The Dome Stadium

Ah the King Dome, what a place for a car show. They blew it up 10 years ago today, I didn't even realized it was happening I remember, my friends did, so they spend the weekend sleeping on my floor waiting for the event. I had to work so I went to work and missed the whole thing. I remember driving home that night, and getting off I-90 to head north on I-5 and no Dome. I remember not even thinking about it at first, but then reminded myself to take a long look. That old concrete eye sore was where I saw the my first baseball game, M's vs. the Angels, 1978, a four overtime Supersonics game vs. the Atlanta Hawks and the only professional football games I've ever seen in person.

It is the baseball games I remember enjoying the most, it was a terrible baseball venue, almost as terrible as some of the Mariner teams I went to watch. As terrible as it was, it was fun though, throwing peanuts at the leftfielders, heckling them with every chance. Wandering around looking for better seats, and finally ending up in the 2nd row behind home plate, heckling the major league scouts and the batter. I watched Julio Cruz and Jim Essian hit back to back homers there and I saw Randy Johnson lose a lot of games. I recall the final game in the dome when Griffey made a game saving catch and a half naked guy ran out onto the field. Most of all I remember the floor was always sticky, and the sight lines were awful, it was ugly and unrefined, pretty much the opposite of Safeco. But every once in a while, I find myself missing sitting the left field seats chanting Toledo Mud-hens with 25 other guys who had consumed too many peanuts and drank one or two too many beers. And when our chants caused the Indian leftfielder miss played a can of corn into a game winning 3 base error. All was right in the universe.