I consume baseball in the most Americana way imaginable. I listen to it on the radio in the summer Midwestern night surrounded by cornfields. In the orange streetlight, moth fluttering nights that refuse to drop below 80. I own a cleaning company and while you are at home winding down your day I am vacuuming and dusting and taking out trash and cleaning toilets and listening to the Chicago White Sox not make the playoffs since 2008. It’s easy to picture me. If I was a character in a Stephen King novel I would surely be the first to get knocked off by a vampire or a clown.
For this reason, most of the visuals of the game are lost to me except when I can tune in on weekends. This is one visual I will certainly not miss.
The New York Times is reporting that the Cleveland Indians, in cooperation with Major League Baseball, are abandoning the Chief Wahoo logo after the 2018 season.
I live fifty miles northwest of Champaign-Urbana and its resident University of Illinois, so I had a mezzanine seat to the Retire the Chief / Save the Chief hullabaloo, which is still going on to this day. The Chief is a sort of local MAGA hat that we’ve had for decades. If I walk into a business or an office that’s festooned Chief stuff, I know the kind of person I’m dealing with upfront. A friend who witnessed the mascot’s formal retirement in 2007–he worked for the local paper and the university–once let me look through his personal letters-to-the-editor Chief file. They ranged from sedate and prosecutorial to spittle-flecked. I liked this:
Unfortunately, all that pageantry was built around a product of the rather odd obsession white people had with their view of Native American culture nearly 100 years ago. Too bad we are still saddled with the decisions of an assistant band director who was just trying to put on a good halftime show. If he had simply chosen some other kind of symbol to be the focus of all that audience participation stuff, we wouldn’t be dealing with this mess today. Can you imagine!
But forsaking the revolting Chief Wahoo logo is more complicated than it appears on the surface. Let’s Go Tribe goes on to say:
It’s interesting, but not surprising, that the Chief Wahoo merchandise will still be sold in local markets. According to Jordan Bastian, this is in part because the Indians still maintain a trademark for the logo and are required to keep it in retail spaces to do so.
“The Indians will maintain control of the Chief Wahoo trademark. In order to do so, it will still have a limited retail presence. No retail presence would open door for another party to seize control of the mark and profit from it.”
Not only will they keep the trademark, but the flood of people who support a logo over their favorite baseball team will likely flock to buy up whatever they can. Make no mistake about it, the Indians are going to keep profiting off the logo for a long, long time.
So either the team profits on its heritage of racism or some third-party does. Short of the team donating those profits to a reservation, there are no good choices here.
While we wait for all of this to wind down (someday it will, people forget) let’s elect the folks from the big tent. Here is the fund that is split between all eventual nominees in House districts currently held by Republicans.
Hungry Joe
This is where the party ends
I can’t stand here listening to you
And your racist friend
I know politics bore you
But I feel like a hypocrite talking to you
And your racist friend
— They Might Be Giants
jackmac
There’s certainly something nostalgic about listening to baseball games on a hot summer night. But, man, those White Sox broadcasters are sleep-inducing. And now they might not even have a home with WLS-AM about to dump them.
pacem appellant
TMBG for the win! I get this song stuck in my head like an earworm from time to time, and it’s never unwelcome, if a tad unsettling, but always prescient.
LAO
I grew up listening to Bob Murphy call games on the radio, man do I miss him.
Yutsano
Long suffering Mariners fan from a long line of baseball player/coaching folks. My dad even coached the 2001 14 year old Babe Ruth team to the World series and won. Baseball really is a calmer, more fun game to watch. If you know the subtle stratagems between pitcher and hitter it becomes almost chess-like.
Villago Delenda Est
Yes, it is offensive. But I think the energy directed against Chief Wahoo is probably better directed against abominations like the Keystone pipeline.
Ridnik Chrome
@Hungry Joe:
Also relevant:
If you have a racist friend
Now is the time, now is the time for your friendship to end
Be it your sister Be it your brother
Be it your cousin or your, uncle or your lover
If you have a racist friend
now is the time, now is the time for your friendship to end
— The Special AKA
Ceci n est pas mon nym
Longer than that. Indeed, the inimitable Mark Twain commented on it in his essay Niagara, in which his “culturally sensitive” narrator attempt to show the Native Americans how much he admires their culture.
Note: I haven’t been able to figure out when Twain wrote this gem. The above link says “Sketches New and Old, copyright 1903”, but I’ve found references to something by the title Niagara much early than that, in 1875. Not sure if that’s the same work.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
My grandfather in WV used to listen to Senators games on the radio when I was a kid back in the 60s. I never “got it” then, being much more into football.
Several things happened over time to make me understand the allure and how hard it is to pull off: 1) I kicked my NFL habit back in the winter of 93-94 when I worked in Italy and missed the entire season; I discovered I didn’t miss football, 2) when baseball came back to DC in 2006, I got back into baseball with a vengeance, and 3) since I live in Central Misery, I’m in the middle of “Cardinals Nation” and if you ever want to hear shitty baseball announces on the radio, listen to them.
Mike Shannon is beloved in STL and for the life of me I don’t know why. It’s not as if the Royals radio guys are that much better but it is noticeable. The contrast to listening to a baseball game on ESPN radio is night and day: those guys know how to call a game on the radio.
That’s when I understood what my grandfather “got” out of listening to ball games on the radio. Alas I can’t get Nats broadcasts out here.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Yutsano:
Right now I’m reading “The Big Bam” by Leigh Montville. It’s a bio of Babe Ruth and you get a real sense of how the game started to change from the old Dead Ball era into what we recognize today (HOME RUNS BABY!!!!!) once the Babe hit his stride in the 20s.
I prefer small ball both on tv and if attending a game because of the chess-like aspects. And there’s more athleticism on display rather than one big crack of the bat. Gotta admit, home runs while you are at the ball park are fun.
randy khan
@LAO:
Ah, Bob Murphy and the happy recap. He was like an old, broken-in pair of jeans.
That said, Howie Rose is a pretty good replacement.
catclub
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
there was a golden internet age (97-98?) when radio stations were also streaming their sports broadcasts – for free.
For us cheapskates, for whom the piddling cost of Audio League Pass is still too much, those days are gone.
MCA1
@jackmac: They are a far cry from the estimable Pat Hughes, but to be fair, they’re a helluva lot more pleasant to listen to than the White Sox’s tv broadcasters. One in particular. Can’t wait ’til “he gone.”
Enhanced Voting Techniques
The whole idea these mascots is to invoke the virtues of those cultures, like using Spartans celibate the culture of male on male sexual abuse in sports or the fighting Irish to celibate the culture of near suicidal bing drinking. So is it really to much for the team to make the mascot look less dorky and more warrior like?
Jewish Steel
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: That is fantastic.
LAO
@randy khan: I love Howie (and I also love Gary, Ron and Keith on TV) but Bob was special.
Served
As a child, I really enjoyed Chief Illiniwek and thought it was special.
As an adult, I did not and do not.
How people can’t realize that an indictment of a thing they enjoy is not an indictment of them personally and it is okay let go, I will never know.
