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It's A Very SJ.com Christmas VI...starring IJAG!!!

Discussion in 'Anything goes' started by BYH, Dec 24, 2008.

  1. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    Or as the nearly, dearly departed would have said...

    He was a throwback to a different era. An era in which men served hard drinks for men who wanted to get drunk fast, and didn't need any characters around to give the joint "atmosphere." For even though the characters in his tale evoked a rich tapestry that carefully quilted together the history of this message board, each fastidiously placed word was a towering monument; an inspiring testament to a sparse, yet wonderfully crafted creation that was nothing short of an exercise in literary simplicity. Nary a word was wasted; rather, each letter evoked simple, yet provocative and vivid imagery that built to a frenzy, until we found ourselves tearing at out computer screens in the midst of a collective message-board orgasm. We celebrated. It was the celebration of a liberated people. A people who had discovered brilliance. For it was brilliant stuff. The stuff that legendary threads are made of. The stuff that stuff is made of.

    Oh yeah... Vocabulary For Dummies, motherfucker?
     
  2. Flash

    Flash Guest

    You know, IJAG ... if you hadn't been a sports writer and there hadn't been an SportsJournalists.com, dozens of Merkans might never have had the privilege of seeing a picture of my cleavage.

    Three or four individuals out of those dozens might thank you now.
     
  3. dooley_womack1

    dooley_womack1 Well-Known Member

     
  4. Trey Beamon

    Trey Beamon Active Member

    Fan-fucking-tastic.
     
  5. 2muchcoffeeman

    2muchcoffeeman Well-Known Member

    Fixed. Everybody knows that's a two-word phrase. Clearly inarguable among the sane. ;D
     
  6. 21

    21 Well-Known Member

    I know I saved the one about me, I'll go dig it up. Who was the first?
     
  7. 21

    21 Well-Known Member

    Found last year's about Boom:

    ------------------------------------------------------------------

    That's right folks. You may have been waiting for it. Chances are you weren't. But it's here anyway...my annual SportsJournalists.com-ian take on "It's A Wonderful Life." This year's star is none other than BOOM_70! He follows in the footsteps of hockeybeat, dooley_womack1, spnited and 21. That'd be quite a poker game.

    I tried to fit as many personalities in here as I could. If you're not in here, my humble apologies. It's almost certainly not personal. Anyway, it's late and it's technically Christmas Eve so no further ado. Merry Christmas everyone!!!

    A Very SportsJournalists.com Christmas V

    It’d been a busy morning for the multi-millionaire businessman: He’d bought the eastern seaboard, sold it for twice as much as he’d paid for it and then bought it back for 10 cents on the dollar when the futures market fell apart.

    But it left Boom Seven Tee feeling vaguely empty. Buy, sell, buy. Sure, he made enough money to afford whatever price increase the Yankees foisted upon him for his prime seats. He had enough money to buy his enemies 10 times over. He could fly around the world with the love of his live, 21, at a moment’s notice. Without his financial support, the Swift Vets never told their story in 2004 and that namby pamby John Kerry would be president.

    But years of frantic buying and selling and the inherent pressures of business at the highest levels had sucked all the joy out of it for Boom. So much accountability, no room for error. One screw-up could cost him millions.

    And the drudgery of it all: Buy, sell, buy. Buy, sell, grease the palms of business-friendly lobbyists on Congress, buy. Buy, sell, crank call Roger Clemens, buy. Buy, sell, masturbate, buy. All the same, everyday.

    Even going to sportsjournalists.com and getting a rise out of his favorite foils didn’t provide the same rush it once did. There were only so many times you could misspell a poster’s name, or post the pictures Moddy told him not to post, or intentionally misspell words to antagonize the board’s best spellers, or start threads that would drive the liberals crazy, before it began to lose all meaning.

    Boom sighed, got up from his desk and walked across the room to his bookcase, which smelled of rich mahogany. Maybe a few minutes with a great sports book would inspire him. He scanned the shelves and selected “Summer of ’98” by Mike Lupica. He began to read the poetic prose about a magical season:

    You would watch his Cardinals across this summer because of McGwire, who was supposed to break the home-run record. He had hit 58 the year before; no right-handed hitter in baseball history had ever hit more. Now he was supposed to get Maris, even though McGwire was thirty-four at the start of the season, and only Willie Mays and Johnny Mize, the Big Cat who had played for the Cardinals and Giants and Yankees, had ever hit more than 50 home runs in a season at such an advanced baseball age.

