Pittsburgh Pirates

Target: Pittsburgh Pirates
Site: pirateball.com
What they sell: Hot dogs
Date: April 14, 2009
Submitted By: Mumpleton Funk

Good afternoon,

I just wanted to take a moment to tell you about my tremendous experience yesterday at opening day with my son Darius. This week Darius turns 9, and I decided to give him a treat and take him to opening day. At 8am, I went to Darius' school and picked him up, my little Darius would be playing hookie today.
At 9am we parked across the Clemente Bridge and made our way towards the ballpark. I decided to walk Darius around the perimeter of the park while we waited for the gates to open.

On our journey we met many nice Pirate fans and even a wise homeless man who was kind enough to take our picture near the Riverwalk. This was a very kind gesture, but unfortunately I think he may have been mildly intoxicated, because you can only see the tops of our heads in the photo. We then made our way to the parking lot and started to mingle with the fellow bucco fans and enjoy some tailgaiting.

It was here that we stumbled upon a group of college kids who were enjoying some drinking games. They took a liking to myself and Darius and invited me to try my luck in a game called "Flip Cup". It had been 15 years since alcohol had touched my lips, but I figured the divorce and criminal charges were in the past and I was a stronger man now.

Boy, was I wrong. The last thing I remember was winning 15 consecutive games of Flip Cup and nearly finishing a case of Old Milwaukee in the process. The next thing I know, I wake up in the bed of a pickup truck with Darius nowhere in site. I immediately began to panic and quickly headed for the stadium. Fortunately the game was only in the 5th inning. While running towards the gate I kept praying that Darius somehow found his way into the park and to our seats. When I reached the gate, I checked my pocket only to find that my ticket was gone! At this point I was too embarrassed to tell the ticket taker what had happened, so I immediately went to the homeplate rotunda entrance and waited.

I had told Darius that if he ever got lost to meet me at the home plate rotunda. I waited for what seemed like hours until finally fans started to emerge from the park. The game had ended and I still hadn't found Darius! Waves and waves of fans exited the park, but no sign of my son. At this point I thought about contacting ballpark security, but finally my fears were extinguished when Darius emerged from the park with the wise old homeless man from before.

The homeless man had followed us into the parking lot and had become concerned when I was nearly unconscious during the drinking games. He didn't want Darius to see me like that, so he checked my pockets and took Darius into the game. At first I was extremely upset that he had done this and upset with myself for allowing it to happen. But then the homeless removed his hat to reveal that he was actually Ben Savage, Hollywood actor, who formerly was Cory Matthews on the hit comedy "Boy Meets World"

I was shocked when cameramen emerged from all directions and began to chuckle and clap. I was completely caught off guard and relieved. Darius had been in on it the whole time, but the college kids and the tailgate was not part of the act. I actually did drink a case of Old Milwaukee and on the way home from the game I was pulled over and got a DUI. My ex-wife Linda had to drive out to the police station to pick Darius up while I spent the night in jail. But the day of fun with Darius, Ben Savage and the college kids will always be remembered.