Headlines from The Onion:

Flesh-Eating Bacteria Wishes It Hadn’t Filled Up On Foot

Cracks In Facade Visible As Teen Enters Third Day Vacationing With Friend’s Family

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Major league ballplayer Frank Saucier died last week at age 98. He has the strangest claim to fame. He was an outfielder with the St. Louis Browns in 1951. I was only one year old at the time but I remember it clearly. (No I don’t.)

Saucier won three batting titles in the minors, but his MLB career was derailed by an injury and service in the navy. He had only 18 plate appearances for the Browns, getting only one hit, a double, and batting .071. But the reason we are writing about him in Owl Chatter is what happened on August 19, 1951, during a double-header between the Browns and the Detroit Tigers. St. Louis was one of the worst teams in the league when Bill Veeck became their chief owner that July. To draw fans to the park, he announced special festivities would take place on Aug. 19 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the founding of the American League.

Between games, a parade of vintage 1901 cars took place, and Max Patkin, the baseball clown, put on a show. Last, Eddie Gaedel, who was 3 feet 7 inchies tall popped out of a large (paper) cake wearing a Browns uniform with the number 1/8.

In the second game of the doubleheader, Saucier was the lead-off batter for STL in the bottom of the first, but he was called back and little Eddie Gaedel walked towards the plate. The umpire, Ed Hurley, said Eddie couldn’t bat, but manager Zack Taylor showed him the contract that was secretly signed earlier and Hurley said okay. Gaedel had a little bat (see below), and, taking no chances, went into a crouch. Detroit pitcher Bob Cain walked him on four pitches. Jim Delsing pinch ran for Gaedel and took over in right field for Saucier. Bob Swift was the Tiger catcher. Two days later, AL President Will Harridge voided the contract, under baseball’s “no fun” rule.

Saucier was born on a farm outside Leslie, MO, in 1926, and died in Amarillo, TX. He is survived by his children, John and Sarah, two granddaughters, and four great grandchildren, all of normal height. He wrote a memoir in 1997 in which he wrote, “Eddie’s antic was the funniest thing I ever saw.”

Rest in peace Frank.

My collection already includes index cards signed by Saucier and Bob Swift. I’m going to try to pick up the autographs of Cain, Delsing, and Taylor to complete the story. None is very rare or valuable. Gaedel’s, however, is very rare, and would cost thousands. Ump Hurley is pretty rare too and would run in the $500 – $750 range.

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To my great shame, I was unable to finish yesterday’s puzzle — a Wednesday no less. I did not know the wicked witch of the west is ELPHABA. Did you know it comes from the name of the author of the Wizard of Oz: L. Frank Baum?

I was also completely lost at 45A: “Crazy, sexy or cool: Abbr.” Answer: ADJ. Srsly? WTF?? Turns out all three (crazy, sexy, and cool) are adjectives. And the abbreviation, of course, is ADJ. (Boo.) It didn’t help that the A came from 29D: “Sprinkled with seasoning, in Italian.” What?? SALATA. Of course. (How do you say “boo” in Italian?)

47A was from outer space too: “Boolean operators denoted by v-like symbols.” Answer: ORS. Gimme a break. Commenter JJK asked: Does anyone who’s not an academic mathematician know this?

Commenter Darren responded: Your question re: ORS reminds me of an old math joke. (Judy, take note!)

Three mathematicians walk into a bar. The bartender asks, “Would any of you like a beer?”
The first mathematician replies, “I’m not sure.”
The second chimes in, “I don’t know, either.”
At which point the third mathematician says, “No, “

In the same spirit, my answer to your question as to whether anyone who’s not an academic mathematician knows this is, “I don’t know.”

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Yesterday’s puzzle was a paean to women. It had a whole bunch of women, including Heidi Klum and folksinger Melanie, who, sadly, passed away last year. Here’s a shot of HK’s gorgeous daughter Leni, followed by a Melanie song, “Candles in the Rain.” Mel performed at 1am the first night at Woodstock (right before Arlo). The song was inspired by the candles lit by the audience and held up during her performance. Mel was born in Queens but moved with her family to Jersey, and I’m going to claim her as a Jersey Girl. She graduated from Red Bank HS in 1966, for cryin’ out loud, although she was barred from the graduation ceremony on account of an overdue library book (not kidding).

