XIII

THE SCORE IN THE STANDS

The opening week of the baseball season brought out few surprises. The line-up in the grandstands was practically the same as when the season closed last Fall, most of the fans busying themselves before the first game started by picking old 1921 seat checks and October peanut crumbs out of the pockets of their light-weight overcoats.

Old-timers on the two teams recognized the familiar faces in the bleachers and were quick to give them a welcoming cheer. The game by innings as it was conducted by the spectators is as follows:

FIRST INNING: Scanlon, sitting in the first-base bleachers, yelled to Ruth to lead off with a homer. Thibbets sharpened his pencil. Liebman and O'Rourke, in the south stand, engaged in a bitter controversy over Peckingpaugh's last-season batting average. NO RUNS.

SECOND INNING: Scanlon yelled to Bodie to to whang out a double.

Turtelot said that Bodie couldn't do it. Scanlon said "Oh, is that so?"

Turtelot said "Yes, that's so and whad' yer know about that?" Bodie whanged out a double and Scanlon's collar came undone and he lost his derby. Stevens announced that this made Bodie's batting average 1000 for the season so far. Joslin laughed.

THIRD INNING: Thibbets sharpened his pencil. Zinnzer yelled to Mays to watch out for a fast one. Steinway yelled to Mays to watch out for a slow one. Mays fanned. O'Rourke called out and asked Brazill how all the little brazil-nuts were. Levy turned to O'Rourke and said he'd brazil-nut him. O'Rourke said "Eah? When do you start doing it?" Levy said: "Right now." O'Rourke said: "All right, come on. I'm waiting."

Levy said: "Eah?" O'Rourke said: "Well, why don't you come, you big haddock?" Levy said he'd wait for O'Rourke outside where there weren't any ladies. NO RUNS.

FOURTH INNING: Scanlon called out to Ruth to knock a homer, Thibbets sharpened his pencil. Scanlon yelled: "Atta-boy, Babe, whad' I tell yer!" when Ruth got a single.

FIFTH INNING: Mrs. Whitebait asked Mr. Whitebait how you marked a home-run on the score-card. Mr. Whitebait said: "Why do you have to know? No one has knocked a home-run." Mrs. Whitebait said that Babe Ruth ran home in the last inning. "Yes, I know," said Mr. Whitebait, "but it wasn't a home-run." Mrs. W. asked him with some asperity just why it wasn't a home-run, if a man ran home, especially if it was Babe Ruth.

Mr. W. said: "I'll tell you later. I want to watch the game." Mrs.

Whitebait began to cry a little. Mr. Whitebait groaned and s.n.a.t.c.hed the card away from her and marked a home-run for Ruth in the fourth inning.

SIXTH INNING: Thurston called out to Hasty not to let them fool him.

Wicker said that where Hasty got fooled in the first place was when he let them tell him he could play baseball. Unknown man said that he was "too Hasty," and laughed very hard. Thurston said that Hasty was a better pitcher than Mays, when he was in form. Unknown man said "Eah?"

and laughed very hard again. Wicker asked how many times in seven years Hasty was in form and Thurston replied: "Often enough for you." Unknown man said that what Hasty needed was some hasty-pudding, and laughed so hard that his friend had to take him out.

Thibbets sharpened his pencil.

SEVENTH INNING: Libby called "Everybody up!" as if he had just originated the idea, and seemed proudly pleased when everyone stood up.

Taussig threw money to the boy for a bag of peanuts who tossed the bag to Levy who kept it. Taussig to boy to Levy.

