My wife, the Cardinals puppetmaster...

Yesterday was my first visit to the new Busch Stadium here in St. Louis. The old Busch Stadium was a bit of an eyesore, but was still pretty functional and allowed for adequate sight lines no matter what seat you had. Add to that, this town is crazy for the Redbirds, and game attendance never seemed to be a huge problem. Money and revenue is the name of the game these days, though, and the need for more luxury boxes probably prompted the "need" for a new place for the Cardinals to call home.

The new stadium is really nice. But what new stadium isn't? Honestly, all these retro-themed parks are beginning to run together. I sort of felt like I was watching a game in Arlington for a minute, if you could ignore the sea of red in the stadium. Sometimes, I wish they'd take more risk and do something architecturally unique that can almost become iconic for the city. Sometimes you end up with something ugly like the Astrodome in Houston or the old Kingdome in Seattle, but you can also end up with something rather timeless like Soldier Field in Chicago or the upcoming Sprint Center in Kansas City.

Unfortunately, being in a new ballpark didn't increase my wife's interest in the game at all. She instead roamed around for most of the game against the San Francisco Giants and perused the team store, explored the various food choices, and contemplated buying a stuffed Fredbird mascot at the on-site Build-a-Bear shop (which is a St. Louis-born company).

The funny thing is that the Cards seemed to score every time she came back to her seat. When we first got to the game, Pujols batted a runner in and Escarnacion hit a three-run homer in the first inning. She then left to do her exploring (even getting some banking done at the Bank of America ATM). The game remained pretty quiet until she returned in the 5th inning when Scott Rolen batted in Pujols shortly after she sat down. She left again around the 6th inning to get a snow cone because it was hot, and returned in the bottom of the 7th. Can you guess what happened then? Another RBI by Rolen. We left the game with the Cards winning 6-1. Does she have magic power over the Cardinals? Or is this divine intervention to spark more interest within her for the great pastime of America? You decide...