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I bet you know 44D: “TV series whose name is shown on a vanity license plate in its opening sequence.” LA LAW of course. In my Business Law class a student raised her hand and asked me about a legal situation that came up in the previous night’s episode of LA LAW. I fumbled through a pathetic attempt at an answer and finally gave up and said: “I usually do better on legal questions that arise in The Simpsons.”

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Rex Parker, whose blog on the daily NYTXW I read each morning, especially for the observations of the “Commentariat,” bills himself “the Greatest Crossword Solver in the Universe (when I co-solve with my wife)! (2017 Pairs Division Champions, Lollapuzzoola Crossword Tournament).” Even so, he is human. (Actually, Rex is not human — but his real name is Michael Sharpe, and he’s human.) And since he is human, he, like me, missed two key elements in the theme of today’s puzzle. Let me bore you with an explanation.

The theme was revealed at 61A: “Commit a party foul, in a way.” The answer was DOUBLE DIP. And in five theme answers, you had to “dip” down twice and take letters from the answers below. For example, at 21A the clue was “Sorts with unruly hair.” And the answer was MOPEDS, which makes no sense, right? But in the word below it, there was an H in a triangle and an A in a circle. You dip down to get those, and mopeds becomes MOPHEADS. See? That happened five times. Okay, Rex and I got that far, but we missed two things: the triangle and circle represented the shapes of tortilla chips and salsa bowls for dipping. More importantly, the ten (5 + 5) letters in those shapes spelled out the words CHIPS and SALSA. Wow. Impressive craftsmanship (craftsmanchip?).

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Pursuant to a recent Executive Order, please delete the clue and answer at 32A from the puzzle today. Clue: “Identity associated with a blue, pink and white flag.” Answer: TRANS. (Good to see it in there, Rich Proulx and Simeon Seigel.)

There’s a whole bunch of orientation flags. My favorites are “bear” and “leather.” Not kidding — take a look. Some folks even seem to have sex with cooking utensils!! Pansexuals. Linda caught me fooling around with the teakettle the other day.

Didja see in the NYT today the Republican Chair of a House Subcommittee, Keith Self of Texas, referred to his colleague, Sarah McBride, who is trans, as Mr. McBride. McBride responded “Thank you, Madam Chair,” before proceeding, but Rep. William Keating, D-MA, was having none of it. He requested that Self repeat his introduction, which he did but still referred to Sarah McBride as “Mr. McBride.”

“Mr. Chairman, you are out of order,” Keating fired back. “Mr. Chairman, have you no decency? I mean, I’ve come to know you a little bit. But this is not decent.”

Self said it was time to continue the hearing. But Keating refused to let go.

“You will not continue it with me unless you introduce a duly elected representative the right way,” he said.

With that, Self adjourned the session.

It’s come to this.

God Bless America.

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The Report from our Sports Consultant, Sarah Fillier of the NY Sirens of the Pro Women’s Hockey League was unusually brief: “Don’t ask.”

It’s not that she had a bad night. She’s just a little embarrassed. The Sirens were playing the league-leading Montreal Victoire in Jersey, coming off an eight-game losing streak and mired in the cellar. Ouch. But they carried play in the first half, taking a 1-0 lead. The Victoire tied it early in the second half, but Sarah (or Filly, as the coach calls her) netted a sweet goal from the right side to regain the lead. So it was 2-1 NY heading into the third half.

Then, disaster. It’s a physical game, even when played by the ladies. So Sarah’s stick might have come up a just a smidge high into a Montreal player’s face. Oopsies. She was called for a five-minute major misconduct penalty and tossed from the game. Yikes! Our Sarah!! With the woman advantage, the Victoire tied the game pretty quickly. Brilliant goaltending on both sides kept it 2-2 at the end of regulation play. Then things got happy: an exquisite goal by Maja Nylén Persson about 2 minutes into OT sent everyone home. Yay! The losing streak was over.

Here’s Maja. She’s Swedish. No doubt her boyfriend (or girlfriend) calls her his/her little meatball.

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From Frank Bruni’s “For the Love of Sentences:

In WAPO, Catherine Rampell explored the challenge of bringing down supermarket prices: “Importing more eggs has proved complicated, though, and so far there’s not much additional poultry in motion.”

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Sorry to end with this wrenching poem. But once I read it, I couldn’t unread it. It’s by Mosab Abu Toha and is called “[You were so small in my hands].”

You were so small in my hands
no shrapnel could hit you,
but the dust and
smoke of the bomb
rushed into your lungs.
No need for any gauze.
They just closed your eyes.
No need for any shroud.
You were already
in your swaddle blanket.

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