Scanlon yelled to Ruth to come through with a homer. Ruth knocked a single and Scanlon yelled "Atta-boy, Babe! All-er way 'round! All-er way round, Babe!" Mrs. Whitebait asked Mr. Whitebait which were the Clevelands. Mr. Whitebait said very quietly that the Clevelands weren't playing to-day, just New York and Philadelphia and that only two teams could play the game at the same time, that perhaps next year they would have it so that Cleveland and Philadelphia could both play New York at once but the rules would have to be changed first. Mrs. Whitebait said that he didn't have to be so nasty about is. Mr. W. said My G.o.d, who's being nasty? Mrs. W. said that the only reason she came up with him anyway to see the Giants play was because then she knew that he wasn't off with a lot of bootleggers. Mr. W. said that it wasn't the Giants but the Yankees that she was watching and where did she get that bootlegger stuff. Mrs. W. said never mind where she got it. NO RUNS.

EIGHTH INNING: Thibbets sharpened his pencil. Litner got up and went home. Scanlon yelled to Ruth to end up the game with a homer. Ruth singled. Scanlon yelled "Atta-Babe!" and went home.

NINTH INNING: Stevens began figuring up the players' batting averages for the season thus far. Wicker called over to Thurston and asked him how Mr. Hasty was now. Thurston said "That's all right how he is." Mrs.

Whitebait said that she intended to go to her sister's for dinner and that Mr. Whitebait could do as he liked. Mr. Whitebait told her to bet that he would do just that. Thibbets broke his pencil.

Score: New York 11. Philadelphia 1.

XIV

MID-WINTER SPORTS

These are melancholy days for the newspaper sporting-writers. The complaints are all in from old grads of Miami who feel that there weren't enough Miami men on the All-American football team, and it is too early to begin writing about the baseball training camps. Once in a while some lady swimmer goes around a tank three hundred times, or the holder of the Cla.s.s B squash championship "meets all-comers in court tilt," but aside from that, the sporting world is buried with the nuts for the winter.

Since sporting-writers must live, why not introduce a few items of general interest into their columns, accounts of the numerous contests of speed and endurance which take place during the winter months in the homes of our citizenry? For instance:

The nightly races between Mr. and Mrs. Theodore M. Twamly, to see who can get into bed first, leaving the opening of the windows and putting out of the light for the loser, was won last night for the first time this winter by Mr. Twamly. Strategy entered largely into the victory, Mr. Twamly getting into bed with most of his clothes on.

An interesting exhibition of endurance was given by Martin W. Lasbert at his home last evening when he covered the distance between the cold-water tap in his bath-room to the bedside of his young daughter, Mertice, eighteen times in three hours, this being the number of her demands for water to drink. When interviewed after the eighteenth lap, Mr. Lasbert said: "I wouldn't do it another time, not if the child were parching." Shortly after that he made his nineteenth trip.

As was exclusively predicted in these columns yesterday and in accordance with all the dope, Chester H. Flerlie suffered his sixtieth consecutive defeat last evening at the hands of the American Radiator Company, the builders of his furnace. With all respect for Mr. Flerlie's pluck in attempting, night after night, to dislodge clinkers caught in the grate, it must be admitted, even by his host of friends, that he might much better be engaged in some gainful occupation. The grate tackled by the doughty challenger last night was one of the fine-tooth comb variety (the "Non-Sifto" No. 114863), in which the clinker is caught by a patent clutch and held securely until the wrecking-crew arrives. At the end of the bout Mr. Flerlie was led away to his dressing room, suffering from lacerated hands and internal injuries. "I'm through," was his only comment.

This morning's winners in the Lymedale commuters' contest for seats on the shady side of the car on the 8:28 were L.Y. Irman, Sydney M.

Gissith, John F. Nothman and Louis Leque. All the other seats were won by commuters from Loose Valley, the next station above Lymedale. In trying to scramble up the car-steps in advance of lady pa.s.sengers, Merton Steef had his right shin badly skinned and hit his jaw on the bottom step. Time was _not_ called while his injuries were being looked after.

[Ill.u.s.tration: He was further aided by the breaks of the game.]

