Take Us Out to the Ballgame...
But First How's About an Oyster? 

A 'doublie' taken Father's Day Miller Stadium Milwaukee

When traveling with wild baseball hooligans, it's hard to predict what might happen next.  Not that the standard long drive to the sports city isn't enough to stir things up – the sibling fighting, the hunger pains (the sugar pains more like it), the borrrrrrdom – but what happens when you get there and find out that some of those stand-by entertainments of old don't cut it anymore?  

Indoor Waterpark at Mpls. Downtown Marriott Depot

What is a father of wild baseball hooligans to do?  Well, when in Minneapolis, you take 

them shopping, admire the architecture along the way, consider the history of the place,  

go to a good restaurant before the ballgame, and hope for fireworks at night's end of course.  Carly's first oyster experience at McCormick and Schmick's on Nicollet Mall, above, came verrrry cautiously.  Some poking and prodding of the slimy gray goo and finally a licking of the finger convinced her that Blue Points and St. James Rivers might not be her thing.  The Popcorn shrimp was darned good though!  Only five blocks around the corner the new Target Twins Stadium stood, open air, still under a 6 o'clock sunlight, clean, quiet and cheery.

One stadium beer and two innings later, well, we tried some shopping (the poor Twinkies were getting beat good by that time), and came back for a few innings more and enjoyed some very fortunate seats.  By the seventh inning, all wild baseball hooligans were ready to walk back to the motel, only a ten minute walk away.  As we sat in our little hotel chairs and pull out couch watching the newest Muppet motion picture, out our third floor window, framed as though a TV in itself, fireworks started to flash up above the apartment complex across the street and went on for half an hour – the largest show we've ever seen in our lives.  

We kept one eye on the Muppets and one on the fireworks until they finally died down and the traffic outside slowed to a quiet rolling murmur.  The next morning, I walked a block down toward the river to see where the fireworks must have launched from.  Mill Run Park at St. Anthony Falls, the grandest of historical parks in the city, offering long biking, walking and viewing areas.

 Time to head back home and start planning for the next baseball trip.