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Heaven: I feel I ought to like this but I DON'T

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  • finelinefineline Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    Piglet wrote: »
    Mozart. I don't dislike all of his music; some of his symphonies are grand (especially No. 40), but I don't revere him as the be-all and end-all of musical genius.

    That was Bach.

    I love both Mozart and Bach. Not in a revering way, and I don’t know enough about music to recognise genius, but just in terms of finding the music lovely to listen to.

    I don’t like Beethoven though. No idea why - I just don’t like listening to his stuff.

  • balaam wrote: »
    American Football, I am looking at you. A game that spends more time with the game interrupted than it does being played does not deserve to be called football. Indeed it hardly qualifies as a sport.
    Bless your heart.
  • Baseball.

    If men want to play rounders, thats fine, but don't kid yourselves its a male game and don't play it almost exclusively in one country and then describe your domestic championship as the "World Series".

    FYI Rounders (which is what baseball is) is a game for younger girls.
  • Piglet wrote: »
    Mozart. I don't dislike all of his music; some of his symphonies are grand (especially No. 40), but I don't revere him as the be-all and end-all of musical genius.
    This is me. There are bits of Mozart I really enjoy—Die Zauberflöte in particular—but much of music leaves me pretty cold. Too many notes, perhaps.

  • Baseball.
    Was quite possibly invented in the Old Country: http://edition.cnn.com/2010/SPORT/06/01/lords.museum.baseball.cricket/index.html

  • I'm not that keen on Beethoven either. Although I got recordings of a period orchestra playing the music as it would have sounded in Beethoven's day. Don't dislike it so much now - not so bashy and loud.

    Don't like Wagner generally.
  • Baseball.

    If men want to play rounders, thats fine, but don't kid yourselves its a male game and don't play it almost exclusively in one country and then describe your domestic championship as the "World Series".

    FYI Rounders (which is what baseball is) is a game for younger girls.
    Sexist bullshit.
  • FirenzeFirenze Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    Rounders (which is what baseball is) is a game for younger girls.

    I think you just triggered my PTSD. I am in a playground and people are shouting at me to run somewhere - but where? Why?

    I seem never to have been there when they explained the rules. I never even understood Simon Says.
  • Ah, that Bach ...

    ;)

    Baseball? Heck, what's the World Series about when it's only the US which plays it.

    American Football?

    It's about as close to a proper sport as Budweiser is to being beer ...

    Before anyone thinks there's a Pond War brewing, I'm very partial to jazz, US writers and some US craft beers (although they really ought to learn how to do cask conditioning).
  • Just as a point of information, the name "World Series" actually refers to the original sponsor, the very long defunct New York World newspaper, and was never intended originally to indicate that the series encompassed the whole world.
  • finelinefineline Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    Firenze wrote: »
    Rounders (which is what baseball is) is a game for younger girls.

    I think you just triggered my PTSD. I am in a playground and people are shouting at me to run somewhere - but where? Why?

    Ha, this was my experience of rounders too! I could never hit the ball either, and as a fielder I had no idea what I was supposed to do with the ball, or what the point was, so I didn’t bother running for it. I did once calmly point out to my fellow fielders, who were running around like headless chickens unable to find the ball, that the ball was right there by where I was standing - though rather than thanking me for being so helpful, they erupted into fury that I hadn’t picked it up and thrown it myself! :lol:


  • My Bible class used to play variants of baseball and cricket called Podex (pronounced "puddocks") and Crocker.
  • RossweisseRossweisse Hell Host, 8th Day Host, Glory
    edited August 2018
    Dafyd wrote: »
    Is there anything in Tolkien that is more likely to come from Wagner than from the Poetic Edda or from the other medieval texts that Wagner used as his sources?

    The source of that intelligence (which I cannot lay my hands on at present) noted that Wagner was very big among undergraduates when he was in school, and that Tolkien was a major fan. Wagner did make significant changes to some of the source material.

    And I'm not accusing him of plagiarism - any more than I'd accuse Wagner of it - but of a certain amount of inspiration. There's no harm in that.

