Iwritecode

QUOTE (KagakuOtoko @ Jul 18, 2017 -> 01:11 PM) To let Ocare fail? I was talking about dropping the idea of a repeal.

This is probably the best decision he's made since being voted in. Do we clap?

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Jul 5, 2017 -> 03:00 PM) Sustained success does result in many more bandwagoners jumping aboard. And honestly, those fans were a key part of our attendance figures from 2006 to 2008. Unfortunately, we couldn't string together enough playoff appearances to keep those bandwagoners for a lengthier period of time. That actually sums up this whole thing pretty well.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jul 5, 2017 -> 02:53 PM) Why would it be any different if they started having more success? The possibility of choking or fading will always be there. It'd be nice to try it once. Just to see what happens...

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jul 5, 2017 -> 02:44 PM) The thing about 2005, the White Sox were never not in first place. First place from day one until the end of the season and 11-1 in the playoffs. About as dominating as can be. Yet in September, they didn't even draw 50k today for a 3 day series vs. KC. That was the weekdays following Labor Day weekend when all the kids went back to school. The attendance for those games was probably mostly made up of the season ticket holders. Which we all assumed was pretty low. That makes the 2.3 million total for the season look that much more impressive IMO. FWIW, they followed up with 80K plus in the weekend series following those games and never had less than 25K in any of the home games after that.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jul 5, 2017 -> 02:19 PM) Even in the 60's the White Sox were trying to move. Do you think of the the 1960's White Sox when you think about successful teams? I mean sure they made their first WS appearance in 40 years and then followed it up a few 2 place finishes but nothing to really brag about... It was similair to 2005. One oddly lucky year in the middle of a lot of bad ones.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jul 5, 2017 -> 02:02 PM) There has been at least 3 times in the last 50 years that the White Sox have been almost moved because they could see greener pastures. Two of those were long before the evil JR empire took over this team. The White Sox haven't been truly big market successful, even when they have had success. That's because they've had so little success. The truly successful teams have had more playoff appearances in the last 10 or 15 years than we've had in the last 100.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jul 5, 2017 -> 01:32 PM) I remember when Sox fans used to say that a playoff appearance was enough. Then it became a World title would be enough. Now they have to win every single year. Knowing this fan base, they would turn into the Atlanta Braves who didn't even sell out playoff games. We just need to stop comparing ourselves to the Cubs who are the biggest attendance anomaly in baseball and compare ourselves to what "normal" teams do when they don't play well. Just look at the teams in our own division. The Royals had attendance around 1.3 to 1.5 million every year for years. Then they went to the WS and *only* drew 1.9 million. Then 2.7 million the next year when they won. Last year they missed the playoffs and their attendance went down. I'm sure it will go down even more if they miss the playoffs again this year. The Indians, even with a WS appearance last year haven't cracked 2 million since 2008. The Twins attendance has been steadily declining since they moved into their new stadium. They've been to the playoffs once since then. We need to quit acting like the White Sox attendance isn't completely normal for what this team is and has been for several years.