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

If you were more familiar with American collegiate athletics, the MLB or the NBA, I don't believe I would have any trouble convincing you that I can sympathize with that. Many Ohio teams have the distinction of being second best. Maybe it would be worse to be bottom tier, but, like I just said, there's not much crueler than ruining peoples' hope. The worst was the year Ohio State lost in the championship games of both football (ours) and basketball to the same team (Florida).

I'm still something of a newcomer to international and English but I guess Sheffield is in the second tier below the Premier league and they just missed promotion? I noticed Newcastle was relegated, which is a shame, because in the few months I've been following the sport, I've taken a liking to Michael Owen.

I think Ormondroyd has written a fair number of entries for the EG. There's not much easier than writing about a sports figure, truly. I should know.

>>There's not much easier than writing about a sports figure, truly. I should know<<

Careful, you might persuade us that you 100-plussers go round looking for pussy subjects to be prolific with

Anyhow, your surmisal is correct in all important respects. The Championship (24 clubs) is the second tier of English football and feeds the first tier, the Premiership (20 clubs). The three bottom clubs in the Premiership at season's end drop down into the next year's Championship, which fate has just befallen 18th placed Newcastle United, Owen and all. The top two clubs in the Championship (this season Wolves and Birmingham) go straight up, but the next four go into a mini-league, the play-offs. Sheffield United finished 3rd, committing them to play 6th (Preston) over two legs. They won, and went on to meet Burnley in the play-off final at Wembley...where they lost 1-0. (If that sounds frustratingly close to glory, then us Blades are allowed to admit we were bl**dy lucky to get that much of a sniff, but nobody else is).

There are more sides to this, though. Not least there are two Sheffield clubs, both in the Championship. The other, bizarrely named Sheffield Wednesday, aka the Owls (less officially aka the Pigs) are a mid-table, underachieving, feckless rabble who are gradually frittering away enormous amounts of undeserved cash going absolutely nowhere. Except they beat United home and away this season, and so can claim to be the reason United aren't now in the Premiership, which most definitely confers bragging rights across this city for the next twelve-month, only don't tell Sho (or Decko) I said so.

Also now in the Championship are my home town team, Scunthorpe United (up from the third tier, which is confusingly called League One) and my boss' team, Middlesborough, down from the Prem along with neighbours Newcastle. Add to the Championship two more teams based within twenty miles (Barnsley and Doncaster Rovers) and who needs the Prem? We're going to have a great little party of our own next year.

So - what else do you want to know about my specialist subject?

I don't think I need to persuade you of that.

I'll keep you in mind if I have questions, though the season seems to be pretty much over. Well, actually, there's one - is it all over this year?

One game to go. The FA Cup Final, Chelsea v Everton, Wembley, Saturday.

In time forgotten, the FA Cup Final was played at the beginning of May, and was a real season climax between two top teams. These days it's pretty much an also-rans prize, because the real top clubs try out their youth teams in the tournament. Till the final anyway. I hope Everton win, since Chelsea still haven't been properly punished for Crimes Against Humanity at the end of the European Championship semi-final.

I don't think I like Chelsea. I'm not sure why.
Hey, if you ever need some pertinent information on baseball or basketball, you know I'll be right here, possibly to nurse you back to sanity.

I don't need sanity, and you can forget basketball. Suckiest game ever invented. I'd rather try swallow one than discuss it.
Baseball I quite like. I always think of baseball as a regional minority sport, though, one that's played in the top right-hand quadrant of the US only. Nothing wrong with that, mind. The top right hand quadrant contains most of what's comprehensible to Europeans.
That reminds me - you ever seen European baseball? In Finland they have a baseball variant where they pitch underhand, so that batters have to hit a dropping ball (it's a foul pitch if it doesn't clear head-height in the flight).
You reckon that sounds boring? You'd be right.

You'd be right about Chelsea too. They belong to the Dark Side.

...look what I can do...

How impressive.

