Boyer we Texas Ranger fans!

Boyer we fans....get it? Boy-are-we? Cute, huh? But seriously, we are huge Texas Ranger fans in this house. Mostly Trent, but he's slowly teaching me more about baseball and about all of the players. I say that we are big fans because well, we drove 6 hours to Detroit to be in attendance at their game, we sat and cheered for the Rangers in a purely orange, white and black Tiger crowd, and we drove 6 hours back all in the same day!

Nelson Cruz, who will be our second son's namesake according to Trent...we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. ;) Our first son will be named Dirk, apparently.

In front of Comerica Park. It's a beautiful stadium that you can see into from the street level almost. It's also home to a ferris wheel and a merry-go-round. Comerica Park has a circus-like feel to it. Trent was quite giddy at the time of this photo.

This all started on Monday when Trent was listening to some baseball highlights. He said, "Wouldn't it be awesome to go to one of these games?"

To which I replied, "Well, why don't you?" I'm a big believer in taking advantage of opportunities and pursuing your dreams. How often is Trent able to see his team play in contention for a spot at the World Series AND so close to home?




We looked up tickets and to our surprise, they were relatively cheap. Good seats went for thousands of dollars, of course, but we just wanted something fairly close to the field. We paid $50 a ticket. What a steal! And as can see, we were not even close to sitting in the nosebleeds.

We'd never been to Detroit before and knew of no one in the area. We figured we would drive up there a bit early. Snag a good and cheap parking spot, and then grab 2-for-1 Quizno's (I had a coupon!) So we set out at 8 am, made good time on I-75 and pulled into Detroit right before 3 pm.

We had an hour and twenty minutes before the first pitch, so we walked to Quizno's which happened

to be right across from The Guardian Building. I fell in love with it. I'm not normally an Art Deco-type person, but this building was incredible. Even from blocks away in the skyline I kept looking at it and thinking, "I want to get a closer look!" So we sat and ate our lunch at a window   looking out at the gorgeous architecture. I could probably do a whole post on all of the gorgeous buildings that I love out East, so I'll save that discussion for another day.

Walking around downtown Detroit was a lot of fun. Granted, we only really walked a 5-block radius or so, but it was a good taste of what the area was like. I'll admit we'd heard over the years about how Detroit is so run down, the economy is bad,  there are homeless people rampant in the city, and it's a shady town to be in. I didn't feel unsafe at all while I was there and the people were very friendly. All of the downtown shops did close at 5 pm, though, so maybe that's an indication of some, ahem, unwanted night time activity.

Detroit is just a stone's throw from Canada. Those buildings behind me on the river are on Canadian soil. There are several signs downtown that point to "The Canada Tunnel" and the Canada bridge. If we'd had more time, it would have been fun to go and see Canada for a wee bit.

This was in the earlier innings when the Rangers were winning. We were quiet Ranger fans. We were completely surrounded by Tigers fans. The guys next to us heard early on that we were cheering for the Rangers and they teased us throughout the whole game. It was good to have some friendly competition for once and not to be picked on for the team you cheer for! 

 You may look at our attire and ask, If you're such big Rangers fans, why don't you have a Rangers hat or at least a Rangers shirt or something?? Well there are two answers to that: One, we didn't want to stand out among all Detroit fans and Two, we're too poor to buy that kind of stuff, duh!

A lot of the fans are die-hards and they really enjoy getting into the game. A man in front of us had his baseball glove on and kept standing up throughout the innings with it. Apparently he wanted to catch a grand slam. Unfortunately, none ever made it to our section.

In the 8th Inning, the Rangers were behind 4-7. Nelson Cruz stepped up to plate, hit a homer, and brought the score up, 5-7. It was incredible. I jumped up and down and screamed several times out of excitement. I looked over to Trent who was staring at me with disbelief. "I was just excited for something to finally happen!!" The next two Rangers hit grounders to get onto base. Michael Young stepped up to plate and didn't deliver. If he had, they could have won the game. Grrr. Every time his picture came up on the screen, I'd say, "Man, he looks so old!" Now I really don't like him.  This isn't a picture of Michael Young, by the way. It's Josh Hamilton. He's a keeper.

The end score: 7 to 5, Tigers won.

At the end of the game, I wanted a picture of us with the field in the background. And no, Trent isn't crying. That would make the story behind this picture even better.

This is a good picture of the Chevy fountain. Every time the Tigers made a good play, this fountain would shoot 20 to 40 foot streams of water into the air. It was really cool. I'd imagine that this fountain doubles as a misting system for the fans sitting directly below it...for better and for worse.

The Guardian Building again. . .

Last one, I promise!