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Pastimes : Laughter is the Best Medicine - Tell us a joke -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bob Bryenton who wrote (6677)	9/3/1998 11:52:00 AM
From: Rick Slemmer	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 62549

In 1953 the Brooklyn Dodgers had a relief pitcher named Milt Famey. Milt was approaching middle age, and as time went by his chances of playing grew less and less likely. By the end of his fourteenth year as a professional baseball player, Milt was spending the entire game in the bull pen, warming up for the chance that never seemed to come. Sympathetic fans started to bring beer into the bull pen for the aging player, and soon Milt was well stoked by the third inning, reduced to watching the game he loved. In the sixth inning of the 1954 playoffs against the Cubs, the Dodgers' regular pitcher was suddenly sidelined with a torn shoulder ligament. The score was tied at 2 runs each, and the Dodgers' coach, unaware of Milt's increasing relationship with the bottle, called for Milt to take the mound and finish the game. Bleary-eyed and quite drunk, Milt took his beer and staggered out to the mound, placed the bottle down beside him, and proceeded to pitch. Alcohol, lack of serious practice, and Milt's blurry vision combined to make his task virtually impossible. Pitch after pitch went high, wide, and into the dirt in front of the plate. As the pitches grew wilder and more unpredictable, batters were walked around the bases until the score was 24 to 2, favor of the Cubs. With night falling and no hope of regaining their turn at bat, the Dodgers had no choice but to forfeit the game. Milt, now sure that his future held nothing but memories, walked slowly back to the bull pen, head low and shoulders slumped, leaving the bottle on the mound. In the Cubs' dugout, jubilant sports reporters crowded around the players of this marathon game and began interviewing them. One reporter cornered the Cubs' third baseman, and, pointing to the lone bottle on the pitcher's mound, shouted above the noise of the celebration, "So what's that bottle on the mound?" The third baseman looked at the bottle, turned to the reporter and said, "That? That's the beer that made Milt Famey walk us." RS

To: Bob Bryenton who wrote (6677)	9/3/1998 11:53:00 AM
From: GROUND ZERO™	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 62549

This guy goes to his dentist to have a set of plates made. Within weeks, the plates corrode. He goes back to the dentist and shows him what happened. The dentist asks the guy what he was eating. The guy says he eats nothing out of the ordinary, but he does put hollandaise sauce on his food. The dentist says that the lemon juice in the sauce probably corroded the plates and he'll need to make another set, this time out of chrome. The guy asks why chrome is needed. The dentist replies, "Everyone knows that there's no plate like chrome for the hollandaise." Hey, you asked for it.

To: Bob Bryenton who wrote (6677)	9/3/1998 4:17:00 PM
From: david james	Respond to of 62549

Disney ends Mr. Toad's Wild Ride in Florida By Brad Liston ORLANDO, Fla., Sept 2 (Reuters) - Walt Disney World has been targeted by Southern Baptists, animal-rights activists and anti-homosexual groups, but the biggest protests by far have come from fans of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, which Disney officials said on Wednesday would soon join the ash heap of history. One of the Walt Disney Co's (DIS - news) worst-kept secrets has been its plan to scrap the 27-year-old Fantasyland ride in favor of one featuring Winnie the Pooh. Disney officials, who were not available for comment, issued a statement confirming Mr. Toad would be closed next Monday. ''The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh will debut at Fantasyland in summer, 1999, replacing Mr. Toad's Wild Ride,'' the statement said. ''It's just horrible,'' said Jef Moscot, a 26-year-old computer systems administrator from Miami who has led the fight to preserve the ride. ''Disney is ruining the park by closing a classic ride in favor of the next big thing.'' Many of the ride's fans, who have picketed the park weekly since the rumor of Mr. Toad's demise swept their ranks last April, consider the ride a treasured memory of childhood that they enjoyed revisiting as adults. ''My parents took me on the ride when I was four and I can still remember it,'' said Wayne Story, of Melbourne, Fla. ''Everything else in the Magic Kingdom was all happy, smiley, happy. Mr. Toad was a little more subversive. I still love it.'' Riders on the low-tech adventure follow the bowler-hatted amphibian from the Kenneth Grahame children's novel ''The Wind in the Willows'' on a stolen motorcoach as it crashes into a train. Next stop is Hell, inhabited by red devils and a pitchfork-bearing Satan. ''I guess Satan has become too politically charged to include on a children's ride,'' said Laurie Stacy, 31, who was among the hundreds of self-described ''Toadies'' who have revisited in recent days. On the new Winnie the Pooh ride, which will open next year, riders climb aboard honey pots and meander through a blustery day in the Hundred-Acre-Wood. This was not the first time Disney has closed a ride, but park officials acknowledged no other closing has provoked as much clamor. The ''Take Flight'' feature at Tomorrowland, which is closing to make room for a Buzz Lightyear ride, has not raised a ripple of protest. But the hundreds of picketers, the thousands of letters and e-mails that poured into Disney officials from chairman Michael Eisner on down, the web sites and the T-shirts saying ''Ask me why Mickey is killing Mr. Toad'' could not save the ride. Disney has been the target of numerous protests recently. Southern Baptists protested over family-values issues; animal rights activists targeted the company over its handling of animals at its new Animal Kingdom attraction, and anti-gay activists threatened to disrupt Gay Days at the park. But unlike other protests targeting Disney, which included threats from the radical anti-abortion group Operation Rescue to close the park last June, the communication between Toadies and Disney officials has been positive. ''Some of the employees see the T-shirt and say, ''Hey, you're a Toady. Me, too. We know a lot of people love Mr. Toad, but what are you going to do?'' said Tim Meyer of Winter Park, Florida. Winnie the Pooh, the creation of writer A.A. Milne, is the most heavily marketed character in the world, according to Disney officials. biz.yahoo.com