to start to try to tell stories about how well the year went fully knowing that my awesome girlfriend Jenna is probably way better at telling every single story than I am.
July:
So I took the 23rd off of work? Where were we off to? Camden Yards.
That’s right, there for the epic Royals-Orioles battle!
This is about how close we can get to the action for only about 19$ a ticket. Where does that get you at Citi Field? Obstructed view.
It was that night, after a bunch of e-mails back and forth, I met Zack Hample. Nice guy and I was trying to get him to sign a copy of his book, of course I didn’t figure to bring it with me to Baltimore (oops) so he let me know if I was ever around where he lives in the city that I should stop by and he’d show me what’s hes up to.
August: So I stopped by the Upper West Side in August. Zack was nice enough to show me what he was working on for his book project and how he had a whole pile of old articles. I saw his 200 pound rubber band ball and I couldn’t even tell you what we talked about for a while but it was just nice to talk to someone who has that appreciation for baseball just like I do. And I got him to sign his book for me, Watching Baseball Smarter.
So it reads:
For Ryan, from one deeply serious baseball fan to another. Dont’ lose the passion even when working for MLBAM drives you crazy. Your friend, Zack Hample 8/3/09
How cool is that?!
So now I know two authors! I love to write and I love to read but I know there’s no way I’d ever be able to do what they do: write books.
And then August flew by, mostly because it was the thick of baseball season: when I wasn’t near home I was working watching baseball, obsession over my fantasy baseball team or hanging out with my girlfriend.
I’m not going to lie: 2009 was a great year. However, it’s almost over so I’d like to recap it. What better way than through blog posts and photos?
Unfortunately, I can’t remember much from the beginning of the year so I’m going to start to try to tell stories that my awesome girlfriend Jenna is probably way better at telling than I am.
March: I got to run around and cover the MAAC Basketball Championships for SienaSaintsBlog.com. Which was fun because we got to go stay with our great family friends up in Niskayuna and got to watch a lot of MAAC Basketball. I got to write lots of articles, including this one as the game ended. Got to do many previews for the NCAA Tournament game, then after watching the game, fire a quick recap out on the game.
At the end of the month I participated in our (Matt & I invested money) fantasy baseball league which took another 8 hours after work, leaving an office at close to 3am is interesting. (The Fantasy Baseball adventure is recapped here)
April: There was an April where we went to Spring Alumni Weekend at Marist to experience all the fun of running around, trying to meet people and going out to places. I already feel old being out of Marist but then I realize people are all moving on. One of the people who I worked with a lot for Marist, Steve Gritti, moved on to Kents Hill School in Maine to be a high school coach/teacher and start a family. But now that I know that, it was a quick Google search and an e-mail to see how things are going.
May: In May we made our first trip to Citi Field. Apparently I refused a haircut for a short time. We both did get one baseball though. That’s good news! So I set a modest goal of trying to get ten for the year, I needed September to get my next one and then get to a good number. Then I got a haircut, one word: oops.
June: Vacation and transition. I took a break from working to go cruising across the Atlantic. We went to Half Moon Cay, home of painful heat. And on the last night I did well at the Casino, making up all the money I lost over the week. Then I do something stupid like go buy flowers to surprise Jenna on the last night even though she can’t bring them off the ship. Oops.
Also, the photographers always made us make weird poses. So many weird poses for one photograph, I’m okay with it now because we got what we wanted, but we had to narrow it down from what appeared to be around 50 pictures.
Speaking of pictures, here’s a compilation I did of the trip:
Then it was back to reality. Reality then, quickly, suddenly (I’ll take another adjective if you want) included a new job opportunity in New York. Before I knew it I was leaving Connecticut and a shared apartment for what I knew best: home.
But this seems like the best time for an aside, I haven’t really said it yet but I really did enjoy the time that I did have in Connecticut. I got to meet a lot of new people and work alongside a bunch of people I would have never knew existed if it were not for the position I was put in.
I had a lot of great experiences up in Connecticut too. I met a bunch of nice people and if I felt like name dropping I could. The only thing I feel bad about is that I haven’t kept up with a lot of the people I worked with at ESPN since I left. I’ve been in a whirlwind of activity since I got home.
I was able to run around and play a bunch of basketball to try (the key word) to improve my skills and I was able to play some softball for a team whose team name belonged to an inside joke. The team name was the Fighting Geese because of the geese that populate ESPN’s parking spots (which was surreptitiously covered on Deadspin). True story, I’ve been told that geese have been known to poke at people’s tires and fight people so the foxes are for “protection.” We won a few games and were mercy ruled but I liked it and had fun. Plus I got to watch Matthew Berry slow pitch and then accidentally cut him off in trying to play a short fly ball on the infield playing first base.
And how could I forget, true story. Our softball team decided to practice in Bristol after everyone got out from work. Needing a pitcher, of course, and we all took a few practice swings. Well it didn’t take long but it’s hard to forget seeing someone who got hit in the face by a softball.
Part Two: On to July… What adventure would I embark on next? Find out next time.
