GAME 20 - It Ain't Over 'Til Its Over

POLL

This weeks poll was VERY interesting!

AFTER STARTING THE SEASON 4-12, THE GRISSLIES SET THE GOAL 6-4 OVER THEIR FINAL 10 GAMES.  IF THEY MEET THAT GOAL WHICH OF THE FOLLOWING SHOULD HAPPEN?

Ingofische shaves his head            6% (Disappointing)
Danny Chiasson hits to left          26% (Impossible)
Piero plays every position      66% (AWESOME)
Tim and Greg arm wrestle          26% (Could Happen)

INTRO

If, Then, Else.

Most of you read the above and thought, "what the hell?"

But for some of you, you either took computer programming courses, became a programmer or work somewhere in Information Technology (IT) and those three little words mean something to you. 

If, Then, Else is sort of the base tenet of computer programming.  It works on a series of true and false statements.  Most user applications work the same way.  For example, have you ever added a series of number in Microsoft Excel?  If you have, then you've noticed that the total is presented in a black text if its a positive number and red text if its a negative number much like my bank balance.  That's because the Excel code has a statement in it that reads something along the lines of:

        "IF" sum is greater than "0" "Then" Font = Black, "ELSE" Font=RED.

That is a serious over simplification, but its basically how programming works. 

Well.....basically.

And you thought this was just comedy?  Shame on you all. 

Perhaps a better question is, "why is he boring us with this stuff"?  Indeed, that WOULD be a good question!  And of course the answer would be....

Because Dave Argue is a computer programmer!!! 

So how does someone go from being the leader of the Young Conservative Party in Forget Saskatchewan to being a computer programmer in the center of the universe?  Its a strange path people follow to be sure.  However, Dave should have known straight away that he was destined to be a programmer because he found his way there using the If, Then, Else principle.

This is Dave Argue as the leader of the Young Conservatives:

 

Dave Argue:  His life laid in front in of him

before that god awful picture came out!

As we've said numerous times here at The BLOG, to know the man, you need to know the man's history.  Dave (The Contradiction) Argue is pretty much like everyone else.  He was kid, he had a family, he stubbed his toe along the way and eventually made something of himself that was greater than the sum of those toes.  However, we're not necessarily interested in the triumphs.  No.  We're typically more interested in those occasions where toes were stubs.  So Stub away Davy boy, Stub away! 

Dave had a happy go lucky approach

from a pretty early age!

Dave's Brother Quarr-El was a little misunderstood

but was a pretty good kid once you got past the piercing stare.

                                                         

And his sister Dee-Bate was the sweetie of the

Grade 4 pep rally team!

So, as you can see, everything was fairly normal in Forget Saskatchewan.  But as you also know, That fateful photo in the Forget Gazette changed things.  Dave went from normalcy to....hmmmm....finding himself?

Dave in his Early "Sean Penn" phase but he wasn't

really cut out for melancholy, THEN

If you have ever seen Sean Penn in the "Falcon and the Snowman" then you have a good sense of Dave's slightly neurotic, moderately paranoid, borderline irrational and almost phobic late teen phase.  It happens.  It happens a lot.  Dave left town.

 

Dave's next stop was at the University of Saskatchewan. 

Oh, he didn't enrol quite yet, but he did something else, he managed to join a fraternity.  The Frat was good and they entered Dave in a North America wide moustache growing contest.  I think its fair to say that Dave put the UofS on the map.  Big Time!!!

Dave's patented "body 'stache".  Go ahead,

try and grow one of these bad boys!!!

Despite the legendary status that he received among the university crowed, the contest just didn't give Dave the fulfilment that he was yearning for back then.  He knew that if he was to find that fulfilment, he'd have to do it elsewhere.  So he packed up again and hit the road.  This time he REALLY hit the road and went west.  When he ran out of road he took a boat and started heading south west.  Before you knew it, Dave hit land and almost immediately then landed himself a gig working as a body double for this man: 

Apparently Magnum had an overwhelming fear of

water and lose fitting shorts.

Body doubles were instructed to not "out shine" the

stars that they were shadowing.  Dave had to work hard

to dumb-down this glamour shot.

After years of hopping in and out of TC's chopper and outrunning the damned dogs, Dave finally said enough was enough!  After all, there was more to life than wealth, surf, beaches, perpetual tans and a world that smelled like Coppertone.  IF only!!! 

So he bailed. 

Dave went back to the Mainland and hooked up with an advertising firm.  He cleaned up his moustache and went to work on their biggest account, Tim Horton's.  Dave had been up all night for a week straight and had been working on a new killer marketing campaign for Timmies that was centered around what would happen if Conservative surfers were drinking coffee on the beach.  He had 'stills' of commercials ready.  He had mocks of billboards.  He had layouts for magazine and newspaper ads.  He was SOOOO ready! 

