The Hard Shoulder - Especially True
'I gazed upon you from the bleachers'
Bleachers
is a US English term for tiered bench seating, as seen at sporting events,
such as baseball.
David Dyte
has also pointed out that the rhyme refers to 'Bleacher Creatures' - the
regulars in the cheap seats at the New York Yankee's Yankee Stadium. They
have achieved notoriety for their rowdy songs and intimidation of nearby
on-pitch members of the opposing team.
'I never knew much... ...quick with the US
cliché'
Two
people wrote to me and suggested baseball clichés that meant the exact
opposite! Rich Harding
suggested it might derive from the
baseball-inspired euphemism "to
score a home run"
meaning to have had sex with someone, whereas
Reece Page suggested it
might be "to
strike out",
which euphemistically means to have failed to pick someone up, deriving from
the baseball rule of a batsman retiring from the field of play if he fails
to strike a valid pitch three times.
'The Major League rules get me so confused'
Major
League is the professional baseball game, and it’s rules are known to be of
Byzantine complexity.
'Central Park after dark, is safe these
days'
Central Park, in Manhattan, is busy during the day, but at night, it was
historically known as a bad place to be, with gangs of youths, drug users
and prostitution. However, since the late 1980s, considerable efforts have
been put into ensuring the park is a safe place to be.
Nothing more than common sense is required to be safe in
Central Park these days.
'America. House of Blues'
House
of Blues is a well-known concert and restaurant chain owned by the Hard
Rock Café owner and actor/comedian Dan Ackroyd.
'America. Shock and awe'
'Shock
and Awe' is a post-Cold War tactic best known from its usage in the 2003
invasion of Iraq. It is a tactic by which an invading force attempts to
overwhelm its enemy by 'overwhelming power, dominant battlefield awareness,
dominant manoeuvres, and spectacular displays of force to paralyze an
adversary's perception of the battlefield and destroy its will to fight'.
(Source:
Wikipedia)
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