Well the weekend started out bright and early on Saturday morning as the game in Cleveland had been moved up from a 7:05 start to a 1:00 start. We got rolling about 4:30am heading east to the Cleveland a.k.a. “The Mistake By the Lake”. Traffic was pretty light the entire way there and I did not get passed by anyone the through the entire state of Indiana. “They call him the Bandit.” Then we get into Ohio and things started to stink. Ohio has a turnpike which I believe is a form of the Latin word which means “gigantic pain in the ass”. Basically you stop at a booth and get a ticket and then pay a toll when you get off the road. Its really incredibly stupid if you ask me, a grand total of right around $5.00 to get across most of Ohio. They drive slow in Ohio and there is really nothing to see.
We get to the Jacobs Field to see the Indians and Reds play. The park is right next to where the Cavs play and the parking situation in the area is really top notch. There was a pretty good size crowd on hand at the game and plenty of parking available, cost us $12. Jacobs Field is pretty solid but nothing really really outstanding in regards to the whole place. I would consider going back to a game there and Cleveland contrary to popular belief didn’t seem that bad, comparatively speaking. Trust me read on.
After the game we drove around Cleveland a little while and saw the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame which really didn’t look like that big of a deal and then headed to the hotel. The hotel was back east about an hour closer to Detroit which was stop two. We get to the hotel and it was basically out in the middle of nowhere. It was like the type of hotel you would take someone you had kidnapped and trying to hide out. This was like the type of place where the mob dumps bodies never to be found. The capper to the whole first night hotel was that the place was sort of a crap hole, and crap hole is a fitting term considering what happened Sunday morning. We all wake up to head up north to Detroit and I’m the first one in the shower. I go into the bathroom and there’s a little deposit somebody left in the toilet. I figure V2 got up late at night and didn’t flush because he didn’t want to wake us up, no big deal. I go ahead and take a leak and flush the toilet…..and it doesn’t really flush the water rises and then lowers a little bit. V2 broke the toilet and was the first running joke of the weekend. Of course he heard plenty about it at each and every opportunity.
After v2 broke the toilet we really had to high tail it out of there because the we had the toilet breaking bandit with us and head to Detroit. We stopped at Tim Horton’s which is Canada’s version of Dunkin Dounts just south of Toledo, Ohio. Of all the towns that we saw on this 1000+ mile trip Toledo was the most crap-tacular. There is nothing really going on in Toledo and it seemed like a ghost town. We got off the expressway to check out where the famous Toledo Mudhens play. Aside from the decent minor league stadium the rest of the Toledo was an armpit. Toledo got bad reviews all around.
Once we got to Detroit we saw old Tiger Stadium on the way and rolled to Comerica Park. Seriously folks Comerica Park is a friggin’ gem of a stadium. People who say its in a bad part of town I don’t know what they are talking about. The area the stadium was in wasn’t that bad at all. The level that Detroit has pimped out the Tiger theme on the stadium is really top notch. The outside of the stadium could be used as the outside of the greatest tiger display at a zoo. There tiger head lights on the outside of the place, four tigers on the roof protecting the place and about a 25 foot high tiger right outside the main gate. There were tigers all over the place. Real good theme to the outside of the park.
Once we got inside we looked around and they have a ferris wheel and carousel in the park and of course both were either Tiger themed or baseball themed. They have a statue of their broadcasting legend Ernie Harwell right inside the park and quite a few different places to get stuff to eat. The only real thing that I would have to say bad was that even with the new ballpark and all the choices some of the lines were still pretty long. We were sitting in right field and the big scoreboard was to our right, and two big tigers were sitting on the top of the scoreboard. They also have a what they call water fireworks to entertain between inning and so forth in center field. There was a real big crowd on hand as they set a record of a three game series at Comerica that weekend. I got the feeling of a lot of bandwagon jumping on the Tigers but you can almost expect that anywhere. I’m sure if the Tigers weren’t playing well it wouldn’t have been so packed. V2 also got a autographed ball of Cardinals closer Jason Isringhausen, sucks though because the Cards lost and have been playing terrible.
