The last two nights at the Dome I was joined by Matt Winters from Irvine, Cali.  Matt and me had been e-mailing for a bit regarding his trip up to Minnesota.  It turned out Matt was an experienced ballhawk who would have done just fine without any pointers from Ol Big Gloveski.

Matt and myself met at gate H on Friday night.  I was stoked since the crowd was light and on Friday the gates open a half hour earlier for extended ballhawking.  I ran in search of Easter eggs and found nothing.  I started working on a group of Twins in left field but they where tossing balls to strictly kids…if anyone at all.

I ranged over to left center where I got Carlos Gomez to toss me my first ball of the day.  I have let Carlos borrow the big glove on a couple of occasions so it didn’t surprise me that he looked out for his bald headed buddy over a bunch of screeching punks.  I also speak to Carlos in his native tounge which has to help.

The outfield was dead so I ranged over to where some Mariners were warming up.  The players quickly spotted the big mitt and laughed.  I knew someone would hook me up.  I then asked for a ball in spanish. I didn’t really need to ask anyone in particular since the M’s roster reads like the employee list at the local mexican restaurant I frequent.  I was quickly hooked up with an orb.  That was ball #2 on the day.

I ranged further over along the right field line to start to work on David Aardsma.  As I was waiting for David to finish warming up I heard a ball bounce off the seats to my left and I scrambled for ball #3 on the day.

When I asked David for the warm up ball he told me that I have enough balls.  Thanks for noticing David but how many people that ask you for balls tell you the High School you went to??  Oh well.

I ranged all the way over to left field but was shut out by a group that said they saw me get a ball earlier.

Total was 3 balls on the day.  Guest ballhawk Matt made a real nice accounting of himself with a 4 ball effort, including a nice commemorative.

Fast forward to Saturday night’s tilt.  I was running a bit late due to an accident on the freeway.  How could those inconsiderate pricks crash and block my way to ballhawk?  We need tighter borders I tell ya. When I got to the dome, Matt was there at the front of the line.  I sized up the crowd behind him as a bunch of sniveling cowards and pencil necks that wouldn’t say a thing if I joined Matt at the front of the line and did just that.

Being in first was of zero benefit since there were no Easter eggs to be found for the second straight night.

The crowd was bigger and I didn’t see there being much hope in the outfield.  I went over to right field were I asked Jose Mirares for a ball in Spanish.  He airmailed it to me and even if I was 10 foot tall I couldn’t have reached it.  This worthless kid, all of 11 years old, not wearing a glove or any team gear grabbed the ball and started celebrating as if that petrified old fossil Ed McMahon just showed up with a 10 million dollar check.  I hope the kid get bullied in school and has to drop out and turn to a life of juvenile male prositution.  Okay, so maybe that is a bit harsh.  But I hope he fails one of his finals.

A couple of minutes later, Luis Ayala threw me a ball.  I snared it clean and then he started yelling at me.  I thought he wanted me to give the ball to the kid.  I told him the kid already scored the last ball meant for me.  It turned out that he was yelling for me to toss him the big glove.

I tossed Luis the big glove and the Twins in right field had a gay ol time playing around with it.  After about 15 minutes of corking around with my mitt, Jose Mirares returned it to me with another pelota!  That is a ball for my friends that don’t speak the Espanol.  That made 2 for the day.

I went over to my seat and saw a Mariners coach hitting fungoes to the first baseman.  Judging by the advanced age of the coach I wasn’t sure he could even hear, but I gave it a shot.  I yelled at him to hit me a fungo.  He said he couldn’t.  So, I asked him to toss me a ball.  That silver haired, geritol swigging geezer aired it out!  He handcuffed me with his hard throw the ball bounced off of my forearm and up a couple of rows.  I scurried and was the first to reach it for ball #3.  To be fair, I didn’t have to scurry too fast since the only one near the ball was a father feeding his baby a bottle.

The ball I am most proud of is ball #4.  Joe Mauer received both his gold glove and silver slugger awards tonight.  Joe always throws balls to kids.  I don’t know if I have even really seen him single out a hot piece of *** to toss a ball to.

Well, apparently the big glove was enough of a draw that Joe singled my *** out and tossed me a ball the I fielded cleanly.  Right after that my phone started ringing and people were telling me that Twins commentator Bert Blyleven had once again “circled” me with the telestrator and named me the Mountain Dew fan of the game.  What a nice gesture.  I didn’t even get so much as a can of Dew for the honor.  But, it was nice to have strangers come up to me at the bar after the game and notice me.

4 for me on the tilt.  Not bad at all.  Guest ballhawk Matt Winters had an exceptional outing of 5 balls.  All in all it was a fun two nights that saw both Matt and I have some success and saw the Twins win a couple of games.