In a setup I've never seen before or since, the now-defunct Nashville Xpress, of the AA Southern League, shared Greer Stadium with the AAA Sounds. As a result, there was a game in town almost every day. But the Sounds were clearly the real team in town; not many people bothered to come out to see the Xpress.

In addition, it had been raining all day long. We watched it come down from inside the local Hooters and figured we wouldn't be seeing a game that night. Of course, we still headed out to the park just to check things out. When we got there, the field was all but flooded, and we were among only a handful of foolish souls waiting for the skies to clear.

Much to our surprise, they did.

We parked ourselves a few rows behind the visitors' dugout along the third base line. Most of the rest of this tiny crowd, being hometown fans, chose the first base side. Now, as a baseball fan, I love to see people coming out to the games, but there was something about having half the stands to ourselves that was very cool. At one point, a pop foul landed several rows behind us and half a section over. In lieu of the usual mad scramble for the ball, Ron casually walked over and picked up his souvenir unchallenged.

But our best memory of the night was definitely Dave the beer vendor. He was right there for us when the game started, and naturally, he made a sale. It didn't take him long to cover the whole park, and we were just finishing up when he got back. On his third visit, which couldn't have been at the end of the second inning yet, we weren't even halfway through. "That's OK," said Dave, "I'll wait. nobody else is buying anyway." And with that, he sat himself down next to us!

Dave turned out to be a great guy. He was quite a bit older than us, and told us stories about all his years of coming out to the ballpark. He in turn was happy to hear our stories of our baseball travels. He went about his beer selling business, but kept stopping back to our seats to continue our chat. By the end of the game (and several beers later), we felt like we'd made a new friend.

So here's to you, Dave, our personal beer vendor for a night!