DanMargarita.com

I guess the convention really kicked off Sunday night when political V.I.P.'s showed up at Fenway Park to watch the Red Sox-Yankees game. You know it's big when Ben Affleck gets bumped from his regular privileged seat.

In what might prove to be a bad omen, soon-to-be Democratic nominee John Kerry threw out, or should I say, attempted to throw out the ceremonial first pitch. Standing several feet in front of the pitchers mound, Kerry bounced the ball in front the catcher (actually, a soldier with a catcher's mitt) in a throw that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger might describe as looking like that of a "girlie-man."

Monday morning, like everyone else, I was wary of the gigantic traffic mess that everybody feared only to find the roads comparatively deserted. Of course, the fact that I was on the road at 6:15 a.m. might have had something to do with it.

The convention officially kicked off at 4 p.m. and among the first speakers (or mumblers) was Mayor Tom Menino. As the mayor of Boston, presumably he was on so early to welcome the delegates. Another possible explanation is that he had to get back to his car before it got towed by Boston cops.

If you want to watch the convention in its entirety, I recommend that you put on C-Span, which follows the events uninterrupted. Although, this means that you have to sit through speeches by people you've never heard of and don't care about. When these people come on the screen it's like when you go to a concert and the performer says "This one's from my latest album." That's when you know it's a good time to go to the bathroom.

Naturally, the national anthem had to be played and it was sung by someone named Bebe Winans. No offense to Mr. Winans, but I've been to enough ballgames and seen enough people doing their "interpretation" of the Star Spangled Banner that I have no desire to see it performed unless it's by someone I know like B.B. King or even actress Bebe Neuwirth. Thank God for TV Land.

The major networks only carried the last hour, from 10:00 to 11:00 pm. That's when the "headliners" came on. Sure there were a couple of "late inning" folks, whom the networks avoided by going to one of their analysts.

One of the featured speakers was a Rev. David Alston who served with John Kerry in Viet Nam. Unfortunately, the reverend seemed to have a strange growth on the side of his head and I suspect he may be more interested in supporting John Edwards because it looks like he has a legitimate case for a malpractice suit against someone.

Al Gore, our most recently elected president, spoke as did Jimmy Carter and actress Glenn Close. Ironically, Close spoke shortly before Hillary Clinton who might've acted like Close's character (with good reason) from the movie "Fatal Attraction" when living in The White House.

Then the senator from New York introduced her husband, Bill Clinton, who closed the proceedings with a rousing speech that wowed the faithful.

After that, there was no need to go to the bullpen.