Mik’s Mini Bat Collection: National Softball Hall of Fame and Museum

At the National Softball Hall of Fame and Museum they had several different colored mini bats, but they all had the same design. Mik went with the darker natural color. The mini bat says National Softball Hall of Fame & Stadium Oklahoma City, OK in gold lettering.

Day 66: National Softball Hall of Fame and Museum

On July 24, 2009, we visited the National Softball Hall of Fame and Museum in Oklahoma City. It is not exactly baseball, but it is a closely related sport, so I decided to make it part of the trip. Plus, I was a softball fan for a few years when we had a NPF team in Tucson. Sadly, though, that league apparently is not related to the ASA as nothing about the league is in the museum. However, softball in the Olympics did have its whole own room of the museum, which is really saying something because the museum rather small.

The Hall of Fame begins with a little bit about how the sport of softball was started in Illinois. It has some early softball items on display related to that, but after that the first floor gets rather boring unless you know about the softball players of the past. That is because this floor is mostly the hall of fame with circular plaques of players and others inducted into the Softball Hall of Fame. I had not heard of more than one or two in the hall of fame and it was sad to see how the place is upkept, as it goes as bad as seeing one guys hall of fame circle actually entirely missing while others looked ready to fall off.

The one part of the whole museum that I did enjoy was the Olympic room off to one side of the Hall of Fame. This room does have the upkeep issue of things falling off the wall behind the glass in some of the display cases, but it does have some cool things. They have a large display case devoted to the 4 Olympics softball was an event (1996, 2000, 2004, 2008). The top of each display case says what Team USA got (Gold for 3 and Silver for 2008). Things on display included team rosters, tickets from the games, signed softballs from the games, uniforms, and bases.

The museum also has a basement floor to it. It sure was not obvious how that floor is accessible for wheelchairs, but Mik did not want to be here anyways, so we did not even ask if there was some hidden elevator. By the way even finding a staff member to ask would not have been easy, as they were mostly absent including the gift shop mostly being unmanned. The lower level has some interesting stuff, but a large portion of it is just photos of teams and the only info is just names. They do have a college section, though, which includes items related to different championship teams including the University of Arizona.

Overall the National Softball Hall of Fame and Museum was not worth going out of our way for. Most of the small museums we have visited have been very worthwhile, but this one is on the verge of being a more big time one while it really is a neglected small museum. Many small museums are the ones you find the people actually passionate about it, but this one does not even have actual staff working other than the take the admission money or ring up your gift shop purchases. Actually that is the main staff role at all the small museums, but at every other one they are least at people that were friendly and/or interested in being there. Not even those paid to be here seem to want to be here and that seems to really say something about its quality.

Day 71: Mik and his Lion

We are doing the Lion Country Safari today before the final game/ballpark of the trip tonight. Mik got a stuffed animal lion as his souvenir. He thinks it will go great with his cheetah.

Sent from my iPhone

Update from laptop 7/29/09: Mik is happy to have finally found a nice snuggy animal as a souvenir of this trip. He tends to like to get one every summer vacation. Several summers ago is when he got the cheetah at the Los Angeles Zoo and two years ago he got his Hard Rock D.C. bear that is his car animal. He had a chance to look at stuffed animals at the Georgia Aquarium and at some of the Build-a-Bears at the ballparks, but the lion was the first one he spotted that he imagined himself actually snugging a lot and he does not believe in wasting money on a stuffed animal if it is not going to get a good amount of snuggy time.

Day 67: Mik Collecting Shells

We got to the campground in St. Petersburg and set up camp a few hours ago. Now we are a few miles down the road at the beach. Mik has actually been excited today since I told him we would go to the beach this evening. He is such a beach boy. It is nice to see him actually enjoying himself on this trip for once.

Smashed Pennies: National Museum of American History

At the National Museum of American History Mik and I each got a smashed penny. The designs seem to be the same as they always were, but the machine is one of the newer ones that cost $1 per penny. The one I got says National Museum of American History Kenneth E. Behring Center and has an image of the museum building. Mik chose the Spark Lab one that says National Museum of American History Lemelson Center.

Day 60: National Museum of American History

Before going to the Nationals game on July 18, 2009, we took the Metro into D.C. and visited the National Museum of American History. This is my favorite museum in D.C. and I have not seen it in over 3 years due to it being closed and this being my first time in D.C. since it reopened. I thought we were going to end up skipping it since we changed the plans and stayed in Atlanta an extra day to see the Maddux Number Retirement Ceremony. However, we got to the D.C. area, set up camp, and still had several hours to waste before the Nats game. Also, since I had been to Nationals Park a lot we did not have to worry about getting there early because I knew where we were going and that there is not really anything to see outside the park.

