¶ Meeting Baseball Fans Across the Pond
Is anybody there ? I'll tell you , the funny thing about this is like I . You know , I flew over the atlantic ocean and went to a baseball game in london and the weirdest thing about the whole experience to me was seeing the philly fanatic , and mr and mrs met on the field at the same time so cool .
And don't forget , uh , front row , ricky what is front row ?
ricky you , oh , rick feliciano , of course yeah ran into front row ricky , that's right . Ran into rick , feliciano . Noted lehigh valley iron pigs fan at the ball massive fan . I can't hilarious dude yeah , just a hilarious uh happened . Yeah , I knew he was over there , um , but it was just so funny to like , look up .
I was , I was waiting for ranger amy to finish using the restroom and uh , I'm sitting there and my phone battery is on like three percent and I see ricky . And I'm like , oh my god , ricky . And so I , you know , we , you know I'd never met him in person .
So it was a really cool sort of quick moment and I took a picture and said I'll post it on Twitter . And he's like yeah , yeah , yeah , do that . And he's like and I'll retweet it . And literally , I took the picture and I load up Twitter and my phone battery dies .
Whoa .
So I had to wait like four or five hours until after we had gone out to dinner after the game Dude .
I almost texted you and and to tell you I was like hey man , look for Rick , you know . Yeah , I knew he was over there but I was like there's 53,000 people .
I was like he's definitely not in row 64 of the 200 level , so I figured I wasn't going to see him . But it was , yeah , it was , it was really funny to run into him .
The other funny thing that happened was so I was wearing my Phillies overalls , which Twins , I have the Rangers ones from Focum oh sweet .
So I was not alone . And the other thing that I really loved was that , as I would pass British people , they would comment on my dungarees . They said , nice dungarees . And I was just like dungarees is such a great word , right Like for my overalls . And so that was a great little piece of vocabulary right there . But it was my brother , unbeknownst to me .
My brother's a woman my brother works for or works with . She's a . He's basically like his assistant at his law firm . He , he had sent her a picture of . I've never met her before , but he sent her a picture of me in my , in my dungarees , and said this is my brother . He's going to be at the game . If you see him shout his name out .
And so I was at an ice cream truck on the outside concourse and I hear someone yell paul caputo . And I'm like what in the world ? Like who , like how in the world ? So , and then and then I see her and I don't recognize her . I'm just like hi . And she's like do you know who I am ? I just like I'm sorry , I don't .
She's like I'm your dad's assistant . Oh , you're sorry , I'm your brother's assistant . I was like oh my God . So we took a picture and sent it to the family and everyone was cracking up about it .
That's hilarious , awesome . Yeah , that was really funny , you all crossed the pond and then you go meet people from your area A crowd of 55,000 people I ran into two people knew me , so it was , uh , that was .
That was definitely very , very funny , so it was , um , you know . So the other thing about the experience was that it's a multi-purpose stadium but it's currently used for soccer , yeah , and the arrangement of the seats was a little awkward in some places and we had our seats , like I said , we were in the upper deck , pretty close to the top .
We had like the whole stage where they were doing all of like the musical numbers and we're like the fanatic and the mr and mrs met were dancing and there was like sofas on it and like , at one point , like the like , all the like , the pre-game celebrities and everything were just sort of like milling around and like taking pictures with fans and that was
between us and the baseball game and so , like it was , it was a long way to to the baseball game and you know , you got real good at telling whether a pitch was a ball or a strike based on , like , the very subtle movements that the umpire was making , right , so it was , yeah , it was you , it was , you know , we , you were there because of the atmosphere
, right , like it was yeah , it's a once in a lifetime kind of situation that you just you know like .
If you have the opportunity to go and you have the the means to do it , why not ?
yeah it was . It was exactly that , and so ultimately I was super , super glad that I did it right .
Like I've never experienced anything like this , you know I've had , I've had a a number of really great baseball experiences and I feel very lucky to to be able to say that uh , very often traveling with friends , you know we we had our , our curb media meet up uh not too long ago in may that's all about .
It's like this is the second time on a podcast . I I keep hearing about this .
I wish there was another one this year . I would go in a heartbeat .
We should do a corporate media meetup , mini meetup .
A mini meetup . Yeah , so , val , are you based in Las Vegas ?
Yes , I'm based in Las Vegas . I moved here six years ago from Arlington , Texas , so I'm based in Las Vegas . I moved here six years ago from Arlington Texas , so I'm from .
Arlington originally Okay .
Isn't the .
AAA championship happening in Vegas again . It is , it is . There you go , paul , there you go .
I'm thinking about meeting Eric in El Paso at the end of the season , though .
Oh , keep me apprised of that . I can drive to El Paso .
I don't know . I kind of that sounds like an even better idea , because I I want to go to el chihuahua's uh yeah , I've heard that that stadium is amazing .
