Seats in shade? Seats in sun?

This is the tale of two baseball Saturdays.

Two weekends ago, Sherri and I went up to Clearwater's Brighthouse Field to see the Pirates and Phillies.

Last weekend, we went to McKechnie Field with my wife's folks  to see the same teams.

The Pirates won up there; the Phillies down here.

But that's not the story.

When we went to Clearwater, we got seats on the berm, the grassy hill along centerfield, the least expensive tickets available at Bright House which regularly packs in Phillies fans. Grapefruit League games draw around 10,000 there.

We sat on a blanket behind right centerfield --- and got roasted.

It was 80 degrees and despite all the sunscreen we put on, we still went home with sunburns.

I wasn't going to make that mistake again.

Ha!

So when I called the Pirate ticket office the middle of last week, I requested four tickets under cover for Saturday's home game.

Figured it'd be a good idea to avoid another ballgame in the hot sun.

Turns out that's exactly what we craved come gametime.

The temperature was 68 degrees --- and felt like 58 in the shade behind home plate at McKechnie.

Our seats were excellent, buit it was c-o-o-o-ld.

We made it through the seventh-inning stretch and split.

"Last week I had to go in the shade to get cooled off; this game I had to get in the sun to get warmed up," my wife said.

I'll get it right next game.