  • NicoleMR wrote: »
    Just as a point of information, the name "World Series" actually refers to the original sponsor, the very long defunct New York World newspaper, and was never intended originally to indicate that the series encompassed the whole world.
    Also, just for the record for the people who like to make absolute statements when they clearly lack the information required to know that exceptions exist, there is one Canadian team in MLB.
  • Before anyone thinks there's a Pond War brewing, I'm very partial to jazz, US writers and some US craft beers (although they really ought to learn how to do cask conditioning).
    What a coincidence! Some of MY best friends are black too!
  • finelinefineline Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    And like the people who say they’re not racist but hate everyone equally, I can honestly say I dislike all sport equally, regardless of its country. Hate would be too strong a word - even dislike is too strong a word, now I think of it. I simply find nothing interesting in sport.
  • mousethief wrote: »
    Before anyone thinks there's a Pond War brewing, I'm very partial to jazz, US writers and some US craft beers (although they really ought to learn how to do cask conditioning).
    What a coincidence! Some of MY best friends are black too!

    Ha ha ha ...

    Look, I'm not damning with faint praise. I do like jazz and I do like US writers and I do like some US craft beer ...

    Also, now I'm reliably informed that the name 'World Series' isn't hubris but derived from the original sponsor and that the participation of another North American team makes baseball or American Football or whichever of the two it was, a truly international phenomenon, I won't joff about it again.

    Happy now?
  • balaambalaam Shipmate
    I did not mean to start a pond war. I really like all the football codes except one, it happens to be the American code, nothing against Americans there.

    So I'll try another thing I don't get -- Salad served with hot food.
    Now I love good crisp lettuce. But wilted lettuce, blurgh.

    Most people seem to be OK with having a side salad on their warm plates in contact with their hot food. If you are happy with watching your lettuce wilt as you eat your food fine, but wouldn't nice crisp lettuce be better. Please British Pub food industry, can we have side-salad on a separate unwarmed plate or dish.

    It is the same with lettuce in burgers as usually sold in the UK. It is in with the hot food and comes ready wilted. Most burger-eaters do not seem to mind, but I don't get it. It is easy, serve it separately or cut the bun into 3 so there is an insulating layer between the cold and hot fillings. I'll go for the latter, as I have had a burger like that in Boston USA.

    UK please catch up.
  • Well we've caught up with burgers, what more do you want? That we serve them properly?
  • balaam wrote: »
    I did not mean to start a pond war. I really like all the football codes except one, it happens to be the American code, nothing against Americans there.
    You were just another brick in the wall. Or the lack of a brick which allowed the flood of the usual America-slagging to pour through. We're getting so fucking sick of it.
  • Regarding baseball (which my brother once described as two minutes of excitement crammed into two hours):

    First, what @NicoleMR and @mousethief said. And @Gamma Gamaliel, baseball is played in a number of countries other than the US and Canada. I refer you to the World Baseball Softball Confederation.

    Second, I can somewhat understand when those who’ve only seen baseball on TV find it less than interesting. But a baseball game in person, particularly a minor league game, with friends (and food and beer) is one of the best ways possible to spend a spring or summer evening.

    Soccer, on the other hand, I find to be interminably dull.



  • mousethief wrote: »
    balaam wrote: »
    I did not mean to start a pond war. I really like all the football codes except one, it happens to be the American code, nothing against Americans there.
    You were just another brick in the wall. Or the lack of a brick which allowed the flood of the usual America-slagging to pour through. We're getting so fucking sick of it.

    I guess that's just the price one pays for living in the home of the brave and the land of the free and where if it sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold ...

    I'm not sure what the answer to that is.

    I can't speak for The Organist but most of the brickbats I lob across the Atlantic are meant in jest and intended in a post-modern ironic sense and not to be taken seriously, but 'I feel your pain' ...
  • Besides, how is slagging off baseball, Budweiser and that ridiculous form of football where they wear more padding than the Michelin man an insult to the entire United States?

    It wouldn't bother me if someone from Phoenix Arizona criticised cricket.

    They might get a reaction if they tried to tell me we serve our ale at the wrong temperature, though.