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jul 5, 2017 -> 10:36 AM) One thing would be to look at all time top attendance figures. You can blame JR all you want but there are only 5 teams that have an all time top attendance mark lower than the White Sox. That to me indicates they are not in reality a large market team. Even when everything goes right, the people don't come out like they do under similar circumstances in other cities. Actually, there are 6. The A's, Nationals, Royals, Reds, Rays and Pirates. What's interesting in looking through all of them individually, is that most of them set their all-time attendance records in a year where one of the following happened. 1) They had 2 or more consecutive playoff appearances in the years prior. Or in the case of the 2011 Giants, they were in the middle of an every other year WS championship streak. 2) It was their first year of existence. The 1993 Marlins and Rockies. The 1998 Rays, The 2005 Nationals. 3) It was their first (or last) year at a stadium. 2008 Mets, 2010 Twins, 2004 Padres. The only real anomalies are the 2007 Dodgers, the 1997 Orioles, the 2008 Tigers and the 2011 Brewers. I'm not sure what was special about the years they hit their attendance highs.Even the teams that have lower records than the Sox fit into one of these categories. 1993 Rockies 4,483,350 first year of existence 2008 Yankees 4,298,655 It's the Yankees. The one year out of an 18-year span they didn't make the playoffs. 1993 Blue Jays 4,057,947 2nd of back to back WS wins. Skydome had a capacity of over 53,000 2008 Mets 4,042,045 Last season at Shea Stadium 1993 Braves 3,884,720 3 consecutive playoff appearances (including 2 WS) in 91, 92 and 93. 2007 Dodgers 3,857,036 Consistently around 3 million pretty much every year. Not sure what's special about this specific year. 2010 Phillies 3,777,322 Consecutive playoff appearances from 2007 - 2011. Won WS in 2008. 1997 Orioles 3,711,132 team drew over 3 million every year between 1992 and 2001 (minus strike year). 97 was second playoff appearance in a row 1998 Dbacks 3,610,290 first year of existence 2007 Cards 3,552,180 6 playoff appearances in 7 years prior. WS win in 2006. 2002 Mariners 3,542,938 Went to ALCS in 2000 and 2001. Won 116 games in 2001. Attendance steadily declined in following years. 1999 Indians 3,468,456 midst of sellout record, won division 4 years prior 2012 Rangers 3,460,280 went to WS in 2010 and 2011. 2006 Angels 3,406,790 Consecutive playoff appearance 2 years prior and 3 years after. 2011 Giants 3,387,303 Middle of an every other year WS championship. Won it in 2010, 2012 and 2014. 2008 Cubs 3,300,200 First back to back playoff appearance since 1908. Steadily declined until next playoff appearance in 2015. 2010 Twins 3,223,640 first year of new stadium (has gone down every year since) 2008 Tigers 3,202,645 no idea? WS 2 years prior. Payroll jumped about 45 million 2004 Astros 3,087,872 Pretty good jump from 2003. Went to NLCS. 2005 attendance was actually lower. 2011 Brewers 3,071,373 No idea? Pretty good jump from 2010. Went to NLCS in 2011. 1993 Marlins 3,064,847 first year of existence 2009 Red Sox 3,062,699 Build up from previous years. Didn't go down much 2 years after either. Haven't cracked 3 million mark since 2012 2004 Padres 3,016,752 first year of new stadium Never above 3 million since. 2006 White Sox 2,957,414 year after WS win 1990 A's 2,900,217 3rd consecutive WS appearance. 2005 Nationals 2,731,993 First year of current iteration 2015 Royals 2,708,549 2nd consecutive WS appearance. 1976 Reds 2,629,708 2nd of back to back WS wins 1998 Rays 2,506,293 First year of existence 2015 Pirates 2,498,596 Third consecutive year of playoff appearances The problem is that 2005 pretty much came out of nowhere. The fans came out about as well as you can expect for a team that was predicted to finish 3rd or 4th in the division and hadn't shown a lot of promise in the years past. Then in 2006 we came out in droves ready to support the team as much as we could. But they fell short and then 2007 happened and we all figured it was back to the same ole, same old once again. Sure we got teased a little in 2008 but I don't think anyone really believed that team would do much. And we've gotten nothing since then. I'm positive the Sox would support a consistant winner/contender. We just haven't been given the chance yet.

