The Ashes

On my last holiday in England, recently, I bought a cricket ball for a souvenir, at a charity sale. I then decided to learn more about cricket. I knew The Ashes are going on. Love the story behind the name "The Ashes".

Is that why it is called "Test Cricket"? I never understood that name. I always wondered, why do they continually play test matches, why do they never play for real? (I understand now that Test cricket is the highest "league" - for want of a better word - of the sport.)

Hey Straggler, what's the score?ABE: we cross postedEdited by Parasomnium, : No reason given.

Maybe they should allow the use of shoulder-launched missile weapons, to make it a bit easier on the bowler.I just found out there are 42 "laws of cricket". Forty two? Surely that's a joke?Edited by Parasomnium, : No reason given.

Unsporting? Never! Because we can fit the batsman with some sort of titanium carbon fibre laser-guided bat with rocket boosters. Howzat? He failed the Test then, I gather. Did someone mention "God's Own Sport"? Hogwash! It's Darwin's Evolutionary Cricket by Random Mutilation at the point of Intersection.My condolances though. Ashes to ashes, and all that. The only consolation I can offer is that you can't cremate English cricket twice.

Speaking of ladies, fat or otherwise, are there any women's teams in cricket?O, never mind, I think I know the answer to that one. Women are multitasking and the game would be over before breakfast on the first day. Boring.By the way, don't you think this women and multitasking business is just a ruse to give us men a guilty conscience whenever we are staring into the microwave to check every second of the process whether our 3-minute meal really does take three minutes to heat up, when we could have cleaned up the kitchen in the mean time? I do. I do think it's ruse. Because whenever I find my partner in the kitchen, multitasking away like a madwoman, and I try to get her attention by gently stroking her and kissing her in the nape of her neck, which amounts to adding just one tiny task to the list, she just can't handle it. Multitasking? Bollocks. And sorry for the digression. Don't worry, it really can't be twee enough for me. The ultimate Englishness of it all is the thing I like best about cricket - as far as I know the details, that is.

Ah, thank you so much! That's just what I was looking for. Whenever my partner plays the multitasking card again, I can now say: "Yeah, and I just focus." Great stuff! Maybe the Englishness is not so much visible in tea-sipping biscuit-dipping odd fellows in woollen jumpers, but in all the rum rules and regulations. A quick glance at those "laws" that govern the layout of the field and sizes of the diverse paraphernalia is enough to determine that they must have been invented by the same guy who thought up the imperial units and pre-decimal coinage. As if the universe wasn't quaint enough already.

I care. Sort of.

Well, why not? We've had High Energy Cricket, now Underwater Cricket, what's next? Space Cricket? Plenty of time for tea in that game:- How's it going?
- O, splendid, my dear chum. The second OBW this year.
- OBW?
- Ah, I forgot, you're a "wetter".
- Yes, well, let's not underestimate Underwater Cricket, shall we?
- Right. Well, anyway, OBW means Orbit Before Wicket. So the tea season has started.
- Marvelous!Edited by Parasomnium, : No reason given.