    I'm sure there are non-negotiables on both sides of The Atlantic. We may have inadvertently trodden on one of yours.
  • Nick Tamen wrote: »
    Regarding baseball (which my brother once described as two minutes of excitement crammed into two hours):

    Well, Cricket is five minutes of excitement crammed into several days. You have to be a connoisseur of the slow build of tension to get it. Well, that or like your cream teas.

    I do not particularly dislike it and rather enjoy the radio 4 commentary but I have never felt the need to watch. I wonder at UK people grumbling about baseball when we have cricket.
  • It's called irony. You might have heard of it.
  • Jengie Jon wrote: »
    Cricket is five minutes of excitement crammed into several days.
    Not T20 though - over in a single evening.

  • Is outrage.
  • MooMoo Kerygmania Host
    NicoleMR wrote: »
    Just as a point of information, the name "World Series" actually refers to the original sponsor, the very long defunct New York World newspaper, and was never intended originally to indicate that the series encompassed the whole world.

    They also published a World Almanac. I think the paper is dead, but the World Almanac still gets published every year.

  • It wouldn't bother me if someone from Phoenix Arizona criticised cricket.
    Consider it done. :wink:

    I really find it impossible to believe that anyone actually understands the rules (if there are any). I'm convinced you make it up as you go along just to confuse those of us who are trying to figure it out.

    However, I am not defending American football of baseball.


  • Pigwidgeon wrote: »
    I really find it impossible to believe that anyone actually understands the rules (if there are any). I'm convinced you make it up as you go along just to confuse those of us who are trying to figure it out.
    No, that's "Mornington Crescent": https://plus.maths.org/content/how-win-mornington-crescent

  • EnochEnoch Shipmate
    Nick Tamen wrote: »
    ... Second, I can somewhat understand when those who’ve only seen baseball on TV find it less than interesting. But a baseball game in person, particularly a minor league game, with friends (and food and beer) is one of the best ways possible to spend a spring or summer evening. ...
    If you can eat and drink beer with friends outdoors, why spoil it by adding the baseball?
  • There’s no spoilage. A baseball game, again particularly a minor league one, isn’t just a game. It’s an event, and a very fun one.

    Disclosure: My first date with Ms. Tamen was a minor league baseball game. We still enjoy going.
  • Do they serve decent beer at minor league baseball matches? They seem to drink Duff at baseball games on The Simpsons, which probably tastes as bad as it sounds.

    (We all know that The Simpsons is a fly-on-the-wall documentary)

    On cricket, no I'm not a fan and the rules are arcane. It's played all over the world though, The West Indies, India, Pakistan ...

    Heck, there's even a religion based on it in Papua New Guinea.

    The missionaries hadn't banked on that as an outcome ...

    There's also a Pacific tribe which worships the Duke of Edinburgh. Fancy that.

    I'm also told there's a tribe that worships the number zero.

    Is nothing sacred?

    I'll get me coat ...
  • Do they serve decent beer at minor league baseball matches? They seem to drink Duff at baseball games on The Simpsons, which probably tastes as bad as it sounds.
    They’re baseball games, not baseball matches.

    You’re probably asking the wrong person about the beer. The ballpark near here has various local craft beers, as well as some of the standard national brands.

    But in keeping with the theme of the OP, I can’t stand the taste of most craft beers. Add to that IPAs and some of the other varieties of beer that the beer lovers wax on about. Blech. I usually can pretty much always find a beer I like, but it will rarely be a craft beer from a local brewery.

  • ClimacusClimacus Shipmate
    edited August 2018
    Well we've caught up with burgers, what more do you want? That we serve them properly?

    We don't apparently.
  • I'm not sure what the answer to that is.
    For asshats to stop making snide swipes at the United States. But you fucking knew that.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Nick Tamen wrote: »
    Do they serve decent beer at minor league baseball matches? They seem to drink Duff at baseball games on The Simpsons, which probably tastes as bad as it sounds.
    They’re baseball games, not baseball matches.

    You’re probably asking the wrong person about the beer. The ballpark near here has various local craft beers, as well as some of the standard national brands.

    But in keeping with the theme of the OP, I can’t stand the taste of most craft beers. Add to that IPAs and some of the other varieties of beer that the beer lovers wax on about. Blech. I usually can pretty much always find a beer I like, but it will rarely be a craft beer from a local brewery.

