Project 60 - Number 52 - The Blue Jays at the Rogers Centre

The Blue Jays, for anyone who doesn't know, are the only professional Canadian baseball team, and I'm sure everyone knows that basically baseball is rounders played by some very unfit looking men in pyjamas who spit a lot.

That said, the OH and Son No 1 are big fans - no, make that Big Fans - and during our week in Toronto we went to see them play at the Rogers Centre, their home base at the bottom of the CN tower. Like Centre Court at Wimbledon it has a retractable roof. And there the comparisons with the genteel home of tennis come to a shuddering halt.

I have actually seen the Blue Jays play once before, somewhere else,  but this qualifies as a Project 60 event as my previous game wasn't at the Rogers Centre. Watching them play at the Rogers Centre is a bit like going to see Manchester United play at Old Trafford. (Not that I'd do that, even for Project 60, but you will get my drift).

Well much the delight of the boys the Blue Jays won; the only time they managed it that week (yes in baseball teams play every night for a week, often against the same opponents. I suppose it's a bit like a test series in cricket but without the breaks in between)

Discerning readers may be detecting a general lack of enthusiasm in my tone. Let's just say it wasn't the greatest of evenings. It was horribly loud, the game is slow, we couldn't see the bit of the pitch where the action was very well and given my bad eyesight I couldn't really tell what was going on, the Rogers Centre is a concrete monstrosity and the food was execrable. In addition I discovered to my horror that I was expected to stand up for the American National Anthem, which I didn't do. In all fairness I didn't stand for the Canadian one either, I don't stand up for God Save the Queen, and prospects, post independence,  of my standing up for a Scottish National Anthem, even should it be replaced with something a great deal better than 'O Flower of Scotland' are slim to non-existent. Other people feel differently and are entitled to, but I don't feel that I need to express my love for my country by singing some frightful ancient doggerel set to music which has little melody and a dirge like (lack of) rhythm. Or, by extension, leaping to my feet like Pavlov's dog when other people are singing it. 

So I don't have particularly happy memories, but what I do have is pictures. 

The excitement mount as we wait to get in and take our seats ...

An action shot. Totally accidental. There were some people so far out from the action but still on the field that they never actually touched the ball and might as well have been left at home. Also look at all those empty seats! 

Son No 1 and his two boys at what is their national game. Son No 1 does not like having his photograph taken. It was the first time the boys had been to a game and considering how long it lasted they did very well. 

Oh look, it's all over, we can go home.