aces of bases

I'm back from a weekend in Reno, NV!  No big winnings on the slot machines, unfortunately, but we did enjoy playing (and winning!) at carnival games at Circus, Circus.  Reno was definitely an interesting place.  Can't say I'm dying to go back anytime soon but I'm glad I went at least once to check it out.  I was pretty stressed out getting there on Friday because I was taking an earlier flight (which ended up being delayed anyway, figures), but I was also making a connection through Vegas so I was really worried that the delay out of LA and the lack of delay out of Vegas was going to be completely messed up - it didn't help that the flight from Vegas to Reno was the last of the night so if anything went wrong and we missed it...yikes.  Somehow, it all worked out perfectly and me and my luggage arrived just fine, phew.  Funny, too, but I be-friended a fellow traveler leaving LA who was also anxious to make it to Vegas because she was trying to catch the same connection to Reno.  As we talked more, we soon realized that in fact, not only does she work at the same company as my dear friend Kristen (who began her work at this company just a month ago), but that they actually work on the same team and just met for the first time on Wed (which also happened to be the same day I met Kristen for dinner myself to hear about said job)!  Mind you, their company has more than 300 employees, too, and she only flew to LA for a few days for training.  What are the chances? 

Of course, the weekend wasn't complete without baseball!  Reno is home of the Triple A Reno Aces, farm team to the Arizona Diamondbacks.  The stadium was right in the city and was really modern/nice, but the unfortunate thing was the Sat night game was FREEZING.  Matt really liked their mascot Archie the last time he saw the team, and we actually managed to find him on the concourse (purely by accident) and got this picture with him.  Pretty cool, huh?  He big!

The Aces also have this crazy tradition that happens for the 7th inning stretch.  To sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame," they inflate a HUGE baseball character that rises above the outfield wall (I think they call him "Ball on the Wall") and he actually leads the crowd in song.  Literally, his mouth moves to the lyrics!

Isn't he cute?  All in all, a good weekend.  We found out that Whiplash, a monkey "cowboy" that's been trained to ride dogs (who Matt first saw in a clip on ESPN), is coming to perform at an Aces game in the future and Matt was so sad to see that it was a Thursday night game so he wouldn't be able to go.  But after I suggested checking out his website to see where else he would be performing, Matt was thrilled to see he'd be at a Sacramento River Cats game in June on a weekend!  So I guess we'll be seeing Whiplash after all, haha.