Patriot Day: Protests and baseball

A lot happened today. Most of which I didn't actively participate in, but it still deserves some mention here, I think.

I fully intended to attend one of the smaller No Kings protests this afternoon; one took place not far from my home, I was planning to at least go and take photos and add my voice for a little while. I'd intended to, but my nocturnal ways caught up with me and I failed. I was umpiring last night until almost 11:30, got home well after midnight, then watched the full Mariner game from earlier in the evening, then had trouble falling asleep... anyway, when my alarm went off at 10:30am I had only been asleep for maybe three hours. Still, I got up and fed the cats, but then plopped back down to check in with things on my phone and before I knew it I had fallen asleep again. (In a rather awkward position, to, leaving me with a nasty kink in my neck that is still annoying me.) I re-awoke around 2:30. A quick shower and I moseyed out to the protest site, but it had mostly dispersed by then. Alas.

But even without me, Seattle showed up in style, with over 70,000 people congregating at Cal Anderson park (often the site of my umpiring adventures) before marching to Seattle Center. Along with several smaller events around town, the greater metro area represented well in the nationwide protests today and I am most gratified to see the great masses of Americans giving POTUS47 a metaphorical (and occasionally literal) middle-finger salute on his birthday. It's especially gratifying to see the split-screen, as it were, of protest turnout on one side and the "crowd" at Donny's multimillion-dollar ego parade in DC on the other. I hope he's seething about it.

Seems the vast majority of the events were civil and trouble-free, but there were bound to be a few exceptions, like the Virginia MAGAt who drove his SUV into protesters and someone in Salt Lake City shooting a protester. The forces deployed to LA unsurprisingly escalated things there, but not until after the No Kings event had ended; I wasn't there, I have no way to really know if the violence perpetrated by law enforcement/Federal forces was appropriate or not, but my instinct is to believe it was at best an overreaction. I know the elderly veterans being arrested in DC for nothing more than protesting Donny's ego parade will have quite the case when they sue, though.

Anyway, I did not attend but fully support the No Kings events. After my abortive look at the remains of the small suburban one, I came back and fixed a sandwich and started to clean up a bit before heading down to the ballpark. Not knowing what traffic would be like after today's disruptions, I left pretty early but getting downtown turned out to be a breeze and I was over an hour early to the game. Still didn't get a giveaway Steelheads cap, though, that was a small bummer. (I'm over it.)

Turned out to be a fun evening. One of my umpees (hi, Neal) was there and had free seats near him down low, so my Spuds teammate Mona and I ended up taking in the whole game from pretty close in, which was pretty cool. I am still very much used to my perspective from 327, so tracking the ball was a little tough from the more expensive seats. It's a nice change of pace, though, and the opportunity was much appreciated.

It was a great game, too, with the hometown M's staging a 9th-inning comeback to win in walkoff fashion. One dude sitting in the row behind me struck up some conversation here and there during the game, first about my scorekeeping then about ballparks and then about game strategy. Always fun. Nice to talk with Neal a bit off the softball diamond, too, though the PA onslaught at the game makes for a less than stellar discussion venue.

All in all a good Saturday. (Edit: Events in Minnesota notwithstanding—I just read about that a few minutes ago. Jesus.)

Below are a few of my favorite photos/signs from the nationwide protests today. Please to enjoy.

From Los Angeles. The Constitution is a perfect prop for today, but I also really enjoy the sign held up by the guy in the lower left corner.

Handmaid's Tale imagery has been used a lot, but hey, cliches are cliches for a reason. The sign is great, too.

From Florida. Glad to see the rest of the GOP get a mention, but mostly I like rooting for gators here.

A little hard to read, but it says "You don't get to talk about what's illegal when you voted for a felon."

Truly inspired to use "Schoolhouse Rock" here.

No notes. 100%.

And, just for fun, the celebration after the win at the ballpark. J.P. Crawford (2nd form left) had a perfect night, going 3-for-3 with two walks
(though he did get picked off 2nd base).