Yankee Stadium
whenever a foul comes in your direction.
I always have to have a hot dog when I go to Yankee Stadium. It's just tradition, and anyway the Stadium has the best hot dogs in all of New York City. I try not to get sodas so that I don't have to miss any part of the game while I'm in the bathroom. If I do, though, I've never found there to be a line for the women's bathroom at the Stadium.
Other ballparks have their seventh-inning stretch, and so does the Stadium; more famous and more fun, though, is the sixth-inning "YMCA". Every single game for at least six years now, the groundskeepers come out to rake the infield clay to the tune of the Village People's "YMCA." They have a choreographed dance along with the song that they do while dragging their equipment behind them. The entire stadium gets into it, and when the groundskeepers go back inside, everyone cheers them just as loudly as if they were players making a game-saving double play. My dad thought it was silly, but my mom and I really got into the "YMCA" at the Red Sox game.
Every game concludes with "New York, New York" blasting over the Stadium's PA system. I used to find it cheesy, but as time went on and I attended more and more games, it somehow became authentic, like the best way to end the best kind of New York day.
Every single time I walk in to Yankee Stadium I get sentimental. It's hard not to at that place. Walking through the tunnel out into the seating area is like magic every time for me. Memorial Park stands out in left field with the plaques of so many Yankee - and baseball - greats: Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Roger Maris and, of course, Babe Ruth. It wouldn't be his house without at least a few tributes to the man himself, now would it? A game at Yankee Stadium is more than just a baseball game, it's part of American history. The Yankees have such a long, storied history full of so many record-breakers and headline-makers that the sense of connection to baseball's place in American culture can be felt in the air at any given game. For any baseball fan, whether you love or hate the Yankees, no trip to New York is complete without a scheduled stop at the Home of Champions on 161st Street, the Bronx.