After all the Birthday Shenanigans, we still had one more baseball game to attend. It was the final game of the Rangers series, and also the day that the Blue Jays were going to retire Roberto Alomar’s number.
We knew there would be a ton of people, so my brother and I had arranged to be picked up around 9:30 by Courtney and her family.
When we finally got to the Dome, the lines-ups were already massive. To make matters worse, Courtney and I still didn’t have our tickets, and the friend who was supposed to go with my brother, bailed on him the night before.
We rushed and got our tickets. Didn’t care where they were, just wanted to get inside.
We stopped to tell my brother that, unfortunately, we couldn’t get in line with him, as we had to go in a different gate. All the Dome staff were telling people that they had to go in the gate listed on their ticket, or they wouldn’t be admitted. Probably a load or crap, but, we didn’t want to take any chances.
We stood outside of our gate, for about 45 minutes. Not too bad I guess. It rained a little bit, which actually, wasn’t that bad either.
We went inside. Once inside, we were handed one of these each:

A Roberto Alomar Bobblehead. One of the main reasons we went to todays game. They are limited to 20,000, and it is an awesome add on to my Blue Jay’s Bobblehead collection:

After safely storing them inside my back pack, we met up with everyone again.

My brother was they only one smart enough to buy a program right away. Everyone else has passed on them earlier, because it was raining. Now that we were in, they were sold out everywhere!

We headed to the elevator to head up to the 500 level. While waiting, one of the Jays’ shop attendants was also waiting. She had a card with some merch on it. Inside one of her boxes, Courtney spied programs!

We decided to follow this girl to her booth, which we did. After waiting in line, we all got our programs:

I was then on the hunt for a hat. Not just any hat. A specific hat.

One booth was sold out. The next one had an attendant who was lost. I asked for a 7.5, and I don’t know what she gave me, but it wasn’t a 7.5.

I finally got lucky at the next one. I used some of my birthday money to pick this up:

We then headed to our seats in section 512 to watch the ceremony.

A number of former Jay’s players and coaches were on hand to celebrate with Robbie. It was fantastic! You can watch some of it here.

Here is a few pics I took during the ceremony:

Not long after the ceremony, it was game time.

It was also disgustingly hot.

I think we all made it until about the bottom of the 4th inning before Courtney, her mother, sister, and myself retreated to the 100 level to try and get out of the heat.

It helped some, but not really enough.

Most of the sinks in the building were putting out really warm water. Diet Coke was literally sold out throughout the building. How the heck does that happen?

We met up with Bill, who was at the Blackberry broadcast booth with his friend Chris and his wife, Corrina.

We hung out for a bit, then the executive decision was made to get the hell outta there!

We all met back at the truck, and headed home. Thank God were got out of the heat. It really was unbearable. Yeah, I get that it’s baseball and that heat is part of the game, but in my opinion, it was rediculous, and keeping the roof closed would have helped a lot.

Whatever, we made it home, and dropped off Bill, then headed to Boston Pizza for dinner.

It was still a great, albeit hot day. The Jays are on the road for a little while now, so we will have a little time to relax between games.

Gotta say it though, I can’t wait until they are back home!