longer.blue

Went to an Orioles game, for the first time in years last night (for those who don't know: when I got into baseball as a kid, the O's were the closest team and had the great Cal Ripken Jr. playing for them, so they became my team but I jumped ship when the Nationals came to DC, because i'm from DC proper) and I have thoughts. 1) Camden Yards is still lovely and one of the best stadiums. Ekiben was some of the best stadium food we've had. 1a) there needs to be clearer signage for seating areas on the concourse. 2) for some reason the netting around the lower sections, which we're all used to now, felt more noticeable. 3) The announcement side of the PA system needed to be just a tick or 2 louder. They also just rolled right into the 7th inning stretch, which felt weird and a lot of fans around us were like "oh it's started." The Nats not only pause before starting, but make sure all PA audio is loud. 4) one of the grab and go places was very chaotic: staff had left out their stock sheet and a chair by one of the counters and another staff, when we asked about any NA beer (which wasn't clear anywhere online) very brusquely said "yeah, there's a whole bunch right there" and pointed to a cooler where we'd looked. We didn't initially see it because it was at the bottom and honestly needed to be labelled. 5) Relatedly: at the same grab and go, after I grabbed a blue moon, a tall guy in a white polo just grabbed the standing cooler door from behind me to keep it open so he could grab something while behind me. It was a forceful grab of the door too. Made me think "alright, sir. yeesh". There just seemed to be less courtesy. The game itself was very fun.