Major Major Major Major
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: i always thought it was really weird that USC picked the Trojans as a mascot given their namesake’s extremely famous history of being completely destroyed.
Miss Bianca
Unless, of course, you *were* the vampire or the clown. This is Stephen King we’re talking about, after all.
randy khan
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
As a lifelong baseball fan and a subscriber to Sirius XM who finds himself driving at night on occasion during the baseball season, I can say with certainty that the bad radio guys (and except for Suzyn Waldman, who does color for the Yankees, they’re all guys) exceeds the number of good radio guys. Part of my feeling about this is because I dislike obvious homers, and a lot of teams actually want to have homers because they think they appeal to the fans. The broadcasts I like, no particular order, include the Mets, Nats, Dodgers (even post Scully), and Giants (at least the Jon Miller innings). Bad ones include the Yankees (because Sterling is just obnoxious, not to mention that they don’t let Waldman do play by play at all so far as I can tell, although in fairness I rarely listen to more than half an inning), Marlins, and White Sox. Shannon’s kind of in the middle, which isn’t exactly great.
BTW, if you’re a big baseball fan and like to listen to games on the radio, Sirius/XM is a pretty decent deal – you get all of the local broadcasts, plus national feeds, plus MLB Network Radio as part of the standard package to go with all of the music and news channels.
a thousand flouncing lurkers (was fidelio)
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: You might want to have a talk with your autocorrect/autocomplete about the difference between “celibate” and “celebrate”.
I’ve had to discipline mine quite harshly a time or two, but it caught on after a bit.
germy
http://derfcity.blogspot.com/2014/04/wahoo-de-chiefing.html
http://derfcity.blogspot.com/2014/04/de-chiefing-wahoo-part-2.html
Backderf in 2014, blaming himself for Wahoo.
raven
As you know, I’m a born and bred Illini. I remain stunned that so many people there can’t let go of the Chief. I thought it was a raw deal to do away with him because the University went to great lengths to make it a dignified “experience” and not use him as a “mascot”. That said it obviously offended some folks and I figured that was reason enough to move on. It didn’t kill Stanford athletics to jettison “The Indians” and it won’t kill Illinois to end the Chief. What most surprising to me is that when I get into discussions with pro-Chiefer’s and say their argument is the same as the Confederate Flag proponents they have a fucking stroke and say NO NO, it’s not the same. Oskeewowow, Illnois. . .
randy khan
@LAO:
Yes, he was. But on the other hand, I also kind of miss Ralph Kiner, despite his awfulness. (For those unfamiliar with him, he’s in the Hall of Fame, probably undeservedly, as a result of a few brilliant seasons for the downtrodden Pittsburgh Pirates, and also famous, among other things, for dating Marilyn Monroe briefly and for multiple calls along the lines of “That ball is way back there, going, going, going . . . caught, just short of the warning track.” (
trollhattan
Radio sports broadcasting can be amusing due to one’s need to understand what’s being described. I learned this bigly listening to shortwave back when BBC and especially Radio Australia and Radio New Zealand broadcast rugby, cricket and Aussie Rules Football (“footy”). Rugby and footy are chaotic and cricket comes across rather like golf (plus lunch and tea breaks!). Guessing baseball is similarly mysterious.
Mnemosyne
I dunno, that seems like a pretty good choice. Maybe a scholarship fund or improving healthcare facilities.
Major Major Major Major
@raven:
They did, unfortunately, ignore the results of the student referendum and decline to replace them with the Stanford Robber Barons.
raven
@trollhattan: zYep, I took a buddy from the University of Manchester to a Braves game and he did ok understanding the game itself but when we drove home and listened to the post game he was really lost.
kindness
One down. Now we need to talk to the Washington Redskins.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@randy khan:
I really need to do what catclub suggested above and get the MLB audio feed package for a season. I almost got the MLB TV package last year since I could get it just for Nats games but then realized I didn’t have that much time on my hands. Methinks “radio” would be a better fit.
Oh, and Jon Miller, yet another example of how fucked up a franchise the Orioles have been for much of the last 35 years. They let him go. One of the best.
Brachiator
Reservations are racist. Nothing more than relocation camps.
Mascots are dumb, but not often meant to be demeaning to any group. But Native Americans have objected, so getting rid of these symbols is appropriate (though to my mind, a largely empty gesture). Also, I lack the sports fan gene, so none of this is an issue for me.
However, there is, of course, a mascot that depicts a white ethnic group negatively, and that is the raping and pillaging Vikings. While this expression of Norwegian/Danish/Swedish bad-assery no doubt excites Donald Trump, most Scandinavian Americans don’t give a rip. And then we have those other bad examples, Pirates, Buccaneers and Raiders, along with fans who actually embrace the implied criminality of these avatars, but again, nobody gives a hoot (except for some Bronco fans who I once saw getting beat up by Raider fans in Los Angeles, which obviously took shit too far).
Amir Khalid
I just spent a few minutes looking up the term Caucasian in Wikipedia. I was reminded that Caucasian =/= white, e.g. people from the Indian subcontinent have Caucasian facial features but are diverse in skin colour.
ceece
ah yes, USC, home of literature’s most famous losers.
Jewish Steel
@randy khan:
All my favorites too.
@Served: Well said.
raven
God, I know it’s right and I hope they don’t change it but I think it was really nice
Farewell to Chief Illiniwek
donnah
I graduated from Miami University on Oxford, Ohio in the early ’80’s. Shortly thereafter, the Miami tribe who had sponsored the University decided to withdraw their support of the Miami Indian as a mascot. While I was a student there, the mascot was an actual guy who studied with the tribe members to learn a war dance ritual and also was instructed on how to wear his authentic tribal clothing. It was all done with respect. But the name was Miami Redskins, which was of course, unacceptable.
He was not cartoony or goofy, but I can understand why modern Native Americans would not want to be represented by a college mascot. The University informed students, parents, and alumni of the change and offered choices for replacement characters to be voted upon.
Some alumni went into orbit and cancelled their donations while the rest of us said, sure, we’re fine with the change. And the Redskins became the Redhawks and nobody, to my knowledge, flung themselves off the top of the stadium.
Times change and our views have to change with them. It’s costly to redo an entire identity and start with new emblems and mascots and logos. But if they’re offensive and dated, let them go. It’s just the decent thing to do.
trollhattan
@Amir Khalid:
You should chase down the George Carlin riff on “vacationing in the Caucasians.”
jackmac
@MCA1: I’m not a Cubs fan, but I’ll listen to their games because play-by-play man Pat Hughes is among the best in the business. I’ve also had the pleasure of chatting with him on several occasions. He’s a terrific guy.
Jewish Steel
@Amir Khalid: You find one Georgian skull you like and we’re all Caucasians!
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@kindness:
One of the most odious owners of any major professional sports franchise. It’ll never happen as long as he owns the team, possibly short of the league taking some kind of punitive action. I don’t know enough about football anymore to know even if the league could do that.
LAO
@randy khan: Kiners Korner!