    Boom slammed the book shut in disgust. All Lupica could do now was rail against the steroid era. But he didn’t mind milking it for all it was worth in 1998. No accountability. A fraud.

    Maybe another book would soothe Boom’s fire. He selected “Inside Baseball: The Best of Tom Verducci” and opened it.

    Between outings Clemens religiously adheres to McNamee's tightly choreographed program of distance running, agility drills, weight training, 600 daily abdominal crunches and assorted other tortures. "One time he wanted me to ride a stationary bike, and I told him I never thought it gave you much of a workout," Clemens says. "He told me, 'Give me 17 minutes.' After 17 minutes I thought my legs would explode."

    Clemens takes great pride in having stopped his baseball biological clock. He will tell you that he still runs three miles in 19 to 20 1/2 minutes, that he still weighs 232 pounds, that he still wears slacks with a 36-inch waist (though they must be tailored to allow for his massive thighs) and that he can still reach for a mid-90s fastball at will -- the same specs he had at least 10 years ago. "He's a freak of nature, the kind of pitcher who comes along once in a generation, maybe every 25 to 30 years," says Devil Rays pitching coach Bill Fischer…

    Boom’s stomach churned. This lack of accountability made him sick. Didn’t Verducci write Sports Illustrated’s first steroid expose in 2002? He flipped to the table of contents.

    Totally Juiced;
    With the use of steroids and other performance enhancers rampant, according to a former MVP and other sources, baseball players and their reliance on drugs have grown to alarming proportions

    By Tom Verducci
    June 3, 2002

    Tears of anger welled in Boom’s eyes. He turned and fired the book across the room. These fucking writers—concerned only with ingratiating themselves with their subjects and giving a surface-deep study of the important issues and contradicting themselves at every turn. These sonsofbitches have no idea what it’s like to work in an industry where one mistake could cost you everything.

    I’m so sick of this shit, Boom thought. I can’t take it anymore.

    “I wish I’d become a sportswriter!” he yelled.

    Suddenly, the wind howled outside and his window flew open. His paperwork flew around the room.

    That’s odd, Boom thought. I didn’t have a window before.

    Boom bent down to pick up the paperwork. He stood up and was shocked to see an elderly man standing at his desk.

    “Hello Boom,” the man said.

    “Spitted?” Boom said.

    “No.”

    “Who the hell are you? How the hell did you get in here? This place is accessible only by handprint.”

    “I don’t need a handprint. I’m a ghost.”

    “A ghost? Do you want me to cue up The Righteous Brothers?”

    “No Boom. Not that type of ghost. I am the ghost of message boards past. And I am here to show you what your life would be like if you’d become a sportswriter.”

    (Yeah there wasn’t as much banter between the ghost and the subject as usual. The intro ran far longer than usual. Deal.)

    With that, Boom found himself standing in a dirty old newsroom. A police scanner bleated weakly in the corner. Fuzzy images flickered on a rabbit-eared television. The combination of old newspapers and moldy Chinese food gave the room a noxious smell.

    “Where the hell am I?” Boom said.

    “You’re at your job at a small JRC-owned daily. Look, there you are: The one-man staff.”

    The ghost pointed to a harried-looking young man working on a Commodore computer. He was typing furiously on a keyboard missing several keys. He occasionally looked up at a monitor that oozed nuclear waste and had Hilary ’08 stickers surrounding it.

    “Goodness,” Boom said.

    “That’s not the worst of it,” the ghost said. “You’re making $4.25 an hour and living at a hostel.”

    “So what?” Boom said. “At least I’m not a fraud.”

    “No, but you get called one all the time.”

    “What do you mean?”

    With that the two found themselves in an apartment where a man sat in a recliner, watching VH-1 Classic and alternately pounding at a keyboard and yelling. “Fuck you Butts_51! You fucking fraud! Yeah! I showed you! Number one again motherfucker!”

    “Who the hell is that loser?” Boom asked.

    “That’s your former friend, BYH.”

    “Why are we fighting?”

    “Because he thinks you’re a fraud for taking Greg Buttle’s name and uniform number as a screen name. He’s very protective of Butts.”

    “That’s it?”

    “Well, that and the two of you are neck-and-neck for most posts at sportsjounalists.com and being no. 1 there is all he’s got.”

    “What a loser.”

    “Well, it’s understandable. He doesn’t have a very good home life.”

