james' blog...

james' blog...
misc ramblings n' thoughts...

Tuesday, April 06, 2004

Opening Day...

So went to opening day at the SkyDome. Jays got hammered by the woeful Tigers 7-0 but it was still a fun day. Got tickets from scalpers for 8 bucks, with of course some good negotiating and bargaining tactics. Since it was opening day, they were giving out packs limited edition UpperDeck PowerUp cards (3 cards per pack per person.) After 4-0, a few of us decided to go scope out the dome and get some mementos (for me, a frugal Chinese student, this was signing up for the Mastercard free Jays visor.) Sam and I stumbled upon more packs of these cards and after collecting about 30 of them, the hunt was on. Will, Sam and I were determined to collect all the cards to make the complete 100-card set. Keep in mind you only get 3 cards per person when you enter the stadium.

Flashback to my wonderful childhood. I grew up collecting baseball cards. I still remember getting my first ever 1990 red-bordered black-dotted Donruss pack of cards at PharmaPlus that my mom bought me. I remember clearly the Henry something (Ok, so I don't remember every detail) baseball card. He was there in all his glory, bright blue uniform and swinging at the pitch (and since he was a no-name, probably missing badly.) Thus marked the beginning of my love of baseball cards and from then on, it consumed me and captivated me, like Smeagol to his Ring. (Ok, so there's a slight exaggeration there.) I've collected boxes of cards, stayed up late memorizing the stats (along with the height and birthdays) of players, played my own "fantasy baseball" with them by making teams, traded and re-traded cards, among other things. It's always been one of my biggest hobbies.

Fast forward back to today. We scoured the entire 500 level of the stadium, circling the entire dome and going up and down all the stairs, walking through almost every row. It was quite a workout I must admit. We were startin' to sweat, it was hot, we were tired but we kept going. We'd find entire packs left on the floor that people didn't even bother opening and also find individual cards left lying around. I remember seeing Ichiro still in its original package, but drenched in Coke and peanut shells. It was one we didn't have yet but to go through all that goo... (we picked it up anyways). In the end, we had almost 400 cards. We sorted them through the doubles, the triples, the quardruples. In the end, we were 7 short of a full set, but it made the day fun anyways. Did I mention the Jays got hammered 7-0?

Edit: Since then, the Jays have been officially swept by the 4-0 Detroit Tigers. And I'm still missing 7 cards for the set. It's going to be a long season. On another note, anyone want to go to $2 Jays game in May?

posted by jamescl | 12:01 AM

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