Yeah , and I would like , I want to go to el paso , just because I've heard that the food in el paso is amazing oh , don't even get me started , for the sake of the time , don't even get it . What's the date of that meetup ?
Eric said it was the last two games of the season , so I don't know off the top of my head , but I will be going to the AAA . I mean I'm 15 minutes away from the stadium , yeah .
Okay . Well , it's not that hard for me to get to Vegas , and Ed and I have been talking about getting out to the AAA championship game a couple of times .
I don't know if Ed has any points left in the chamber here for baseball travel this year , so Eric was actually at the game that I was at . It was the Sounds versus Durham . It was Bulls versus Sounds . Two years ago he was at that game too . Obviously , we didn't know each other . I haven't been since 2022 .
The last game for the El Paso Chihuahua was at home . It's September 10th through the 15th . The last two games is the 14th , which is a Saturday , and 15th , which is a Sunday .
Uh-oh , this is trouble . Eric's about to get stood up again .
I'm going to have to make a decision because okay , so I turned 30 on September 14th . I was going to be in Denver for my birthday for a Rockies-Broncos game .
Yeah , you know who lives in Denver , right .
Yeah .
That guy right there .
If you are in . Did you say a Rockies-Broncos game ?
Yeah , so the Broncos play the Steelers that Sunday , and then the Rockies are going to be in town as well .
Well , keep me apprised of that , because I will come meet you at the , at the , at the rockies game that would be very least you'll go to the the rockies game . Yeah , I don't need to go to a broncos game , but uh but yeah let me know when you're going to be at course field and I will come down decision
¶ Baseball Fanatics Abroad Experiencing Culture
.
I didn't know that . I mean I . I guess I thought I could . I mean , if I can do both , I will . Well , you just said the 10th . If I can do both , I will . Well , you just said the 10th , if I can do both , I will . I can probably do here to El Paso , el Paso , up there .
Well , listen .
Lots of planning going on .
If I know Eric Prophet , he's not going to hold it over your head for the rest of your life ?
No , not at all .
He won't hold it against you two years later still going not at all .
Whoops which by the way , uh , duran bulls did win that series , the championship , when the one you guys were duran bulls , my duran bulls , your duran bulls .
I did see some good um minor league hats over I was just gonna ask you what .
Give me the .
Give me the teams and names , like that you saw there , I saw , I saw some hillsborough hops , really I know in london , uh-huh uh-huh oh my god , yeah yeah , I saw , um , the uh , uh , the modesto nuts .
There was another one that , because I , when I found , um , oh , the frisco rough riders , uh , I saw the rough riders over there yeah I saw the clear water threshers , but that's because I was wearing them um that doesn't count bro .
I did see some lehigh valley iron peg iron pigs on uh rick feliciano , of course I need to know what hat was he wearing that ?
was it the bacon hat , which I think is the coolest hat was ?
it I'd have to he was wearing . He was all yellowed up . I don't think he was wearing the bacon hat . I think he was wearing a yellow .
I think he was wearing the yellow with the pig on it .
Yeah , although you can check my Twitter and it's there . Except you can't , val , because you're not on Twitter . I'm looking it up right now . Okay , yeah , check . You might have to scroll for a little bit .
Yeah , I know that's a lot of helmets going on right now .
The other thing that was interesting . They played , they did the United States National Anthem and then they did God Save the King , which was oh yeah , which was and I'm still not used to it being God Save the King instead of God Save the Queen . They actually changed their anthem based on who the head of the royal family is at that given moment .
Interesting it's been God Save the Queen for so long . I'm not going to lie .
I did love the fact that you found somebody who almost had , like , the same hat as the Newport goals .
Oh yeah , that guy from Italy , yeah .
He's wearing on this one he's wearing the Phillies , all yellow Phillies , with a baseball and the and an Iron Pigs jersey yeah , and a Pigs jersey yellow .
With a heart and the bacon shaping a heart . Yeah , this dude from Italy he was like this was at Trafalgar Square and he shows up and he's in a Phillies jersey and he's in that like Gulls hat . And I was like , do you mind me asking you what that hat is ? I think it's really cool and I knew it looked familiar to me .
But you know , he was like , oh , it's my softball team and it's called , and he says the Italian word for goals , which I can't remember , and uh , and then he's like it's , you know , we're called the goals . And so I was like , okay , that's very cool . I took a picture of it and I posted it .
The moment I posted it , I was just like , wait a minute , that is the Newport goals . That is a logo that already exists Right away . I'm just like , hey , here it looks .
They just changed the colors . Here and there they put a logo on that cap , but it is good for them , though that's awesome .
I don't think the newport goals are going to send a cease and desist to an italian I don't think so .
No , no , I don't think so either .