After the game was over we headed out to Livonia to the hotel. This time it was much better then the last one we were in where V2 broke the toilet. We sat around there a little while after we checked in and then we were going to head out to find 8 Mile Road, cause that’s how we roll. We find 8 Mile and take some pictures with the sign looking like total douches, but you sort of expect that now don’t you. Then we got some Little Ceasar’s pizza since the one in the hood closed down. It’s not the best pizza by far but its cheap and gets the job done.
Then on the way back to the hotel which is on this frontage road type thing right off the expressway a little baby duck (EDIT: Ilooked online it was a mallard duckling) runs out across the street right as we get back to the hotel. I hit the brakes and hoped I didn’t hit the little dude. We pull into the hotel parking lot and the little duck is running alongside the curb in the other lane. This little duck is motoring the other way and I get out and chase after him to get him out of the road. Picture this a little duck about the height of a regular gym shoe and me running up to catch it and send it the other way to corral it. I got him heading back to the hotel and my brother stuck his foot out and I got him into my hat. I didn’t want to touch him because I know how wild animals are sometimes if they get a human scent on them. Anyway I end up picking him up in my hat and head around the side of this business to see if I can see his mom. As I’m walking over there he takes a dive out of the hat so I have to pick him up again in the hat. The entire time this is happening V2 is taking pictures and laughing at the whole thing. I get the duck to the entrance of the building and he’s trying to jump up into the glass front door of the building. I stuck him in a bush and couldn’t hear him making the noise anymore so hopefully Monday morning someone at the place found him and took care of him.
Monday morning we were going to head across the river to Windsor Canada just for the heck of it. We had all our paperwork with us to get in and went international. On the way over we took the tunnel for who knows what reason. On the American side we pay our toll go through the tunnel and then at the Canadian border encounter a real Canadian **** at the booth. This old bag asks us if we have our Nexus card and I’m like what are you talking about. She says this booth is for people with this card and I said where did it say that. She says it said it in the tunnel (it didn’t) and all over the place. The first and only mention I saw of this card was on the booth……that she was sitting in. Anyway she’s in her ****y mood and asks if we have our paperwork (birth certificates) and I giver her the 3 of them. She looks over them and then hands them back to me and says, “Next time you come over and don’t have proper paperwork we can turn you back at the border.” I said, “What are you talking about its all right there?” Then she says, “How many of you are in the car?” I shot back, “There are only three of us.” Then she motions towards the back seat closest to her and said, “That looked like another person.” Ready for the punch line? This stupid Canadian **** thought a hat on top of a small cooler looked like a person! Some real eagle eyed border folks you got working for you Canada. I guess a small cooler and a hat looks like a person when its only like 4 feet from you. This whole incident got my Canada experience off to a rousing start. I just wanted to say, “I’m from a world super power you 65 year old Canadian bag! Let me in now!”
Windsor kind of sucked not much going on. They didn’t even have a decent Canadian gimmick store so we ended up stopping in a WalMart after driving around about 90 minutes and then we headed home. No problem getting back in the greatest country in the world of course.
Aside from that Canadian idiot at the border it was all in all a pretty good weekend. I’ll post some pictures here later this week like 8 Mile photos and duck pictures.
EDIT: Geez I almost forgot we were sitting in the hotel in Livonia and an ad for this place came on the TV. I couldn't believe my ears, check it out contrary to the name its nothing dirty
http://www.backdoorfriends.com/
This is an action shot Nate took of me trying to use the hat to guide the duck into the bushes and a safe place. I like the action in this one as the duck is just barely in the frame.
Here's us rolling on 8 Mile. V2 didn't really get the joke since he obviously hadn't seen the movie. I told him to get out of the car and come over by the sign and just said, "Look hard." He actually looks more pissed in the picture than hard. Sometimes he thinks dad is strange. I have another one of me in front of the sign throwing up the shocker. This picture was about 12 hours after V2 broke the toilet.