    We have a similar problem here; craft brewers falling over themselves to put more and more hops in until it tastes like grapefruit pith. Fortunately plenty of real ale breweries are still producing balanced brews you can stomach more than a pint of.
  • The US is there to be side-swiped at, it's part of its job.

    But yes, it is wearing when it happens gratuitously as on this thread.

    On the craft beer thing, I observed that I liked 'some' US craft beers. The US micro-breweries have been very innovative and sparked developments that have influenced brewing all around the world. The UK micro-brewery scene certainly received a shot in the arm from developments across the Pond. All of that was and remains positive.

    The problem was, that in reaction to the tasteless fizz that passes for beer across most US national brands, the experimental microbrewers began upping the hop content of their brews - particularly their IPAs - to the point where they take the skin of the roof of your mouth.

    Instead of a fine hop / malt balance they ended up with hop-bomb paint stripper.

    This aspect has had a deleterious effect on both sides of the Atlantic, but I hope the pendulum is beginning to swing back the other way. There are some hybrid styles here which merge the more astringent US hops with traditional UK brewing techniques.

    Of course, I'd suggest that one of the main problems is that US beers tend not to be cask-conditioned. They don't undergo secondary fermentation in the barrel or bottle as real ales do over here (a 'real ale' is a cask-conditioned one as opposed to one that is filtered, pasteurised, 'kegged' and dispensed with awful electric pumps or the infusion of gas.).

    That said, whilst I'm very much a real ale bloke, I am quite partial to some lagers - particularly proper ones from the European mainland. I think that Brooklyn Lager and Samuel Adams are very palatable examples from the US.

    Anchor Steam Beer is also worth a sip and there's some other Anchor beers I've sampled which were interesting. Sierra Nevada is also interesting. I wouldn't entertain anything from Coors and Miller, although I suspect they own some of the smaller US brands.

    I've had US craft beers whose names I've forgotten, including a very pleasant ruddy brew in New York.

    Sadly, though, too many of them have hopped themselves to death.

    Hopefully things will settle down. I wouldn't want to see the US beer revolution end in an IPA reign of terror. There are so-called IPA's all over the world now, so much so that the name of the style has become meaningless.

    Fortunately, some of the traditional British IPAs style exist. They are far more balanced and subtle than the over-hopped upstarts which bear their name.
  • Just to ensure I'm not misunderstood as a Little Englander, the reference to traditional British IPAs above, doesn't imply that I don't believe that anyone else, anywhere in the world, shouldn't attempt to brew one.

    That said, one of the concerns as Brexit looms is that evil, wicked US corporations will start flooding the market with cheap, ersatz 'cheddar' cheese and the like ...

    But that's another story and a different debate. It's not as if our own food industry is squeaky clean. I'm not looking forward to chlorine-washed chicken though ...

    The question I have, is whether that constitutes a side-swipe at the US or a legitimate concern. I'd say it was a legitimate concern.

    Taking the piss - erroneously - out of baseball because of the 'World Series' or American Football because it looks so bloody stupid - less so.

    Heck, I'd almost forgotten American Football until it was mentioned on this thread ...
  • finelinefineline Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    I had to google IPA, as I know it as International Phonetic Alphabet, which didn’t seem to apply here!

    I’m not a fan of ale or beer or lager. Which is probably not very British of me, along with my dislike of football, and tea with milk in it.
  • jedijudyjedijudy Heaven Host
    Lightsaber lit/
    Mousethief! Gamma Gamaliel! Get a room.
    Let's keep Commandment 5 in mind, y'all. My Southern graciousness is worn a bit thin today. No Pond Wars.
    jedijudy
    Heaven Host
    /lightsaber down
  • Climacus wrote: »
    Well we've caught up with burgers, what more do you want? That we serve them properly?

    We don't apparently.
    Reading that article, I’d say that chef doesn’t know how to do burgers properly. What does he mean, only “American cheese” belongs on a burger? A burger with bleu cheese or, better yet, pimento cheese is a thing of beauty. American cheese, on the other hand . . . .

