great stuff: football and international politics

[Laurence Horn]

On Mar 17, 2012, at 9:22 AM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:

> No "ghost runners."
>
> "Invisible men."
>
> We played "punchball."
>
> JL

We had invisible men too.  Can't recall if there was any difference (semantic, regional, or otherwise) between ghosts and invisible men--I know, it's hard to tell when you can't see them.  We played punchball, stickball, and stoopball, but not always in an organized enough way to have ghosts/invisible men on base.

LH
>
> On Fri, Mar 16, 2012 at 10:27 PM, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC <
> Bill.Mullins at us.army.mil> wrote:
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       "Mullins, Bill AMRDEC" <Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL>
>> Subject:      Re: great stuff: football and international politics
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> =20
>>>>
>>>> We played kickball at Chevy Chase elementary in Toonerville
>>>> (Atwater district, Los Angeles) in the late 1940s -- rules similar
>>>> to softball, as modified by circumstances,
>>>
>>> In all the versions of kickball I remember playing (early-mid 1950s,
>>> NYC), you can retire a runner by hitting them with the ball (between
>>> bases).  Such throws are frowned upon in softball.
>>
>> =20
>>
>> When you played pickup games of kickball, soft/baseball, and other games =
>> with base runner, and you didn't have enough people, did you use "ghost =
>> runners"?
>>
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>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
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