    With that, a woman’s voice yelled out at BYH. “Did you sell a book yet, BYH?”

    “No MOM!!!” BYH said.

    “Have you been working on it?”

    “Mom, I’m BUSY!!”

    “I know you are honey, I know you’re covering VH-1 Classic and Beverly Hills 90210 for your little message board,” his mom said as she walked into the room, a giant cross dangling from her neck. “I know it’s tough to find the time with so much to do. Not everyone can be a writer, or move out of the house before he turns 35.”

    “Mom, it’s hard to find a place to live on a writer’s salary!”

    “No I’m sure you try hard to find a full-time job. Maybe you can do it before I die of heartache. I will pray for you. I’ll pray to the patron saint of message boards.”

    “MOM!!!”

    “I know honey. It’s just tough if all you can provide someone is effort and not productivity or talent. Oh well honey. Don’t worry: I wasn’t crying because of you today. Not completely, at least. Maybe a little bit. Do you want Spaghetti-O’s for dinner or are you going to be busy not writing your great little book?”

    BYH slammed his computer down and ran into his room. “Man that is lame,” Boom said. “What a beast he’s got for a mother.”

    “You should be nicer to your beloved 21.”

    Boom gasped. “21? But she’s Jewish! And a great writer! And she never ever wanted kids! What’s she doing giving birth to no-talent hacks?”

    “Without you in her life, 21 converted to Catholicism and gave up her dreams of writing the great American novel. Now she’s just another passive-aggressive Catholic mom, working out her aggression through a son who will never meet her standards. And she’s in a loveless marriage, but she makes decent money.”

    “What’s she do?”

    “Produces bras for Jewish women with lopsided breasts.”

    “Geez, that’s terrible,” Boom said. “My darling 21, how I’ve let you down so…”

    “You haven’t seen anything yet.”

    With that, the ghost and Boom found themselves on a street corner in a bustling city. Everyone was dressed well and hurrying to and fro except a naked man who reeked of booze, cigarettes and failure as he kept showing a tattered piece of paper to passersby.

    “LOOK AT MY POLL!” he yelled. “LOOK AT IT!!!”

    “Who the hell is that?” Boom asked.

    “That’s Slappy4428. He used to organize a poll at an anti-BCS message board. But before the last week of the season, he was busy and pre-wrote his lede about Missouri and West Virginia meeting in the national championship game. But both teams lost and he was blackballed off the board and shamed into homelessness. Now all he does is compile his own poll and yell about it on street corners.”

    “That poor crazy bastard,” Boom said. “Is that ironic?”

    “I’m not sure,” the ghost said. “Is this?”

    The two appeared in a basement. A few feet in front of them sat a 20-something guy in sweat pants and a wife-beater. Posters of Kim Kardashian and the girls from “The O.C.” covered every inch of the wall.

    “Who’s that?” Boom asked.

    “That’s Double Down.”

    “Double Down? But he was such a respected guy at SJ and such a great writer. He looks like a blogger here.”

    “That’s exactly what he is. He runs a blog called ‘The Big Bleed.’ All he does is post potentially libelous rumors as fact, then backtrack and shrug it off as no big deal. Check this out.”

    Double Down pecked at the keyboard. “A source tells us Tom Brady is gay and is having Matt Leinart’s baby.” He hit post. Then he scratched his belly button, sniffed his finger and licked it before hitting modify. “This just in: The source might be wrong. Tom might not be gay and he might not be having Leinart’s baby. Supposedly men can’t have babies. Whatever. I don’t know. Sometimes we get these things wrong. Big deal. Kim Kardashian has huge tits and I want to fuck her.”

    Boom shook his head. “this is making my stomach hurt,” he said.

    “Too bad because we’re just getting started. Why, Double Down isn’t the only SJer blogging now that you’re in the field.”

    Boom and the ghost found themselves watching a man laying on a couch with one hand in a bag of chips and the other on a computer. The E! network blared in the background.

    “Who’s that?” Boom asked.

    “That’s Fenian_Bastard,” the ghost said.

    “That’s impossible! Fenian was the most politically active member of SJ! Now all he does is eat potato chips and watch trashy TV?”

    “Well, without you to spar with he decided he just didn’t give a fuck anymore. So he started a blog. He calls it whogivesafuck.org. He’s trying to inspire people to not care.”

    Tears again appeared in Boom’s eyes. “This is terrible,” Boom said. “I’ve been so selfish. I don’t want to be a sportswriter anymore. I can’t take it.”