Basketball can be very exciting, I think. I don't watch the NBA, partly because there's no team I pledge my allegiance to and partly because it's boring. But college basketball is about as good as much fun to watch as any sport.

Never seen European Baseball. I'll resist doing so in the future.

I've actually been thinking about an entry, or a series of entries, on college football (the throwing football). It's a sport with a beautiful, long history. It is also much more fun to watch than its professional counterpart, the NFL.

Look what I have done
I've done the categories and chronological archives, but couldn't stomach the author ones. Whose idea was an author archive?
I should really stop asking questions with embarrassing answers.

A few of them were tough to categorize, but I guess that's half the point, sometimes. Reading through them to figure out where they fit made this chore almost bearable.

Hey Pin,
Something's just reminded me of Ariadne's ball of string and I found this. F110334?thread=246540

For someone whose views have shifted and who has changed a lot during his time on h2g2, it's almost startling to see your views having remained so consistent. I mean that. I was amazed, looking back, to see how your ideas six years ago are the same as your ideas today. If that says anything, it might tell you that my mind can be changed about your ideas on the division between the EG and UG.

There was a radical publication in America in the 70s I think. Before my time, but I've read about it a little. It was called The Realist. I don't know if you've heard of it. It published fiction (mostly satire) and factual reporting alongside, letting the reader decide what was true. I think that's the vision some people see when you talk about merging the guides into one. (Or maybe it's what they want to see so they can oppose it) It's up to you, friend, to actually show what you mean. A celebration of writing.

You were ahead of your time six years ago, and you're still ahead of the rest of us today. But we're all of us catching up, a tectonic fingernail at a time.

Changing institutions, and even would-be institutions, is tough. It always needs a co-operative effort.

One proven model is to have an unflinching advocate of change, way off beyond the position of the general community, persistently hammering out the same, consistent, monotonous message. The message must be fundamentally right, of course, or there’d be no point in having the change. The delivery method can be, and maybe even should be, fundamentally wrong. The job of the Outcast soon becomes to keep the issue alive, irritating, incapable of resolution by easy but puerile consensus.

And then into the gap come sensible individuals who care about the issue. Some are a little way out towards to the Outcast, and some are scarcely different from the unthinking, reactionary, prevailing system. These people aren't unthinking, though. They rationalise a better system, and they arrive at a compromise. The system moves a quarter-way out towards the Outcast, and usually a little off to one side, because the Outcast, for all his meticulous justification and self-delusion about his uniquely powerful imagination, really should have moved on a bit in the intervening six years.

May I call you Jodan?

Yeah.
I dunno, Pin.

OK. That was a bit portentous and silly

I'm not as consistent as all that, in truth.
I do keep reanalysing my ideas, each time round the loop when once again so many people seem to disagree with me so vehemently.
I keep coming back to the same answer.

I still think, too, that there's a hidden motivation here, and that it has something to do with elitism v inclusivity. I think there's a feeling that it's not fair that some should fly when not everyone can, and so we ought to hold the thing down at the level of the lowest common denominator. I think, too, that the LCD principle gets reinforced by a loose clique of the mediocre who resent in others the imagination, creativity and self-confidence that they lack themselves.

Our innate wonderment at flight can't be suppressed, though. Have you noticed this one, and the praise it's already getting? A53069051
Of course, it can't go into the Edited Guide in this form because of the dire and reactionary Charlotte-Rule outlawing any dramatising the account with speculation. How can he possibly know that she straightened her hat?

The kind of device that dmg is using here is so obviously a good and valid way to make an Entry stimulating, as well you know, having been out along the same branch yourself. Sooner or later, though, PR's Dementors are going to descend on the style, and then I hope there'll be a decisive rally in its defence. The irony of my own stance is that I'm a toxic supporter of the cause, so I can't very well weigh in. Any approval from me just sustains the Diminishers of Words.

Each time round the loop, though, we ought to make at least some adjustments to acknowledge what's truly changed. I'll call you Jordan then. Perhaps the woolliness doesn't appeal to you so much these days.

