We wake up way late. Whatever- way late is rapidly becoming a theme on this trip. We check out of the hotel and complete the final leg of our hajj, our sacred journey, and walk over to our Mecca- the Baseball Hall of Fame.
The BHoF has its own field behind it, and we watch an inning of an old-timers game between the Mets and Dodgers. I am bitterly jealous of these old dudes- all I want is to be playing baseball right now. We head into the BHoF, which is both bigger than it appears to be when you're looking at it and smaller than you think it would be before you get there.
We wander through exhibits spanning all of baseball history, and attend a lecture by a guy who just finished a book explaining how the Yankees dynasty of the 1950's was built by putting their people in other organizations and using those people to engineer trades for all those other teams' good players, in very lopsided trades. What they did was equivalent to the St. Louis Cardinals getting a buddy of theirs to buy the Philadelphia Phillies, and then having that guy announce, "yeah, our three best players, Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley, and future Hall of Famer Ryan Howard- what if we traded them to the St. Louis Cardinals for their batboy and a few cases of Bud Light? It's really a good deal for us because we're weak at the batboy position, and we're so tired of getting wasted on the expensive local microbrews." It was a really interesting lecture, and it proved 2 things: (1) that the Phillies should trade Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley, and future Hall of Famer Ryan Howard to the St. Louis Cardinals for their batboy and a few cases of Bud Light, and (2) that the Yankees really are the dirty filthy cheating scum that everyone outside of New York, (and in their heart of hearts, everyone inside New York), thinks they are.
Some pics from the BHoF:
Clang clang clang goes the trolley...
Ed paying homage to his lame Florida Marlins...
And me paying homage to Ozzie Smith and the glorious St. Louis Cardinals. (Wow- it turns out that it really does matter who writes the history...)
After a few hours of wandering around learning about baseball, we head outside for lunch at the Cooperstown Diner. It is pouring rain out by now, and is freezing cold. Since this road trip features a lot of baseball, I silently pray that this trip will not be like the one with Laszlo, where it rained for 80% of the entire trip.
The Cooperstown Diner, which is about the size of a telephone booth, is nevertheless full of yummy things like sloppy joes, tater tots, and hush puppies. I haven't had a sloppy joe in years. Jesus, they're good. And this highlights yet another emerging trend on the trip: we are discovering that even though Ed and I are only collectively 25% white, we have the white-trashiest, most trailerpark taste in food ever. Unless an outside force intervenes, we'll be eating at greasy spoon diners for 3 solid weeks.
From there, we head back to the BHoF for more learning, and for the obligatory souvenir buying. This from Ed:
"I, of course, got a Red Sox hat- they didn't have any Marlins shit that I liked, and I had just come to the realization 24 hours earlier that I actually am a Red Sox fan."
I'm sad that I had to witness such a tragic realization. Watching someone realize they're a Red Sox fan for the first time is like watching someone realize that the ambulance isn't going to get there in time, and they're about to bleed to death. Red Sox motto: "We'll never be half the dirty, filthy, cheating scum the Yankees are, but that won't stop us from trying!"
So it's time to hit the road again. It's a long way to Chicago, our next stop, and we're leaving half a day later than originally planned (but dammit, there was SO much cool stuff to see in the BHoF!), so the goal is just to get as far as possible. But, at least that gives us time to catch up on road trip mixes. First we pop in today's mix:
BMFRTE: 8-20: Songs of Friendship
1) The Dukes of Hazzard - Original TV Theme
2) Stuck in the Middle With You - Stealers Wheel
3) When You Got a Good Friend - Eric Clapton
4) You've Got a Friend in Me - Toy Story soundtrack
5) With a Little Help from My Friends - The Beatles
6) The Monkees - Original TV Theme
7) You've Got a Friend - James Taylor
8) Kryptonite - 3 Doors Down
9) Hablemos de Mismo Idioma - Gloria Estefan
10) Bridge Over Troubled Water - Simon & Garfunkel
11) Hakuna Matata - Lion King soundtrack
12) Laverne & Shirley - Original TV Theme
13) Closer to Fine - Indigo Girls
14) You Can Call Me Al - Paul Simon
15) Mr. Jones - Counting Crows
16) "For He is an Englishman" - Gilbert & Sullivan
17) If I Had a $1,000,000 - Barenaked Ladies
18) Old Friends-Bookends - Simon & Garfunkel
19) Trust Me - AnnMarie Montade
20) Friend Like Me - Aladdin soundtrack
21) Side by Side - Hudson Hawk soundtrack
Too bad we ate in Cooperstown and are running late. I coulda used me some Redneck Bar-B-Que. Lord knows, there's no shortage of rednecks around here to barbeque...Ed and I switch somewhere in NY, and I pop in a new mix. MK was not the only person who donated mixes to this trip:
Guest Mix: Road Trip '07, by Jill
1) Malibu - Hole
2) beautiful Day - U2
3) This Old Heart of Mine - The Isley Brothers
4) Forever Man - Eric Clapton
5) Do Ya - Frehley's Comet
6) Girl - Beck
7) Don't Fear the Reaper - Blue Oyster Cult
8) Cruel Summer - Bananarama
9) Daytripper - The Beatles
10) Fire Woman - The Cult
11) Where the Streets Have No Name - U2
12) Sufragette City - Alice in Chains
13) Anything - Buckcherry
14) All Right Now - Paul Rodgers
15) Crazy - Gnarls Barkley
16) Big - Peter Gabriel
17) Steve McQueen - Sheryl Crow
18) Baba O'Riley - The Who
19) Hotel California - The Gypsy Kings
We're committed to pushing it as far as we can tonight, but it turns out that that's not so far. This from Ed:
"Looking at the road atlas, I discover there is a town in western New York called Cuba. But we're pretty tired, so we don't make it that far. Instead we stop for the night in Elmira after eating our cold slices of day-old pizza- that's right... and they were still delicious."
So there's the outside force- we got into Elmira late enough that everywhere to eat was closed. So instead of eating in a greasy spoon diner, we ate leftover greasy pizza joint food that had been sitting in the car for 24 hours. Mmmm good. Next time you're in Harvard square, pick up some slices from Pinocchio's (or 'Nokes, as the hip young Harvard kids call it). They keep.
So, check into a dingy motel, and since we're still a long way from Chicago, quickly to bed. But not before burning the last few mixes, which Ed took a picture of for some reason...
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