This afternoon I discovered the one person with the absolute most miserable job in the entire world.

Background: I had to arrange for 4 cabs at around 5pm this evening in order to arrange our trip out to AT&T park from the office for us and 12 members at a nearby agency.

I let it ring for a few seconds, and on the other end, a man picks up who has the most absolute dull voice that mankind has ever known.  His voice has seriously caused at least 3 people to commit suicide during the time that they were on with him.

“Phone number?”  he begins, in a voice that literally sent shivers down my spine.
“Oh, hi, um it’s xxx-xxx-xxxx”
“Address?”
“Uh yeah we’re at xxx”
“Okay.”
“WAITWEACTUALLNE…”
*click*

o_O

Yeah that didn’t quite work well, so I call them up again hoping and praying that I would get someone else.

I wait on hold for about 30 seconds, when again, a familiar voice answers..

“Phone number?”
“HI YES I’m going to need  FOUR cabs for 6 o’clock”.
“Phone number?”
“My phone number is xxx and I’m at xxx street”
“And why do you need four cabs?”
“Um, because there are 16 people with us”.
*pause*
“Address?”
“Like I said, I am at xxx.”
“Goodbye”.

Thankfully he’s a man of few words, for if he went on for just a bit longer I really would’ve taken the phone cordand strangled myself with it.

6 o’clock comes then, and surprise surprise, the cabs aren’t there yet.  5 minutes past, followed by another 5 minutes, and my coworker suggests that I call up the cab company to see what the status is, and I’m all, “no f’in way”.

However given my junior status and submissive self, I reluctantly agree and give them a call again..

*ring*
“Phone number?”
*UGH*
“Yeah I called about an hour ago in order to reserve some cabs and they’re not here yet.”
“Address?”
“No you don’t understand, our cabs aren’t here yet and I’m checking their status.”
“Sir what’s yer phone number?”
“Yes it’s xxx.”
“What’s yer address?”

:|

Long story short then, our cabs from this company never came, we end up just waiting for them on the corner, and with the 16 of us on one side trying to flag down some cabs, there was a genius across the street (which was one-way) who thought he had a chance against our group.

Through the high and hell water that is San Francisco rush hour traffic then, we end up arriving in front of the lovely ballpark, go through the field level hall to the great smell of hot dogs and garlic fries, into our section, and down the stairs..and down, and down..and didn’t stop until we were at the very bottom.

It was quite a feeling really, getting our seats at the front row looking into the Braves’ dugout, trash talking the batboy who was being quite the punk.  If I was 12 and drunk enough he would’ve totally have gotten the finger from me..once he was turned around.

The seats were really great, closer than I’ll probably ever be for any pro event ever, there were some concerns to our very safety:

a) We were closer to the batter than any of the fielders out there, aside from the catcher.
b) There was no protective netting in front of us, as there is directly behind home plate (why?)  Plus, we were directly to the right of the batters’ box, which balls will have a tendency to gravitate to for right handed hitters–of which make up a majority of the game and the world
c) As a social event, and in particular one where few people were actually baseball fans who actually cared about the game, most were simply there to interact with each other, so there wasn’t exactly an undivided level of attention paid to the direction of the ball on each pitch
d) Around the time of first pitch, Jeffrey, our server was taking our order for a good 15-20 minutes, given that we only had a couple of menus for the 16 of us, and because we kept changing our minds and doubling up our orders, particularly with alcohol–so very little attention was paid to where the ball was going during this time–which brings me to the next two points
e) And because of the outrageous amount of alcohol that was being consumed (which is the only way to make it through a baseball game) our reaction times were certainly not at its peak either
f) At any given time we had some sort of food or beverage in our hand, which would not be so readily sacrificed to the ground had something come our way
g) Half our crowd probably had never even touched a baseball before and so were extremely unprepared under even the best of conditions.

However, given all that I ended up quite disappointed that nothing that landed in the crowd came even within 20+ feet of us…though I suppose that was much better than the alternative.

All in all, it was a great night, watching a baseball game will never be the same again.