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< Earlier Kibitzing · PAGE 47 OF 914 ·
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| Apr-28-09 | | hms123: <Phony Benoni> Thanks for stopping by the <ChessBookForum>. I hope you will check in often. |
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May-01-09
 | | Phony Benoni: OK. I give up. Every time I finish judging a pun, four or five more are added. Face it, folks. Some of you are not going to get the benefit of my wisdom. How lucky can one person get? |
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| May-01-09 | | technical draw: I agree <Phony>. My great puns will be buried under tons of garbage and I'll be lucky if 2 players get to see them. |
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May-01-09
| | Phony Benoni: Having judged a bunch of others, I don't hold out much hope for my own submissions. simply because my sense of humor seems to be totally different from the normal standard found around here. Which probably explains a lot. Instead, I fully expect to get more than my share of "I don't get it" ratings. Heck, sometimes I don't get them myself. I just make the puns; I don't understand them. |
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| May-01-09 | | Jim Bartle: Considering some of his opinions that I've read, and the fact that he turned a journalist who criticized him into a child molester character in one of his books, calling Crichton an idiot has some justification. |
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May-02-09
| | Phony Benoni: <Jim Bartle> Does that mean I shouldn't finish the book? If it makes you feel any better, I picked it up at the library and Crichton's estate isn't getting any royalties. While I would agree that portraying one of your critics as a child molester is beyond the pale, in general I don't let a person's opinions bother me if I enjoy their work. Otherwise, I'd never look at another Fischer game. And I can't see calling someone an idiot because of their opinions. What guarantee do I have that I'm right? An insolent jerk, maybe, but not an idiot. |
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| May-02-09 | | Jim Bartle: No, some of his books are good, and my wife loved "Sphere," which I think is the one he included the child molester named after the journalist. I remember picking up "Andromeda Strain" when I was in college and reading in just one or two sittings, it was so exciting. It seems to me Crichton could write really good books like "Jurassic Park" (far more thought-provoking than the movie) and utter dreck like "Congo." |
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May-02-09
| | Phony Benoni: I suppose that once an author becomes succesful, they are more likely to produce dreck--or, al least, more likely to have dreck published on name value alone. |
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May-03-09
 | | jessicafischerqueen: Is <DIRP> real?
I'm still unsure-- I'm going to guess NO=
You made him up right? He's too good to be true.
Great idea for a collection- the "never saw it coming" mate in the first game is the end of what is actually a very exciting game. |
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May-03-09
| | Phony Benoni: <jessicafischerqueen> Of course DIRP is real! When have I ever lied to you? Besides now, I mean. |
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May-03-09
| | jessicafischerqueen: <TG Bamits>
HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAAH
And you even worked in a reference to <Uncle Tom's Cabin>.... Great idea again for a collection- I only went through the first game so far. OK I'm voting for you in the <Funniest Kibbutzer> category in next year's <Caissar Awards>. |
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| May-03-09 | | Jim Bartle: A letter in The New Yorker from 1999:
"Roger Angell might be overly optimistic when he wrote that Tiger fans 'will be back next year for more of the same, wherever the game happens to be played.' Tiger Stadium was--and is--the nation's great proletarian ballpark, with 5,800 bleacher seats among the 46,864 total, and with the majority of those seats having great, close views. Replacing that stadium with one that seats roughly forty thousand, and selling most of those seats as season tickets, is an act of criminal greed. The recent outpouring of weeply nostalgia misses the point: the current
Tiger Stadium has better access and greater intimacy for working-class fans than any park ever built. And now the real fans will be shut out. Agree? Disagree? |
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May-03-09
| | Phony Benoni: <JessicaFischerQueen> Hey, now I can't lose! |
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May-03-09
| | Phony Benoni: <Jim Bartle> Overly sentimental. The cold fact was that the evils cited were inevitable, given the financial structure of baseball today. Tiger Stadium, which dated back to 1912, was not in good shape and needed a complete overhaul. In addiiton its neighborhood was dying, as are so many in Detroit, while Comerica Park is in one of the few growing and vibrant areas. Those glorious bleacher seats were mostly in dead center field, 440 feet from home plate. Close view? You couldn't see what happened on long fly balls near the wall, but had to wait for the roar of the crowd. With all that, Tiger Stadium was a glorious place to watch baseball, and we knew every inch of it. 340 down the left field line, 370 to left center, 440 to dead center, 385 to right center, 325 down the right field line. Relief pitchers warmed up on the field instead of an enclosed area. (Indeed, I have a theory that the modern explosion in relief pitching is due in large part to the bullpens no longer being on the field of play and relivers don't have to worry about getting conked on the head by a line drive) And the hot dogs at Comerica stink. I think they're supposed to be healthy or something. The first game I was there, a vendor was actually trying to give them away near the end of the game, with no takers. |
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| May-03-09 | | Jim Bartle: Thanks for that, I sort of suspected it was an exaggeration. Is it really true there was an overhang in the outfield at Tiger Stadium, where the second deck stuck out over the field? |
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May-03-09
| | Phony Benoni: Indeed there was. If you could hit high fly balls, the distance down the right field line was closer to 310 or 315. Norm Cash specialized in this.