So , I'm trying to remember some of the other minor league teams I saw over there um was it a queso's hat , or was it ? No , it was . It was actually a Rough Riders t-shirt .
Oh , okay , still very cool . Yeah , it was .
This is the one thing so far that we both disagree on . It's on the queso . Oh yeah , I'd like for my jersey to come in .
You have no idea how I feel .
She's a massive fan of the quesos .
I'm not . No , it's so bad . I'm sorry , man , the Hickory Crawdads . Oh really , that was another one I saw that's a Dan Simon classic so I had to take a picture of it and send it to him . And yeah , I was like what are you doing wearing a Crawdads t-shirt ? And he's like .
I went through there once and I like the logo and I was just like that's what my league baseball is all about there . It is , yeah , that's awesome dude , though . Yeah .
Let me ask you , I want to know . It's like did Major League Baseball do anything as far as like you know , maybe before the game , during a game , after or anything like that Like to educate fans on the game ?
Educate fans on the game , obviously , because there's , like you know , obviously there's a lot of Americans that were going , but also a lot of people from there that were going , like , did they do anything as far as education ?
wise . They did actually . Yeah , it was kind of cool . I mean , especially at the Trafalgar Square thing they had like a .
Here are the basics of the game , and I wish I had actually documented some of it , because it was the stuff that you don't think of because it's just so innate it's just so ingrained , it's so second nature for us and I'm sure it's true of any sport . Right , like any sport that you watch , stuff is going to become second nature .
At one point , little Tyler wanted to know if there was a hit by a pitch or there was a near hit by a pitch . He wanted to know if the player was out for getting hit by the pitch Right , no , no , no , you
¶ Global Baseball Travel and Fan Events
don't . But I like I remember the closest experience I can I had to . This was in in 2010 . I was in Australia and I went with an Australian friend or at least a friend who had been in Australia for quite some time to an Aussie rules footy match and I had never seen it before . I didn't know what the rules were . There were basically like three rules .
It was super easy to pick up Aussie rules football . And then I remember like really enjoying the game and I sort of wondered you know how baseball is in that respect ? Like , are there like just the very most basic fundamentals that you can pick up and you can enjoy a game without really knowing the nuances of it ?
Uh , or is it one of these sports that you really have to like know inside and out to really follow a game . And you know there were . There were home runs . There were . You know diving catches there were . You know there were . There were plays . That was very clear , like something cool had just happened .
Um , the home run was the big thing , right like bryce harper hit a solo shot to tie game one and then he did his , like his , went down on his knees and did the goal thing of all the people to have , like the big hit of the weekend .
Whit merrifield hit a three run home run and that was all people right whit merrifield , right um , the stupidest thing is the uh bryce harper home run that tied game . One happened while I was out on the concourse meeting rick feliciano no so ricky and I both missed that one .
Were there any tvs like has that you could see the game , or it's not like here .
No , no , the the stadium amenities were really bare bones . It was . It was , um , you know , you can see why they have hot , you know , soccer , soccer riots over there . It's because , like there wasn't that much else to do , right , like there was , you can buy beer and you can watch sports .
And , uh , you know there was , it was like even even some of the minor league . And granted , this is I'm basing this on one stadium in one sporting event in all of europe that I've ever been to .
So I don't know if there are ones over there that are more , like , you know , adorables , or the albuquerque isotopes or whatever , where you have like these fairly nicely appointed stadiums that like feel sort of architecturally interesting . It didn't feel architecturally interesting , right , like it felt well I mean , it's what ?
2012 is almost 2012 . Yeah , it's a long time for them .
I don't know . I mean Coors Field was built in 1995 , right . I mean it felt more like Veterans Stadium than it did Citizens Bank Park .
Interesting .
Yeah , yeah , and the other thing that was funny , sort of game-wise , was that they had artificial turf , but I think they were protecting the soccer pitch , basically , right , and I'm pretty sure that they just put the artificial turf down on top of the soccer pitch because the ball was very bouncy , it was like they were playing on sponge .
And I remember at one point Edmundo Sosa hit a little flare to right field and it landed in front of the right fielder and it just about like bounced over the head of the right fielder because it was , you know , it was like such a sort of spongy material .
And so we've we've seen games played on sort of spongy artificial turf before , but never at the major league level , right , like that was pretty interesting to to see them playing a major league game on that kind of surface . Yeah .
Interesting yeah , val , you got anything for him ?
No , I'm just as you're , as you're telling you , as you were telling your story about . Like when you got on the plane and stuff , I was just I couldn't help but think like man , I can't wait to experience this . I've never flown internationally . I I know that the next opportunity will be I'm not doing my math right . What's going to is Dodgers .
When are they going to Korea ? When is that game ?
