International I Hate Sports Club

Earl wrote:A word of explanation concerning my last post: I got the impression from Dsf08's last post that he was taking this personally, so I felt sorry for him. I wanted to make him feel better; but all I succeeded in doing was to produce a dopey, slightly rambling post. The comments I made were sincere, but somehow it all just came out weak. Oh, well. This forum scene is wierd for this middle-aged guy. (That's me, yours truly.) The exchanges often make me laugh, but sometimes the name-calling (on both sides) gets to be a little bit too much. (I'm not complaining. I'm just making an observation.) Given their rabid hatred of nerds, I'm concerned that Samdaman and Harold (not the same person?) might be bullying other kids at school. I'd be very surprised if they weren't, actually. Perhaps this post is not as dopey as the last one was. Carry on.

I liked your post. It was completely factual and honest and conciliatory. It had that conversational tone that encourages listening and invites a fair exchange of ideas. We should all strive for that ideal: communication.

On the other hand, your mature approach may be wasted on the likes of DSF. It's like giving a monkey at the zoo an expensive wrist watch. He won't know what to do with it.

Fat Man, I would be delighted to send you a set (typewritten, 12 font, single-spaced) of the final copy of the first 27 pages of the lengthy short story I mentioned that I've been writing (at a slow but deliberate pace). (By the way, I hope Ray and Skul won't mind my using this forum as a personal message board. I will get back to the forum's topic in my next post, unless I'm distracted again by something else.) Actually, I haven't written more than one short story; and I don't have any aspirations of becoming a professional writer of fiction. But I am quite pleased with what I've already written. It's my best writing. I've used a few sci-fi devices, but the plot is predominantly horror. There is a problem, though. When it comes to all this new computer technology, I'm an ignorant clod. I don't happen to know what "PM" is. And I wouldn't want you to give your e-mail address at this (or any other) website because you could then be subjected to a flood of hate e-mail or viruses. There is something I can do that might possibly take care of this problem, but I must not say in this post what it is.

A PM is a Private Message. It'll allow you to send a message to a particular member. If you look at the very bottom left of your post, you'll see some buttons. One of them is labelled PM. Once you click on that, you'll be taken to a page that looks like what you'd type a new post in. It works the same way. Difference is, just one member will see the contents once it's submitted.

Oh and when submitting a new post, click the submit button once. You're probably double-clicking and that's what's causing your double-posts.

Thanks, Skul, for telling me what a PM is, and how to avoid double-posts!

Well, Fat Man, here goes nothing. I'm going to try to set up a PM for you containing final copy of the first 27 pages of the short story I mentioned to you. Hope I won't mess up.

Earl wrote:Well, Fat Man, here goes nothing. I'm going to try to set up a PM for you containing final copy of the first 27 pages of the short story I mentioned to you. Hope I won't mess up.

Thank you very much!

I'm looking forward to reading it.

Two items.

Sorry, Imc850. I did appreciate your not responding like Samdaman, Harold, or SpeedofLeight (who are jerks, after all). I intended to respond to your post, but I got distracted by the exchanges between Fat Man and Dsf08. I think what accounts for the difference in our points of view about mandatory PE is generational. I'm middle-aged; whereas, you're a young guy. I'm happy to hear that PE is changing for the better, but to what extent I'm not sure. That remains to be seen. Let me say first that not all school districts are the same. [I just recently heard of the "PE4Life" program, which sounds great. But any resistance to PE reform will come from those coaches who are afflicted with machismo (properly defined), NOT from sports haters.] Some school districts today may still be continuing the same "Old PE" that I and all other nonathletic boys of my generation dreaded. From what you've said in your post, though, your school district apparently does not. I am impressed that your school's PE program gives their students a choice. Choice was COMPLETELY LACKING in the PE of my generation. I was forced to play ball games, even if I didn't know how to play them; and I didn't even get to choose which ball games I had to play. I had no options. Weight lifting, which would have been great for me, was never offered to nonathletic boys. Because of your own experience as a teenager, this may seem strange to you; but it was the norm at every elementary school, junior high, and high school at the time. PE was a humiliating experience for most, if not all, nonathletic boys (including myself) of my generation. All that we learned from PE was to fear coaches and athlete classmates. Two years ago a former junior-high classmate of mine who was overweight told me that his junior-high PE experience was so bad that when he was in his twenties, he had to see a clinical psychologist to overcome his bitterness because of the way he had been mistreated. And, by the way, being forced to take PE did NOT cause him to lose any weight. Dsf08, in case you are reading this: Addressing the people who run this website, you said "You guys just don't value fitness in any way, and that's a terrible thing." (Again, I'm being respectful.) The problem with the PE of the middle-aged generation (which includes most of the people who run this website) is that no value was placed upon encouraging nonathletic boys in a positive, supportive way. The attitude that the PE coaches of our youth seemed to have was that nonathletic boys didn't count.

Fat Man, please tell me if you did not receive the PM that I tried to set up for you. I could have made a mistake. I have never used forums at a website before. All I really know is how to submit a post. So you'll have to tell me if you got the PM. If you didn't, I can e-mail Ray for assistance.