Philadelphia, PA
That was a five-hundred dollar rainout. The best part of the entire evening was the realization that even though every being in the five boroughs knew from two o’clock in the afternoon that there would be no baseball tonight, the Mets kept all of us hanging around, spending money, drinking beer and eating overpriced hot dogs for ninety minutes. Then, when they decided they’d made enough dough off the suckers they unceremoniously threw us out on the streets of Queens. I actually had a docent come up to me and say, “We’re closing guys. Get out.”
I can’t say it was a wasted day though. I had a spectacular hotel in midtown with a view of the Empire State Building. I got to walk around Flushing Meadows Park – site of the 1939-1940 and 1964-1965 World’s Fairs – and see some of the remaining monuments and pavilions: including the “Panorama of the City of New York” which alone was worth the five bills. I got to go into Shea Stadium in the last weeks of its existence and see the pathetic imitation of Ebbets Field rising next door.
And then I got up at the ass-crack of dawn and got to spend the entire day with almost everyone in my extended family. And that made it all worthwhile.