Don't the Dodgers have a game in Korea and Japan coming up soon , or the Dodgers , the Dodgers and Padres opened the season in Korea .
I'm so dumb . Okay , then , wbc is on my bucket list .
Oh , wbc , yeah , yeah , yeah , absolutely .
Even five , right Even in the United .
States . That would be . That would be cool to see . Well , I'll tell you , the first thing I did was I started looking at you know what are ? What are the other series that they're going to be doing ? Right , like , when are they going to be playing international baseball again ?
Um , I am very fortunate to have gotten to do a certain amount of international travel in my lifetime . I am aware of how fortunate I am for that . Once you do it , you sort of get the travel bug right like it's . It's hard to you , you also realize at a certain point , like how easy it is , like like it feels like such a barrier .
And yeah , I mean , there are certain like going through customs is a pain , the time zone changes are a pain , but ultimately , if you can handle being on a plane for a while , you know it's , it's very on a plane for a while , you know it's , it's very , very doable . And , um , you know , like I'm we .
We made sort of a snap decision to we're going to Japan in September .
We're going to tour around and I have my . My friend Masa is over there . He's a huge Hanshin Tigers fan and so we now have tickets . He sent me a picture . I have . I have a picture of the tickets that we have to two games in September and actually we now have tickets . He sent me a picture . I have .
I have a picture of the tickets that we have to two games in September . And actually , val , when you were talking about the Chihuahuas game , um , september 10 is when we get back from Japan . So I was like I don't know if I can get , if I can go straight from Japan to El Paso to , uh , to see baseball .
But , um , you know , that is like the idea of of traveling internationally to see sports is so much fun , right , like and so and it doesn't even have to be major league baseball , like seeing a japanese baseball game or two japanese baseball games . I'm so jazzed for that . Um , I saw a caribbean series game in puerto rico .
Ed and I were just talking about that before we started recording .
And I was just going to say , by the way , the AAA World Baseball Classic is going to San Juan in 2026 . We've got to do it .
Curb your meetup . Getting to San Juan is so easy .
It's so easy to fly to San Juan .
And it's usually pretty cheap .
I've got to say Mom and Dad I know you're probably going to listen to this and they have told me multiple times I know I don't need a passport to get to San Juan , but that's my biggest thing I have a passport , but it expired in 2007 .
We're good , you're good , you're good .
Also on that note , cubs to open the 2025 regular season in Japan versus the Dodgers . That's what I was thinking .
The Cubs versus the .
Dodgers Huh .
The Dodgers yeah .
Yeah , well , I mean that's . I knew I saw something about that a few weeks ago so I was like I got to make up my mind 2025 , cubs , dodgers or WBC , and I'm like WBC got to do it . I did go to the WBC when it was in Phoenix , but obviously that's not the same Guys .
This year , 2024 , september 27th obviously it's a national holiday . I don't know if you guys knew this September 27th is a national holiday . It's Julie's birthday , by the way , and that's a Fridayiday . The 28th is the triple a championship in vegas ed's birthday in vegas .
Are you kidding me ? Ed is also just about to turn 30 oh my goodness , I'm turning 21 .
Yes , you gotta take a shot for every , for every year .
So I'm going to have to tell the wife I'm like , listen , babe , weekend in Vegas . Yes , I'll do one game and then you'll do whatever you want .
Darla would like that . She would love going to Vegas and seeing one game .
And she said as long as we go to the Grand Canyon , you know she doesn't mind .
And you know what's so fun and I was on the phone with my father a couple days ago because he's coming out for that game father , a couple days ago , because he's coming out for that game you know what's so fun about the triple a championship game is that we don't see any of the international league teams in vegas right , because yeah , you're pacific , pacific
coast . So like when I saw like sounds jerseys and durham bulls jerseys , I was like I feel like I'm in an international game like this . This is insane . Like not international , like international league . But like international , like from a different world , like it was so cool , isn't it ?
awesome oh I've never been to an all-star game , but the all-star game is going to be in philadelphia in 2026 , and so I'm going to the all-star game in a few weeks or in arlington , and in about I wish I could I could say in a few weeks , I guess it is in a month .
So
¶ Stadium Food Influencer Interviews Val
this is . There's so many cool things happening this year .
It is not to be understated , I think I said this before we started recording and not after we started recording .
It's very much an honor for me right now to be speaking with Val , the stadium food girl , for the first time ever , because I have been following Val's work for a long time and noticing and especially I really enjoyed , val , when you were a guest before you were a co-host , you were a guest on the Dad Hat Chronicles .
That was a great episode and just uh , hearing all of like the access that you have gotten to like different stadiums and getting invited to Fenway and getting to experience these ballparks in certain ways by being a a a stadium food social media influencer right media influencer right Like that's super cool and that gives you a a perspective on all these experiences
that I think other people don't have .