It was a Saturday and it is the summer, so it ended up being very crowded, so we did not really get to see much. We did wait in line to see the new way they display the Star Spangled Banner, which is really well done. It was also oddly the shortest line to wait in to see an exhibit. The only other exhibit we got to was the Philadelphia Gunboat. I had wanted to also see the Popular Culture exhibit, but there was a long line just to get into the exhibit. I had never seen it to ridiculous before and honestly I think the remodel has caused these line issues because the exhibits are now more connected with less general hallway space in between. That and it having been closed for so long and it being the first summer reopened probably added to their being more people visiting.

Anyways it was sadly not as enjoyable as I had thought it would be. We ended up leaving after less than an hour because there was no way to see anything and still get out of there to the Metro and then the game. Thus we wasted time by walking the National Mall to get to the green line at L’Enfant Plaza and go to the game instead of getting on the closest stop and having to transfer at L’Enfant Plaza, which can be an annoying multi elevator thing.

Day 56: Centennial Olympic Park

We still had time to waste on July 14, 2009, after the World of Coca Cola and the Georgia Aquarium, so we walked across the street and walked through Centennial Olympic Park. I would have liked to have more leisurely strolled through here, but Mik was being a pain and kept complaining, so we did not really get to leisurely explore it.

The Centennial Olympic Park honors the hundredth anniversary of the first modern Olympics in Athens, Greece, in 1896 along with the Olympic games that took place during that centennial anniversary year (1996) in Atlanta, Georgia. Some of the park features include the symbols for various Olympic sports in the sidewalk (we did find the baseball symbol), a torch monument, and a monument to Baron Pierre de Coubertin, who is the founder of the modern Olympic games.

Car Sticker Update: Coca Cola

At the World of Coca Cola Dad got a Coca Cola sticker the car, but it turned out to actually be a cling. He ended up having to put it inside the car and it cannot really be scene through the tinted back window. It is in the bottom left corner. From the outside it is supposed to be a red circle that says Coke, but the only side I could get a decent photo of is the side inside the car that says Atlanta Home of Coke.

Smashed Penny: Georgia Aquarium

At the Georgia Aquarium Mik and I got the same smashed penny design. We went with the simple design that has the Georgia Aquarium’s G logo. It is a pretty interesting logo, though, as the G is made to look like a fish and there are air bubbles in front of it.

Mik’s Food Scrapbook: Georgia Aquarium

The main reason we ended up going to the Georgia Aquarium was that we were hungry after the World of Coca Cola and the café in the Aquarium was the only thing nearby to go eat at. Mik had a corn dog and a red velvet cupcake for lunch here. He rated the corn dog horrible because it was overcooked and even the hot dog was burned. The red velvet cupcake was no Fox & Obel Fat Boy, but it was still good, especially since it was only $1.

Day 56: Georgia Aquarium

The Georgia Aquarium is right next to the World of Coca Cola. There was nowhere else to get any food nearby, so we decided to go to the aquarium as something to do and a place to get lunch on July 14, 2009. The aquarium sure makes itself seem amazing boasting about it having the largest aquarium in the world, but it is actually not that impressive. Sure it has the large aquarium and was fun to see, but I think there is more to see overall at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago.

The first exhibit we went into was Ocean Voyager. This exhibit is of what I think they said was the largest aquarium environment in the world or something like that. Anyways it does not end up looking all that big because the viewing windows are mostly only enough for a few people to look through at a time, although there is also a tunnel view and one large viewing room. It may not end up seeming that big, but it certainly is pretty big because they have several tiger sharks in there. The aquarium also is the home to the only manta ray in a U.S. aquarium. It was interesting to stand an watch the various aquatic life swim by the large viewing wndow, but a lot of the small windows were horrible because it blocked the view of the aquarium as a whole and just showed an area mostly isolated by artificial settings that did not even have much in terms of little fish around it.

The second area we saw was Cold Water Quest. This area has animals that from cold ocean habitats. One of my favorite things in the whole aquarium was in this area. That was the seadragons. They are so fun to watch, especially the ones that look so much like kelp. This area also has belugas, an octopus, spider crabs, and a preserved specimen of a giant squid. They have penguins here, but you can currently only see them on a behind the scene tour, which we did not realize until too late to see them. Anyways it is not like I have not seen the African penguins in their native habitat.

The third area we explored was the Tropical Diver exhibit. This exhibit includes species native to tropical coral reefs. One of the interesting animals was the jellyfish, especially the transparent moon jellyfish that were illuminated with different colored lights. The garden eels were also interesting to watch pop up in the sand. There is also a large viewing window type display for this area. Other species on display included sea horses and clownfish.

The final exhibit we saw was Georgia Explorer. This exhibit contains aquatic life native to Georgia. They have loggerhead turtles and a touch station in here. They also have a display on a fish once thought to be extinct.

Overall it was not that bad of place to kill a few hours, but it was an extremely expensive place to go and see everything in less than two hours. It really is not worth its crazy admission price. It might have been better if it was not so crowded, but then again it might have been a faster trip if we were not slowed down by the crowds trying to see the different things.