Doug Glanville on Opening Day(s)...this is funny

[caulfield12]

Even stranger was the surreal experience at Olympic Stadium in Montreal. It was during that season when hardly anyone was going to Expos games. (Which of those seasons, you ask? Be nice....). Playing there was like entering some sort of time-space vortex where you would get out of bed, walk to the train station, travel underground to the bowels of the stadium and take the elevator to the locker-room level. Once you got on the train, you did not see daylight. The game could have been at noon, it could have been at midnight, and you would not have known the difference.

 

With the domed stadium only partly filled with fans, every ball hit and every conversation sounded like it was going through something Alexander Graham Bell was about to throw in the trash. Everything echoed, and the sound system made it sound like the announcer was speaking from a submarine booth 1,000 leagues under the sea. To top it off, he spoke in two languages, English and French, and the sound was so bad that no one could tell which one he was speaking in. As far as I was concerned, we were on the surface of Mars.

 

To kick off their opening day, the Montreal Expos took a creative page from the hit show “Survivor.” They had dramatic drumming, a dance team, tiki lamps with flames, and grass skirts. The players went out to their positions and snuffed out their lamps like they were eliminating someone. Since most opening days revolved around fireworks, Blue Angels, parachutes and flying mascots, the burning tiki lamps really took us to a new place. It’s really too bad only a handful of people were at the game, because it was the most creative opening day I had ever seen.

 

 

from the front page of today's NY TIMES

 

[iWiN4PreP]

Chuckled, good stuff haha thanks