h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Fenchurch says:
It isn't very funny, is it? And where are the pictures and charts you always put up?

Why is it as long as the line to hell?

And who the hell cares about that anyway?

Fenchurch replies:
Leave me alone. I'll fix it soon enough. I've got pictures, I just don't feel like putting them in now. It's late.

A lot of stuff happened. I don't want it to be incomplete.

Did you ever think that someone might need this information, to settle a dispute with a baseball buddy or something? huh? Ever think about that?

Fenchurch, it has come to our attention that your mental health may be deteriorating. Your unhealthy obsessions with things like theories of personality, death penalties and baseball are clearly affecting your mind, and could also be affecting your writing style. Your combination of these unhealthy obsessions with late-night computer-watching binges and the equally unfortunate habit of talking to yourself could be characterised as a seriously defective behaviour flaw.

Please, in the interests of the well-being of fellow researchers, and the maintenance of good humour without corresonding sacrifice of sanity, stay straight, and get some sleep!

The editors

Hypoman - don't you go trying to change Fen. If she were to get some sleep, she might find that she enjoys it, and we would never see her again

Fen - Wow wow wow. This is a fantastic article, one of the best I've read on h2g2. I'm tempted to put it on my recommended reading list, even though it isn't an official article yet (it will be one day). You either spent a long time researching this subject, or you are much older than you claim.

There isn't much to pick on here, so I'll just offer a few lame grammatical points

Paragraph 6: "The press was on Comiskeys side" should be "Comiskey's"

Paragraph 13/14: I think the paragraph break is missing between these two (13 ends with "Rothstien had changed his mind and would be in on it, but didn't want his name involved" and 14 starts with "Five days before the series, Sullivan told Rothstien"

Paragraph 15: "Sullivan received the $40,000, but only passed on $10,00 to Gandil" should be "$10,000"

Paragraph 23: I'm confused by this paragraph. It reads as if Cicotte pitched and lost game 7, giving the Reds a 4-3 lead, but then it says that Lefty Williams would pitch game 7. Help!

Last point: more of a question, really. I always thought the Black Sox were named as such after the series, and the "black" referred to their tarnished reputation, not to their dirty uniforms. Have i been misinformed?

At any rate, a fantastic article. Well done!

and who says something has to be funny or have neat pictures to be interesting, anyway?

Hypoman (and editors)- It's not a *deteriorating* state, I've always been this way. Was there really something wrong with my writing style, though? I know it's more of just a chronological recount of what happened, and I tore some of it out, leaving gaps and peculiarities.... but there not really much more you can say about it without becoming Eliot Asinof.
I think I've developed a mechanism remeniscent of dolphins, where I rest one side of my brain at a time, thus requiring no sleep. I think that explains the alternating entries: Personality theories, draw pictures for personality theories. Death Penalty, choice of music on homepage. World Series, thinking of writing a moving poem about pixels and such.... the shining of the light/ like a twinkle in the eye of a newborn child/ reflection of a mother thousands of miles away....this is the pixel of life.....

TVF: Thanks Three wows in sequence makes me smile. I'm not older than I claim though, ahhh!!! It was a research project for school actually, hence the mountains of research... why do something unfun and typical about early American 20th century like jazz or WWI or major scientific discoveries when you can do the fixed World Series?! And that paper was even longer than the entry, which I mangled more a bit, generating all the oopsies you found (and thank you, I'll change them when I've got time). Got an 87%, which I suppose is good.... I've never been good at nonfiction....

The Black Sox first earned the name within the baseball community because of their uniforms, but after the scandal the name was more universally accepted because of it... I should probably add that to clear up confusion.

Thank you both for reading it

I just use them to entertain myself... I feel inadequate without them, since I already know the information. I can then read my own work and go "I learned nothing new, but I'm still damn proud of those pictures and clever jokes"

Sorry Fenchurch: the implication was that you needn't have put up the comment - not that there's REALLY anything wrong with you!

I agree with Frink that it is a good article, and it does give a lot more of the background to this particular baseball scandal than I've heard before (remember, Americans' obsession with this particular national pastime puzzles us almost as much as our own - with cricket - puzzles you!).

As far as the sub-editing goes, I could point out an awful lot of spelling errors, typos and mis-expressions, but the article is so long I'll have to wait until I can get a good run-up at it. I'd suggest, though, that you put it through a spell-check, as quickly as you can! Several of the mistakes which are more typos than anything (e.g. in the first paragraph where you write "it is look upon [sic] as being a beloved American pastime...") will not be exposed by a spell-checker though, so you may have to get a good proofer to look it over for you.

Regards,

H.

How you take those poor little insects and turn them into sport is beyond me.

Fenchurch - this is so, so, so . . . comprehensive!! I'm impressed (you just don't find that much information lying about around here!). Sure, there are a few subediting little things to do, but the guts of the article is great. And that's coming from someone whose knowledge of the whole debacle was gleaned only from "Field of Dreams" (and that's not an easy thing to admit).

As for the crickets . . . they're willing participants. The bats on the other hand . . .

Fenchurch, even though the title of your pop-up window says "Recommended Autumn Reading" and it is Spring in New Zealand I pushed on and kept reading.

Nice informative article. An h2g2 approved guide entry for sure. Perhaps.

In New Zealand last year our national softball team was rebranded and their new name is the Black Sox.

All the news media explained the inappropriatness of the name in light of the Chicago scandel but Black Sox it remains.

Most NZ sports teams wear black uniforms and the word 'black' is incorporated in their nicknames.

On a related point. Do you have any knowledge on the origins of the name 'World Series'? I have asked this question in a couple of other fora but am no wiser.

What happend to the article about the 1919 World Series??? Also, I could not access Fenchurch's page! What gives?

Fenny must have written this one in white ink

I assume you are using the new alabaster skin and white text on a white backgound doesn't show up too well

I'm afraid its one of the side effects of the latest site updates but you can get round it.

you can see the page in its full glory using this url http://www.h2g2.com/A167258?skin=classic

If you add the ?skin=classic to any url on the site it will display that page in the "classic goo"

If you want to use the "classic goo" as your dfault skin you can change it in your personal settings from your home page

Since this forum is alive : Look, Looney, now it *is* Spring here an' Autumn there!

Yes, I care not for the new skin and refuse to bend in order to comply with it's needs. The reason my page was down was my (rather charming, if I might say so) java. The new XML didn't like it, an' so I gotta do the whole thing over.