On no other day was the Washington Nationals' motto more appropriate than yesterday. Throughout the early part of the day, it appeared that we would be very lucky to see any baseball played in RFK Stadium. About a half hour prior to game time, the rain slowed and the prospects for getting a game began to look better. As it turned out, the slow steady rain lasted for the entire first six innings, stopping in the 7th inning. A much heavier rain began to pelt the field in the top of the ninth for about five minutes before subsiding...
Sunday's game began much like the previous night's game as the Nats fell behind quickly, in large part due to defensive lapses. Josh Bard's 3-run homer in the top of the first of starter Jason Simontacchi gave the San Diego Padres a quick 3-0 lead. The Nats were held in check by Padres pitcher David Wells until the third inning when Ronnie Belliard doubled in Nook Logan with two outs. The very next batter, Ryan Zimmerman, hit what can only be called a prestigious shot to left field three pitches later to tie the game at 3. Padre left fielder Termell Sledge didn't even move as Zimmerman's blast went into the upper deck, flying high into section 444. Mark Zimmerman of the Washington Times noted today that in RFK stadium history, only Frank Howard (of the Washington Senators) had reached that part of left field before. Barry Bonds of the San Francisco Giants also hit a shot into Section 468 in right field two seasons ago.
Simontachhi would falter after that though, and allowed three more runs in the top of the fifth inning including a solo homer to the .111 hitting Hiram Bocachica. The Padres added another run in the seventh for the Padres seventh and final run. The Nats now are 2-4 on the homestand and now get a day off, facing the Pittsburgh Pirates in a three game series starting Tuesday night.
After the game, I took the Metro to the Eastern Market station and did a little exploring on the East side of Capitol Hill. In my previous visit to D.C., I had covered the North, West and South sides pretty thoroughly, but I never made it to the East side on that trip. I explored several landmarks including the Library of Congress and walked on the steps of Capitol building.
Since I was starting to get very hungry at this point, I decided to hit the Sonoma restaurant and wine bar on Pennsylvania avenue just before 6 PM... Georgetown has a very similar themed establishment which I visited the last time I was in D.C. called Mendocino. The food there was excellent and there was a great ambiance about the place. The same definitely could be said about Sonoma... Not more than ten minutes after I walked in, a man named "C.C." grabbed a bar seat next to me... I soon found out that C.C. was a regular to the establishment, visiting two or three times a week. For the next hour and forty minutes or so we talked about everything and anything - sports, music, the D.C. scene, etc - and the conversation was very enjoyable. C.C. was also very impressed with my local knowledge and how I seemed like a "Washingtonian" even though this was only the 6th full day I had spent in the city. At that point I had to confess that I had been given a lot of help, and that knowing a couple of people that live here definitely made it a lot easier.
Around 7:45 PM, I headed back to the Metro station and on the way back to my hotel... the rest of the night was spent answering voicemails and calling a few relatives in between pitches of the Red Sox-Yankees game...
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Today, I plan on taking in the DC Ducks historic tour before checking out of the Best Western here in Georgetown and heading to Nashville. I'll be meeting up with several of my friends from Carrie Underwood's fanclub at the airport there in anticipation of Tuesday night's fanclub party... and not to worry, I'll be taking TONS of pictures of this event!!!
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