Game number 8/30 came to us from the city of Houston in South-East Texas (basically right on the gulf of Mexico). I managed to survive my flight from Denver only using the bathroom twice – quite the feat from me – and pleasingly the plane arrived 20 minutes early.
As soon as I got off the plane and outside the MASSIVE Houston Airport, the humidity and heat hit me like a ton of bricks. Most people that know my wardrobe will attest that 90% of my t-shirts are grey, so this made for a pleasing spectacle for locals as I sweated up a storm waiting for my UBER ride.
Arriving at my Air Bnb in the “Historic District” of Downtown Houston (located on the North Side of the city), I was greeted by my host “Devon”, a HUGE Houston local (too shy for a picture), that gave me a tour of the historical mansion that had been converted into a hotel of sorts with my own private room and bathroom – I’d highly recommend this place if you ever find yourself in Houston.
Not having much time before the game began, I showered, grabbed my ticket (shouout foodora for the ticket), and put on my Super Bowl XXXVIII Hawaiian Shirt (Patriots over Panthers) as this game was played in Houston and was a nice tie-in that’d surely get me over with the locals.
I arrived at “Minute Maid Park” – home of the local Houston Astros – did a few laps of the perimeter (it pretty much looks just like a massive building with some interesting statues outside), and decided to cool down by having a couple at the dive bar across the street “HTX Fan Tavern”.
Once my whistle was whet, I made my way into the ballpark, which much like Phoenix had a closed roof and PUMPING Air Con (thank god).
The park also had some neat features (see above) such as a train that runs above left field (if someone could explain this to me that’d be great – I assume it’s sponsorship?), plenty of decals highlighting Houston’s triumph in the 2017 World Series, and what has been by FAR the best mascot I’ve seen (apologies to the Elephant in Oakland), “Orbit”.
I assume Orbit is meant to be some alien (shoutout Mark Williams – they’re real god dammit), that fires up the crowd, plays pranks on opposition players (not during play of course), and pretty much has a hand in every activity on game day. They posted a highlights video at the stadium, so check this out via the YouTube below – you won’t be disappointed (note these are from 2016).
The game itself was a beauty, with a big Texan crowd getting LOUD for the Astros contrasted by a decent turn out for the always popular Boston Red Sox who to be fair made just as much noise when their boys went up 2 runs (after a BOMB 2-run homer) in the top of the first.
Houston would get on the board in the bottom of the first with a solo home run of their own which is how the game would stay until the fifth when the Red Sox would tack on 1 run for a 3-1 lead heading into the sixth.
Houston would rally in the seventh reeling in two runs after some solid hitting and Red Sox errors, however power hitting and getting runners on base would prove the difference as the Red Sox piled on another run in the eighth and two in the ninth for a 9-3 victory.
An exciting and fun game for sure, but it was the little differences in the Texas ballpark that made it a unique experience for me.
First off, cheerleaders aren’t a massive thing in baseball, they’re typically reserved for football and you’ll probably see some dancers at an NBA game, so that was very interesting to see (they had plenty of interaction with Orbit too which was a lot of fun).
Secondly, following the traditional singing of “Take Me Out To The Ball Game”, the Houston crowd then all joins together to sing another song “Deep in the Heart of Texas”. A cool tradition that is unique to the Astros, which made me feel as if the locals perhaps viewed themselves as “Texans” first and as “Americans” second. In any case, check the song below (it’ll be stuck in your head all day).
As I was leaving the game, I could see lightning outside and knew I could be in for one of those Gulf Coast storms you hear about. Sure enough, as I exited rain was HAMMERING down and you could legitimately see lightning was striking the buildings in the Downtown area. A situation for sure, but besides getting wet feet, like the hero I am I made it through once again surviving in a situation where a lesser man would have perhaps perished!
I’ll be checking out some more of the historical neighbourhood I’m staying in today, before flying back to Denver to grab my car and continue my quest East for game 9/10 in St Louis Missouri! It’ll likely be at least a two day drive, so I’ll be keeping you all updated via all channels and the blog of this drive through corn fields and ummmmm corn fields.
Also, a quick shoutout to my guy Sam Wolff-Gillings (SWG), for providing feedback and putting together this map of the journey so far – Sam, if you’d like an internship with GDThirtybefore30 it’s yours!
Until then, please enjoy some more pictures from last night!
Thirty before 30 
Aliens are not real god dammit!
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