Old Milwaukee

Yes it rained and thundered and lightninged (I think I just invented a word) Tuesday. The storm passed fairly quickly but it was fun while it lasted. I headed into Milwaukee to catch the Brewers at Miller Park. As I headed east, the skies got darker and darker until it rained some more. I must stop washing Shirley. It seems that I have driven to almost every game in the rain lately. By time I reached Milwaukee the rain had ended for the day. Parking was quite easy and after the attendants extracted a hefty sum (even more than the boys in Baltimore) I headed into Miller Park.

The park is very nice from the outside and the inside was just as nice. The park has a retractable roof and it was open for the game. I arrived early, found my seat and watched the grounds crew prepare the field after batting practice. There is something soothing about watching them make the field perfect, raking here and there, tamping the dirt on the mound, and applying just the right amount of water to the infield.As I sat there, a raptor flew into the park and soared over the field supervising the work of the crew and making sure everything was done properly. He must have been satisfied because after checking it out for ten or fifteen minutes, he flew off to his next appointment.

Miller Park has some interesting features. It has Bernie the Brewer who slides into a barrel of brew after each Brewer home run. Bernie got dunked twice this night. Some sponsor pays “X” dollars per strike out thrown by Brewer pitchers and a running tally is kept in right field (147 as of the end of the game), There is a clock with baseball bats for hands if anyone is interested in non-baseball time, there are Harley-Davidson motorcycles on the ledge by the windows in left-centerfield (Milwaukee is the home of H-D), and there are windows in the outfield, mostly covered by advertisements and motorcycles. The seats are definitely “have and have not” seats. Those who have get pretty nice seats. Those who do not are way, way up in the nose bleed areas. I think they are still in Milwaukee but they actually might be in the next town over. Wow, they are far away. The tradition at Miller is the “Beer Barrel Polka” in the middle of the 7th, after “Take Me Out to The Ballgame.” The Brewer Babes and Dudes dance the polka on the dugout roofs while the fans hoist beer and sing along.

The game was a ho-hummer, the only excitement was seeing if the Brewers could keep the shutout going. They couldn’t. In the 9th, the #2 stopper gave up back-to-back doubles and Hunter Pence of the Astros scored for a final score of 6-1 in front of 27,000 fans.

The drive back to De Forest was uneventful but still scary due to the kamikaze deer population. I kept reminding myself, steer to where they used to be, not where they are going. Luckily the deer stayed in the forest and not on the highway.

Wednesday was a maximum driving day, backtracking through Wisconsin, Illinois, (only a buck ninety in tolls today), Indiana and finally Ohio. I went through the outskirts of Indianapolis and looked at a map and saw I was very close to the Indy Speedway.I took a detour and headed that way when I remembered the race was coming up and there were probably pre-race hysterics going on at the track. I found a place to park at the Indianapolis Police Department Command Post (it was vacated) and walked over to the track. It was late in the day so things were very mellow and most of the attractions were closed. There were some private cars driving the track so I asked if they let RVs drive it. They declined. There is the Memorial Day Indy 500 held at the track but there is also a NASCAR event, The Brickyard 400 held there. I didn’t get to see an actual Indy car but I did get to see the Dale Earnhardt, Jr. car. I took a few photos and headed for Cincinnati. I arrived at about 8:00 after about 580 miles and called it a day. (Oh yeah, it rained and I hadn’t washed Shirley)