Hatblog

From Outta Nowhere

2009-05-04T20:41:00.004-04:00

Schick called me out. Guess I should post something.

Married life is good. I suppose I could have blogged the wedding. I can send a CD of pictures if you send me a self-addressed stamped envelope.

Work goes well, but obviously I can't talk too much about it....my science knowledge and people skills get tested on a daily basis, and obviously I'm much better with one of those than the other.

The umpiring is in full swing, when it's not raining constantly. Lost two games yesterday and I'm not holding out hope for Wednesday.

The softball league I'm in has every batter bat in every inning, in a order that can be changed. Seriously: it's t-ball rules. I did not know this at the time. Kinda lame. Like my blogging.

Spoilerific Discussion Post--Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

2007-07-20T19:23:00.000-04:00

Here we go. Same drill as always--post in here to discuss the book, once you've either finished it or don't care if you're spoiled. If you're trying to stay clean, stay out.

I get my copy in a few hours. See you later in the weekend.

The New Wheels

2007-06-25T22:16:00.000-04:00

Well, the 1996 Chevrolet Lumina finally gave up the ghost. Probably just a dead battery in the heat, but given all the other crap wrong with it, not even that was worth fixing. I do have to say Chevy does make a good, long-lasting car. But, it's time for Stevis to do his part to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and improve U.S. security by incrementally disentangling the nation from foreign oil supplies.

That's right. I'm now one of those jerks with a Prius passing you at the pump:

You have to look at me in the last photo, because Julie refused to pose seductively on the hood.

Just picked it up Saturday; signed the papers Thursday. Wanted the Barcelona Red Metallic but had to settle for the Magnetic Gray, since I didn't want to go two weeks without a car.

My softball buddies commented that it was a uniquely bumper-sticker free Prius. Many, of course, will be adorned with the pro-environment and liberal messages of their owners. I figure on not using my car to speak for me, though I may add some goofy ones. I say the same thing about that as I did to Julie in agreeing with her about not getting the "Clean Special Fuels" vanity plate that Virgina offers: It's a Prius. By its very shape, it announces "I am a self-righteous jackass who tuts and looks down his nose at your SUV."

Still figuring out all the bells and whistles, but of course the energy monitor on the touch screen is addictive, and not terribly conducive to maintaining situational awareness. Though I remain completely geeked about the regenerative breaking. I'd shudder to see the spike in accident rates for the first month of owning a Prius. Still have to figure out how to turn off the backup beep, too. (hint, hint).

Peak Helium

2007-06-14T21:21:00.000-04:00

Hell with oil & gas, we're about to run out of balloon fuel! Helium shortages are here due to decreased U.S. reserves (helium is usually found in natural gas reserves, as a byproduct of underground radioactive decays) and problems getting plants online overseas. Liquid helium is used to cool things close to absolute zero, and with huge increases in demand from the medical industry (it's used to cool magnets needed for MRI scanners), NASA using a tremendous amount to purge lines in the Space Shuttle systems, and the needs of low-temperature research, quotas are being put on users and budgets are de facto shrinking because an increasing percentage must be used for the helium.

The irony is that helium is the second most abundant element in the universe, formed both during the early universe and in stars.We can't easily liquefy the helium in the sun, however.

So lay off the balloons. Science needs the light elements more!

Typhoon Gonu

2007-06-05T23:48:00.000-04:00

It takes a hurricane to get me out of my posting doldrums...caused by wedding planning and a lot of Little League umpiring. Anyway, Tropical Cyclone Gonu is about to slam Oman, before veering into Iran. Neither of these places ever sees any hurricanes, let alone a Cat 5...althgouh it's weakened to a Cat 1 at the brush-by of, or landfall in, Oman. Oman in particular is a land built on dry riverbeds (perfect for conducting storm surges, one presumes) and could be in serious trouble.

Follow along, if you're a junkie like me, at Jeff Marsters' blog (guest-blogged while he's on vacation) and Margie Keiper's as well.

The Makers of Equal™ are Whiny Losers

2007-04-09T21:13:00.000-04:00

Merisant, makers of Equal brand aspartame, are suing the makers of Splenda™ (McNeil Nutrutionals) claiming that their "starts from sugar" claims are false.

Now what Merisant is doing here, to this lay person's eye, is filing false advertising claims. I'm sorry, that's a consumer protection issue, isn't it? How is that the competitor's concern? I suppose the false advertising hurts Equal's market share, but they could just as easily have a better product. After all, Splenda is not covering up a known danger or poisonous behavior of their product. It looks to me like they're just trying to sue as an alternative business model, as SCO and Diebold have tried.