    And fried eggs on burgers can be found all over the place here. Nothing wrong with them.

    As for beers, @Gamma Gamaliel and @KarlLB, yes, it’s the hoppiness that tastes terrible to me.



  • I can understand that, Nick. I know I'm biased, and I don't mean this as an insult or criticism, but it seems to me that some US craft brewers - followed by imitators across the world - reacted against the bland fizziness of some of the big, leading US brands by over-hopped to the nth degree.

    It was experimentation going over board.

    There was a reason that the original English IPAs (India Pale Ale, for Timeline's benefit) were heavily hopped, and that was so they would keep on the long voyage to India where it was served to the troops during the days of the Raj.

    There's no reason to hop anything as heavily as some of these new craft brewers do. An English IPA is quite hoppy but with a nice malt balance - indeed, that's what's to look for in a classic British bitter ale anyway, a good hop/malt balance.

    The experimentation over the last 20 years, say, led by US microbrewers, has, overall, been a good thing I think. However, the hoppy thing has been overdone and there's beginning to be a reaction against it.

    I'm quite fond of some IPAs and the newer, lighter 'Golds' and summery ales you get over here these days - and many have been influenced by US styles. Which is fine. All for that.

    But things have gone a bit too far. I'm also very partial to Belgian beers, I've recently discovered blond ales like La Chouffe and Bruges Zot and they're terrific. I do like a good Trappist ale in the winter months too, as well as English stouts and 'old ales'.

    On the Pond War thing. I've saved a white flag and started a new thread about what we like most about the US.
  • Simon ToadSimon Toad Shipmate
    edited August 2018
    NicoleMR wrote: »
    Just as a point of information, the name "World Series" actually refers to the original sponsor, the very long defunct New York World newspaper, and was never intended originally to indicate that the series encompassed the whole world.

    Wow. I never knew that. Can it be true? It must be. I believe Nicole MR.

    Gamma, my brother has a beer app on his phone that he consults before ordering and then enters a rating and notes as he drinks the beer. Madness. Just give me a Vic, or a Guinness, or maybe a Stella if I'm feeling sentimental.
  • I wouldn't go that far. Beer apps have their place. Besides, if all you know are Vic', Guinness and Stella then there's a whole bigger world out there to explore.

    Even in Australia ...

    ;)

    But yes, the beer bore world gets the rest of us beer bores a bad name.

    (I can't imagine anyone getting nostalgic for Stella. It might be something to drink on a very hot day somewhere but that's about the only thing to be said in its favour.)

    If you drank it in the UK then I can only say that you missed out. It'd be a last resort for me.
  • No, Fosters. That'd be a last resort. You'd have to pinion me down first.
  • Beer................................yuck!!!
    Give me a decent cider or better still a bottle of "Auchinstochen" or "Highland Park"

    What is it with men and beer.....................?
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    I'm not really a beer drinker either - I prefer wine or (in certain circumstances) GIN - but a nice cold lager-type beer can be very refreshing after singing or on a hot day.

    Pace Gamma, but I rather like Stella Tortoise (as a friend used to call it). Sorry about that. :blush:
  • WildHaggis wrote: »
    Beer................................yuck!!!
    Give me a decent cider or better still a bottle of "Auchinstochen" or "Highland Park"

    What is it with men and beer.....................?

    I don't know, but I have never acquired the taste.

    A decent, cask cider is far better if you want a large drink. Wine or spirits if you don't.
  • WildHaggis wrote: »
    Beer................................yuck!!!
    Give me a decent cider or better still a bottle of "Auchinstochen" or "Highland Park"

    What is it with men and beer.....................?

    I love beer. I found out I have a "nose" for it when I worked in a pub.

    All the stuff people say about wine, I can never get. But beer? So many things go on in beer! It lights up regions in my brain that nothing else can touch.

    I'm in love with Ontario craft beer, but I'm also with the poster who complains that a lot of craft beers are aggressively overhopped. Muskoka Brewery I'm looking at you. All Citra all the time. Give us a break from that one-note samba would you? I know you can do better.

    I must have been an alewife in a previous incarnation.

    AFF

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