San Antonio, TX

Park # 32

What I Remember

I remember a Puffy Taco. For the uninitiated, a Puffy Taco is pretty much what it sounds like – a taco made from a crunchy but airy taco shell, kind of like a sopapilla except not sweet. Here’s a recipe that looks pretty good. However, although I am pretty sure this San Antonio specialty was available somewhere in the ballpark that night, the Taco I recall wasn’t available for dinner. He was a mascot for the Missions.

The Puffy Taco was dressed in long flowing brown robes with green and brown scarves of some kind coming out of his shell and he wore a red hat on top to represent a tomato. He would cavort with the crowd in a variety of ways throughout the night but during one memorable performance, which made both our weekly MLB Magazine segment and our season-end ESPN special, he raced a little girl around the bases. The Taco led most of the way but the girl was catching up and she dove at him at home plate and came up…just…short. She got up with tears in her eyes but to the great delight of the crowd whacked Puffy with a forearm shiver. The crowd roared.

The Game(s)

San Antonio Missions 7 Midland Angels 6

It was a rematch of the game we had seen in Midland the previous week and once again, the home team won in thrilling fashion. The Missions put together three hits to score two runs in the bottom of the 8th inning and came from behind for a 7-6 win.

The Box (Click on the arrows to see more images)

The Trip

We were dog tired after several long days of driving and nights of little sleep so we pulled over at a rest area a few miles east of San Antonio hoping for a few hours of sleep in the minivan. This was not our favorite accommodation but with little of either money or time it was a a frequent option early on in the Excellent Adventure. However, on this night, we were awakened by the sound of a car horn in the wee hours and sat up to see what was going on. A Good Samaritan in an RV had been blowing his horn, he said, because someone had been trying to break into the minivan while we slept. It was really the only scary thing that happened to us that summer and we were no worse for it, but I don’t think we slept in another rest area again.