Of course, as a result of researching this post, I learned that there's a sweetening herb named after me.

Always Knew It

2007-04-05T21:51:00.001-04:00

And God created baseball. Pay special attention to the third paragraph.

An Amateur Watches The General

2007-03-24T18:35:00.000-04:00

A 1927 Blog-a-thon Contributory Post

Julie and I watched The General this weekend. This is the first silent film I’ve ever seen in its entirety. I decided, as I am not versed in film technique not the history of the era, to approach it with a modern eye. Not a jaundiced, cynical one, however, as I had heard good things and expected to be entertained. I am writing with an eye to others with this unfamiliarity; so expect some recapping in here with my thoughts.

For those who haven’t seen the film, Johnny Gray (Buster Keaton) is a train engineer in an unspecified Southern location—though it must be near Chattanooga—when Ft. Sumter is fired upon. As the woman he is a-courtin’ has a father and brother who enlist, she insists he does as well—though when he tries, they refuse him--he is too valuable as a train engineer to the logistical effort. Naturally, his woman snubs him and doesn’t want to speak to him “until he is wearing a uniform.” Some time later, his train—which unbeknownst to him, carries his beloved as a passenger—is hijacked by a Union special ops squad, which intends to destroy the supplies therein and the supply line to the front. Gray grabs a separate engine to pursue, and hijinks ensue.

My first though was to wonder why our heroes were Confederates. Was it not as hard to sympathize with the Southern cause in those days? Nothing really awful is ever portrayed—it could have been any two warring sides, and the attempts by both the Union and later Gray to damage the rail lines to hold up supplies are certainly within standards of war. The only black persons I saw were unloading passengers just before the hijacking. But as I think back to the pro-South portrayal in Birth of a Nation--which I’ve also on read about—I’m curious about the turn-of-the-century view of the Civil War. Or, as I should say residing in Virginia, the War between the States.

My next impression, as a modern viewer, was that the best analog to what Keaton was doing might be a Jackie Chan film. This isn’t a comedy so much as an action adventure film that doesn’t take itself seriously—the comedy comes from the haplessness of our hero, and the times he and the Union soldiers are victims of physical gags. Specifically, what made me think of Chan films was the elaborate use of objects from the background environment. At one point, Gray leaves the line from a water tank, soaking his pursuers; in another, he gets a fun sight gag out of attempting to steal fence rails twice as long as he is tall for locomotive fuels. It strikes me as amazingly kinetic film for the times—although, as I said, I haven’t seen a lot of the silent comedies. The dual train chases give extended energy to the audience, like a beat that causes you to drive a little faster. While the set pieces are funny, they are also amazing in a way that makes you grin rather than chortle. I felt more like it was a fun ride that make me smile, than a side-spliter in which the plot steered me to the next laugh.

I was also struck by the brilliance of Keaton’s portrayal of Gray’s innocent bewilderment at events around him. Several times, he attempts to deal with a problem or obstruction, only to solve it (or for it to resolve itself) while his back is turned. For example, his engine starts to move without him, or a car blocking his way switches to a side track without him seeing. His confused look really sells his predicament to the audience.

The last thing that I wanted to mention was the clever way pieces of the film meshed into each other—very little was extraneous or unrelated to anything else. Not to give away (any more) of the best bits, but the uniform line I quoted above is not left without a callback, and several important discoveries or successes for Gray are set up by previous serendipitous failures or difficulties. There’s an economy to this film that encourages you to take it all in along the way.

OK, if you haven’t seen this, I can’t recommend it strongly enough. The disc Julie received from Netflix also had two other shorter pieces from Keaton on it (The Playhouse and Cops), both of which were brilliant as well. Seemed to be a 1995 copyright, if you’re casting about at your favorite rental or purchase place.

Baseball in the Newsreel

2007-03-24T16:22:00.000-04:00

A 1927 Blog-a-thon Contributory Post

So when you say to me “1927” I immediately think of the Yankees, whose edition that year was one of the most dominant in baseball history; and of Babe Ruth’s 60 home runs that year. So I figure there’s got to be some newsreel footage right? Images abound; see Gehrig and Ruth, circa 1927, to the right.

Well, Paramount newsreels started in 1927, so close enough. I couldn’t find a good online archive, but the book Reel Baseball, with its included documentary, comes close. Well, as close as 1933, and having the 1927 Yankees lineup in the background at Lou Gehrig Day at Yankee Stadium (“Today…I consider myself luckiest man…on the face of the Earth.”) So, herein find some brief thoughts on how America’s pastime was experienced by the masses via the cinema, and Ruth in particular.

