Coco Crisp Bobble...waist?

After a couple months of patiently waiting, we finally got to an A's game.  And not just an A's game, but a day when they were giving away Coco Crisp "Lean" bobbleheads.  The only thing, his head doesn't bobble but his torso does, to depict him doing the Bernie Lean.

Notice his hand is backwards?  

When the A's had their Reggie Jackson bobblehead giveaway, there was an enormous crowd that showed up (or so I've read).  I came across a blog of a kid, Nick Badders, who documented the extremely long lines and noted he arrived at 9:00 for a 1:05 game.  Following in his helpful footsteps, LaVor called the coliseum Friday night to find out what time the parking gates opened.  When the lady told us 8:30, we knew that's what time we had to be there.

We pulled up right at 8:30 to a semi-empty parking lot.  We think they actually opened the gates at 8:00, or people took BART, but there were about 50-75 people ahead of us in line.  A total of 15,000 bobbleheads were available and we were determined to get one.

The line when we got there

The line about an hour later

With a bag full of snacks, a blanket to sit on, some coloring pages for The Lime, and the iPad, we were set to brave the 2.5 hour wait until we could go inside.  If we had brought a squirt bottle with a fan attached, we would have really been set.  We knew it was going to be hot, but we weren't expecting it to be that hot at 9:00 in Oakland.  But it was and we dealt with it, and some may have complained a little bit.

The little boy in front of us, Leo, kindly offered his trains to The Lime.

 The Lime and I took a little break to walk around and see how bad the other lines were.  There were people everywhere and boxes of bobbleheads everywhere.  We think we saw Josh Reddick pull into the player's parking lot in his older Chevy truck that might have had a train horn on it.  The Lime was excited to see that LaVor bought a frozen lemonade while we were gone and he (The Lime) ended up claiming it as his own.

Homeless encampment underneath the overpass. 

Several people said, "I don't get it.  Who's Nickelback?"  I got it and thought it was hilarious!

 We had a tiny countdown and when the clock struck 11:05, we had our tickets in hand and headed toward the gates.  We got our bag checked, our tickets scanned and then it happened...we all got our much anticipated bobblehead!  The Lime was so stinkin' excited and wanted to open it right then and there.  But since people were already asking to buy them, we thought it'd be safer to hold off until we at least got to our seats.

I made The Lime a sign that said, "Coco's Biggest Littlest Fan".  He and LaVor hung out above the A's dugout for a while, hoping to see Coco and have him sign it.  Unfortunately, it was hotter than it was at 9:00 (obviously) and The Lime just couldn't take it anymore.  Sadly, when I turned the recorded game on this morning, the camera crew shot the guys that The Lime was standing right next to!  Darn!

The guy in the yellow shirt and the other one holding a huge Coco head were the ones that made it on tv

We got to watch everyone stretch and warm up and unfortunately had to listen to the drunk man behind us "Boo!" every person that walked by in a non-A's outfit.  The only positive thing that came out of his mouth was when he yelled at the people around us to take their hats off during the National Anthem.

Bartolo Colon

Jerry Blevins & Pat Neshek

_____ & Grant Balfour

I think it was Blevins who was doing the Bernie Lean!

ATM & IMD performed "Bernie Lean" and Reddick seems to approve

Caught Stomper getting in on the action, too!

No words...

As soon as the game started, The Lime wanted to go home.  We had already been there for almost five hours and he was spent.  Thankfully he perked up when LaVor's parents arrived and started getting into the game.

Shouting, "Let's go Oakland!" and "Go, Coco!"

Waving to Stomper

The Lime's favorite thing to say, "Now batting, #52, Yoenis Cespedes!"

Josh Donaldson

Josh Reddick

Eric Sogard

Jerry Blevins

Pat Neshek - look at his arms!

The gentleman that sat next to me asked if we were able to get any bobbleheads.  I told him we got three, since we arrived at 8:30.  He was disappointed that his arrival time of 11:00 landed him nothing. We had already promised one of the heads to a friend, and we wanted to keep one for The Lime.  So we offered the third one to him and he couldn't believe it.  He offered us some beer and sunflower seeds in exchange but I told him we were covered in the snack department.  He made a comment about my camera compared to his camera phone.  He then asked if we were season ticket holders and I told him, "We wish!"  He kept asking me who certain players were, only to say, "Just making sure you knew!"  It was funny and it's always nice to sit next to normal people, even if they do stink.  

Things were going good up until Jarrod Parker got a cramp in his leg and had to leave the game.  Jesse Chavez was brought in and it all went downhill from there.  To avoid a sold out coliseum rush of people, we left at the top of the 7th inning, as did a number of folks.

Although we were all hot, tired, and slightly disappointed about the score of the game, we were excited for the bobblehead and had a fun adventure of getting them.