The General Purpose Thread

I assume by your comment that you have cornered the market, then, Missi?

How on earth does it rain cats and dogs?

It rains frogs occasionally, doesn't it? Why not furry animals, too?

Even fish, or so I've heard.

Yes but how?

They fall from the sky, Flash.

But how did they get up there?

Cornered the market? In what? That remark has no relevance to MY remark whatsoever. Are you on something?

Some scientists think it has to do with the creation of water cyclones in one part of the world travelling at high speed until they hit a landmass somewhere else, where they deposit whatever they've collected in the meantime. I personally think it's God reminding us of how weird and miraculous the world is...

It's careless Virgin passengers Flash.

Oh, never mind, Ole Miss. Perhaps I got the wrong end of the stick. I _wish_ I was on something...unfortunately, _water_ makes me high; I don't need anything else...

It's the steam pressure, Ag!

Yes, pressure has been rather, uh, compressed, lately.

Wouldn't that be 'all of them'?

I blame the parents.

My therapist was wrong, then...

The chimpanzees are playful - sure that life is just a joke. The gorillas with machine guns laugh and shoot at their own folk. The monkeys burn their family trees and dance round in the smoke. While the rich apes takes another soul and another snort of coke. And the Master rubs his hands in glee - at the wasted chances to be free. The only one who can Truely see - what fools we mortals really be. That's what monkeys do - but what of gods?

Sorry, burinsmith, that was meant to be a reply to your post on your "Add A Word..." thread. Please feel free to post about words from dreams on this thread... I think a lot of people will find it interesting.

The American baseball team, Colorado Rockies have officially changed their name. They are now named...Colorado Rockies Suck!

Baseball is boring no matter what the team is called.

No doubt it would be boring in a country the size of Oregon.

I actually rather like baseball -but why would it be any more boring 'in a country the size of Oregon' - by which you mean Britain, right? The usual rule is that small places are more easily awed. In a small town in Oregon, something might be exciting and entertaining and draw crowds who would never bother in somewhere like New York, where there are more things to offer.

Well, for starters...Major League Baseball, it's farm system of minor league teams and not to mention the college draft. A country the size of Oregon couldn't support such an infrastructure. Quality of the teams would be diluted and it probably would be akin to watching double A ball here (mid-level minor leagues), at best. That would be an interesting thing to ponder though. What if we put another say, 50 million people in Oregon, could it support an entire major baseball league and play at a competitive level with the United States, or even Japan for that matter. Probably not, it would be too boring.

*still fishing*

We're busy playing lots of other games. None of them terribly well, it has to be said, but we do play a lot of other games. And sad to say, we British are so petty that we bridle at America calling something the World Series and then not actually competing with anyone outside their country. As I've said, I like baseball, but I like it primarily because it is a glimpse at another culture and for the mythology and tradition that surrounds it. I wouldn't want it to come over to Britain - I like watching baseball played well. The British basketball and gridiron football that has taken off does pretty well, but I've no interest in watching it played badly. I'd rather see it played by sportsmen who have grown up desperately wanting to be a basketball player or quarterback. Can someone not express an opinion that something is boring without it being regarded as a personal attack? I like cricket, but I'm well aware that many people violently dislike it, some of whom I would count as good friends. If you said you hated cricket, I wouldn't think any less of you, I'd just know that you didn't like cricket. If you said you liked it, we could talk about the Ashes and whether England might actually squeeze a draw out of the series...

isnt the world series called the world series after the paper (or something) that sponsors it, as opposed to the 'whole world' thing? and i'm not mad keen on baseball either. We could play it though, cos we did in junior school... except it was called rounders. Or is that a different game? It looks the same to me, apart from we didnt wear guards and pads and stuff.

Andy...it wasn't perceived as a personal attack (not here anyway)...so, chill out. My point was that I don't think GB could support a quality baseball league even if there was enough interest. Didn't we try exporting American football. American sports in GB (and elsewhere) tend to have the same problem other world sports have in America. They are secondary and niche sports, not supported by the public in large numbers and with very limited farming structures. I would manage a guess that if the Colorado professional soccer team went to GB and tried to compete, they'd be heckled and kicked off the field for lack of talent. Our professional soccer on a good day is at best about as good as your worst teams on a bad day.

