it is not funny but it’s hard not to chuckle fortnight for fight night
As Guardians broadcaster Tom Hamilton intoned, “Down goes Anderson!”
Tom Hamilton’s call of the Jose Ramirez-Tim Anderson fight on Cleveland radio is the stuff of legend.
“DOWN GOES ANDERSON! DOWN GOES ANDERSON!”
“It’s not funny,” Guardians manager Terry Francona said after the game, “but coming in (to the clubhouse) and listening to Hammy, it’s hard not to chuckle.”
Call me soft but I think Anderson should be benched by the league for two weeks. A fortnight for a fight night. He should get seven games for starting it and another seven for losing. That’ll teach him to square up like he’s Sonny Liston.
I don’t follow baseball like I used to but I do follow baseball writing.
Anyone who can get the word fortnight into a story about baseball deserves recognition.
I found it fascinating that shoving fortnight into the google, I found myself on webpages where the discussion about that the word FORTNITE, which was the name of a game that took over the world wide web for its 15 minutes of fame a bit ago, was based on a centuries old REAL WORLD, fortnight.
This discussion pointed out that it meant 2 weeks or 14 days and writers like Shakespeare, Dickens and Twain all used the word FORTNIGHT in their writing and it HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH the game!
How ’bout that!
But I digress.
Aside from that, Mr. Greenberg’s chronicling of the downs and downs of this season by Chicago White Sox infielder Tim Anderson is, well, funny.
Fighting in any sport is not to be condoned.
But …
But sometimes you get to look past the fight to what was going on before the fight and, well, it’s that quote from Guardians manager Terry Francona said after the game, “it’s not funny, … [but] it’s hard not to chuckle.”
strikingly glowing marked brilliance of expression oh incandescence
Rereading Edmund Morris’s book on Thomas Edison at the same time the end of the incandescent lightbulb put in mind to write about two things.
One is the incandescent lightbulb itself.
I am fascinated in this age when old invention exist.
I think of the qwerty keyboard.
Who could guess that such and invention would be driving computers worldwide to this day.
The feller who invented it may not recognize the computer but he would be able to type on the keyboard.
And the electric lightbuld.
The glass bulb and the filament.
The only visual change from that bulb and the one Thomas Edison first showed off in 1879 except that soon after being introduced one of Edison’s engineer came up with the threaded base so it could be screwed into a socket and if held upside down, would not slide out of the socket.
I will miss these light bulbs
Even if I don’t notice when they are being replaced.
The other thing I want to comment on is that most marvelous of words, incandescence.
The word is not onomatopoeic but is it autological or a word that describes itself?
Can it be autological when it has so many meanings?
Incandescence.
Look at the online Merriam-Webster.
incandescent adjective in·can·des·cent ˌin-kən-ˈde-sᵊnt 1 a : white, glowing, or luminous with intense heat b : strikingly bright, radiant, or clear c: marked by brilliance especially of expression incandescent wit d: characterized by glowing zeal : ARDENT incandescent affection 2 a: of, relating to, or being light produced by incandescence b: producing light by incandescence
Then, wikipedia explains Incandescence as the emission of electromagnetic radiation (including visible light) from a hot body as a result of its high temperature. The term derives from the Latin verb incandescere, to glow white.
If you needed a word that described glowing, or luminous with intense heat, strikingly bright, radiant, or clear – marked by brilliance especially of expression – characterized by glowing zeal as well as emission of electromagnetic radiation (including visible light) from a hot body as a result of its high temperature, what word could you come up with other than incandescent.
I am also reminded of a dress was made for Alice Claypoole Vanderbilt. of yellow satin, decorated with glass pearls and beads in a lightning-bolt pattern. A built-in battery lit a light bulb she carried, which she could raise over her head like the Statue of Liberty, made for a masquerade ball that was held in New York City on March 26, 1883. The ball was hosted by Alice Vanderbilt’s sister-in-law, Alva Vanderbilt, as a housewarming party for Alva and William K. Vanderbilt’s new mansion at 660 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.
The house was one of the first with Mr. Edison’s electric lights.
As Bill Bryson writes in his book, The Home, this was possibly the only occasion in her life in which she could be described as radiant.
impossible to listen without idea that senses are deceived
No matter how familiar a person may be with modern machinery and its wonderful performances, or how clear in his mind the principle underlying this strange device may be, it is impossible to listen to the mechanical speech without his experiencing the idea that his senses are deceiving him.
So reads an article in in the journal, Scientific American.
