June 6, 2017
As an engagement gift from some of our friends, my fiancée and I received tickets to the Red Sox home opener against the Yankees. We’re both hard-core Red Sox fans. As luck would have it, she wasn’t feeling well enough to attend, so we decided to rent a robot to go in her place. On my way to New Fenway Park in South Boston, I stopped at a Rent-A-Bot to pick one up. As long as you already hold a ticket, there’s no up-charge for bringing a bot to a game. My local Rent-A-Bot had just what I needed – a first-person point of view, variable speed, fully mobile robot that my fiancee could operate remotely from our living-room sofa. Using her laptop, she could maneuver the bot back and forth, from side to side, turn its front-facing camera 360 degrees, and even record highlights of the game. Best of all, the bot was equipped with a 15-inch monitor, speakers, and voice recognition software so that I could see and hear my fiancée enjoying the entire game. Truth be told, it was the next best thing to having her there with me.
After my autonomous vehicle self-parked at a lot adjacent to the ballpark at a cost of $250, I unloaded the bot, uploaded its software, and my fiancée navigated it remotely (with some assistance from yours truly) through the human and vehicular traffic to find our seats behind home-plate. Actually, it was pretty easy. At New Fenway, they have a designated entrance for humans accompanied by bots. Once we were seated, I ordered a beer and a couple of NFF’s (New Fenway Franks). The total came to $125. It’s expensive but worth every penny. For the first six innings, it was a pitcher’s duel with a fast-baller on the mound for each team. The Yankee’s pitcher could throw in excess of 140 miles per hour. Today, biologically engineered pitching arms are legal in the MLB (enhanced pitchers are known as TJ’s – short for some 20th century pitcher named Tommy John). Since 2021, catchers have been using advanced navigation systems to pinpoint the accuracy of each incoming pitch.
In the bottom of 7th inning, the Red Sox broke the game wide-open. The fans remained on their feet for the entire Red Sox 16-run rally. We were seated in front of two die-hard Yankee fans who, by that time, had a few beers too many. When my bot stood up to capture video for my fiancée at home, the bot and I were assailed by vulgarities from the Yankee fans seated behind us. Although my bot was not offended, when I turned around to say something to guys behind us, one of them grabbed my bot by the monitor and shook it angrily. Looking at my fiancée’s face on the monitor I could see that she was terrified even though she was lying comfortably on the couch at home. The spectators around me called NFP Security and they ejected the two hooligans immediately. I will probably have to go to court next month as these two Yankee fans will likely be charged with the crime known today as botulism, or as defined by statute – vandalism associated with a robot.
It’s good to know that the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry is still alive and well in the mid-21st century.
By: Ransom Landfare, Edudexterity Contributor
edudexterity.com 
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