So much for the importance of males protecting and defending the dignity, health, and sacredness of women. Synchronicity can be so much fun--unless you are the target of the foul ball--or embarrassed by your own actions.
Worst date ever: Boyfriend bails as foul ball hits girlfriend
By 'Duk - Yahoo.com - 8/11/2010
Many women would do anything for a boyfriend who likes to dance.
But as one woman unfortunately learned on Monday, a man who decides to do the Texas two-step and electric slide away from your side as a foul ball screams toward you into the stands is far from a dream date.
In one of the funnier foul ball mishaps I've seen, a woman named Sarah was struck with a foul ball at the Houston Astros game after her male companion named Bo ducked out of the way.
Watch the play on MLB.com
As most of the blogosphere is noting this morning, chivalry is officially dead.
After all, if a man can't abide by the simplest rule of a baseball date — don't let your company get hit by a foul ball — what hope can women hold for things like flagging down the beer vendor or having their scorecard kept when they head to the ladies room?
On the bright side, Sarah's only injury was a bruise and Bo's strict interpretation of the term "dodgeball" earned the couple a lighthearted moment in the spotlight. Sarah later told the Astros television reporter that she, unlike her boyfriend, saw it coming:
"As soon as we got here and I saw where we were sitting, I said 'Baby, I'm going to get hit," Sarah said. "He said, 'No, you won't. I'll catch it if you do.' We just had this conversation and sure enough, the ball comes at me. He just bailed."
So what was Bo's excuse for his comedic act of temporary cowardice? Well, he claimed to have lost Chris Johnson's(notes) drive in the lights at Minute Maid Park.
Of course he lost it in the lights. Here's hoping that the couple stopped at a sporting goods store for some eyeblack. You know, just after their postgame trip to the florist.
*********************************************
What's really funny about this is that 'Bo' was given a heads up straight from his girl friend's mouth. Which proves that having female intuition is not necessarily useful even if it's acknowledged.
Maybe there's just something about foul balls and the male gender. I vividly remember attending a game at Fenway Park in Boston which was televised nationally. A foul ball was hit behind the third base dug out where I happened to be sitting and I went for the ball. I was steamrolled, flattened, pretty much crushed by a guy who was at least 150 pounds heavier than me. He was wearing, more like bursting the seams, of a Boston College football jersey. I got neither the ball nor an apology.
Later that night my husband called and said he'd seen me on TV, at least the part of me not being smashed by a football jersey. We both laughed about it then, but at the time it happened, I was not particularly jolly. I firmly resolved the next time I went to a game at Fenway I would take a bat instead of a glove---to defend myself.
For more serious fare, the NCR has a number of really good articles. I'm sure this one, from Sr Joan Chittister is sure to draw a lot of comments given the number of comments this one about Sr Theresa Kane has already drawn. Speaking of foul balls, one wonders how badly flattened the LCWR will be when the Vatican men in red dresses are finished. Perhaps they will do more or less what I did as 'a woman of spirit in our own times'. After getting flattened, I picked myself up, straightened my shirt, and flipped the guy off. That particular gesture did not make America's TV screens as the cameras went back to the field of play. Since the LCWR is the field of play, I sincerely hope their gesture is equally as spirited but perhaps in a more gender appropriate way.
All I can say is: The Holy Spirit is at work!
ReplyDeleteOne day only... and the proof comes that women have better frontal lobes than men and men are surely not focused on protecting women!
Good one Colleen!
ReplyDeleteReminds me of the Canadian University Football championship back in the '70's when I sat one bleacher in front of my friend's sister, Miss T. She was a big strong German girl with a blackbelt in judo. The guys behind her were a bit "over refreshed" and obnoxious. They spilled a little beer on her and she warned them what would happen the next time if they interfered with her enjoyment of the game. It wasn't long before buddy one and buddy two came flying over my head, landing among our friends. They had been launched by Miss T. (No damage done to anyone because the place was packed and she knew that we knew they might be arriving via Air Mail. She had been my Judo instructor.)
Bo should be ashamed of himself. Sarah needs a new boyfriend. No it doesn't have anything to do sexism.
When the Blue Jays were just fledglings they played at an old football stadium down by the lakeshore. It was a terrible place to watch a ballgame. We were on first base side not far from the only "luxury box" in the place. The afternoon lunchbox crowd didn't mind razzing the suits on the patio because in those days they were the only ones who had the privilege of beer service. The team was owned by the Labbatt's beer company and it was their patio. Two of the suits were hunched over their documents when a foul ball went straight up and backwards over the screen. They never saw it coming. It bounced up off the table and nailed Poindexter square in the face. He was out cold, nose bleeding profusely. I'd like to think the crowd would be more charitable but they weren't. They cheered wildly and booed when the first aid attendants carted him away.
And we tend to think of Philly fans as heartless.
p2p
Here's a short ad that will amuse you and restore your faith in the universality of the human experience. Then again maybe you have to be a guy to appreciate it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3H9wDdRk0vs
p2p
What? word verification: ovenist !!!