Well, after after I wrote my little adieu to RFK the other day, my wife promptly scored free tickets to the Nats/Phillies game last night and off we went. And they weren’t just any tickets…they were Diamond Club tickets, four rows behind home plate, that included a free buffet in a separate stadium lounge and free drinks/snacks in the seats. The tickets also came with a free parking spot about 50 yards from the stadium. Now, THAT‘s the way to say goodbye.

The seats were great. Still, it creeped me out to have a waiter circling me at my baseball game and I couldn’t help but feel I was on the wrong side of the whole loathsome plutocrat/plebe segregation that is starting to characterize too many sporting events. It also creeped me out to have various corporate types around me who clearly didn’t know much about baseball and had no rooting interest in the game. The buffet was fine and we enjoyed that, but back at the seats, I couldn’t make myself tell my personal man-servant to go fetch me some nachos (we did have him get us a couple of beers, but you have to pay for alcohol). I just couldn’t get comfortable with this luxury from my padded seat, although we saw a good game.

Next year I may have club seats in the new stadium, and they have certain luxuries attached to them (including a private lounge and — yes — padded seats), so I guess I’d better get used to this sort of thing.