Volcanoes

This morning I asked Ru if he wanted to go to Silver Falls and he said "NO".  We puttered around the house, played some vid games, ate yummy eggs.  I was informed that today's eggs were the "best eggs in the whole world ever" because they had cheese in the middle just how he liked it. My egg whites were boring by comparison.  Late morning we got on our bikes and rode to Ruben's old school, Queen of Peace, to pay off his final bill and get his report card.  Ru got all A's and B's on his academic tasks.  I was super proud of him. We rode to free lunch and ate with our friends from our apartment complex.  Lunch was not appealing to Ru so we came home and had PB and J.

I have this list of things that I wanted to do this summer that I made back in April.  It is a mix of things from a travel guide, and what my coworkers told me might be fun.  I looked it over and thought a ballgame would be fun.  Ru was game so I ordered us some tickets.

The list of fun things to (maybe) do this summer

 Ru went out to ride bikes with the sweet neighbor boys and I cleaned up a bit and got ready to go.  Just as we were about to leave our neighbor Michael brought over half of a watermelon.  It was incredibly delicious, and we shared it with Ruben's friends.

We took the back roads in the convertible to the stadium which is just off the freeway in Keizer.  Arriving just in time to find our seats in the bleachers we stood to sing the National Anthem.  The Volcanoes were celebrating local military personnel and the entire stadium was decorated with flags.  Ru and I were laughing about not knowing which one to salute.

We made it!

Which do we salute?

It turned out to be a great game.  The Volcanoes were playing Vancouver, and Vancouver kept making errors.  There were two points in the game when the Volcanoes had bases loaded.  In the end they won 5-3. Ruben was having a blast in the stands.  He would read the board and stomp, yell, sing, clap, and hoot more enthusiastically than most of the people in our section.  We had a great time and probably crossed the line into obnoxious more than once.  We kept giggling about how often the batters and pitchers had to adjust their "junk" and the funny dance moves the batters make just before they swing.  We ate chicken strips and fries, and we had popsicle.  I am sad to report that the Volcanoes stadium does not have ice cream in a hat. Good thing we are going to an Em's game in August in Eugene with Betsy and Robert.  We will get ice cream in a hat eventually.
 The Volcano's mascot is called "Crater" but some locals let us in on the secret that everyone calls him "Spew", I guess cause that's what Volcanoes do...

Not as good as ice cream in a hat.

Crater (Spew) the mascot

Bases are loaded, the excitement builds.

Because it was 4th of July weekend they were having fireworks after the game.  We stuck around for the show, to get the most bang for our buck (that was for you Jeff) and weren't expecting much.  The stadium was only 1/3 full, and lots of people had left early when they had finished introducing the service members.
However, the fireworks were extraordinary.  They blew away the show we saw on the 4th of July.  They may not have been as big but they were closer, and there was patriotic music blasting from the loudspeaker, and the crowd of tipsy adults and little kids may have been sparse but they made up for it in spirit. Ru was bouncing on the bleacher in joy and oooohing and aaaaahhhing so much I got a little drippy eyed.  It may be the best $30 spent this summer.