My mom is a huge Mets fan (as I am) and when I was a kid, the afternoon game would always been on in the house, on either the radio or TV. One afternoon, I was doing my homework in the family room with the game on TV and Kiner launched into a rambling monologue about the per diem meal money players used to get and how important it was too most players. Somehow the focus of his story shifted from per diems, to an old teammate of his, who committed suicide in a bath tub. I’m pretty sure Tim McCarver was the color guy that day and he was stuttering and desperately trying to get Ralph back to the game. That being said, I really did love listening to Ralph. He certainly had stories to tell.
raven
@jackmac: I was a Brickhouse guy, Harry came later but I was up there abut 10 years ago and after we left the game in the 6th (the Mets hit TWO grand slams in ONE Inning) we turned on the radio I and couldn’t believe how bad the announcer was. It was Pepitone.
Yutsano
@Amir Khalid: Yup. As I’m certain Schrodinger’s kitteh will be along to confirm as well, the diverse peoples of India do have a common linguistic ancestor in the north: Sanskrit. The ancestor of that language came from either Anatolia or central Asia (it’s very hotly disputed which) but could very well have been the region known as the Caucasus Mountains. But Sanskrit is also related to Greek and Latin, so the fact that the Caucasoid descendants include India is not a big surprise.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@Brachiator: Shorter – I don’t care about sports, oh and btw all mascots matter. Pretty clueless comment, IMHO…
gvg
they could seduce a bunch away if they could come up with a really good replacement.
Sell a token offensive chief only in civil rights museums and Native American history centers. you don’t have to maintain commercial in a sports arena I would think. talk about a place that isn’t supportive of PC…
Has anybody done studies of how many people avoid supporting or becoming fans because of the offensive logo and offensive supporters?
randy khan
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
All true – Snyder is a lousy excuse for a human being, even by NFL standards. That said, I suspect that Roger “Vladimir Putin Wishes He Had This Much Power” Goodell could make Snyder change the name if he wanted
Mnemosyne
@Brachiator:
You started to nudge around the difference in your comment but didn’t quite get there: the other groups who have become mascots are extinct historical groups (Vikings, Buccaneers, Spartans, Trojans).
American Indians are an existing and continuing ethnic group, and I understand why they find it unnerving to have people “celebrate” them as though they were as long-extinct as the Vikings.
raven
@Mnemosyne: Chief Illinwek was a representation of the Tribe of Illini and the State of Illinois was named after that tribe. They are extinct so one of the problems, as opposed to the FSU Seminoles, is that there is no one to give permission.
eta I guess I was wrong abut that “As a consequence of the Indian Removal Act, in the 1830s, the Illinois were relocated from where they had migrated to in eastern Kansas to northeastern Indian Territory. Today they chiefly reside in Ottawa County, Oklahoma, as the Peoria Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma.”
Gravenstone
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: You could always adopt the Cubs’ radio broadcast (Pat Hughes and Ron Coomer). Hughes is hands down one of the best of the craft.
Cacti
Why do people who were robbed of their lands, riches, culture, freedom, and dignity get upset about being reduced to cartoon characters for the amusement of the everyone else?
Some people are just so sensitive.
MJS
@randy khan: Not a chance. The players’ union may have given Goodell carte blanche, but the owners and Goodell know who pays his salary.
trollhattan
You know “it’s a small world” when JK Rowling is retweeting John Scalzi.
Mnemosyne
@raven:
Yes, I grew up on the North Shore. Technically, they’re not “extinct” since they were removed to Oklahoma by the US government in the 1830s. Today they’re known as the Peoria Tribe.
Doug!
Baseball only really works on the radio, IMHO.
raven
@Mnemosyne: Yea, I changed that.
Major Major Major Major
@trollhattan: I am shocked that two genre-vanguard authors known for their social media presence would engage each other on Twitter, about twitter :)
Jewish Steel
@raven: I know an old fella who was the chief back in the ’60s. Great guy! It’s probably a little disappointing and confusing that a thing that he felt was simply fun and in no way racist turned into such a flashpoint.
@donnah: Having a replacement seems to have helped. My wife pointed out to me that this was part of the lingering problem.
Mnemosyne
@raven:
I see we saw the same Wikipedia article at the same time. ?
But my point is more that I can see why Native American people would find it creepy that their ethnic group is spoken about as though it’s as extinct as the Vikings. It’s like, Dude, I’m standing right here!
germy
Robert Wagner has been named a “person of interest” in the death of Natalie Wood.
LAO
Things that make me go hmmmm:
raven
@Jewish Steel: Might be the same Chief I knew! Ever hear of Webber Borchers?
ProfDamatu
@Mnemosyne: I think it also has to do with the fact that the other mascots are either groups (now considered) white (Fighting Irish, Vikings) or more of an (extinct) occupational category than ethnicity (Buccaneers, Raiders). It’s that whole punching down thing – a nonwhite caricature mascot is going to be much more offensive than a white caricature because white people still have more social power. I’m sure everyone commenting already knows this, but for the lurkers. :-)
Jewish Steel
@raven: Nope. Hell of a name tho!
rikyrah
India Wants to Give Half a Billion People Free Health Care
By VINDU GOEL and HARI KUMAR
FEB. 1, 2018
trollhattan
@Major Major Major Major:
Should Rowling ever pop in here then the circle will be complete.
raven
@Jewish Steel: He conducted these big hearings into the anti-war riots on campus and then got busted for misuse of funds for investigating hippies! Are also was the second Chief
patroclus
The Chief Illiniwek controversy heated up again this week when the current “unofficial” chief – Ivan Dozier – showed up in his garb for a Illinois basketball game. He’s unofficial, but the “Council of Chiefs,” a group of former Chiefs, continue to select from auditions a Chief every year and they continue to perform the fake “war” dance at least once a season or whenever they think they can get away with it. This time, an anti-Chief faculty member spotted the “Chief” in a bathroom before the game and he took a phone picture and then got arrested for violation of privacy (he wasn’t prosecuted). And a university maintenance official supposedly sent an e-mail “prohibiting” the wearing of pro-Chief clothing by employees which, yesterday, the administration denied. Periodically, there are “unofficial” polls taken of the student body and alumni which virtually never fail to generate an overwhelming majority for the Chief (70+%). The students and many alumni just won’t let it go – I suspect the same thing will happen in Cleveland. I live in Chicago and certainly don’t like the U of I and am appalled. Otherwise reasonable people who are Illini are utterly blind to any rational dialogue on the subject.
trollhattan
@LAO:
My spider sense is telling me Trey is going home to spend time hammering 20d nails into his closet door.
jackmac
@raven: Harry Caray was great with the White Sox and his partnership with Jimmy Piersall was a hoot. Unfortunately, age and effects from a stroke caught up with Harry in his later years with the Cubs. If you can find a audio clip of Harry from his Cardinals or early White Sox days you’ll catch a play-by-play guy at his peak.
DesertFriar
For the longest time, I felt the best way to show the insensitivity is to get some of the tribal colleges to change their mascots for athletics.