So I don't have . I know like it has been . It has been and I get emotional when I think about it because I remember my mom and dad and then it's like they have three girls right .
I'm the oldest and I remember not understanding why we couldn't sit behind home plate , why we couldn't have the cool seats , you know , and for us it was always like 300s , nosebleeds , whatever . Not that there's anything wrong with that , but it's like I never . And I remember such a funny story .
One of my favorite stories is I remember when we would pass the club level at the old Arlington ballpark , which was AmeriQuest , when I used to go there and I used to see the suites and I used to tell my sisters look , those are hotel rooms , that's where the rich people get to stay , like I wonder what the hotel rooms look like .
And they're actually just suites . I'd be like I can't wait to be in one of those hotel rooms one day . I wonder what the hotel rooms look like . They get to stay here at the stadium and then watch from their room like it's Toronto or something .
I was just going to say Toronto . You can do it .
Just be careful about your behavior .
It's cool because now I get to help show off their work and there's so many foodie . You know pages for like restaurants in new york , chicago , la , but it's like there aren't enough like stadium food pages .
And , to your point earlier , you know stadium food isn't really known to be the best , but you know when you see that there really is when when it really is awesome , you know it's it's fun to see like the boomstick at Arlington and now a lot of stadiums are doing the two foot long hot dog and it's awesome .
But it's like , like the food stadium food has come such a long way .
Yeah .
We were kids to like now , like , know , like , you know , like I can still think to like when the cleveland guardians they have the , the hot dog with the fruit loops on it and all that . You know what I'm saying . Like 10 years ago you would have not gotten that and I I remember ed I was .
I think I said this on on your when you had me on as a guest minor league games unfortunately do not draw the same crowd as a philly's nuts or philly's mess dodgers yankees crowd , you know .
So these chefs have to draw in people some way and it's , it's always going to be through the food well , I think it's cool that the work that you're doing to showcase that and I think that that helps them raise their game right like the fact that you're out there calling them out or not calling them out , but showcasing the work that they're doing , and so ,
um , I don't know not only not only baseball , though , because she's done some hockey and some basketball .
So , like you know , like she just like you know not just baseball at all , which is pretty cool yep yep , gotta show the world you can go well .
Maybe next year at the london series you could tell them not to put cheese whiz on cheeseburgers save the cheese whiz for the cheese sticks .
That's funny that's actually kind of funny though , like if you think about it like you know , you know what people think . What american food ? Is like you know in other countries , right , and what we think is , you know , like british food , like you know , fish and chips here is a little different than what you got over there .
Yeah well , and we did like the touristy thing right , Like we went to , we were like let's go to a pub and we'll get fish and chips and meat pies , and they were delicious , I will tell you .
Mets fans , you know I support all people rooting for their own home team and you know , you know , being who they are as fans , um , but Mets fans are objectively the worst people and , uh , we had I don't know man , there's I , I got a .
I got a list of a couple fan bases .
I am , of course , being funny , uh , as they some of my best friends are Mets fans , but the we had . We had a funny experience where , after , so after game one , we the the .
The ballpark was about four miles from our hotel , which was an easy subway ride , right , it was an easy tube ride , um , but after the game they , there was basically one way back to the stratford station , which is where the ballpark was , and to get to it , like 55 000 people all funneled out of the ballpark and started walking the same direction and they were
really like sort of you know they were , they were just funneled into this . You know , this one spot there was a huge , huge bottleneck , basically getting to the , to the station , to the point where you could tell what was happening and you just accepted it . But it was like being in a traffic jam trying to get out of a parking lot .
You just would walk for a little bit and then you'd stop dead and then you just had to make friends with the people around you because you were just going to be standing there for a few minutes before you got to walk again and they actually had like like police basically , or or traffic , you know , folks directing , you know , the the mass of humanity with like
stop and go signs . They were holding up signs that were like stop and go and like you'd reach a certain point and then you had to stop and like you'd wait , and so it took us about an hour and a half to get from the ballpark to a subway stop .
That was like a 10 minute walk away and let me ask you that you couldn't walk back to the hotel well , that's what we did .
After game two we walked four and a half miles back to the hotel and it was a very cool walk and we went through all these little neighborhoods in london . It was a cool way to see london right . That was actually kind of great . But after game one we finally get back to our subway stop and there was like a little pub there that we wanted to try .
It seemed like a cool little spot and we got in there and it was 10 50 pm and I ordered us two beers and I ordered ordered us some fish and chips with mashed peas , which are just mashed peas . By the way . There's like if you want seasoning , you got to bring your own and and and wings .
And so the guy who I was ordering from I think he was a little grumpy that we were ordering like right , as the kitchen was closing .
Basically , yeah , and you were that guy I was .
