Last Friday, one local headline spewed out some bullshit about the Brewers’ ‘long-awaited Opening Day’.

COVID erased it before noon.

Don’t call it Opening Day.

Please.

It’s not even close.

I know what Opening Day looks like in Milwaukee. I also know what it smells like.

First of all, the weather usually sucks. Today’s 60 degree fresh cloudy day would’ve been a godsend in late March/early April.

The real Opening Day is a nortorious combination of young, amateur-hour drunks reveling in skipping day-to-day responsibilities to day drink along with very experienced, older drunks.

Most true baseball fans (the nerds who keep score) abhor Opening Day for that very reason.

I once skipped an utterly useless day of college classes to go to Opening Day back in the 90’s. I don’t remember who won, but I remember skipping schoo to go.

And I remember the County Stadium smells because I wasn’t drinking.

Decades of spilled beer on cement.

Buckets and buckets of freshly poured beer.

Hundreds upon hundreds of grilled sausages.

Stale cigar smoke.

Thousands upon thousands of long beer pisses.

Popcorn.

Peanuts.

Freshly cut grass.

I walked near Miller Park just before the Brewers’ first home game tonight. Didn’t smell a thing. Kelly’s Bleachers had a few fans crowding around the bar, but their parking lot was nearly empty.

It’s not Opening Day without fans.

It’s not sex without skin.

It’s not a toilet without the toil.

THE END