today i heard the phrase play a straight bat 
1. (British) to avoid answering someone’s questions or giving them the information they want
When asked about the affair, he plays a straight bat.
2. (British old-fashioned) someone who plays a straight bat is honest and has traditional ideas and beliefs
Wilf has played a straight bat all his life - I can’t believe he’d get mixed up in anything illegal.
words from Tawona: ‘just some phrases that came to mind: ‘paint the town red’ or ‘having a ball’, both meaning to have a good time. the opposite side of that would be the idea of being ‘in the red’, where a cheque might bounce - 2 sides of red. the idea of trade is linked to accumulating wealth, with those better of from trade being better of in terms of gain. to gain an advantage through trade - in tennis you gain advantage from a deadlock (deuce) at the expense of the player at the other end of the court or ’sporting transaction’.
painting the town red :
meaning engage in a riotous spree.
origin The allusion is to the kind of unruly behaviour that results in much blood being spilt
It is sometimes said to come from the US slang use of “paint” to mean “drink”, When someone’s drunk their face and nose are flushed red, hence the analogy.
Rudyard Kipling. in his book Abaft Funnel, 1889: “They would do their best towards painting that town [Chicago] in purest vermilion.”
trophy hat :a prize for a tournament .. batting history around in swingball tournament?
”Threads weave to make fabric in the first place, and then to decorate (embroidery) or to repair (patching), or attach two pieces in making a garment requires thread.
the social impact of requiring two people to work the loom is an interesting analogy on life itself, the challenge of living and working together. it mirrors the sport of tennis where you can’t play on your own, which also works well with the idea of trade where there has to be more than one party for that to happen . . .
the comment of ‘no Wimbledon without Stroud’ seems to emphasise the fact we can’t seem to get away from the concept of 2 - 2 parties to trade, at least 2 players for tennis, 2 weavers of the original loom, 2 parts that make the tennis ball
tawona
i like the idea of embroidered words and history being bounced around/batted about ………………………………………the idea of taking something which is normally considered precious ( embroidery) and batting it around.
batting
n
1. (Clothing, Personal Arts & Crafts / Textiles) Also called batt cotton or woollen wadding used in quilts, mattresses, etc.
2. (Team Sports / Cricket) the action of a person or team that hits with a bat, esp in cricket or baseball
‘i can imagine the connections between the words on the bats and what is on the ball, then what about if you switch and use different bats, with different words printed on them . . .or should all bats have the same words, and it’s just the balls that have different words on them . . .?’ suggestion from Tawona
I have been thinking again of trophy cloth and red flannel pieces and have been patching a tennis ball with stroud red cloth.
’some of it in N America started as ‘trophies’ - small pieces cut from the jackets of captured/killed British soldiers and then attached to or worked into artifacts and garments as a decoration, to show off a Native American’s ‘victory’ (much the same as scalps, but there was more of it and it would be more easily divided up’
I thought i would post Tawonas comment relating to the post red flannel pieces relating to trade,colonialism and slave trade.
‘the battle continues: being African, i find it interesting that our story is most often told through the eyes of the enslavers themselves – the written accounts of the ‘great’ missionaries and explorers. my schooling in a former British colony was thoroughly British and socially, many Africans continue to live in awe of ‘Great’ Britain. When people think of slavery, not often would one consider the experience of those Africans who were not transported, but remained on the African continent; initially to work on plantations there, and then later to live in segregation under oppressive regimes. In common usage, the term ‘colonialism’ has a somewhat romantic and often nostalgic connotation, which inadvertently renders it a euphemism of slavery. whether the former empire is too ashamed, afraid or unwilling to confront this issue, the tendency to resort to ‘tokenistic’ gestures which lack meaningful impact, or any real sense of justice - leaving a lot of African descendants frustrated and often angry. as time carries on, the untold story lingers like cobwebs in an abandoned home’
see TED talk by Chimamanda Adichie HERE the danger of a single story
A game similar to tetherball is swingball (also called Totem tennis). It uses a smaller, softer ball that the players strike with raquets. It is more popular in the United kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and south africa . In these countries, tetherball is virtually unknown.
Swingball has a shorter pole (about 1.5 metres (4.9 ft) in height). It is portable, and the ball flies around the pole at a constant distance (also about 1.5 metres (4.9 ft)) on a helical screw. The game ends when the ball reaches the top or bottom of the screw. Generally the ball used for these games is either a tennis ball, or a softer, sponge-rubber ball. The racquets are usually the size of tennis racquets, but are constructed of hard plastic . The game is played informally, usually with the pole being driven into a lawn or other grassy area,
totem tennis ……totem pole
‘Although made before the arrival of Europeans (late 1700s), totem poles became increasingly popular during the 1800s. The fur trade had made people wealthy, and encouraged greater displays of privilege and rank’
martina navratilova plays swingball HERE