As the Scientific American, it was a ” …simple little contrivance” as the machine itself is still working, or at least it was when Alistair Cooke demonstrated it in his America: A Personal History of the United States (which was produced in 1976 … this video itself is 50 years … how did that happen??)
The AI of its day and the phonograph inspired some of the same fears.
It is already possible by ingenious optical contrivances to throw stereoscopic photographs of people on screens in full view of an audience. Add the talking phonograph to counterfeit their voices, and it would be difficult to carry the Illusion of real presence much further.
The sky is falling … again.
Lets run and tell the King.
PS: Thinking of Kings and those who want to be, this article also had a warning for its day and today.
“The witness“, states the article, “in court will find his own testimony repeated by machine confronting him on cross examination.”
was an actual need bigger, bigger, bigger, best? wasn’t that at all
When I was a kid growing up in Grand Rapids, Michigan in the 1970’s, fall afternoons meant football.
Michigan football.
University of Michigan football.
It was hard to miss.
My Dad was into what was called Hi-Fi or High Fidelity sound systems and he had wired our whole house and with a click of a button, his sound system would play in any room, or as he liked it, all of the rooms of the house.
Just before noon on Saturday’s he would tune into WUOM Ann Arbor in time to hear the words, “The Wolverines are on the air” and then the deep bass of the voice of Michigan Football (for UOM listeners) Tom Hemingway would welcome us either to Ann Arbor or West Lafayette, Indiana or Champaign, Illinois or wherever Michigan was playing that day and the broadcast of the game would be the backdrop to another fall weekend afternoon.
Every week.
The format of the broadcast more or less got embedded into your subconscious and when game breaks were made, the same breaks used year after year, you could recite them along with the broadcast.
One game break always came at the end of the 3rd quarter.
“Highlight films of todays game” it would start, “will be available this …” and a list of the locations and times across the state where fans could go and watch FILMS … 16mm movies of the latest game.
My memory says that Grand Rapids fans could go the University Club at Noon on Thursdays.
I never knew anyone who went to see these films but that was what fans had to do to WATCH the Wolverines.
Unless, by chance, the game was TV.
Back then there was only one or two college football games on any Saturday.
Televised games were seen as so powerful a recruiting tool that every team was limited to just two appearances a year with an extra game every other year so no team could be on more than 5 times in two years.
If you wanted to see the Wolverines on a weekly basis, it was game films.
It was game films, OR, you went to see the game.
There was time when going to see a Michigan Football game, or any professional athletic team or concert was all about the event.
Over 100,000 people would pack themselves into Michigan Stadium to do one thing.
Watch a football game.
100,000 and everyone, for the most part, focused on what was going down on the field.
Talk about unity.
Talk about one out of many.
Talk about a shared community experience.
One of my college roommate’s was from Ann Arbor and his folks had a set of 4 seasons tickets and in the years after college, I would often get a call and be invited to a game.
One year, due to wedding, my buddy’s folks couldn’t go to a game and the tickets were offered to me and my wife.
It was the 1991 Michigan – Notre Dame game.
As an aside, we got to our seats and I greeted most of the fans sitting around us.
My wife asked, ‘How do you know all these people?’
I told her that these were seats that Scott’s (my roommate) Parents had for 20 years and everyone who sat there knew everyone.
I then added, ” … and they know if you are NOT supposed to sit here.”
A guy in front of us turned around and caught my wife’s eye and with a big smile, nodded a very firm agreement.
This was the game that is known for a 4th quarter touchdown catch that won Desmond Howard the Heisman Trophy.
One play that won the most valuable player of the YEAR award?
One play in the first game of the year that won the most valuable player of the YEAR award?
YUP!
And I can see it like it was yesterday.
Up 17-14 late in the 4th QTR with 4th down and ONE FOOT at the ND 25, Michigan went for it.
This alone brought 110,000 people to their feet.
Quarterback Elvis Grbac dropped back to pass and looked right, cocked his arm, the crowd held its breath … and pulled his arm down.
The crowd exhaled, thinking the pass play was gone, but maybe maybe maybe, Elvis might fall over and get one foot for the 1st down.
Then Grbac half turned and leaned over so far backwards he almost fell and threw the ball hard and high.
And the crowd again sucked in all the air in Michigan Stadium.
The disappoint of Michigan fans rippled through the crowd like a wave that broke against the jubilation of any ND fan in the crowd.
With the ball in the air going towards no one and no where but the empty corner of the end zone, there was blur along the right sideline.