But before I was that guy , I was . But before I was that guy , there was a group of mets fans in front of me and they were trying to order quickly . They just wanted , like , a bunch of food and they didn't know what anything was . And they were . They were all clearly americans , um , and they were kind of they were .
It was like , uh , you know , a group of attractive young people , right , like so they could sort of get away with whatever , but they were . They had the menu and they were just like this and this and this and this and this and this , and so they ordered and they all went back to their table and they were having a good time .
And then I so I step up and I got two beers and I ordered the food that I just described . And he hands me the beers and I pay for the whole order and I say , how does the food work ? Do we come claim it , like , or do they , you know , do they bring it to us ? And he says , no , no , we'll bring it to your table .
So I was like , okay , that's great . So I go and I sit down .
We are starving , right like , and we're sort of nursing our beers while we're waiting for the food , because our stomachs are kind of empty at this point and , um , we're waiting for it's our , it's our first night there and so we're waiting for our first fish and chips of the trip and uh , and so finally , like 20 minutes goes by and I was just like you know
, I know it's different in europe and it's like you know there's no tipping in europe , so service is a little bit different .
Sometimes things take a little bit longer , but finally I like get up and I go over and and I was just like you know , so roughly , you know how long you think it might take for the food to come out and he looks at me and he says he says we delivered your food over here .
And here's a table full of mets fans with a whole bunch of food on their table and among their food I'm sure is our food , which they were just I'm sure they had , I'm sure they had had plenty to drink at this point , probably had no idea that , like , stuff that was delivered was not stuff that they had ordered , but our wings and our fish and chipped and
our unseasoned mashed peas were delivered to a bunch of mets fans and we were left without food and still starving . And at 11 o'clock at night in London , you would think there would be a way to get some food . Right , like you would think like , yeah , like I , I equate London with like New York City .
Right like I'm thinking like you should be like a big metropolitan area the very first night in London , what we had for dinner was stadium food at the ball game and then papa john's pizza shut up . It was the only place
¶ International Travel and Baseball Experiences
that was open . It was , and I was just like we . You know , we're pretty good about like being . I mean , we looked like big , dumb , goofy americans in our baseball caps and our baseball stuff and all that and your dungaroos in my , in my dungarees and my sneakers and all that um .
But like , we do a good job of like not going to starbucks or mcdonald's or whatever when we're traveling . Yeah to the local thing . Yeah . So we , we were , we wanted even if it was like touristy , like give me a dark beer and a fish and chips , like you know , every american tourist thinks every british person eats .
It was still like we were in the british pub . We were , you know , we weren , we weren't doing American fast food and to be forced into on our first night having having having Papa John's pizza , and then they had these like chicken nuggets , but they were like tandoori chicken nuggets . They had like Indian season on it .
Those were actually awesome , right Like , and I'm sure they don't have them in the United States . I'm sure it was because we were in Britain and they have good Indian food over there . Uh , you know it was . At least we got those and that was like a little bit British .
But then the really hilarious thing was we brought them back to the hotel room , cause there was no place to sit at this Papa John's , and we put on the 1979 Roger Moore James Bond film Moonraker , which looks like it was made in like 1952 . It's like so bad . I'm not a big James Bond guy anyway , but this Moonraker was hilarious . I love the .
British accent dude .
I'm such a big fan of British accent .
It's so cool .
Yeah , I've always wanted to go to London , so I'm so jealous that you got to go , dude .
This is so cool to hear the whole . Yeah , I mean , I can't stop smiling . I'm just like man . I can't wait to experience this one day .
Yeah , like that's what I'm saying , it's like I cannot wait , Like Japan , oh , my die so if , if you are a person who travels which I know , ed , you are , you're , you know , a great facility with just being like hey , I'm just gonna get on a plane and val I don't know you as well , but it sounds like you're pretty willing to just like jump on a plane
and go see a ball game or something I you know . If , if I only had like one message that I wish I could you know convey through this conversation is it's just not that hard , it's not that hard , I think what turns me off is not being great at like the like conversion , like when you turn your money in , like .
there's a few things that turn me off . One of them is the money part right , Like I don't know where to go and then I don't know what pounds is , or I guess , in my case , yen , since I really want to go to Japan . I think that's one .
Two is actually , I guess that's it . I hate doing the math in my head . Well , the jet you know jet lag is is to me the hardest one . I was in Laos in November and literally it was just like you change AM to PM . It was 12 hours different and so the time zone messed me up pretty good when I was in Laos .
But the money thing is actually way , way easier than it used to be . I didn't change any cash , I didn't change any currency , because everywhere now is just paperless , and so I played with everything through either the , through apple pay , or just tapping a credit card , and the bank does all the conversion for you .
So , um , I mean , it helps to sort of roughly know what things cost like pounds . It was basically like five5 to four pounds , and so you know , even if you don't feel like doing the math , you can figure . Okay , if they tell me something is roughly pounds . It's going to be $20 and a little bit . It's like $20 plus tip .