    “Shut up and deal,” the ghost said. “It could be worse: You could be imjustagirl.”

    The two found themselves in a house adorned with posters of Brad Daugherty. “What’s wrong with this?” Boom asked.

    “Instead of becoming a Duke fan who stalked Brook Jacoby, IJAG became a North Carolina fan who stalks ex-Cavs star Brad Daugherty,” the ghost said. “But she’s vaguely unhappy with this, which means life is hell for the poor guy who calls her every night at dinner.”

    The phone rang. “Hello?” IJAG said.

    “Hello, would you like to take a poll?” the voice on the other end said.

    “FUCK YOU NO!!!” IJAG yelled.

    “Why not?”

    “Because I’m about to eat dinner and you fail at life!”

    “What are you eating for dinner? Please choose one of the following options: Meat loaf, chili, hamburgers, hot dogs, spaghetti, chicken, turkey, roast beef, sushi, kung pow chicken, ham, pot pie, waffles, toast, green eggs and ham…”

    “I FUCKING HATE YOU AND I’ll FUCKING KILL YOU IF YOU EVER FUCKING CALL HERE AGAIN!!!” IJAG slammed the phone down.

    “Who was that poor bastard?” Boom asked.

    “Your decision to become a sportswriter turned PhilaYank36 into a cold call salesman for Gallup. Had you just stuck with what made you a fortune, his damage would have been limited to the message board.”

    There was much more horror to be seen: Buckweaver running SABR4Kidz—Society for American Basketball Research—and posting as Chuck_Nevitt and defending Reggie Bush on message boards…The Good Doctor, typing on several laptops with different IP addresses and bragging about how he has a Hall of Fame vote in every sport and how his next door neighbor likes it when he fucks her in the ass…Zeke12, living alone in a basement—unwashed and naked except for a tattered “Building The Perfect Beast: Tour ‘85” T-shirt—as he runs “The Boys Of Summer” webring, which tries to chronicle every single time Don Henley’s classic has been played on American radio…Oz, a Yankees and Mets fan who also roots for the Browns and was kicked out of the Dawg Pound because he was too rude and too fat…Sam Mills 51, posting as Kevin Greene 91 and belligerently attacking people on message boards…Shotglass, running and serving as the only poster at an anti-design message board called helmetssuckalway.com…Spnited, the oldest Bon Jovi fan in the nation…Shockey, posting on message boards as Mitchell…Casty33, divorced from the woman who plays Lauren Fenmore on “The Young And The Restless”…JR, a militant Republican trying to turn Canada into a United States territory…HC, the lead singer of a death metal band…Mike311gd, trying to land financing for the porno movie he wrote that ends with his money shot on a face—Tobanga…Cadet, running Joe Morgan’s official website: Abettersecondbasemanthanrynesandberg.com…Sportschick, a shock therapist specializing in weaning people off message board addiction…old_tony, boxing in 50 states in 50 days with the words “Vote Hilary ‘08” temporarily tattooed on his chest and back…Flying Headbutt, authoring a book on the 1985 World Series…The Big Ragu, a meat-eating chemist who ran MALCO—Manhattan Area Laboratory Co-Operative—and starfucks steroid users while posting as meatora on SportsJournalists.com…Hoops McCann, a Rush fan imprisoned for trying to blow up the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame…Rosie, an Arizona Cardinals fan…Webby, the author of “Duckpin Bowling: Why It Will Kill Ten-Pin By 2010”…Moderator1, who gets banned from numerous sites for posting pics of Tim Tebow’s girlfriend…Mizzougrad96, living the high life as Jerry Crasnick’s literary agent…BigDog, a professional hockey player who has won the Lady Byng Award…Tom Petty, posting jibberish under the screen name Bob Dylan…Simon_Cowbell, a noted economist who has published several academic papers on why baseball does not need a salary cap…Starman, the ghostwriter of Larry Brown’s autobiography: “Playing The Game The Right Way”…Armchair_QB, standing outside Busch Stadium with a sign reading “GET A BRAIN MORANS”…Ace, delivering the Plain-Dealer…Bubbler, living in a fallout shelter and convinced the Russians are going to attack any day now…Jones, writing magazine stories that tout Hilary Clinton as the comeback candidate for president…jgmacg, an overweight sportswriter outing people on message boards…dooley_womack1, admiring his shrine to Don Denkinger…Idaho, the only Mormon living in New York City…Hank_Scorpio, posting as Hello_Newman…Junkie, serving as the real singer for Lou Gramm on his solo tour and winning an award at SportsJournalists.com for most consecutive posts without self-nuking…and of course Huggy, starring in a one-man off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off Broadway in Willimantic, CT called “Love Touch And Beyond.”