Little Priest Tribal College could change from the Warriors to the Battlin’ Bishops. The mascot could have full vestments with crosier (crooked staff) and mitre (hat). While he/she is entering, the crowd starts chanting “Amen” while making a cross. The final part of the entrance would be the mascot taking off the mitre while cheerleaders toss white frisbees into the crowd.
Somehow I think Bill Donohue, Bill O’Reilly set wouldn’t like it.
Little Big Horn College could change to the Custers. Mascot could be a cavalry general with 20 arrors sticking in him.
(((CassandraLeo)))
@Yutsano: There’s also a theorised linguistic ancestor to Sanskrit, Proto-Indo-European, which linguists believe is a direct ancestor to some 53% of the languages spoken today (I can’t recall if this is by number of people speaking them or by bulk number of languages). This includes Germanic languages such as English (though French is a secondary influence on English, it should be noted – I don’t remember the technical term for this. I’ve noticed that longer English words, at least by syllable count, are likelier to have Greek or Latin origins than short ones, which are almost always Germanic in origin).
I don’t have time to keep up with sports these days (or maybe it’s just that I don’t make time), but I completely agree with the comparison of baseball to chess. It’s what I most liked about it when I followed it. I suppose there is something of a spatial strategy to football that also resembles chess in some ways, but it feels more impersonal. The one-on-one interaction between hitter and pitcher is something you don’t really get in any of the “get the ball/puck into the goal” sports AFAIK (football, other football, rugby, basketball, hockey). There might be something like it in cricket, but I find cricket almost completely incomprehensible. (I suspect the sport’s incomprehensibility to outsiders was at least half the joke behind Brockian Ultra Cricket in Life, the Universe, and Everything.)
catclub
@MJS:
The US taxpayers – through the tax break that calls the NFL a charitable/non-profit corporation?
The owners are the ones who direct that largesse to Goodell
(((CassandraLeo)))
@LAO: Makes me wonder if there’s some news story about to break that would avert his confirmation by even this group of sycophants. It is irresponsible not to speculate.
@ProfDamatu: I’m almost certain this and Mnemosyne’s comment collectively explain most of it.
catclub
@trollhattan: Even stranger when Gowdy had said he wants to get back something something in the law field.
Wild Cat
@randy khan: He dated Liz Taylor, not Monroe.
Jewish Steel
@raven: Whoa! That is bananas, man!
HeleninEire
@LAO: Oh me too. Have you read Lyndsey Nelson’s autobiography? If not, you should. It is delightful.
randy khan
@MJS:
Considering how he’s treated Kraft and Jones, both of whom were supposed to be allies, I don’t know for sure whether he would feel he couldn’t go after Snyder (who is widely disliked, one of the few things fans have in common with owners). I don’t think there’s any real chance that he *would* do that, though.
germy
Matt Walsh is on the job.
ruemara
Hey folks. I just have to pop in to say thanks! Jenai & her mom are over the moon for the help. She’s terribly excited that she’ll actually get to go. Like, I couldn’t even afford to go to visit the Statue of Liberty, so I’m thrilled she’s going to DC for this Youth Leadership thingy.
President Jenai does sound good.
Wild Cat
@LAO: My source at CBS radio says he loathed Gary Cohen and tried to get him out of the radio booth, where he himself was banished to years before.
raven
@Jewish Steel: He was a wild man, I think he was OSS in WW and he hated us!
swbarnes2
@Brachiator:
Scandinavians have a whole lot of popular cultural representation; there are Scandinavians presented as silly, serious, strong, villainous, beautiful, sweet…anything you can think of.
Native Americans don’t get that. They get very little popular representation, so when one of the few examples is cartoony and foolish, it matters a lot more than Vikings matter to Swedes.
There is also a difference between white people picking a white mascot to please mostly white people (knowing that some of the target audience identifies with the mascot), as opposed to white people picking a non-white mascot to please mostly white people.
patroclus
@jackmac: Harry was so homerish that I found out that whether you thought he was a good broadcaster depended largely on whether you rooted for his team. When I was a little kid in north central Texas, before the Texas Rangers came, we were all Cardinals fans and I thought Harry was the best! Then, he went to Oakland and then the White Sox and I recognized his buffoonish qualities and thought he was terrible. But then he went to the Cubbies and I had moved to Chicago by then and, in the early years with Steve Stone and Milo Hamilton (who hated him), I thought he was fantastic again. But, as you say, he faded in his latter years and the SNL parody of him was hilarious. He called a good game on the radio and made it entertaining, but my (now) view is that he was largely a caricature, especially on TV, and there were many many better broadcasters (like Scully, Mel Allen, Red Barber and Jack Buck).
randy khan
@Wild Cat:
There’s a famous photo of him with Taylor, but there also were reports that he dated Monroe (and Vivian Leigh, and Jayne Mansfield).
Citizen Alan
@Miss Bianca:
Vampire clowns are, of course, the worst.
donnah
Steve M at No More Mister Nice Blog just asked on Twitter who would replace Christopher Wray in the event he gets replaced or resigns, and someone posted Trey Gowdy.
Ugh
mad citizen
I know U of I can keep Fighting Illini without the Chief, but I kind of wish they would change nicknames to something like the “Convicts” or for a newer style name: the Illinois Corruption.
This comment from your Hoosier neighbor, all in good fun.
LAO
@HeleninEire: I have not, but I will check it out.
@Wild Cat: He could be a total asshole IRL, but I enjoy listening to him. Cohen is the superfan who grew up and got the opportunity to call the games of his favorite team.
(((CassandraLeo)))
@swbarnes2: Another good point. Longmire is one of the rare cases of popular culture I can think of that didn’t portray American Indians as a one-dimensional caricature. Unfortunately the TV series ended recently. (I think Craig Johnson is probably still be writing new novels, though. IDK how much the TV series diverged from his books as I still need to read them.)
Tony Hillerman’s novels were another case; unfortunately he died about ten years ago. (I need to read these, too.) Oddly, they’re both mystery series.
…oh, also the Doctor Who serial “The Aztecs”; though its portrayal of history is outdated, the portrayal of the Aztecs was relatively nuanced and accurate according to the contemporary understanding of history. (Obviously British, though.)
Amir Khalid
@germy:
The secularised yoga that most non-Hindus learn doesn’t involve any form of worship at all.
John Revolta
@jackmac: This is true. Harry was a clown by the time he switched to the Cubs but he was great with the Sox. And Piersall was a great if eccentric color guy. He would sometimes refer to his interesting history by signing off like, “This is Jimmy Piersall, and
I’m CRRRAAAAZZYYYY!!!!”
randy khan
@patroclus:
I heard of lot of Harry Caray in the WGN superstation days, and I totally see why people were hot and cold on him. Heck, I was hot and cold, sometimes during the same game.
I saw him once when he appeared in a Smithsonian series on baseball broadcasters, and he made a lot more sense to me then. He said he thought of himself as the voice of the fan, and so his broadcast reflected what fans would be thinking, including when they were frustrated and mad about what the team was doing. The example I remember is when somebody popped up with runners on base to end a game, and his call was, more or less “He popped it up. He popped it up. I can’t believe it. He popped it up. The Cubs lose.”
