I really don't understand baseball

TO be honest, I've gone to the far ends of the world to avoid anything dealing with the superbowl (yeah, I know, wrong sport, but...) only to have it rear its head on the shortwave news.

Likewise, Baseball makes no sense to me. It's called rounders. Although rounders is assumed to be older than baseball (alleged to date back to Tudor times), literary references to early forms of "base-ball" in England pre-date use of the term "rounders". The earliest reference being in 1745 in A Little Pretty Pocket-Book where it is called "baseball". That calls into question its claim of being an "American" sport (So, It IS as American as apple pie, which is Dutch).

The world series is totally misnamed since it only involves teams from North America: Unsually from the United States, but I understand there are Canadian baseball teams. Someday, there may be Japanese teams, but that will probably be a long way off.

If the Japanese beat the Yanks at baseball, then the US will develop another national sport.

Needless to say, I prefer cricket test matches and World Cup Football to baseball.

Anyway, I digress from the real topic at hand: it seems that Bensalem police arrested a woman for prostitution. She is alleged to have offered sex for world series tickets.



Normally, I'd be ignorant of such things and prefer it to be that way, but this has exploded into an international news story. The basic gist is that Finklestein:

Described herself as a "Diehard Phillies fan" and "gorgeous tall buxom blonde," Finkelstein said she was "in desperate need" of two tickets to see the Phillies play the Yankees at Citizens Bank Park.

Then came the zinger: "Price negotiable -- I'm the creative type! Maybe we can help each other!"

The actual ad was placed in the "for sale/wanted section" not the adult section:

http://philadelphia.craigslist.org/tix/1438649356.html
DESPERATE BLOND NEEDS WS TIX (Philadelphia)
Date: 2009-10-26, 3:36PM EDT
Reply to: sale-zafz2-1438649356@craigslist.org

Diehard Phillies fan -- gorgeous tall buxom blonde -- in desperate need of two World Series tickets. Price negotiable -- I'm the creative type! Maybe we c...an help each other!

S.

Location: Philadelphia
it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests

PostingID: 1438649356

Does that sound like solicitation to you? I don't see any offers of sex and the ad was in the section for Tix on Craigslist!

Are these Bensalem Cops Yankees fans and just being jerks?

The short term outcome is that Radio DJ Chio from Wired 96.5 gave two tickets to Finkelstein and her husband explaining that anyone who was that despirate deserved tickets to see the game.

I hope the long term outcome is as good for Ms. Finklestein.

Let's say I'm closer to this story than I would like to be...

But my basic comment is that once one leaves Philadelphia (or Pittsburgh), one finds the police and district attorneys have too much time on their hands. Especially in Bucks County, This is a place where they once had a three day Jury trial for squeezing bread.

You think I'm joking:

Commonwealth v. Feldman, CP-09-CR-0003020-2000 and CP-09-CR-0003021-2000,(aka “Bucks County Bread Squeezer”): Client was originally charged with Felony criminal mischief for allegedly destroying thousands of dollars of bread and cookies in a supermarket in Yardley, PA. Client was found not guilty by jury of all criminal charges, sentenced by the judge for summary violation to pay $500.00 fine. Received worldwide coverage from the Associated Press and Newsweek Magazine and story was on all 4 local news stations, CNN and the Court Channel.

Bucks county has had a lot of problems with Cereal killers as well. cereal murder (or breakfast murder) is defined in Bucks County as the killing of one breakfast food item by another, or the killing of one cereal mascot by another. It can also describe human-on-cereal murder, animal-on-cereal murder, or inanimate-object-on-cereal murder.

Notorious Convicted Bucks County Cereal Killers are:

* Cornelius (Corn Flakes rooster)

Evidently, Cornelius got into a very brief cockfight with one of the Freakies from the Freakies cereal. Cornelius creditied his win to his large talons, and the use of the Filipino curved blade.
Kelloggs profited massively from the illegal fight by betting big money on Cornelius to win. Some say that the fight was fixed, and that Kelloggs is to blame.

* Dig 'Em Frog, for his spooning to death generic mascots, was turned into a pure gold statue in Quahog, Rhode Island.

Some of the more famous yet unsung cereal killers were actually mob bosses for the Kelloggs:

* Snap, Crackle and Pop
* Tony the Tiger
* Captain Crunch
* Calliou
* Ed, Edd n Eddy
* Toucan Sam

Seriously, the word around the court house is that Bucks County has a crime problem in that it lacks any significant crime such that they have to troll Craigs List to make work for themselves.

There's a rumour that Bucks County may actually set up a humourous crime squad to chase down craig's list jokers, bread squeezers, Cereal Killers, and people who put jelly in other people's shoes!

In the mean time, stay tuned for more trials of Cereal Murderers in Bucks County, PA! Maybe they might actually go after some of those Meth Labs they have up there!

Hallelujah !

A Message from John Cleese

To the citizens of the United States of America:

In light of your failure to nominate competent candidates for President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately.

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas, which she does not fancy). This means you will stop calling her the Queen of England - she's Queen of the United Kingdom i.e England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Mistakenly calling her anything else is like calling George Bush, President of Texas.

Your new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, will appoint a Governor for America without the need for further elections.

Congress and the Senate will be disbanded, and a questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary.

1. Then look up aluminium, and check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.

2. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'favour' , 'humour' and 'neighbour.' Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters, and the suffix -ize will be replaced by the suffix -ise.

Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up 'vocabulary').

3. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as " cool", "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication.

There is no such thing as US English. We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell- checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter 'u' and the elimination of -ize.
4. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday and you will relearn your original national anthem, God Save The Queen.

5. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not adult enough to be independent. Guns should only be handled by adults. If you're not adult enough to sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist then you're not grown up enough to handle a gun.

6. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. A permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

7. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and this is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.

8. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

9. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling gasoline)-roughly $10 per US gallon. Get used to it.

10. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.

11. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to as beer, and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as Lager. South African beer is also acceptable as they are pound for pound the greatest sporting Nation on earth and it can only be due to the beer. They are also part of British Commonwealth - see what it did for them.

12. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters.
Watching Andie McDowell attempt English dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to having one's ears removed with a cheese grater.

13. You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full Kevlar body armour like a bunch of nancies). Don't try Rugby - the South Africans and Kiwis will thrash you, like they regularly thrash us.

14. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. You will learn cricket, and we will let you face the South Africans first to take the sting out of their deliveries.

15. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.

16. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated to 1776).

17. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 pm with proper cups, never mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; strawberries in season.

God save the Queen.

Only He can.

John Cleese

If only this were true!