One thing that struck me is how this must have been the Sportscenter of the day—only far more intermittent. The narration is clearly trying to tell stories that establish our heroes, and surprisingly I found the attempts to be witty in a similar vane to highlight shows now—although, far less snarky, disparaging, or sarcastic. It was a time when the media gladly overlooked the moral failings of sports heroes—the tale of Ducky Medwick’s vicious spiking of Mickey Owen in the 1934 World Series, which led disgusted Tigers fans to pelt him with fruit—is told with a “that’s baseball” wink and a nod.

There are lots of World Series and All-Star game highlights in the 1933-1965 time frame covered on this documentary, but less in between—mostly commemorations and stunts (e.g., Bob Feller throwing fastballs through an Army device which tested the speed of artillery shells, and measured his fastball at 98 miles per hour). One such stunt was a wartime exhibition between Babe Ruth (in his late forties) and Walter Johnson (in his fifties.) Ruth looks mostly like you remember him, even then, although his swing is obviously slower and his timing is way off. Ruth looks (and sounds) much worse later, in footage of him playing Santa Claus in the late 40s, when the throat cancer which would eventually kill him must have been progressing. I’m sure he loved entertaining kids, but I don’t know how well a raspy voiced Santa with a beard that wouldn’t stay put was taken—the kids don’t look entirely thrilled.

But of course, even that footage of how we remember Ruth betrays what he was—he had let the hot dogs and booze soften him around the middle by then, and the mental image most have is of a pudgy, swing from the heels type. He was, of course, much more than that; had he stayed a pitcher his whole career he probably would have been a Hall of Famer for that alone, and early in his career he was a tremendous defender and graceful base stealer as well. Compare his face in this photo from his Red Sox days and this wallpaper from the Baseball Hall of Fame.

I talk in a post below about how I’d disagree with this as a “golden age” of baseball; I think that’s a sentiment of those who tend to romanticize the past and overlook its flaws. But in ways, it was a magical time for the cinema and baseball. Unless you lived in the Northeast or Midwest, you didn’t have major league baseball for most of this time. In 1927—and through 1953, when the Boston Braves moved to Milwaukee--Teams were in New York (3), Boston (2), Philadelphia (2), Washington, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago (2), and St. Louis (2). The rest of the country only saw footage in their theaters.

Did this contribute to the larger than life status of baseball stars, as they were only literally seen that way? Did the associations get made with other famous stars, images of far-off locales (that were really studio lots), and epic tales of valor and romance to elevate baseball to America’s game in the rest of the country as well? I’ll argue it helped, but despite a lack of major league baseball, there were plenty of regional leagues in the south and west, and these minor leagues, at that time, were not the farm system we know today—they were independent, scouted and signed their own players, and while they passed them up to better teams in exchange for fees, they could make local heroes of their own. But the newsreels did bring the top players, the best of the best (save for the color line) to most of America, and no doubt contributed to the sense of wonder.

As a mini "Shameful Book Report," I highly recommend to the baseball fans with a sense of history getting a copy of Reel Baseball from your local library--the documentary CD with the actual footage is certainly worth it, as it contains tons of footage of famous plays you've heard about (e.g., Al Gionfriddo's catch in the 1947 World Series) but probably only seen stills of. A very entertaining hour spent. The book doesn't contain a lot of info I didn't know already, but that's because I've read it before. If you know someone just getting into pre-War and early post-War baseball history, I think it would be a good pickup.

Notes and Preview

2007-03-19T22:14:00.000-04:00

The rest of Denver went alright, though I fought off the cold all last week down here at sea level, only to see it or another one move into my head in the last couple of days. Bleah. I will get pictures, such as they are, up at some point. I'm not a photojournalist.

I got a personal invite to contribute to John McCain's Presidential bid exploratory committee! Since they sent me a free return envelope for my check, I imagine I'll send him some unsolicited advice. Perhaps I'll post it here.

In other news, I'll be participating in goatdog's 1927 Blogathon. I'm afraid it might be a somewhat tenuous connection; my first thoughts of 1927, of course, turn to Ruth and the Yankees, and I thought I'd do something on the rise of Ruth's popularity with the newsreels--and low and behold, I find Paramount News started in 1927. Aha! I thought. Well, I found a disappointing lack of good material on the Internets, and then got busy with APS and such and forgot to do my homework. I did snag a copy of Reel Baseball (see the Booklist) from the library (sadly, Fairfax County, not the Library of Alexandria) but they sat on the hold for a couple of days, so I just got it tonight. Wherein I discover that none of the footage on the DVD appears to be from Paramount, and the earliest is from 1933.