(He also was about my favorite broadcaster to appear in the series. The guy who was moderating really preferred the sound of his own voice to whatever the broadcasters might say, but Caray figured out (or perhaps was so egotistical that he assumed) that the audience would much rather hear him than the moderator. So when the moderator got more than a sentence or two into his monologue, Caray would break in, saying something like “That reminds me of a story,” and talk for five minutes. It was hilarious.
trollhattan
@Amir Khalid:
What about “sun salutations”? Heliodeists!
germy
@Amir Khalid: He’s convinced it’s all “pagan” (as he calls it) worship.
Haydnseek
@Major Major Major Major: I was hoping that at the height of racist wingnut hysteria after Obama was elected some smart ass kid at Kenyon College would launch a campaign to rename their athletic teams the “Kenyon Usurpers.” If it happened, I didn’t hear about it…….
Anotherlurker
@randy khan: I like to say that I’m not a baseball fan, I support the Mets.
I love listening to Howie Rose pxp.
The Moar You Know
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Kicked mine when the NFL re-signed Michael Vick straight out of prison. That was it as far as I was concerned. He tortured and killed dogs. That’s a bridge I can’t cross. And the NFL decided not only was that totally OK by them, they’d give him a contract plus a million bucks in hush money.
I now watch and listen to no sports at all.
trollhattan
@randy khan:
Yup, nothing bugs me more than a “homer” broadcast team in the booth, regardless of the sport. Share your home team knowledge and insights–that’s why we’re listening/watching–but don’t paint over the warts. Flip side is playing the radio over the teevee broadcast. 50% less Joe Buck and Troy Aikman.
Citizen Alan
@raven:
You should come to Ole Miss, where the Confederate flag was an official school symbol for decades. They dropped it as the school flag in the early 80’s, but people still waved it at the games until the school finally took the extraordinary step of banning sticks of all kinds. Then, they replaced Colonel Reb (a mascot that resembled an elderly plantation owner!) with the Rebel Black Bear, a move that pissed off nearly everyone. The racists wanted their plantation owner, and the people who thought Colonel Reb was racist were nevertheless appalled by how incredibly stupid the Bear looked — it basically looked like something that came from a furries convention. There was actually a move in the Miss. Legislature to require Ole Miss to wave the rebel flag and reinstate Colonel Reb. Unsurprisingly, the prime-movers were actually legislators who went to Mississippi State and wanted their rival school to remain hobbled by racist trappings that killed recruitment for decades. The most recent (and absurd) development is that the University finally realized how disliked the Bear was, so they had a student referendum that replaced the Bear with ….
The Land Shark.
Crap like this is why I wanted to go to school out of state but my parents guilt-tripped me into staying here.
Brachiator
@swbarnes2:
I had to go back and double check what I had written.
I don’t defend the mascot. Never have. I agree that it should not exist, because Native Americans object.
The other rationalizations about why don’t really matter to me.
These days in mystery novels and movies, they are mainly dour murderers with depressing secrets.
schrodingers_cat
@Amir Khalid: That’s because India has been a melting pot since forever. You will find every variation of skin tone, although almost everyone has dark hair.
Matt McIrvin
@(((CassandraLeo))): “The Aztecs” isn’t bad, but it’s hilarious how obviously the villain is just (Shakespeare’s) Richard III.
Also, I think that’s the one original-series story in which The Doctor gets his way through his manly sexual magnetism… and it’s William Hartnell.
Citizen Alan
@Citizen Alan:
And the site wouldn’t let me edit that awful italics screwup
Sab
@ruemara: Yay! So glad my tiny contribution could help.
Belafon
My wife’s alma mater, Arkansas State University, was the Indians until they were forced to change. They became the Red Wolves. My wife was sad, and then bought a new sweat shirt.
I think the best way to kill off the old one is to switch, and market the hell out of the new one. Give away free tickets, a free drink, etc. to those with the new logo.
The Moar You Know
@germy: Wow. I literally live in what could be termed the Ground Zero of yoga in the United States, we make the news a lot because it gets taught in the schools here. And I can say unequivocally that the only two things that get worshiped in American yoga classes is the socioeconomic class of the participants and, occasionally, some participants will end up fucking. Not in the class. Just want to be clear on that.
Of course, even true Indian yoga classes can’t really be classified as religious worship. At the worst, they’ll read some stuff by old philosophers.
jharp
I grew up and Indians fan. Even had season tickets in the old 80,000 seat Municipal Stadium in the early ’90’s.
And I agree with those say the logo must go.
But what is curious to me is not one of my facebook friends (all Indians fans) have defended Cleveland for doing the right thing. There are about 30 posts that are all pissed off about it. Most say they are going to buy some booty with the logo on it to keep the chief alive.
Also most of those if not all also are the same ones making favorable posts about Trump.
I guess they all want to make their open bigotry even more bigotted.
John Revolta
@The Moar You Know: I was a big fan but at some point back in the ’90s they started packing more and more commercials in until a three-hour event was now three-and-a-half or more, and there was a time out after practically every play. Ruined the damn flow of the game, and it was even worse going to a live game. “There is an official’s time out on the field……………..” Bleah.
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
@LAO: For me, it was Ernie Harwell, may he rest in peace. Baseball was made for the radio, or watching live, anyway. I still listen to Tigers games via MLB’s At Bat app, which allows you to stream every home and away MLB game all season long through your cell phone for the reasonable fee of $20. The TV package is too rich for my blood but I’d really rather listen on the radio anyway. As for going to a game, it’s great on a nice summer evening…plenty of space within the game to talk, eat junk food, have a couple beers, enjoy being outside on a nice evening without missing much action.
I lived in Champaign Urbana for a couple years in the early 2000s. I never found the Chief Illiniwek logo to be anywhere near as offensive as Chief Wahoo (who is basically a grinning sambo caricature of an Indian)…the antics of the mascot were arguably objectionable, but as images of American Indians go the Illiniwek logo was pretty anodyne. They should still adopt a new mascot. You could probably morph the Illiniwek logo into a facing directly on turkey with a few very minor tweaks, so there’s an idea – the fighting Maleagris gallopavo’s.
Mnemosyne
@ruemara:
Yay! I already got a nice thank-you email from her mom.
Sab
I have been back in NE Ohio since 1999. People have given me Wahoo stuff since forever. I only wear it in the backyard doing yardwork. I am so glad this logo is going. I hated it. My mother (died in 2012 at age 85 hated it and loved the team.) Her dad died in 1960 age 70 , loved the team and hated Wahoo. Time to put it to rest.
raven
@What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?: The Chief was not a mascot and they were not “antics”.
martian
I went to one Illini alumni game with my MIL back in the day – family is full of alums, me included – and when Chief Illiniwek came running down the field, I kind of laughed, because what is this fake Indian shit? Then I turned to my MIL and she was crying with the emotion of it. It was strange to realize that I was the odd one out in that crowd by a good mile. Many of the older alumni around me were very serious, very upset about the threat to their tradition, and were really having a moment seeing their beloved Chief.