Before an enthusiastic and notable gathering, young Lester J. Dimmik, age three, put to rout his younger brother, Carl Withney Dimmik, Jr., age two, in their matutinal contest to see which can dispose of his Wheatena first. In the early stages of the match, it began to look as if the bantamweight would win in a walk, owing to his trick of throwing spoonfuls of the breakfast food over his shoulder and under the tray of his high-chair. The referees soon put a stop to this, however, and specified that the Wheatena must be placed _in_ the mouth. This cramped Dimmick Junior's form and it soon became impossible for him to locate his mouth at all. At this point, young Lester took the lead, which he maintained until he crossed the line an easy winner. As a reward he was relieved of the necessity of eating another dish of Wheatena.

Stephen L. Agnew was the lucky guest in the home of Orrin F. McNeal this week-end, beating out Lee Stable for first chance at the bath-tub on Sunday morning. Both contestants came out of their bed rooms at the same time, but Agnew's room being nearer the bath-room, he made the distance down the hall in two seconds quicker time than his somewhat heavier opponent, and was further aided by the breaks of the game when Stable dropped his sponge half-way down the straightaway. Agnew's time in the bath-room was 1 hr. and 25 minutes.

XV

READING THE FUNNIES ALOUD

One of the minor enjoyable features of having children is the necessity of reading aloud to them the colored comic sections in the Sunday papers.

And no matter how good your intentions may have been at first to keep the things out of the house (the comic sections, not the children) sooner or later there comes a Sunday when you find that your little boy has, in some underground fashion, learned of the raucous existence of _Simon Simp_ or the _Breakback Babies_, and is demanding the current installment with a fervor which will not be denied.

Sunday morning in our house has now become a time for low subterfuge on the part of Doris and me in our attempts to be somewhere else when Junior appears dragging the "funnies" (a loathsome term in itself) to be read to him. I make believe that the furnace looks as if it might fall apart at any minute if it is not watched closely, and Doris calls from upstairs that she may be some time over the weekly accounts.

But sooner or later Junior ferrets one of us out and presents himself beaming. "_Now_ will you read me the 'funnies'?" is the dread sentence which opens the siege. It then becomes a rather ill-natured contest between Doris and me to see which can pick the more bearable pages to read, leaving the interminable ones, containing great balloons pregnant with words, for the other.

I usually find that Doris has read the Briggs page to Junior before I get downstairs, the Briggs page (and possibly the drawings of Voight's _Lester De Pester_) being the only department that an adult mind can dwell on and keep its self-respect. "Now _I_ will read you Briggs," says Doris with the air of an indulgent parent, but settling down with great relish to the task, "and Daddy will read you the others."

Having been stuck for over a year with "the others" I have now reached a stage where I utilize a sort of second sight in the reading whereby the words are seen and p.r.o.nounced without ever registering on my brain at all. And, as I sit with Junior impa.s.sive on my lap (just why children should so frantically seek to have the "funnies" read to them is a mystery, for they never by any chance seem to derive the slightest emotional pleasure from the recital but sit in stony silence as if they rather disapproved of the whole thing after all) I have evolved a system which enables me to carry on a little constructive thinking while reading aloud, thereby keeping the time from being entirely wasted.

Heaven knows we get little enough opportunity to sit down and think things out in this busy work-a-day world, so that this little period of mental freedom is in the nature of a G.o.dsend. Thus:

_What Is Being Read Aloud_

"Here he says 'Gee but this is tough luck a new automobile an' no place to go' and the dog is saying 'It ain't so tough at that'.

Then here in the next picture the old man says: Percy ain't in my cla.s.s as a chauffeur, he ain't as fearless as me' and this one is saying 'h.e.l.lo there, that looks like the old tin Lizzie that I gave to the General last year I guess I'll take a peek and see what's up' 'Well what are you doing hanging around here, what do you think this is a hotel?' 'Say where do you get that stuff you ain't no justice of the peace you know' 'Wow! Let me out let me out, I say' 'I'll show you biff biff wham zowie!' etc. etc."

_Concurrent Thinking_