Now that I think about it, didn't the original Polo Grounds in New York have a similar set-up that Dusty Rhodes exploitied in the 1954 World Series? But I think there's no doubt about the hardest hit ball ever at Tiger Stadium. Reggie Jackson, 1971 All-Star game. A line drive that was still rising when it hit the light tower above the third deck in right center field. That's about 385 to the fence and well over 100 feet up, plus the width of the seats. I saw it live on television, and ... well, there are moments when all you could say is "Wow." Not even "Wow!", just "Wow." |
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| May-04-09 | | Jim Bartle: I heard many stories about that Jackson home run, but have never seen it. I read it would have gone completely out of the stadium had it not hit the light tower. For the life of me I can't remember the players involved, except that both were major stars, but one time a guy hit a long, long homer to left, and the video showed the pitcher mouthing the word "wow." |
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May-04-09
| | Phony Benoni: Usually, home runs that went out of Tiger Stadium were high flies that bounced on the roof before skipping over. Jackson's was a laser shot that was still rising when it reached the roof. Five feet to the right, and it would have been a sure 600-foooer. There were a couple dozen that went out to right field. I think the only two to hit one out to left field were Harmon Killebrew and Frank Howard. |
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| May-06-09 | | Jim Bartle: Bing! |
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May-06-09
| | Phony Benoni: It remains to be seen if he can get people to jump through hoops. As usual, he won't get any help from the City Council. They got their own, er, things they consider more pressing problems. When Kwame Kilpatrick resigned, City Council President Ken Cockrell became mayor pro-tem, while Monica Conyers (wife of longtime Congressman John Conyers) became City Council President pro-tem. When Cockrell was beaten by Bing yesterday, everyone assumed he would resume the City Council President position--everyone except Monica Conyers, who claims the city charter does not allow that. The lawyers are already rubbing their hands gleefully, and the real problems of Detroit will not get any attention until when and if this latest power grab blows over. "We Won't Get Fooled Again!" |
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| May-06-09 | | Jim Bartle: So Bing needs to get Terry Dischinger, Happy Hairston and Eddie Miles onto the city council. |
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May-06-09
| | Phony Benoni: He'd probably get better results with Bill Laimbeer and Rick Mahorn. |
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| May-06-09 | | Jim Bartle: Good point!! |
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May-06-09
| | Phony Benoni: Okay, somebody explain something to me.
The latest Viagra commercial has the man deciding to spice up his romantic life by taking the woman to a deserted island. They hop off the boat, which then speeds away. Nobody else within a hundred miles. This being a short commercial, they exchange some quick glances and decide to give the product an immediate test. They walk into a nearby hut, and the man carefully shuts the door as the commercial ends. Why in the world do they need to shut the door? |
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May-07-09
 | | tpstar: A: Because the cameraman is still there.
Lots of suggestive imagery with those ads, like the football going through the tire. |
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