After the game, I had a long talk with my MIL, thinking that since I had friends involved in various protest actions against the Chief, surely I could present a good argument against, but she held on hard. A couple years ago she even gave all the alumni in the family Chief Illiniwek souvenirs for Christmas, me included, so that’s how much of an impression I made. What I wonder now, and maybe this is a stupid question, how is anybody’s mind changed? People are saying that times have changed, but how did it happen? There must be some mechanism, some pattern of argument that works, or is that untrue and direct confrontation never works? I clearly don’t possess the key, so I’m really wondering.
(((CassandraLeo)))
@Matt McIrvin: Agreed on both counts. It’s obvious the conventions of the series weren’t fully established yet because it’s AFAIK the only romance he has in the classic series (unless Romana II counts). It’s also one of the show’s biggest downer endings. Still, it’s definitely one of the show’s better philosophical examinations of the ramifications of time travel. And the writer clearly loved Aztec culture, and it shows in the amount of (largely historically accurate) detail.
MCA1
@DesertFriar: That is a f’ing fantastic idea. I would absolutely buy a t-shirt or cap from any such institution. The Custer mascot should have the brightest yellow wig imaginable and a mockable blond mustache, too.
That appropriation of what someone else believes to be “their” culture is a big part of the problem here. A lot of people focus on whether or not the depiction of a group is accurate or respectful, but imho that largely misses the point. Chief Illiniwek may have been well-researched and had the support of some actual Illini members, and was never a caricature of a red skinned guy with a dumb smile like Chief Wahoo. That kind of makes it better, but at the end of the day it’s still a bunch of white people turning a living culture their ancestors subjugated into the mascot for their fucking sports teams. It’s de facto demeaning and carries psychological weaponry, well-meaning or not. I don’t particularly care whether or not certain tribal leaders are “OK” with it – we can do better.
Maybe if Florida State, for example, were to make a huge public deal about apologizing for the U.S. government’s treatment of the Seminole nation in the past, establish a reparations fund or scholarships for members of the tribe using paraphernalia sales, or something like that which would make the tribe a partner in a real sense with the academic institution, that might go a long way toward overcoming a rebuttable presumption of what it “means” to be called the Seminoles and have a guy ride a horse out in war paint and plant a spear at midfield before football games. But that still might not finish the job. And it’ll never happen.
AnotherBruce
@jackmac: I haven’t listened to radio in Chicago for decades, But WLS I grew up with, in Iowa for godsakes. It was a powerful station with boring top 40 crap. I heard it went wingnut in later times. The station I thought was cool was coming out of Little Rock, Arkansas. Could only get it at night, Very progressive Think the program was called Beeker Street. Got to hear an AM station with a very FM music style. Hendrix, Clapton, Led Zep and weird releases from the late 60s and early 70s. There was a station in Rockford that was really good. I remember them playing Television. Sorry to ramble, but that’s what old men do.
Oh, and where can a I get a Caucasians hat? .
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
@raven: What was the “Chief” then? There’s an Illiniwek logo, which is a stylized rendition of an Indian Chief with feathered headdress. There was a guy who pranced around in “native” garb at athletic events. When I say mascot, I’m referring to that guy. The stylized rendition was inanimate and hence not capable of locomotion, and hence not capable of antics. I find the stylized rendition to be fairly anodyne. The dude prancing around was more offensive. Maybe he wasn’t considered a mascot, but he sure filled that role at athletic events.
martian
@raven: How was the Chief not a mascot? I’m old enough to remember terrible official Illiniwek caricatures as bad as Wahoo. And merchandise sold with drunken Illiniwek caricatures before the school clamped down and made things more respectable.
JustRuss
@DesertFriar: The mascot for my daughter’s college is the Missionaries, named after a colony of some sect that got pretty much slaughtered by the local Native Americans (not entirely without reason). Their cheer is “We’re on top!”
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
@martian: Those pre-date my time. They definitely should pick a new symbol for the University. I think Turkeys works. As far as I know it’s not taken.
schrodingers_cat
@Amir Khalid: Hatha Yoga is just exercise that helps you relax. Geeta calls anything you do with full concentration yoga. There is jnana (knowledge) yoga, karma (action) yoga, bhakti yoga etc..
The namaste is as much a greeting as it is a prayer, its like the Indian version of handshake, or salam.
Yoga comes from a word which means to join. So hatha yoga can have as much or as little religious significance you want.
Old Dan and Little Anne
Any long distance trip I take driving between April and September is spent with my right hand turning the tuner in search of a baseball game. Any baseball game. And I happen to be one of the few Yankee fans that enjoys Sterling and Waldman. As for Hawk Harrelson, Fuckem.
Yutsano
@What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?: Jive Turkeys?
(I’ll see myself out now.)
Immanentize
@martian: What Max Planck said of science is true of sports traditions: they progress one funeral at a time.
catclub
@trollhattan:
I definitely prefer the basketball play by play to the TV (TV never consistently mentions substitutions), but then I looked into delaying that radio feed to match up with whatever delays in the TV feed. Never worked it out. In general the radio feed was multiple seconds ahead of TV.
Immanentize
@MCA1:
Obligatory Link to Jubilation T. Cornpone as the ultimate Southern Civil War Hero
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
@Yutsano: Hah!
low-tech cyclist
I haven’t had time to read the thread, so people may have already suggested this ten times over. But why doesn’t the team sell the Chief Wahoo trademark to a Native American organization for $1, then let them decide what to do with it? They should be the people with agency here.
ruemara
@schrodingers_cat: You’re probably going to laugh or get mad but I wasn’t allowed to do yoga as a little girl because demons would possess you for doing asana poses. We were also proscribed from martial arts, having owls, rats, bats or spiders in the home (effigies, stuffed animals, prints, pictures-barring science texts) because demons. Fundies are very fearful people.
Jewish Steel
@catclub: Basketball pbp is faster paced and more exciting. I watched that whole Bulls championship run with the radio on and the sound down.
Jewish Steel
@Immanentize: That’s a great quote.
Fair Economist
@Citizen Alan:
Do all these student mascot referenda result in jokes? In California this process produced the UC Irvine Anteaters and the UC Santa Cruz Banana Slugs. That said, making a joke out of college sports boosterism isn’t all bad.
MCA1
@Served: “How people can’t realize that an indictment of a thing they enjoy is not an indictment of them personally and it is okay let go, I will never know.”
I love that quote. It should be somewhere in the program at every hockey game at the University of North Dakota, or on placards handed out to every d’bag there who insists on wearing their old Fighting Sioux jersey. Is there a connection between (i) a public university being so in thrall to revanchist white dude hockey fans that it took 10 years to implement a new team name after the NCAA sanctioned it (including suing the NCAA), and (ii) the location of that public university being North Dakota, the state where as of this week Dolt45 has his highest approval rating other than in West Virginia? Yes, yes there is.
martian
@What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?: I want to say it was the early nineties or so when things got cleaned up and the university doubled down on “honouring” Native Americans. That was in response to increasing protests all over the country, though, I think, not just specific Illiniwek protests. The climate changed, and they got rid of the indefensible stuff first to try and hold off the inevitable. Man, the stuff was crazy racist. Just smacked you in the face.
