Procedurals & Pixie Dust: The other love of my life

If you ask any of my friends to name two things that I am obsessed with, most will probably tell you that I have sick infatuations with both Disney and the New York Yankees (other popular answers would be television, men, men on television... etc...).

But I'm going to talk about the Yankees now. So haters beware.

I've been a Yankees fan for as long as I can remember, and not some flaky little fair-weathered fan; a die-hard, blood and guts, paint my face with pinstripes, screaming Yankees fan. Nothing will ever deter my devotion, and I would love my boys even if the Steinbrenner family never existed and the payroll was $5 and they played ball in a parking lot. So don't hand me any of that Evil Empire crap.

That said, I do enjoy the luxury that the team enjoys. I'm a classy girl (hah!), I like classy things. If Derek Jeter asked me to accompany him on his yacht (if, like, Derek Jeter had a yacht) and enjoy champagne and caviar, I would not decline. You probably wouldn't either.

My family used to buy into a season ticket package at the OLD Yankee Stadium. The REAL Yankee Stadium. We had the seats for about ten years. They were field-level, eight rows behind the dugout. I spent the majority of my Yankees-loving childhood in those seats. Needless to say, I was spoiled rotten. I would get to the Stadium for batting practice and hang out by the dugout and talk to whichever player would be standing two feet from my face. I acquired quite a few souvenirs in section 37; autographs, balls, bats, batting gloves, a cup of dirt from the pitchers mound handed to me by Joba Chamberlain himself, and some priceless conversation with some of the greatest baseball players of all time. My sixteenth birthday was spent at the last game ever played at the old house. And after the game, I stood at the dugout and hung out with some fellow die-hard fans and some of our favorite players and said goodbye to the place that we all called home.

The next season, the brand new shiny park opened, and we were kicked out. Our homey little section 37 was no more. Instead, it was replaced by a smaller section of championship seating or whatever it is. With big, fluffy reclining chairs and unobstructed views and a price tag of $2500 per seat, per game. As much as I love my Yankees, NO one should pay that much to go to a three-hour baseball game. I think the price has dropped a little now, but it's still too monumentally high for anyone in their right minds to shell out.

And I, who had been going to games my entire life in what I will forever consider to be the best section in the entire park, could never find anywhere else that would compare and not cost me my entire college tuition. I stopped going to games at the level I did before. We went to maybe one or two a season, and I left disappointed, all the time, selfishly longing -- like the spoiled brat I am -- for my old box.

Well, I'm still not over it. But I'm still a spoiled brat. My aunt is on the board of directors at a company that was holding is annual retreat in a luxury box at the Stadium on Tuesday night. I was invited to come along. We were put up in the penthouse suite of a midtown hotel for the night, and bused to the game, where we all hung out in this amazing room with a full bar and a buffet and private viewing of the game. I still missed my old seats, but this was one of the most incredible, once-in-a-lifetime experiences I could've ever asked for. I was so lucky to be invited to this game, and I'm extremely grateful.

To top it off, Andy Pettite is back in pinstripes and pitched a two-hit shutout. The Yankees won an pulled within half a game of first place. All is right with the universe.

But I spent about 18 hours feeling like a bazillionaire. Pictures because I couldn't resist.