    “So you see,” the ghost said, “how life for everyone else—including yourself—would have taken a turn for the worse had you become a sportswriter instead of simply posting on a message board for sportswriters.”

    “I get it now,” Boom said. “Thanks for this reminder. I feel invigorated for my job—and my duties on the message board.”

    “There will always be people who are unaccountable for their words and their actions,” the ghost said. “And there will always be errors in the paper that drive you nuts. Why, did you realize the Daily News has a piece today calling Dan Naulty a member of the 1998 world champion Yankees without noting he wasn’t on any of the postseason rosters?”

    “Motherfucker. I am all over that.”

    -30-
     
  8. hockeybeat

    hockeybeat Guest

    I was.

    I hope someone has that one saved. I lost in The Great Board Crash.
     
  9. 21

    21 Well-Known Member

    Christmas 2006, by BYH:
    ------------------------------------------------------------------------


    This year, my very favorite person on the board, 21, overcomes my inherent sexism and becomes the first woman to star in "A Very SportsJournalists.com Christmas," following in the footsteps of hockeybeat, dooley_womack1 and spnited!

    It was impossible to fit in all the wonderful characters here, so my humble apologies if you are not mentioned here. It's probably nothing personal, unless you're Hondo.

    So without further ado...A Very SportsJournalists.com Christmas IV!!!! MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE! Cheesy Grin


    It was a dark and stormy night when Mickey Mantle entered Marilyn Monroe for the first time. No, that's shit.

    It was a dark and stormy night and the trees swayed like Mickey Mantle and Marilyn Monroe on the dance floor. He's such a hard hitter, she thought to himself. I can't wait until he swings the wood inside me. Good God, I suck.

    It was a dark and stormy night and the rain pelted from the sky, making the ground as drenched as Marilyn Monroe's panties. Fuck!

    It was a dark and stormy night yet the trees remained hard and erect, like Mickey Mantle's penis as he prepared to Boots Marilyn Monroe.

    With that, 21 slammed her laptop shut. The inspiration, fleeting as it is, just wasn't there as she attempted to write Mickey Mantle's inventive memoir. Maybe a phone call to Boom would cheer her up.

    "Helo youv'e reached Boom_70 I can not come to the fone rite now please leve a massage."

    She sighed. Probably off making another few million.

    Perhaps a trip to her second home, sportsjournalists.com, would inspire her. No such luck. Buncha stupid posts by a buncha stupid kids about fantasy leagues that weren't as cool as the No Idiots Allowed league and weddings and engagements and people seeking advice on which soda to buy for a holiday gathering, name brand or generic. It felt a lot like the end scene in St. Elmo's Fire, where the gang stands outside the bar and sees a bunch of undergrads sitting at what used to be their favorite table.

    21 rolled her eyes. Maybe a trip to the Hilton bar would cure whatever ailed her.

    A Grey Goose in hand and her nerves already settling, 21 opened up the Mantle file. But instead of seeing the words on screen, she heard a sizzling sound…then nothing. Fuck! The hard drive was fried. Twenty thousand mediocre words, up in smoke.

    Oh, this was it. It was two days before Christmas, her mother was coming in for a visit tomorrow and a book that she hated from the start was now toast. 21 picked up the laptop and threw it across the room. "I hate this business!" she yelled. "I wish I'd never become a writer!"

    With that, she swallowed the contents of her Grey Goose. She raised her hand to get the bartender's attention. As she stewed, bouncing the five-inch heels that dangled off the stool, she noticed the man at the end of the bar staring at her. Oh goodness, she thought. Another leering perv.

    "Can I help you?" she said as the bartender filled her drink.

    "I think I can," the man said.

    "Let me guess," 21 said as she raised the glass. "You're going to tell me you've learned my dad is a thief because he stole the stars and put them in my eyes? Save it. I've heard them all before."

    "Not at all," the man said. "But I heard you bemoaning your craft, and I think it would be a shame to give up something you're so obviously talented at."

    "Don't end a sentence with a preposition."

    "See what I mean?"