The Moar You Know
@DesertFriar: Call the team “the Fighting Pincushions” with a cartoon Custer full of arrows and watch white America riot. I would buy all their shit.
Wild Cat
@randy khan: Kiner claims he ran into Eddie Fisher at some event. He told Fisher he dated his ex-wife. Fisher just said, “You too?”
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
Gooooooo… Crackers!
Origuy
@raven: I never saw the point of Chief Illiniwek. But then I only went to football games my freshman year because I was on the fencing team and got in free. I don’t remember going after that, and rarely went to basketball games.
The Golux
As a Red Sox fan, I was underwhelmed by Joe Castiglione when he first joined the radio broadcasts, not particularly liking his voice, but after three decades I realized that he’d managed to do the job without becoming irritating. That’s an accomplishment, especially when contrasted with the self-caricature that is John Sterling. I wonder what cringe-inducing catchphrase the latter will come up with for Giancarlo Stanton? At least “A Tex message!! On the Mark!!!” has been retired.
trollhattan
@Fair Economist:
I believe the answer is “affirmative” and nominate the Evergreen State Geoducks as starting the trend.
Served
There is also at least one school in the immediate Champaign-Urbana that still goes by Redskins, and the reaction to a movement to change it back in the 90s turned out to be a shocking MAGA preview.
Brachiator
@Mnemosyne: BTW, I have not been able to check into the site as much as I would like. Did lamh get to see a “Will and Grace” taping?
Sab
@JustRuss: Mascots of my college were the Lords (Kenyon in Ohio.) When we went co-ed the women were the Ladies. There is nothing more unladylike than a really good Kenyon womens’ sportsteam.
schrodingers_cat
@ruemara: Neither. Why would one scare a child like that? BTW Hatha Yoga is attributed to the Sankhya school of philosophy which is mostly a rational and an agnostic/atheist school, which relies on observation to draw conclusions.
Sankhya == numbers.
The Moar You Know
@Fair Economist: I was there for the Banana Slug change. 1986 as I recall. The chancellor thought it was undignified and by fiat announced it was to be the “Sea Lions”. The student body lost their shit and shut the campus down for a week. The chancellor caved and resigned, in that order.
That was a great fucking school to go to back then. It has not changed for the better, sadly. Way too much biotech money.
I was and still am perfectly fine with being a “slug”.
Adria McDowell
@germy: That’s hilarious to me, considering they sometimes do yoga for gym class at my kid’s Catholic school…
Wild Cat
@LAO: Nothing against him, although Gary’s the best play-by-play man on TV. I grew up with him. I went to his Farewell Day at Shea. I understood his bitterness being exiled to the booth. I understood his sadness that Jack Murphy [his brother] Stadium was renamed by the Padres after a product for filthy lucre. I learned years later he was a very heavy smoker and drinker and a loner and the Mets were pretty much his entire life.
Nelson I met (briefly) when I snuck into the TV booth with a pal two hours before game time. He was a nice guy—just smiled and said, “Helloooooo, boys . . . ” as a hint we should get the hell out and let him do his job.
randy khan
@MCA1:
Florida State actually has the Seminole Tribe’s permission to use the nickname. FSU’s page on its relationship with the Tribe is interesting: Closer than you might guess
The Moar You Know
@Wild Cat: It was renamed “Jack Murphy Stadium” for filthy lucre as well: paid for by the San Diego Union-Tribune. The first corporate sponsor of what had been known up until then as simply “San Diego Stadium”.
randy khan
@Sab:
There are some good male/female corresponding names. There are at least two Cowboy/Cowgirl schools, and St. Peter’s in New Jersey (my father’s alma mater) uses Peacocks and Peahens.
Fair Economist
@schrodingers_cat:
Because Fundamentalism needs its members to *not* know about alternative philosophies/religions, most especially reasonable and appealing ones.
Capri
During the half time of the Illinois game at the first Big Ten women’s basketball tournament I attended (around 2000) the Chief came out and did his thing. As he was strutting off the court after his dance, a person shouted “RACIST” at the top of his lungs so that everybody in the arena heard it. The Chief never came back, although he continued to prance around during the halftimes of home Illinois games for several more years.
Ask those proud Illini fans why, if the Chief is such a respectable symbol, did they know better than to let him show his face off campus years before he was officially killed off..
Jager
@AnotherBruce:
KAAY Little Rock
LAO
@Wild Cat: I just went back and re-read your original comment — which I clearly missed the first time. Bob hated Gary. I thought Gary was the jerk. Got it. Still love them both.
I really need to up my reading comprehension.
randy khan
@Old Dan and Little Anne:
Granted, I hate the Yankees with the white-hot heat of a thousand burning suns, but I’d appreciate an explanation of how anyone could enjoy Sterling. He’s obnoxious, self-important, and often not in sync with what’s going on in the game because he feels the need to tell you things that aren’t actually about the game. For instance, I happened to catch the play-by-play when Jeter got his 3000th hit and Sterling figured that was the perfect time to go off on a canned recitation of Jeter’s accomplishments, rather than talking about the specific thing that had just happened on the field and how the teams and the fans were reacting. Also, his home run call stinks.
I have a soft spot for Waldman, though. I remember her from the early days of WFAN when she was the Yankees beat reporter. She covered the 1989 World Series for the Fan, and had the odd distinction of being one of the very first people back on the air after the earthquake in San Francisco. I still remember it – she sounded shaken (sorry) but determined to make sure people knew what had happened just moments before. I still don’t know how she did it.
Just One More Canuck
@trollhattan: There’s no greater homers than the British Formula 1 announcers, from Murray Walker right down to whoever the current crop are (at least Murray was entertaining with his screw-ups).
rikyrah
@ruemara:
So glad for her!!
catclub
@ruemara:
The most frequent statement from Jesus in the Gospels is “Fear not.”
martian
@Immanentize: So, is real change only possible generationally? I was wondering with regards to politics as much as sports. Does real change within a generation require some sort of leveling event that opens up the possibility for a reset? I’m thinking of how the European social democracies were built after WWII.
I had been thinking that gay rights happening within my lifetime represented proof that cultural change was possible, but maybe the AIDS epidemic was the leveling event that made room for a paradigm shift. Losing a generation to disease and governmental neglect instead of to war.
Chet
What a great thread. Makes me long for spring.
I lived in the Quad Cities until age 14. That’s literally the battleground between U of IL and U of IA territory. My choir director, who I am still in touch with on FB 30 years later, is an old queen and a Chief dead-ender. Go figure.
I listened to Harry Caray on the radio, but liked him better on TV. In 1995 I moved from the Midwest to Boston and was infected by the Red Sox, partly because they started making the playoffs frequently but also because their radio play-by-play guy (Joe Castiglione) was so enjoyable. I’ve been listening to him ever since, and I’ve got to know him so well I can pretty nearly guess the score from the tone of his voice within a minute or two of turning on the game.