I was off Monday and yesterday. This year we also get the Friday before Labor Day weekend off as well. It's nice to get a couple of 4-day weekends.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jun 30, 2017 -> 10:08 AM) I freely admit that if not for nearly all of our friends and family being in the Chicago area, my wife and I would have fled to somewhere on the west coast already. Gonna be interesting to see what increasing temperatures do to all of the migration currently heading to the sunbelt over the next few decades though. A couple of years ago when I was job searching we were seriously considering moving out of state. Friends and family is mostly what has kept us here. That and not wanting to uproot our kids from their schools. But with our youngest turning 16 our reasons for staying are becoming less and less. I could see the possibility of us leaving the state within 10 years. Although the idea of starting completely over in a new city/state is a bit scary. At least here we know where to turn if we need help with something and we've built a good relationship with a lot of businesses over the years. Banks, repair shops, construction companies, etc...

Just imagine if we had the possibility of picking someone else for president. Like if there was some way we could ask everyone who they want to be the president and whatever name was picked the most would get the job...

Tyler Saladino = Tony Graffanino

QUOTE (Iwritecode @ Feb 19, 2017 -> 10:14 PM) The girls literally swept the post-season. Highest score of all the teams in the regionals, highest score of all the teams in the sectionals and then yesterday they won state. linky Our girls won the National Championship on Saturday. Boys came in 2nd. link

We got some golf ball sized hail about a month ago and my car got pretty beat up. Had the insurance adjuster look at it and his estimate was that there was around $5800 worth of damage. We were worried that they would total it but he said we were only at 50-something% of the value of the car. I thought that was pretty good so I took his word for it. We literally just paid this car off in March so we were REALLY hoping they wouldn't total it. Fast forward to last week when we finally get it into the repair shop. They look it over and say the estimate is about $2000 too low. Talk to the insurance company and they decide to total it. They tell me the total value of the car is about $5800. So I'm trying to figure out how the value of the car is almost the exact same amount as the repairs they were originally willing to make. The claims specialist I'm talking to doesn't really have a good explanation. So I take trip to the repair shop and they let me know that the original estimate had the wrong mileage on it. They guy wrote down 51,000 instead of 151,000. Yea, that extra "1" knocks the value of the car waay down. We found this out on Friday afternoon. They tell us we have until Wednesday before they'll stop paying for the storage fees at the repair shop. So we went out that night and found a 2012 Ford Fusion with about 56,000 miles on it. Luckily that's the make/model we had researched when we bought our other car 5 years ago. Took a loan out on it for now but figure we'll pay it off pretty early between the money we get from the insurance company and simply paying more than the minimum amount each month. We decided to buy our other car back even with the hail damage. Youngest daughter is taking a driver's ed course now. Figure it'll be a good car for her to learn in. Just need to get the windshield replaced.

I'd also have a huge collection of shoes. I'm not really a sneakerhead but if I had the money I would certainly become one. I can walk into a shoe store and easily pick out 3 or 4 pairs that I like. As it is right now I usually only buy a new pair every 3 or 4 years. But I rotate them so I can keep wearing them for 10+ years without a problem. I make sure I get my money's worth out of them. I've still got a pair of boots that I bought in 1996. They were brown at one time but now they are mostly black and the soles are almost completely worn out. But they are still good for wearing while mowing the lawn or working on the car. Not including my dress/work shoes, I've probably got 15 pairs of shoes in my closet right now. They range from a cheap pair that I bought at Wal-Mart just to bum around in and get dirty to 3 or 4 pairs of Jordan's that I paid $130+. There are quite a few pairs of shoes that I used to own that I really miss. I could re-buy them now but I'd probably pay $300 or more for them.

I'd sell my house, buy a truck to pull my 5th wheel trailer and become a full-time RVer traveling around the country. After spending a few years visiting all the states, I'd probably buy a couple of houses. One near here for the summer and one somewhere down south for the winter. Then I might look into investing into real estate/house flipping. Or maybe buying a campground. Although the number of family-owned campgrounds are getting fewer and fewer every year. They are all getting bought out by larger companies.

I've actually talked to someone on another message board that says he believes that Sandy Hook, 9/11 and Columbine were all staged/government setups.

QUOTE (Leonard Zelig @ Jun 9, 2017 -> 02:10 PM) Is The Dark Tower going to be a series or are they going to cram 7 books into one movie? The plan is to make multiple movies, but nobody really knows how many at this point. I think they are waiting to see how this first one does. At one time there was also talk of making a TV series that ties-in as well. Basing it on the 4th book where Roland was younger might make sense there. They are apparently putting some parts of the later books into the movie though. The low men, The Dixie Pig, Algul Siento etc... Those things all existed when the first book took place, we just hadn't been introduced to them yet.

Maybe Private Russian Hackers Meddled in Election, Putin Says

QUOTE (greg775 @ Jun 1, 2017 -> 01:32 PM) I still don't buy the stats. This actually explains a lot.

QUOTE (soxfan2014 @ Jun 1, 2017 -> 09:17 AM) At first I thought "who would be the male equivalent of doing this be?" I first thought Adam Sandler but then realized, he was at least relevant before while Kathy Griffin isn't even a has been. More like a "never was." Probably someone like Dustin Diamond or Carrottop.

QUOTE (greg775 @ May 31, 2017 -> 04:27 PM) we are in real danger from ISIS bastards running around the USA ready to chop our own heads off!!!! No... we really aren't.

I saw it uncensored on Yahoo and Facebook yesterday. Apparently it was on Twitter as well.