Text 25899, 99 rader
Skriven 2015-04-11 21:34:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
Ärende: spring training 497
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Hampton Inn Phoenix/Glendale/Peoria is old but friendly;
there are bunches of suspicious-looking characters lounging
around in front, but that doesn't particularly bother me, as
I often am one of them myself. What bothered me: lumpy beds,
and my back hurt mightily in the morning.

Breakfast: biscuits and gravy senza sausage, so I had my
okay biscuit with honey and butter; fruit - grapefruit,
orange, pineapple, all sadder than the previous Hampton;
and presynthesized Western omelets.

CLE@MIL Maryvale 1

I always liked this stadium, but like the night's Hampton,
it's a little tired, and there are fewer of the modern
amenities one looks for (such as a reasonable overhang to
shade the fans in the early afternoon). We had seats
further back, so the shade came relatively early. The beer
selection, once mighty with Leinenkugel products and the
dreaded Old Style, is now useless, bad for my disposition
but good for my pocketbook, as I refuse to pay top dollar
for Coors and Anheuser-Busch products. It was a nothing
game. The visitors prevailed 3-2.

We roared back to the Hilton Garden Inn Phoenix Airport
North on Van Buren; originally we were staying out west,
but Lilli was joining us for the weekend, as she is on a
run to ensure continuing top status on American, so I
rescheduled for here.

Her flight was half an hour late, so we handily beat her
there. Oddity: though both Swisher's and her names were on
the reservation, the hotel again had no record, and the
airport shuttle refused service until she claimed she was
my wife.

We got two rooms on the top floor with only two breakfast
and drink coupons, which was rectified to three breakfasts
when challenged. The third cocktail was not forthcoming.

Lilli had read that Bill Johnson's Big Apple, once a proud
though somewhat silly fixture of the Phoenix dinihg scene,
was set to close in 2016, so we decided to eat there for
old times' sake. Well, part of it is that it's 250 paces
from the hotel, and she bartered her room cost (points)
with dinner for Swisher and me, and the place is not too
expensive.

Tip of the day: don't get the Merlot.

Next tip of the day: don't believe the sign that says that
draft Bud and Bud Light are $1 - this offer ends at 6.

The food is nowhere so bad as its reputation, which is of
airplane food. It's really first-class airplane food.

I cry for the days when you could get a t-shirt that read
I Ate The Big One if you ate The Big One, a not-so-big
24-oz porterhouse that varied between 18 and 30 ounces,
depending on whether you got there on a good or a bad day.
I once went there with a FlyerTalk and Others dinner and
got The Big One, and it came a shriveled and bare 18 ounces,
so I sent it back, and the replacement was two pounds and
just about raw. This was perfect for me, and I ate it up
and half of Alex's not so great sirloin as well. Those were
the days, around the millennium.

Anyhow, Lilli got a quite nice burger, half a pound of meat,
rare as ordered, dragged through the garden, decent domestic
Swiss, for under $10 with a huge pile of onion rings, which
she shared around.

My Tenderfoot Plate was 6 or 8 ounces of decent "USDA Prime"
top sirloin, actually cooked rare as ordered, and a half
rack of slightly puny presauced baby backs no doubt out of
a Cry-O-Vac but not too bad.

Swisher's chicken-fried steak was quite good - bigger than I
remember, beefier than I remember, with the gravy possibly
real rather than out of a 55-gallon Sysco drum.

The sides came in foil ramekins like you get on the plane
when they have had to rush the service. Cowboy beans were
okay though very sweet - I was going to write extremely,
but then I remembered the smashed sweet taters, where were
in fact extremely sweet and spiced like pie. Corn casserole
was cheap canned creamed corn with cornflakes on top.

A basic but surprisingly not bad meal.

There are respectable draft beers for not too much money.

Back to the hotel, where Swisher excused himself - it had been
a long day -, and Lilli and I used the drink coupons on a
glass of house Cabernet and a glass of house Merlot. The Cab
was somewhat dreadful, the Merlot somewhat better.
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