Monday, June 18, 2007

Weasels in their various forms

Here is tonight’s forecast from the good folks at weather.com. Pretty boring stuff, eh? However, I’m still not sure whether I should take my umbrella, since there appears to be a slight chance of rain, even though I won't need it for more than an hour. Or maybe I should take my twenty percent umbrella, which works eighty percent of the time?
What meteorological phenomenon occurs between 4pm and 7pm to reduce the chance of rain to zero? C’mon, weather guessers; you know the chance at 4pm is zero, too. Your problem is that you want to hedge your bets, like those snow forecasts where you tell us that we will get between 2 and 6 inches of snow. That’s a big range. I won’t stay home for 2 inches, but I will for 6. Then, when we get 6 you tell us you were right. "See ... six inches, just like we said." Weasels.
Here’s a news flash: It ain’t gonna rain tonight. Zero chance. Not 10% or 20%. What in Hell is a 20% chance anyway? Either you think it’s going to rain or not.

Meanwhile, over in the south side of town, the local baseball squad, The Phillies, are fast becoming leaders in at least one thing – weasel moves. They have trouble winning a lot of games, but they sure can spin a marketing campaign.
This interesting offer came today:

4 Game Pack
The only way to purchase tickets to the sold-out Independence Blue Cross Fireworks game on June 29 or the WB Mason Phillies Delivery Truck giveaway on June 30 is with a Phillies 4 Game Pack.

So, is the game sold out or not? Apparently not, but if you want to go, they are going to squeeze you a little. If a family wants to take their kids to see the fireworks, they can cough up another $300 for three other games – which they probably don’t want to see – because God forbid they only want to see one game, especially if that game is sold out. Huh?
The sad (sadder) part is that this intimidating marketing technique must work, or else they wouldn’t use it. In baseball parlance, it’s called a Squeeze Play.
My question: What happens to the “sold out” tickets to the fireworks game if they don’t sell all the 4-game packs? Do they put them on sale as single-game tickets? If they do, then they would have to admit that the game was never really sold out to begin with - which it isn't, actually. Huh?
I say, put them in the tubes and shoot them out over center field along with a large group of people who run the team. Now there are some fireworks I’d pay to see.

1 comment:

Sparky Duck said...

You can just run really fast between the rain drops.

And you are saying you dont value fireworks enough to have to sit through games with the Nats and the old old Astros? How unpatriotic