Monday, June 30, 2008

Oakland A's vs. LA Angels 6-30-08

The Getty Museum is very impressive. Beautiful structure, fabulous gardens, lots of art, and a great view of LA (sorry ... no pictures ... we left our camera in the car as we rushed to catch the tram from the parking garage up the hillside to the museum).

We did, however, get some pictures of the La Brea Tar Pits. It was better than I expected. The Tar Pits are kinda cool. However, the gardens and the park they've created around them were a pleasant surprise. The museum on the grounds does a great job describing the history of the area and the paleontology work that has been done and continues today. Here are a few pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/14772189@N03/sets/

Side Note ... we ate an Italian restaurant on Wilshire Blvd called Palomino last night. It was very good. We sat next to Jeff Bridges, the actor, who was having dinner with his Mom (Lloyd's wife). As the waiter said to us after they left, "I love this town!"

It was a beautiful night for the game. Gorgeous weather (70 degs) as opposed to the hot 90s for last week's Dodger game. As for Angels Stadium, it has the most beautiful grounds of the stadiums we've seen so far. There's a beautiful palm tree garden outside the stadium, the halo structure, two size 649.5" helmets in front of the home plate entry, and a waterfall in a large rock garden in center field. Unfortunately, the rest of the ball park is just ok. Nothing special. As for the game, Greg Smith, the Oakland A's pitcher, dominated. He threw just 100 pitches in a complete game, 6-1 victory. The A's scored early and kept adding to their lead. The game was never in doubt. By the way, Nancy has a new favorite ballplayer ... Kurt Suzuki of the A's. When we saw the A's in Oakland, Suzuki had a great game (4 hits and 5 RBIs including the game winner) despite being hurt while catching and when at bat. We were surrounded by Angels fans so she quietly routed for him throughout the game. Here's the link to the box score:
http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/gameday/index.jsp?gid=2008_06_30_oakmlb_anamlb_1

Here's the picture link:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/14772189@N03/sets/

Before we get to the hot dog rating, the concession operators were the slowest we've encountered. It took forever to get our hot dogs and a full inning to get our pretzel later in the game.

Hot Dogs: They had a special ... a 1/2 pound hot dog, straight from the grill for $7.50. Nancy had an Italian sausage. We both had peppers and onions. For me, it was quantity over quality. The first bite was great and it was downhill from there. The bun was too big and not terribly fresh. The mustard was standard fare. Nancy said the Italian sausage was ok. She gave it a "7.5". I gave my dog a "7" ("8" for the first bite down to a "6" by the last bite ... for an average of "7").

We now begin our trek back east. Phoenix and very hot weather again here we come!

1 comment:

stevegarfinkel said...

wouldn't that be an inaccurate rating. If you figure for the standard hot dog you would have lets say 6 bites from the hot dog. That gives you an 8 for the first bite and a 6 for the last 5 bites. That gives you approximately a 6.3334 rating.