That's sort of how you had to think of everything . So , uh , you know so , but yeah , I , I have one . I have two credit cards and one of them does not charge an international fee . So , OK , so yeah . And then the other thing , oh , the other thing about traveling internationally . That sort of used to be hard .
It used to be a project for me , until I just decided to bite the bullet . My phone plan is such that I used to put it in airplane mode and I would only communicate when I could get Wi-Fi .
Just get the international plan for that time , the international plan is $10 a day and it's so , so , so , so worth it .
Because if you don't do the international plan and you try texting or calling , I'm sure .
Oh , you get all sorts of roaming .
Yeah , yeah yeah , yeah , because I know about , because when Darla travels for work , we automatically go into our plan , which is AT&T , turn on international for that specific phone and then off it goes . You don't think about it .
It is , for real , a small world out there . I don't mean to understate . We spent some money on the tickets , right , like the tickets were not cheap and you know you're staying in a hotel and , um , you know that that's , that's an expense .
But like I don't know , I drive a 12 year old car and I , you know , I , I don't have like a lotully paid off and all that . Yeah , yeah , exactly . So it's like if you choose to invest your liquid cash in experiences rather than stuff , then you can do stuff like this .
And this was actually part of Amy's birthday present , right , it was like you're not going to have any presents to unwrap , but we're going to get to go see baseball in london and she's like you get to experience .
That's , that's , that's my whole thing too . It's like the experiences is like you don't get when you , let's be honest , like I mean I'm gonna try to get morbid here but like when you died , you don't take anything with you , right ?
So it's like you know , we're collecting all this stuff , which I am a collector but , like you know , those experiences are cool , right . Like you know , corporate media , or like the World Baseball Classic I've been a part of that .
Man , let me tell you the Caribbean series amazing , which , by the way , is coming back to Miami , just so you guys know , very nice . So I mean those things are cool that you should anybody like , if you're a baseball fan , do it , and that's like you know , I'm with you 100 and it's easy to get a passport , especially if you have an expired one .
It's so , so easy , which I knew mine . Here's the problem . For us collectors , the problem is you start getting those stamps in the passport and then you're like oh boy don't , don't , tell me that I got all these empty pages in here , that means I gotta start collecting yeah .
I just started my MLB and MILB and spring training passports and I'm telling you I can't stop flipping through my pages .
So , to recap , everything is if you have the opportunity .
Do it for me , especially because the Phillies were playing . Like the moment I saw the Phillies were playing , I was just like , ok , I've got to find a way to make this happen . And that was before the Phillies , you know , before they got off to the start , they , they got off to this year . Right , like it was .
Just like I want to go be a part of this .
But even if their team is going to be a shitty team , right , it doesn't matter . Like you get to experience that , like I regret to this day , to be honest , with you not going to Puerto Rico when the Cleveland Indians were playing there against the Minnesota Twins . Yeah , the Puerto Rico series , yeah . Right , I had the opportunity , I just never did it .
And , like I don't mean to be flippant about it , it's an investment . There's money involved . This is what I choose to spend my liquid cash on . I don't regret it in the least .
That's why we're all friends .
¶ Discussing AAA Championship and Travel
I just thought I'd redo my passport . Let's just redo our passport . Let's plan out for the AAA championship in Vegas . Yep , celebrate a national holiday as well . I mean , why not ?
And then we'll all tell Eric Profitt that we're going to El Paso , but we're really going to Rockies , really going to .
AAA , yeah , exactly , and then he'll hang that over our heads for the rest of our lives again .
I also got to say and I know he'd be okay with me saying this because so far he's done it every year but around that time the chef for the aviators puts together and it's only during that time of the season a beef Wellington burger , and it is phenomenal . It's phenomenal . So we'll have to get that .
Fred , put a few candles on it and so here's your homework .
Let's try to get him on the podcast . Oh , oh that doesn't involve me .
I'm just a guest here , I forgot .
Okay , okay .
Well , this is how it is .
Let's go See at the AAA Championship , then maybe Val will facilitate an introduction here , because I think that'd be pretty cool .
How awesome would that be , though , right , oh , my God , I'm just kidding . You know , eric is like rolling his eyes right now as he's listening to this episode . He's like , okay , you guys are going now , Val's going , so you guys go in . And then , when I went , nobody went .
I really hope that the Curve Brand Media , everyone from there , can come here for a Vegas game . I know it's way on the other side of where a lot of people are , but still .
Again , we're talking about Not that hard for me to get to .
Yeah are , but still again , we're talking about me . To get to yeah right , paul , uh anna's uh closed by because she's in texas uh , right , yeah , yeah you got . You got eric , you know , in wichita . So I mean , you know you got a lot of people on .
