This.
It seems that if you attend a Lake Elsinore Storm game during one of their “Fat Tuesday” nights (i.e. all-you-can-eat night), they will help you out with the impending flatulance by giving you a sample of something called subtle butt: a “disposable gas neutralizer.” For those too lazy to click on the link, the key paragraph from the Storm’s press release:

“You can probably deduce that All-You-Can-Eat ballpark food might lead to substantial gas emissions, which is where corporate sponsor, Subtle Butt, enters the picture. Made of activated carbon fabric, each disposable 3.25″ square shield is held onto the inside of the underwear with two self-adhesive strips. Subtle Butt effectively filters flatulence, absorbing and neutralizing its odor.”

You can’t make this stuff up.
Unfortunately for me, I fly back from my southern California baseball trip on the morning of April 14… which just happens to be the first day of this promotion. Otherwise, I would be sending an e-mail to a certain San Diego resident right now informing him that I would be taking his car to Lake Elsinore that day, whether he was coming with me or not.

Last night the two baseball teams I follow the closest, my beloved Minnesota Twins and the Boston Red Sox, with whom I am increasingly less and less enamored of, took the field for the opening game of the Mayor’s Cup, the annual Twins-Red Sox spring training title. NESN aired the game last night, so I was able to watch the Twins win 5-2.
But man, the rotating announcers NESN had last night in Jerry Remy’s absence did not want to talk about the game at hand unless the Red Sox were at bat. I was being a passive fan, simultaneously solving some crosswords and generally surfing the internet while the game was going on. I figured if someone got a big hit or scored, they’d announce it and I’d look up from whatever I was engrossed at the moment. But somehow, not enough fuss was made in the bottom of the 2nd because suddenly I looked up and the Twins were ahead 3-0. And the announcers were talking about Pedro Martinez. What?!
I know it’s spring training and it doesn’t “count” and that this was a broadcast for Red Sox fans, but come on. The Twins scored three runs and the announcers were instead talking about a guy who hasn’t played for the Sox in nearly five years. It’s that kind of arrogance and narcissism throughout “Red Sox Nation” that makes them the second most hated team in baseball (behind the Yankees, of course).

Come April, besides two Twins games at Fenway, I’ll be upping my visited stadiums list two notches with two Southern California games. Anand got boxed seats to a Padres-Giants game from his department. Having never sat in boxed seats at a Major League game (minor league, yes), I convinced him that not only was it a good time for me to visit, but that we should also drive 90 miles that Saturday to see another game in another stadium and another league: Angels vs. Red Sox.
I might actually root against the Sox though… I haven’t decided. Boston fans have soured me a little on their team. Also, Wally made some excellent points which I agree with in a comment and a blog post. I have an I-agree-but-I-still-like-this-sport-because… response formulating in my head which one day I will get to. Probably around the time I do my Mystery Hunt write-up.

I just spent the day in the “Virtual Waiting Room” trying to get a couple or four tickets to just about any game this season. The goal was to be able to go to a game or two with people. I was released from the interminable waiting room twice. The first time, I was greeted with an image of a seating chart for a random Tigers game, but anytime I tried to click through to select seats, I was greeted with the following: “We’re sorry, we were unable to process your request due to high transaction volumes. Please try to submit your request again by clicking the CONTINUE button.” (Clicking CONTINUE just gave me the same message.) Eventually I was booted back to the waiting room.
Finally, about 20 minutes ago, I was let out of the waiting room again. Only now I was told that the only seats together were standing room only. Grrr… going to baseball games should not be this hard. Maybe it’s time to be a Paw Sox fan.

The fundamental difference between being a baseball fan in Michigan and being a baseball fan in Boston?
In Michigan, if I wanted to see the Twins play I would drive to Detroit the day of the game and purchase as many tickets as I wanted without paying crappy TicketMaster fees.
In Boston, it is still January, and I went looking to see the status of Twins-Red Sox tickets to find that I can no longer get two seats together. Thus, I have just given TicketMaster $16 for “convenience” and have a single ticket to each of the April 21st and April 22nd Twins/Red Sox games. Also, one of the tickets cost me $90 — there is not a seat anywhere in Comerica that approaches this.