The Shoestring Catch

THE TRIP.

Baseball: My two best friends and I just graduated from college and we are going on a three week road trip to delay our inevitable entrance into the “real world”.  We are all avid baseball fans, so we framed our trip around seeing as many MLB games in as many different ballparks as our schedule would allow.  This blog is an attempt to detail our experiences and hopefully inspire others to take similar baseball themed road trips.

Budget: We are all broke college students, so we have put this trip together for as little cash as possible (while still maintaining some semblance of fun and safety).  If you prefer to have things spelled out for you, you could say we are trying to do this trip “on a shoestring”.

Beer: I am a fan of good beer.  One of my goals on this trip is to drink only craft beer that I cannot get at home in Texas.  I have a preliminary list of beers I want to try, but hopefully the locals in each city will point me in the right direction.

ME.

My name is James Van Hooser, and I just graduated from the University of Texas with a B.A. in English.  I want to be a travel writer, so I have decided to travel and write.  I am a Houston Astros fan by trade, no matter how painful that may be these days.

ANDREW.

Andrew is my college roommate and hetero-lifemate. We road tripped to Colorado together during the summer of 2007 and drove to the magical Rio Grande Valley in the spring of 2008.  He just graduated from The University of Texas with a B.S. in Human Biology. He’ll be applying to med-schools this fall. Ranrew is a die-hard Boston Red Sox fan.

ERIC.

Eric is my best friend from high school and my primary road tripping buddy. Our first trip was a jaunt to Dallas to see a Texas Rangers game in the summer of 2005. Since then we’ve driven to the Grand Canyon, Florida, Colorado, and lots of places in between. Eric just graduated from Texas A&M with a degree in Mechanical Engineering. He is also a Houston Astros fan.

ARWEN.

Arwen is my 2007 Vapor (Dark Silver) Ford Mustang. We’ve only been together for a year, but I know it’s true love.

LIAM.

Liam is my teddy bear and the unofficial mascot of this trip. My girlfriend Stephanie crocheted him for me for Valentine’s Day. He is named after Liam Neeson, and he has a particular set of skills. Hopefully you will see pictures of Liam at all the ballparks we visit.

Stephanie

Stephanie is my girlfriend and the brains behind this blog. I may write the content, but she does everything else. She designed our awesome graphics, set up all of the pages, and she posts the expense reports and pie charts from the home base in Houston, TX. She also let me go on this trip! She is the greatest.