However, with all the hard work, Dave slept in.  At 8:45, on his way to the 8:00 am presentation he said "screw it" and pulled into a drive through and got a large double double and a small black.  He chugged the black and started sipping the double double as he drove the remaining 30 minutes to work.  He got to the office and it was complete chaos!  They could ill afford to lose this account and Executives were literally on the ledges ready to jump.  Dave's boss trailed him down the hallway chastising him the whole way!  "Who do you think you are?  What's your problem?  Do you know how important this is?  An hour and 15 minutes late, and yet you have time TO STOP FOR A COFFEE", he screamed!

Dave, now at the entrance way to the presentation room turned and looked directly at his boss and said in a very calm voice, "You've always got time for Tim Horton's" 

His boss was horrified and Dave was in shock when he walked into the room and all the Tim Horton's ad types were standing and clapping.  "That's exactly the kind of slogan we're looking for, nothing else has worked!  Keep up the great work!  We'll be back next week to look at the roughs for the ads." 

As disgusted as Dave was in the line, he wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.  However, news travels fast in the Marketing / Ad agency world and competing firms knew that they had to recruit Dave to their firms or kill his credibility.  Dave was none too eager to move; so the firm 'across the street' launched a multi-million dollar suit against him for modeling his moustache after their biggest client, Toyota.  They were able to connect a drop in profits to the day that Dave changed his style. 

The ad world being the ad world, Dave's firm dropped him immediately.     

Tough break.  There's never time for Toyota

in Dave's world!

Now it was REALLY time to slip into 'find one's self mode' and Dave headed north as so many before him had done.  Dave had heard stories of a "unit of solitude" somewhere in the Canadian far north.  He spent 3 years wandering, searching, but if it WAS there it eluded him.

 

                                      

A rare picture of Dave on his northern quest. 

Dave's answer would not be found in the North.  So Dave continued his search by heading East.  Not Shag Harbour East; but India East!  Dave had heard stories of transcendental mediation offered by Guru Arun Randiv Kumar Sangakkara.  (GARKS) 

After 4 years under GARKS tutelage Dave had

finally achieved 'inner peace'

The next step was for Dave to leave India and re-immerse himself in his own community.  To truly find inner peace he had to take the spiritual lessons that he had learned and apply them in his own culture. 

The lesson from GARKS was clear. 

                                      

A lesson worth learning.

So Dave came back to Canada.  He landed in Ontario and ended up in Tottenham.  Not knowing quite yet what he wanted to do for a 'full time career; he took a summer gig as the Engineer of the Tottenham steam train!

Engineer Dave!!!

FOOTNOTE:

I followed Dave, now long since a computer programmer, to work one day a couple of weeks ago.  Yes, I know it was wrong, but once he noticed that I was close enough to see him, he started weaving through traffic.

Around Avenue Road and St. Clair I got this picture:

                                       

COULD IT BE?!?!?!

SPEECH

It doesn't mater at this point if you have 20 wins or 20 losses.   The song remains the same as Rob likes to say.  You can heear this famous Lenny Kravitz tune by clicking the song title. 

It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over

Here we are fielding together

We are one

So much time practicing

Playing games with our gloves

So many beers I've drank

So many games in the tank

But Grisslies, It ain't over 'til it's over

So many games we've tried

To keep our season alive

But Grisslies it ain't over 'til it's over

How many times

Did we give up

But we always overcame our doubt

And we can hit now and our "D" is lights out

Kept me wondering, yeah

If we've always, always been above

So many beers we've drank
So many games in the tank

But Grisslies It ain't over 'til it's over

So many games we've tried

And kept our season alive

'Cause Grisslies it ain't over 'til it's over

So many beers we've drank

So many games in the tank
Grisslies It ain't over 'til it's over

So many games we've tried

And kept our season alive

'Cause Grisslies it ain't over 'til it's over

So many beers we've drank
So many games in the tank

Grisslies It ain't over 'til it's over
So many games we've tried

And kept our season alive

'Cause Grisslies it ain't over 'til it's over

Over, over, over.

So many beers we've spewed

So many games we threw

But Grisslies It ain't over 'til it's over

So many games we've tried

To kept our season alive

'Cause Grisslies it ain't over 'til it's over

Over, over, over

So many beers we've drank

To kill the way we stank

Grisslies it ain't over 'til it's over

THE GAME

I'm trying not to get TOO carried away, but we played good!  The final score was 12-5 and the tone was set early in this one. 

The Grisslies, as the home team, gave up a walk to start the game before getting the next three batters.  Then at the plate in the bottom of the 1st, there were 2 on and 2 out and one run in before a nice 4 run two out rally took place. 

The outfielders consistently hit the cutoff men.  The infielders didn't throw wildly to bases.  All the bases the Dodge City Rounders got, they earned.  Not having freebies makes a big difference!

Individually, Piero Del Greco continues to wield a solid bat.  The MVP drove in two runs in his first at bat, two more in his second and one more for a total of 5 in his third at bat. 

As much as I miss having the stats, it might be a blessing because we're doing the lineup by feel right now and it "FEELS" like we're onto something!  The Grisslies have won 3 of 4 for the second time this year and the first time since early June!  With six games left a 3 and 3 record will get us the 6 and 4 finish that we wanted.  Hopefully those three wins come sooner than later so that Piero can play every position in the Torn Ligaments season finale!

Good job team!!!