    "Big deal," 21 said as she sipped from the glass. "So I can spot a poorly constructed sentence. Doesn't mean I haven't wasted my life."

    "But you haven't. Why, no one ever brought the Arena Football League to life quite like you did."

    21 almost dropped her glass. Terry Haute…she hadn't thought of him in weeks. "What…what…how would you know that? Who are you?"

    "I'm the ghost of message boards past, and I'm here to show you what the world would be like if you'd never become a writer."

    With that, 21 and the ghost found themselves in another bar—an establishment as seedy and sticky as the Hilton was elegant. Alone in a corner sat a man, alone with a glum look on his face and a drink in his hand.

    "Boom!" 21 said. "My darling. How is he?"

    "Not well," the ghost said. "He spends all his time here at Stan's, bemoaning not only his lack of a soul mate but also the difficulty he has spelling."

    "His spelling issues? Big deal. He's brilliant. He's so brilliant his mind can't catch up with his fingers."

    "Yes, well, you know that, and you were the one to remind him of that. But you never became a writer, so you were never in the Bronx that October day in 2002. So you never met Boom. And now, instead of confidently brushing off the criticism he got at sportsjournalists.com, he spends his days nursing the wounds he receives from users at his favorite message board."

    "What's that?"

    "canadiansoccer.ca."

    "Oh my. That's awful."

    "Yeah, you ain't seen the worst of it. Check this out."

    With that, 21 and the ghost were in a high-rise building in the middle of Manhattan. "My goodness, I've never seen a man with so much work done to his face," 21 said as she stared at the man pointing frantically at the other people in the office and yelling into a hands-free headset. "What's his deal?"

    "That's your SportsJournalists.com foe Spnited," the ghost said.

    "What happened to HIM?" she said. "He was the oldest man at SportsJournalists.com by decades."

    "He still would be," the ghost said. "But he never went into sportswriting. Instead, he became the top exec at MTV, where his motto is "Kill anyone over 25." Once his kids turned 25, he disowned them. He has injections every week and a facelift every month in order to look as young as possible."

    "OK so Spnited is a fraud. Big deal."

    "Oh you better be careful how you use that word. You might get sued. Hey look over there, it's your friend BYH."

    21 saw an impeccably dressed man dictating a statement to a secretary in a large yet sparsely decorated office. "That can't be BYH," she said. "All he does is post on SportsJournalists.com as he eats Oreos that he spills all over his John Stockton shorts."

    "Yes, but without you to lead him to SportsJournalists.com, he did something meaningful with his life—he became a lawyer. Instead of calling people frauds on SportsJournalists.com, he represents people who have been called frauds on message boards. He's the busiest libel lawyer in America."

    21 shook her head. "That's impossible. He'd never do that. BYH thinks everyone's a fraud. Almost_Famous, Herm Edwards, the Mets…"

    "Yup. Those are his top three clients."

    "So BYH became a libel lawyer. Good for him. He's making real money as opposed to doing this shit. You haven't convinced me I made a terrible decision."

    "Perhaps this will help."

    With that, 21 and the ghost were back in Chicago, this time in a conference room at the Tribune Company. They stood in the back and watched a speaker drone on as he ran a Power Point presentation on the importance of design in newspapers.

    "That's DyePack," the ghost said.

    21 had to steady herself on a desk. "That cannot be," she said. "He HATES design."

    "Yes, he did. But without a message board to vent on, he sold out to the man. Now he's the Chief Executive Officer In Charge Of Implementing New Design Practices for the Tribune Company. Mistakes in the paper are at an all-time high, but no one knows or cares because there's no DyePack to point them out."

    "That's awful," 21 said as she wiped her eyes.

    "It gets worse. You're also staring at the next general manager of the Cubs. Speaking of which…"

    21 and the ghost were now standing on a nicely manicured lawn in an obviously exclusive cul-de-sac. It was the only house in sight, and indeed, there was not a sound to be heard…until a small truck motored up the hill. It was a US Postal Service truck. Out of it stepped a man who could be heard muttering to himself about Neifi Perez, guns and the ultimate revenge.

    "Say hello to your fellow Cub fan Armchair_QB," the ghost said.

    "My goodness, he's a mailman?"

    "Not just any mailman. Dusty Baker's mailman. He's two months away from re-defining the term 'going postal.'"

    "Poor A_QB," 21 said. "Maybe you're right. Maybe I was speaking out of turn. Can't I just go back and return to my writing?"

