Downtown Houston

I'd been to Houston a couple of times before, but not gone to the downtown area. Frankly, I wasn't missing much. I was there to check off another ballpark (which I will write about separately) and it was convenient to stay nearby and avoid renting a car. I have to say that Houston's bus system (express bus 102 from the airport to downtown) worked quite well, to my surprise. And it's only a buck each way.

I had some time before the game so walked over to the Downtown Aquarium. It wasn't bad, but is rather overpriced for what it is. There are only a few seahorses and no leafy sea dragons (my particular aquarium obsession.) There are some jellyfish, a lot of big game fish (groupers and the like), an electric eel who doesn't have a light bulb to show off with, the usual reef fish, some attractive lionfish, and so on. The highlights were turtles - an amazingly huge snapping turtle and a very odd prehistoric looking matamata. There are also some white tigers who get to live in an area called the Maharajah's Temple. While it is suitable for them to be bask in the worship of visitors, this didn't really seem to be a very comfortable tiger habitat.

I also did some general walking around downtown. The walkway along the bayou is pleasant enoughand I imagine that the green space is welcome by weekday office workers. The most impressive building is the (not yet restored) 1910 courthouse. But, all in all, downtown Houston is eminently skippable. If someone were there for, say, a convention, they'd be better off hopping the light rail to the museum district.

Minute Maid Park

This was my third baseball game of the season and the second one to a ballpark named after an orange juice company. Minute Maid Park is a step up from Tropicana Field, but it's not really a great ballpark. There's nothing inherently wrong with it - it's just lacking in character. I gathered that the ballpark was built on the site of the former Union Station and there's a little train that goes back and forth before the game, but it's not like railroads are really anybody's first association with Houston so that doesn't quite work. The old Astrodome, as horrible as it must have been (and Astroturf is really an unforgiveable invention), at least had a theme that had an association with the city. But the Space Age has come and gone without ever really arriving, it seems.

Maybe I'd have liked the ballpark better had the retractable dome been open. Or if I'd had a better seat, instead of being up in the nosebleed section. Or if the Astros had halfway competent pitching. Normally I wouldn't care, but they were playing the Source of All Evil in the Universe and were, hence, my second favorite team of the night.

Another annoyance, by the way, is that they don't let you bring in even a sealed bottle of water, forcing you to pay the inflated ballpark price. I'll also note that there are remarkably few vendors coming around the seating areas (at least in the upper deck area). I think a beer vendor came by twice and a cotton candy vendor once, but that's about it.

Finally, I'll note that they played "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" once through (and surprisingly few people sang along, with many remaining seated), followed by "Deep in the Heart of Texas" twice (with somewhat more people singing). The Rangers do the latter, also, but have the decency to do it earlier, not during the 7th inning stretch. It is okay to sing whatever you want to at other times, but let's not muck with traditions, please.