You know closer to you , uh , to vegas than I'm the one who's the furthest away , and uh , and patrick larson by the way , I didn't .
you probably can't see it from here , but I'm wearing kind of in your honor here . I'm wearing my Nice .
I was going to either wear this or that hat . I have a blue LV hat .
Right .
I'm still . I don't know if it's a 51s hat , I don't know .
I have , yeah , I've got one 51s hat and I've got some Aviator stuff .
Speaking of hats , by the way , did you ever get a dad hat for the Fort Myers Miracle ?
Who are you asking that , you Me no , I don't have a Miracle .
They're selling 47 cleanups right now . Man , no , I don't have a miracle .
They're selling 47 cleanups right now .
Man no , I'm spending your money too . I get it . I know I understand this .
I missed my chance to steal that Great Falls Voyagers cap that you have in your house .
I know I did hide it .
Yeah , you hid it well enough , I hid it . Well , I hid it well , I was like Mia tell me where the hats are , mia's , like I don't know .
Daddy hides hats , hides them from mommy . So yeah , just saying I just ordered mine . Mine is in the mail . It should be here delivered tomorrow . Amazing .
Another Dan Simon classic .
So , speaking of a good classic , I'm wearing a snapback today , but look at this thing Support local baseball , yeah .
Very good .
I was like that's not a metal buckle .
I know , I know I was here and I was like , let me just put it on . I don't want to be . Everything is upstairs and baby girl went to sleep and if I go make noise it's not good for anybody . So , man , it's an hour and 20 minutes in guys where this thing is going . You know this is amazing , so it's just me yapping .
That's because I was so jazzed about this experience . It was such a fun experience I don't blame you , it it .
I was just looking at all the videos and I'm so happy that you got to go it's it really is a once in a lifetime and then to see your team and to see the different people , foods and houses , neighborhoods , everything it's like . It's just so cool . That's . The best part about travel is that it's out there . You just gotta go see it .
It's out there , you just gotta go see , go see it .
It's out there . You just got to go see . It is absolutely right and it's . Yeah . That was the . The walk back .
The decision to not take the subway and to walk four and a half miles from the stadium to the to the hotel was like I was so thrilled with that Cause , like we saw , like all the cool that they had a canal that was filled with houseboats , like people living on houseboats oh yeah , they live there full time , dude I know it was so cool .
Right , it was so cool to see that I was just like that's . You know , they had cats on them .
They were like cats on houseboats like dude , I'm telling you I so want to go to london . It's one it's on my bucket list to go , yeah , and watch a soccer game , football game there . You know , I was like it's on the bucket list .
My only advice is order dinner before 1045 and keep an eye on it if there are Mets fans around .
Noted .
Noted Done Check my friend Paul . Thanks so much , dude , for doing this on this very official first episode with Val on now going forward . I'm so excited , dude . This is I'm happy that you got to go , my friend , I'm happy you got to go .
and let me tell you what I'm excited about . I'm excited that I got to hang out with you again , ed , my good friend as always to do so much baseball stuff recently . I am psyched to have finally met val because , like I said , I've been following val forever and like , like one of these , like why are we not friends ?
You know Val and I should be friends .
Right , definitely .
So now Val and I are friends and I feel really good about that and I feel really good about you guys as co-hosts of the Dad Hat Chronicles . I think this is a great thing you have in the works here . I think it's going to be fantastic .
I needed more baseball-loving friends . I had been praying about it and then , within a week , I meet Eric , I meet Patrick , I meet the mayor , I meet , re-meet Ed . And now I'm on this thing and it's just cool .
Well , I don't know who any of those other people are , but I'm just kidding .
Hi guys , I love you all .
I love you all .
I don't know who those Yahoo's are .
But one and only baseball . By design , like , are you kidding ?
So I feel , I feel the very same , and this is the dad hat Chronicles is off and running on a on a great new adventure . I love it .
¶ Social Media Baseball Fan Connections
All right . So , for for everybody , make sure that you guys are following all of these wonderful people . A stadium food Girl on Instagram , youtube , right , tiktok . Make sure you guys are going on TikTok as well . You're on threads , aren't you ?
Who me .
Yeah .
I am on threads .
See , there you go . Then you got that guy right there , the Ginger Vigil . He's everywhere as well . You're on Instagram . You're on Instagram , you're on Twitter , you are on Facebook . You said you don't do all Facebook .
The countdown to spring training on Facebook . I'm on Facebook during the baseball offseason .
There you go , and of course , the Dad Hack Chronicles wherever you can find social media . So we will see you guys next time on another episode of the Dad Hack Chronicles podcast . I'm so excited for this guys , very excited . Just wanted to put that out there Again . Just my opinion Me too , likewise .
Okay , bye , thank you .