Yeah, that's a great entry. It's just beautifully done. And you know, I'm really beginning to think that the quality of the EG is picking up. Entries like that are becoming more regular, not an exception to a rule or an occasional quirk. They're still outnumbered, but given the small amount of entries being written, it's not so bad. Maybe the Stretcher has something to do with that. Maybe even EotM, I don't know.

I think you're being too pessimistic when you say it won't go into the EG. There's nothing in it that hasn't been done before. Who's going to say 'This can't go into the EG' now? It's hard to imagine anyone taking that stance. I've done it and gotten away with it, so I'm now using it more and more. 'Strange Fruit' has some dramatization, as do the two entries I have in PR right now, and obviously Ashtabula and the Dayton Flood. Haven't seen the Charlotte-rule seriously invoked yet. And if it is, I do believe there would be a decisive rally, as you say.

I don't think your commenting on an entry would hurt an entry's chances. Your approval is not a death kiss, you're not quite the outcast you think, exciting though that may seem. Go tell dmitri what you think (unless your job as Stretcher judge precludes an early comment).

The Stretcher judge role means it'll have to wait, but dmg knows we respect him. He's not perfect, and he's not IMO quite the best we've ever had, but he is exceptionally good and he's also exceptionally prolific. Best of all, he tries things and isn't scared to fail now and then.

It sounds like you reckon I'm a bit paranoid, but I actually believe that the Charlotte-Rule was created to deal with me specifically. I accordingly think it has been invoked, too. It was the initial premise (Charlotte's own) for blocking my Orgreave Entry. It's really all that stops some of my (admittedly extreme) dramatised Entries that are nonetheless basically factual entering the EG, such as Gorgon, the long Lee, Gunson and the Towton Bowman.

There's an Entry I'm planning to write that will test it again. I need AB's OK first, though, since it's a little bit his story.

Another aside: depending on how serious you are about Lampi, you might like to know that I expect to be in Worcester, Mass sometime in August. Do you need a copyhound?

I'm optimistic in the same way you are, about high-class, distinctive Entries getting more frequent. And I own up to fondness for being a rebel, and occasional delusions about the size of the waves I make.

I've realized that I tend to be a bit rough on dmitri's entries in PR, despite their being some of the best in there, and I've come to a sort of a conclusion as to why. I think that when I read his entries, I always get the feeling of being one step removed from real greatness. I don't know how to articulate it other than that. I've been meaning to talk to him about it, but also waiting to see if I can clarify that thought a bit.

You might be right about Jims' ruling on Orgreave. In fact, I think you are right about that. But there's a new regime and there are new attitudes. Probably because they don't have time to be restrictive, the staff is more open-minded. I think Sam will continue in that mold; if I remember him correctly he was a very reasonable guy (whereas Jims and Ashley could be prone to occasional unpleasantness, but I was friendly enough with Ashley because of the UG).

That's an interesting coincidence about Worcester. I don't know. When I said I wanted to meet him, it had nothing to do with the entry, and everything to do with just trying to figure the man out. I'd be almost afraid that it would be a disappointment.

I'll try not to correct your delusions too much. A little delusion now and then can't be too bad. They tend to provoke.

Here's a bit of irony for you: F3719964?thread=6664756&latest=1#p81586519

I take your point about not quite getting the full deal with him too. In fact it really interests me that you should say it, because I'm not as prolific as either of you.

I've always thought that the price of output is finishing quality. Writing isn't like a footrace. If you dash for the line as soon as it comes in sight, you might as well never have started.

Irony? Nah. I happen to agree with him, remember

I don't know. I'd say it depends on the writer.

Do you realize you and I have the same number of badges now? And I resigned from the orange one's group ages ago, they just forgot to take it away. I can see why you've refrained from using your witty little epithet lately.

-Badges

By the way, I've been working on a draft of Pickett you might like. It has very real potential to be rejected from PR. Might also end up being a little piece.