Like a genie out of a bottle or the sudden appearance of a ghost, teeny tiny #21, Desmond Howard flew and I mean flew, and I mean from the 15 yard line to the corner of the end zone, little Desmond FLEW, parallel to the astro turf surface, flew, never more then 3 feet off the ground.
Now there was no oxygen in that stadium.
Time stopped.
It was like those flashback scenes in a movie where what I saw was like still pictures played in fast succession instead of real life in real time.
The stadium, 110,000 people, for a split second went silent.
The blur that was little Desmond met up the football and he caught the ball with both hands, hugged to his body and fell into the end zone.
And that place exploded!
Everyone as one, focused on that one single second, that moment in time, all part of one collective thought.
Pandemonium, as the papers would report, ensued.
There was no waiting for a review.
There was no need for any other decision by a ref other than TOUCHDOWN.
There was no replay in the stadium.
My memory tells me that is how it happened and that is good enough for me.
The game day experience.
What, really, WHAT could be better than that?
30 Years later, Michigan has the answer.
Bigger, better TV scoreboards in the Stadium.
According to a story in the Detroit Free Press, Michigan is putting the final touches on what will be the 3rd largest scoreboards in the country.
Oh Boy!
According to the story, “This wasn’t ‘how do we spend more money, how do we go bigger, bigger, bigger,’ it wasn’t that at all.”
It was this paragraph that gave me pause.
As for the function of the boards, the plan is to use the additional space to have more in-depth stats available to fans during games, as well as show other games’ scores more consistently, to compete with the at-home experience.
This was done, the giant scoreboards, to compete with the at-home experience.
Big College Sports on the Big Stage in the Biggest Stadium needs the BIGGEST scoreboards to compete with the at-home experience.
The story goes on, “We’re really trying to prioritize what’s done for the fans,” said Jake Stocker, U-M’s director of game presentation and fan experience. “Using this new technology to make it a better fan experience, knowing that people can’t always connect to their cell phones at Michigan Stadium, so we’re giving them that experience.”
Michigan has a Director of Game Presentation and Fan Experience?
I guess they do and he said “Using this new technology to make it a better fan experience, knowing that people can’t always connect to their cell phones at Michigan Stadium.”
Isn’t there anyplace, ANYPLACE on EARTH, where the ability to connect to a cell phone takes the 2nd seat?
Certainly not at a college football game.
To me, for the Leaders and Best, bigger bigger bigger, doesn’t add up to best.
The game I went to in 1991 had over 100,000 focused on one thing.
Today, the Director of Game Presentation and Fan Experience wants you to be at Michigan Stadium and fell like you never left home.
Really.
Then why leave home?
To paraphrase George C Scott in the movie Patton, “God, how I hate the 21st Century.“
Back then there were about two dozen staffed checkouts, in those days of innocence before the death march of progress gathered pace.
A handful of self-checkouts appeared; a handful of human ones vanished. At first we saw them as harmless novelties.
They were never all in operation, and those that were rarely worked properly.
I used to bet my kids that I could get any one or two items from Walmart in under 5 minutes.
The secret was moving fast and the little used self check out lanes.
My wife would say she needed milk or one of the kids needed a poster board or a glue stick for a school project and the game was afoot.
I would drive to the Walmart and park near the garden section and enter a back door and sweep round inside in a wide circle to the correct department, grab my item, hit that self checkout with debit card in hand and be out the door, always under 5 minutes.
The kids got into it as well and would run along with me.
Once my daughter D’asia said she would get the check out all set for me and ran on ahead and pressed the touch screen to start the process.
I got there to scan the item in question and the machine, in computer voice said, “presione completar compra”.
I looked down to see a screen I didn’t recognize.
D’asia had pressed the button to continue the transaction in Spanish.
I was lost.
I looked at Daddles and she just shrugged.
I took a chance and pressed a few more buttons.
Whatever the buttons said, they set off a beeping that got the attention of a human being.
The human being in the form of a Walmart Sales person who wanted to turn the beeping off but all the prompts were in Spanish.
We were both hopelessly helpless or helplessly hopeless in the face of bilingual computer voiced madness.
Together we got the machine to cooperate but the sales person looked at my daughter with one finger pointing at her and said, “DON’T DO THAT AGAIN.”
Took us about 15 minutes.
As Mr. Chiles writes:
“… the remainderinvariably had a glitch in store for you.
Only the other day I had a torrid time with some pitiful, dried-out geraniums on a three-for-£5 offer.
They just wouldn’t scan.
I got them for nothing in the end, but they all died anyway.
Why does that last line make me think of a coming epitaph for us all in so many ways.
No Haiku For You 