    "Not yet. Not before you see the most horrifying thing you've ever seen in your life."
    With that, 21 and the ghost were standing outside a basement window. They peered inside and saw an obese naked man holding a Boy's Life in one hand and a computer mouse in the other. On the screen were the words "A Large Regular."

    "That's your friend Chris_L," the ghost said.

    "He's naked, 'reading' Boy's Life and posting on a blog," 21 said. "So tell me what's changed, exactly."

    "Plenty," the ghost said. "Look at that man behind him."

    The sounds of Barry White filled the air. A man in a Toronto Maple Leafs jersey came up to Chris_L. The two shared a passionate kiss.

    "That's Chris' one-time arch-nemesis, JR," the ghost said.

    21's stomach churned. "Oh God no!"

    "As you know, the two of them sparred, with increasing viciousness, for years at SportsJournalists.com," the ghost said. "But without a message board to divide them, they actually realized they were both log cabin Republicans. And they came together. In more ways than one."

    21 put her hand to her mouth. "I can't take anymore," she said. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said I wanted to quit writing. I can't take this anymore…I can't take it…"

    "But you haven't even seen Buck and his 'dorsal fin' join JR and Ace."

    There was more for 21 to see…such as BigRagu moderating a David Hasselhoff message board under the name Prego…Sportschick, who turned into an arch-conservative stay-at-home mom of 12 who was not only married to a yeehaw golf writer in Florida but also spent her spare hours burning all books containing the word "dammit"… Hockeybeat, selling lemonade to tourists in New York City during the Christmas season…Moderator1, enjoying his box seats at Baltimore Orioles games…Dooley_Womack1, making billions after inventing a tracking device that allows employers to know how much employees are posting on message boards… Oz, serving as the athletic director at Missouri…Mizzougrad96, serving as the athletic director at Kansas…Simon, an unpaid intern working for Mizzougrad…Jones, waiting by his phone for a call back from John McCain's spokesman… Poindexter, working the phones as the circulation manager of the Los Angeles Times…Starman, serving as O.J. Simpson's spokesperson…Columbo, a season ticket holder at Yankee Stadium…Imjustagirl, stalking a former member of the Cleveland Indians named……………Ken Schrom… Bubbler, living in an Amish village with no electricity and no contact with the world of popular culture…Cadet, a wrestling coach who is leading a nationwide moment to wipe Title IX off the books…Boots , a conservative lobbyist who is leading a nationwide movement to turn sodomy into a crime punishable by death…Fenian_Bastard, a right-wing radio host who rails against black quarterbacks in between scarfing down copious amounts of prescription painkillers… Cosmo, yelling racial slurs at the audience during comedy shows in Los Angeles…Acepublishing the Plain-Dealer…Freelance_Hack, coaching the Boston University football team even though the team folded nearly a decade ago… Junkie, leading the pep band at Ohio State…Dog428, posting on message boards as "Bobblehead" and "Yawn" and having gay affairs with day workers he picks up every, uhh, day…Idaho, who stalks Uma Thurman… Shotglass, still throwing cats at passerby…Huggy trying to capitalize on Rod Stewart's renaissance by putting out covers of Stewart's late '70s schlock…Flying Headbutt singing in a Cheap Trick cover band...and, of course, Slappy4428, mimicking his idol Mitch Albom by penning dimestore pap such as "Wednesdays With Waldo," "Fridays With Felice" and "Eight People You Meet In Purgatory."

    "So you see, 21," the ghost said as they sat back down at the Hilton bar, "the sportswriting world would have been irreparably harmed had you not gotten into it. There'd be no SportsJournalists.com. And all your friends would be worse off. Well, except BYH."

    "I'm sorry, I'll get right back on that Mantle novel," 21 said as she picked up her wounded laptop. "Why, that Chris_L/JR scene gave me an idea. What if Mickey and Joe DiMaggio were actually not warring over Marilyn Monroe but were in love with each other? Hmmm. I bet I could write a really hot love scene with the Mick and Joe D. in the bathroom of an Amtrak train…"

    "Who the fuck cares about that? Finish the fucking Terry Haute book."
     
  10. slappy4428

    slappy4428 Active Member

    A tradition like no other...
     
  11. dixiehack

    dixiehack Well-Known Member

    I wish IJAG had never become a sportswriter.
     
  12. Angola!

    Angola! Guest

    Apparently this is my first inclusion.

    Good stuff BYH.
     
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