Joe C’s years with Dave O’Brien were magical radio to me. Obie was technically the color man, but they both great in both roles, and they had amazing on-air chemistry. I always figured Obie was being groomed to take over when Joe retired, but then he got the TV job.
I get the Sox on the MLB audio package too, so on extra long nights I can pick up a west coast game too. $20 and worth it at twice the price.
I live in the NYC area now, and got to appreciate Howie Rose on WFAN. Not enough to be a Mets fan, but he does call a good game. Unfortunately, CBS buried the Mets on WOR-AM and put the Yankee games on WFAN.
Holy hell, John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman are the worst. I put them on in the car and shout insults back at the radio. I hate Michael Kay as a play-by-play guy, too. If ever a broadcaster believed he played for the team he was covering, it was him. But he’s not so bad as talk radio host.
I
schrodingers_cat
@Fair Economist: Sankhya questions the idea of a maker, they ask who created the creator? No one knows and no one can know. Nasadiya Sukta (Hymn of the nothingness , which 19th century western orientalists translated as the hymn of creation) from the oldest Veda, Rigveda, lays those thoughts out in a poetic form.
WaterGirl
@ruemara: Your thank you is a good reminder! I couldn’t give yesterday, but today is the first. She’s at $925 now.
P.S. Hope you weren’t offended yesterday when I said she was almost as adorable as Scout. That is high praise, indeed, but i hope you didn’t take it wrong!
Old Dan and Little Anne
@randy khan: Baseball is my favorite thing in the world and I acknowledge he is a terrible play by play man. He is notorious for calling plays completely incorrectly. Meh. I just can’t get worked up over it. I comment on a Yankees blog and one of the ongoing jokes is one of his favorite phrases, “ya just can’t predict baseball.” His homerun calls are incredibly cheesy but they make me laugh. He loves baseball and the Yankees and he expresses many of my same frustrations. I’ve listened to other radio guys and many are so dry. I get my people hate him but I save most of my hate for republicans. Cheers.
Jewish Steel
There goes the NYT biting my style again.
https://www.facebook.com/nytimes/posts/10151473479624999
CarolPW
@The Moar You Know: I proudly have a Fiat Slug license plate frame. When I entered (1968) we were already the Slugs. The campus was set up with no sororities, fraternities or official sports teams allowed. So the banana slug wasn’t a “sports” mascot, but they were the most ubiquitous fauna on campus. Pissed me off when they tried to change the mascot. No sea lions on campus at all.
Sab
@randy khan: Akron Ohio’ s University has a female mascot: Zippy the kangaroo. Only girl kangaroos have pouches, and an early supporter invented zippers. So the mascot was Zippy the (girl) kangaroo.
Lately we have added the Roo, as in “Fear the Roo” who is definitely not Zippy. Possibly her terrible boyfriend.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
The could change the team to the Cinncinati Filibusters (using the 19th Century meaning of the word) They could have William Walker as a mascot…
VeniceRiley
@Citizen Alan:
Ole Missy McMissface
ruemara
@WaterGirl: Oh no. I wouldn’t get offended. Scout’s adorable and Jenai will become a teen. That right there is a massive negative. You guys don’t know how happy you’ve made her. And me.
@catclub: And the most important over the law is “Love Thy Neighbor.” And they fail at that even worse.
Aleta
@ruemara: She seems like an amazing person.
Sab
@Aleta: @Aleta: @Aleta: Nice to be able to give deserving kids a vote of confidence.
Thaddeu
ABC NewsVerified account @ABC
NEW: Attorneys representing Rick Gates, who was indicted last fall in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe, move to withdraw as his counsel, effective immediately.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
Can I get some love for the Rhode Island School of Design GoNads? Apparently that is RISD’s official mascot for what intercollegiate teams they have, which there aren’t a lot of. Art majors don’t go in big for that stuff.
I found out about the Nads when my daughter spend a couple years at RISD.
WaterGirl
@ruemara: Well, right now she looks like a lovely girl, with no rolled eyes or big sighs in sight. Enjoy it while it lasts!
How nice for you to have been able to enlist your friends in doing this for her. You must be the aunt of the year. (if that was your relationship, i can’t quite recall.) You are so generous to have done this, particularly when you didn’t always get the support one would hope for. (as I recall)
Mike J
@Just One More Canuck: Speaking of F1, great news. They’ve dropped the grid girls. Of course all the people you would expect to be upset are upset.
randy khan
@Old Dan and Little Anne:
I reserve pretty much all of my hatred for the Yankees. Republicans are in a whole different category.
schrodingers_cat
@germy: Who is this person, never heard of him before. Do Yoga or don’t, I don’t care a whit.
drdavechemist
@schrodingers_cat:
A former student of the spousal unit (a caucasian) married a woman from the subcontinent. Their first child had (quite unexpectedly) very pale skin and red hair. Melting pot indeed.
Ben Cisco (onboard the Defiant)
@AnotherBruce: Don’t know about a hat, but I know a guy who could help you out with a shirt: https://youtu.be/zWyV0BBVhpg
WaterGirl
@drdavechemist: What did the mailman look like?
The Lodger
@catclub: But do we listen?
ruemara
@WaterGirl: Oh, my poor mum has glommed onto her actual aunt as the daughter in law she didn’t get to have (my brother has questionable taste in comparing the current, but I’m shady & judgmental like that). She’s my personal pleasure to auntie for as I’m a softie regarding doting on kids and even teens. Like how I spoil my interns with a coffee stash and pizza days. I feel that not having had something is no reason to deny that to other folks. I’d much rather see people be happy & thriving.
Just One More Canuck
@Mike J: I’ve seen a few threads in F1 groups on FB and you’re right – there’s a ridiculous number of people who say that ‘they’ve been watching F1 since the 60’s and taking away the grid girls is the last straw and they’re done with F1 forever’. I cant say I’ve ever noticed them enough to care one way or the other about them – I’m usually trying to make sure that I’m awake early enough on Sundays to see the race
WaterGirl
@ruemara: I get that, I was raised to take the high ground, too.
BTW, when I searched my email today as the easiest way to get the spelling of your nym, I found a message from you that I hadn’t seen before! It was from November and it was all about your kitties. So sorry I missed it! (No wonder I didn’t get a Christmas card from you this year; I thought maybe you were boycotting Christmas to stick a finger in Trump’s eye. Okay, not really.)
Origuy
My freshman roommate was from Pekin, Illinois. The story was that Pekin was named after Peking, China. The person who named it thought that Pekin was directly opposite Peking, as Canton, Ohio supposedly was from Canton, China. The Pekin High School teams were the Chinks. Seriously, until 1980.
Sab
@ruemara: Teens are awful. It ain’t their fault. They are who God made them. God has a weird sense of humor, and he loves teens. I love them also, but I don’t know why he does. They are often awful.I love the ones I know, but I don’t know why anyone else loves them.
This has nothing to do with your niece, who is clearly a pre-teen.
jackmac
@Served: Morris High School (just outside the Chicago metro area) still goes by Redskins. Morris is full of MAGA types so I don’t see a change anytime soon.