spring training

Tis' the season for spring training and I happily took in a game yesterday with my friends Allie and Vicki. We went to Camelback Ranch to see the Chicago White Sox get their butts kicked by the Milwaukee Brewers. It was quite the enjoyable afternoon, laying out on a blanket in the sun enjoying some baseball and good conversation with friends. (And the steel drum music from the band playing near the snack bar wasn't too bad either!) Here are a few pictures from the game.

My roommate wants to go see the Seattle Mariners play the Chicago Cubs in a few weeks, so I'll probably go with her to that game too.

I suppose I am starting my own little "spring training" tomorrow. I told my friend Kat that I would play on her intramural flag football team, and we have our first practice tomorrow (and first game on Tuesday). I thought at first that it would be a friendly game of football against some of our classmates, but the competition is appearing to be quite intense. For one, this is not a mandatory co-ed sport, which means that we may be facing teams of all guys. Also, several of my classmates played football in college, and they are forming teams of their own, with playbooks and everything! Some people make this quite hard-core. However, rumor has it that one of the guys on our team played in college and one of the girls plays on a league football team in the area, so maybe we will have a few "secret weapons" of our own. Either way, I am now hoping that enough players for our team show up so that I can be a bench warmer...or maybe cheerleader, because I certainly don't see myself being able to play against any serious football dudes. Should be fun though!

Oh, also, I found out why the houses don't have mailboxes. Vicki lives in a mailboxless house, and she told me that the large neighborhood mailboxes prevent identity theft because they are locked. Since the Phoenix area has a large illegal immigrant population, identity theft is common down here and unlocked mailboxes are a prime source of personal information. Neighborhood mailboxes apparently help prevent this.