My Last Yankees Game at Yankee Stadium

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

In case you don't know, they are tearing down Yankee stadium. I wasn't planning on going to another game because the price of tickets have skyrocketed with the end drawing closer, but then a friend called me up last night and asked me if I wanted to go.

Of course I did. We had a great seats, so it was a great send off to good ole' Yankee Stadium. Here are some other pictures I took during the evening.

This board counts down the games left in the stadium.

The Yankees beat the Chicago White Sox. This is Yankees playing nice at the end of the game.

The grounds crew performs YMCA as they smooth out the clay.

September 11th

Last year, I didn't realize it was September 11th until later in the evening and by then I was too tired to go down and see ground zero and the beams of light. I decided I wouldn't let that happen this year.

It was a very somber experience. Everyone was really quiet, but there were people everywhere. There were makeshift memorials set up along the fences surrounding ground zero.

As I walked around, I saw so many people in uniforms. Some were firefighters, some were police officers, and some were in the armed forces. This place means a lot to them. There is a large ramp that goes down into the pit (for construction purposes). There were flags from all the different countries of people who died in the tragedy lining the ramp.

A lot of people who went down to the site realized for the first time that the beams of light representing the two towers are not actually on the site of the towers. They are about 4 blocks south of ground zero. They sit on top of a parking structure because of all of the work going on at the site. Supposedly, this is the last year they are supposed to have the beams of light.

Then, I stopped a the fire station that sits across the street from ground zero. Inside you could see the memorial for the firefighters that lost their lives from this station. It was very touching.

It was a great experience that I will always remember. I think I went 2 hours without speaking which gave me time to reflect on what had happened 7 years ago.

Trip Home

Thursday, September 4, 2008

It has been nine months, but I finally returned home to California to visit. I've seen some of my family on vacations since Christmas, but I never actually went home. I guess it was because I thought I would be moving to Utah where it is a lot cheaper and quicker to get home.

It was such a great, relaxing trip. I flew in late Wednesday night. On Thursday, we just lounged around, played with the kids, went to the pool and then headed out on the boat. It had been over a year since I had last been wakeboarding, which I definitely noticed. Unfortunately the water wasn't very good, so we switched to the tube. That night, my older brother and older sister came over for a big BBQ. I realized how much I missed home cooked meals.

Then on Friday, we woke up and went to Disneyland. It is so much fun to go to a Disney park with kids! They make it so exciting to see how excited they are for the rides and characters. The kids were so good all day, even though they were catering to me. It was the first time that I had been to California Adventure, which has a lot of cool rides. Here's some pictures from our adventure.

Then the rest of the weekend we just lounged around and enjoyed each other's company. We played some Wii at my brothers and had another BBQ. On Sunday, we celebrated my nephew's first birthday. He wasn't as excited as we would have hoped, but I think he still had fun. He had his own cake to play in and made a mess with it.

It doesn't necessarily take living far away to realize how much your family means to you, but it definitely solidifies it. I loved being with them and miss having them around.

U.S. Open

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Another checkmark added to my list. One more thing you can only do in New York is attend the U.S. Open. I only attended an evening session, so I just went to the main stadium. They have almost 15 different courts with all different games going on at the same time though. It's pretty cool. We went the 2nd night of the open, but still saw Venus Williams and Roger Federer play. It was great. I've never really watched tennis on TV before, but it's quite exciting live. Here's some shots we took.

This is Venus serving.

And here's Federer.