Misread the tone then Gary, sorry. We play far too many sports already in Britain, that's why we end up not being much cop at them. If we gave up athletics and made everyone who could run fast play football or rugby, that'd be a start. We need more sports over here like we need a hole in the head. See, your Australians, who win loads of things, play a stupid sport they invented that nobody else plays, rugby (that they are very good at), cricket (that they are practically unbeatable at), tennis (pretty good) and swimming (very very good) The Brazilians play football and don't fret about anything else. The Cubans and Mexicans get on with boxing and have produced dozens of great fighters. Despite the fact that we don't have any mountains or reliable snow, we Brits still piss about with entering a team for the winter olympics, we have a go at every single event in the olympics and we just spread our resources and efforts so thin that we end up winning chuff all. Anyway, we're clogging up Mykle's flirting thread.

And on both sides of the water the so-called 'professional' teams get paid far, far too much money for doing something essentially worthless in making the world a better place, instead of funding hospitals or building inexpensive housing for the poor. Ban all (paid) professional sports, I say. Put that £300 ticket price or £2 million salary to better use.

I think the expression is a spoonerism of an event in Japan where there was an explosion in a factory that made gearbox parts.. It was actually raning Datsun cogs.

tis true and quite right too. I've always believed that the quality of a country's sport should reflect the love of its countrymen for that sport. Hence, more people love football (not soccer) in England so it's right that we should be good at it. More people (proportionally) love Rugby in Wales so I'd rather see Wales winning the rugby because it means more to more people... and so on and so forth. I'd rather see Americans winning at Basketball (the only sport actually invented in America... and by the same token therefore, playing the banjo too) and Baseball.

I'll have to tell my dad that one. He'd love it...

Actually, Cuba has a very strong baseball following. In 1990 I watched the Cuban national team play here in Denver against our championship AAA team (in the US, AAA is a top notch minor league pro team in smaller markets, that can compete talent wise with major league teams). The Cuban team mopped the field with our team. They were damn good! I say we create a Mykle flirt thread so he don't get pissed about baseball talk cluttering up his prospects.

It is a nice idea, Witch and salaries have gone wildly out of control. I was supportive of sportsmen earning more than the average salary because most of them finished their career at 35, but once they started earning £30K a week or more, it just became ridiculous. But that money is not the Government's money to dish out on schools or hospitals. If Newcastle gave Alan Shearer a £20K a week paycut, that money wouldn't find its way anywhere near public finances. Ask the public whether they want Freddie Shepherd to be 20K a week better off and there'd be little public support. The fans of the club want the best players and for success. The people who aren't fans of the club don't pay for it. They don't buy tickets, they don't buy programmes, they don't buy shirts, they don't subscribe to Sky, they don't get subjected to the advertising that gets shown. So the choice is - for a football fan, do you want to pay to support your team, or do you want to donate extra money to the Inland Revenue? If that's even possible - I imagine if I wrote to the IR and asked if I could pay an extra £500 this year, there'd be forms to fill in and they'd probably assume I was covering something up and investigate the hell out of me. In fact, you could argue that stopping Lottery funding of athletics, thus forcing fast and strong people into football (as in my scheme) would be a good thing - saves public money, gets us better footballers. There's no point in working hard to be a good consumer unless you like the things you're consuming, which is the problem with governments cracking down on fags, alcohol and drugs. If you can't enjoy yourself from time to time, why go to work? Work funds your enjoyment of life. Sport is a part of that for many people.

Now, Mykle has already stated unequivocably that he's looking for a Pisces, so any 'prospects' would have to respond under Piscean auspices.

Call it Communist, but I just have an issue with knobhead lads getting paid more than I ever will just for playing some idiotic game, and feel the wealth should be redistributed. I'm in health services and it seems unfair that those of us who work hard, long hours get paid peanuts while some tosser from Harlow gets 30k for playing a game requiring few brains but lots of physical endurance (and recreational coke snorting, random shagging, etc). Where is the outrage?

I might weaken so long as it's not another Libran :)

Just to get us off topic....... [%sig%]

Thankss, Hox, there's a few I haven't tried yet...

Hahaha. I see I'm free :o)

I'd better explain: if you follow Hox's link you will get one of three pop ups at the top of the screen - one of which reads "Free Smileys (Click Here)" :)

How can beggars be choosers?