Went to the Bulls game w/ S & D last night. Very exciting game -- here's a recap from the Indy. Included two "home runs" that were over-ruled by the umpires. The first one, I think, hit the fence above the Blue Monster and I (and most of the crowd) thought it should have been a home run. In his recap, Sobsey states pretty categorically that the fence is considered in play. Weirdly enough, a similar thing happened later in the game, this time out in center field. The ball cleared the wall but not the outer fence. The umps called it a homer but after Rochester complained they reversed it to a ground rule double. Lots of booing and yelling from the crowd. Best line: "what do you have against home runs!" But the next batter pounded out into the bull (of "hit bull, win steak" fame) and that was all the runs Durham needed. BTW, we were sitting down the third base line with a good view of the bull and I think Sobsey's wrong on Chavez hitting the grass. It looked to me like it hit smack on the brisket.
Also adding the late game excitement was a looming thunderstorm. We knew it was supposed to start raining sometime last night. About the fifth or sixth inning, the wind started to pick up and it started smelling like rain. We started seeing lightning and heard thunder a couple of times. In the eighth (I think) we started feeling the occasional raindrop and the grounds crew took up positions by the tarp. Which was right near us so we got to hear them planning and following the storm. As the last fly ball was caught out in center, I looked up and could see the rain coming down. There was a moment when it was raining in right field but not in left. So we all beat a retreat but since we'd had dinner at Bull McCabe's we were parked on the other side of downtown. Got about halfway there before the skies just opened up. Probably we should have waited it out in the car but it didn't seem that bad. But it actually was one of the worst rains I've ever tried to drive thru. There were multiple times when it was raining so hard I could barely see the road. Only the fact that I was driving a route that I travel almost every single day kept it from being the absolute worst. But it's right up there with the hailstorm we got caught in driving back from Greensboro. The worst weather I've ever had to drive thru was a super-thick fog on 421 up in the mountains near Boone.