Too bad. I'll make it stretch.

Let me disagree here, though, with the book's contention that this was baseball's Golden Age. First, that's tough to say the black and white footage included on the DVD doesn't need much black to show the players for half of the "Golden Age" time frame. Second, the very fact that the newsreels were the prime means most fans saw baseball belies this notion--how is it not better with major league teams from coast to coast, minor league ball affordable and available all over, Baseball Tonight for your moving picture highlights, and the vast majority of games available for your enjoyment on Internet radio, Internet TV, or cable/satellite package, if you can pony up the cash?

Of course, that's my opinion before more than a cursory flip through the book. I want to read it and watch the footage before defining the thread of my post/essay. Just wanted to get that criticism out so I can be more positive and thoughtful.

Hello Down There

2007-03-06T21:25:00.000-05:00

You know what Denver needs? Oxygen.

I kid, but in retrospect, asthma + chest cold + thin air = not so fun. It's better today--I seemed to cough a lot of it out this morning--but I'm using my inhaler like crazy, feeling quite winded after little exertion--even taking my decidedly non-Olympic conditioning into account--and looking up symptoms of altitude sickness (not showing any, other than the getting winded, which happens to me astmatic lungs at sea level.)

Anyway, the talk went pretty well. It wasn't great work, so that brought it down, but I pulled it off smoothly.

So far, I've gotten 3 free meals...two hotel breakfasts (hot, not Continental) and one lunch sprung for by one of my old professors. This frees up the budget for $16 scotch. About a shot and a half worth, but still. I'd have stayed and tried more of their huge selection, but it was also a cigar bar, so I didn't need anything more coming between me and sweet, sweet oxygen.

I have some time tomorrow and Thursday slated for siteseeing, so I hope to get some picks of the mountains from the state capitol, the Coors Field exterior, and anything else that suits me. I already have a pic of the two-story blue bear that seems to be looking inside the convention center for snacks.

Speaking of the convention center, it's the only one of seen, out of all these March Meetings, that has prominent ads in the concourses for local gentlemen's clubs. Guess they're not going to get a lot of NOW conventions.

Rocky Mountain High....

2007-03-04T00:39:00.000-05:00

Now that you've got that stuck in your head, time to report that I'm off to Denver tomorrow (later today) for the American Physical Society March Meeting. I'll try to blog if I can (and I'm taking song suggestions) but we'll see how connectivity goes. And also, how my oxygen supply holds up at altitude. Anyone know the experiences of Colorado asthmatics?

"Un but! Vokoun est completement supris!"

2007-02-22T22:48:00.000-05:00

I just had a marvelous time watching the Montreal Canadiens top the Nashville Predators, 6-5, in a shootout. The trick was the broadcast the Center Ice feed had was from RDS--the French langauge station. No idea why there was no English feed, but I wanted to see newest Predator Petr Forsberg, and to root against the Preds overtaking the Red Wings in the standings. I could only catch bits an pieces of the commentary, but it was fun nonetheless. And I could read the on-screen promo that some form of food deal was given to fans because the Candiens scored five goals.

Yeah, that French minor was good for something, at least.

Shameful Book Report--Collapse

2007-02-20T22:42:00.000-05:00

Collapse is Jared Diamond's followup to Guns, Germs, and Steel, his study of how aspects of geography and speciation have given certain societies advantages over others. In his new work, Diamond examines the fates of societies who stretched their available natural resources, and the ways those societies have either scaled back or continued to their own demise, as well as the whys. He does this from case studies diverse societies, such as Polynesian Easter Island, the Greenland Norse and Inuit, and Native American civilizations in the Southwest.

While these are interesting anthropological investigations in their own right, the book also aims to apply them to ecological issues faced by modern societies, using modern case studies of regions such as Montana and Hispaniola, and industries like mining and petroleum extraction.

It's hard not to find a book like this somewhat depressing. It illustrates societies that overexploited their resources during environmental conditions conducive to expansion, and also couldn't or wouldn't adapt to changes in those environmental conditions. It's hard not to see the same lack of adaptability in our society--including my own lifestyle--and a similar lack of political will in our electorate. However, Diamond makes pains not to be that pessimistic in his conclusions. Although he sees reason for concern, he doesn't think the looming problems are insurmountable.

Partly due to this sense of worry, I didn't find I enjoyed Collapse as much as I did Guns, Germs, and Steel. I didn't find the story or its telling as compelling (though in both cases, Diamond can lapse into lists of facts that can be dry and sometimes repetitive.) I also didn't think the individual stories of societies held the book together as well as the overarching story of human civilization in Diamond's prior work. However it's only in the comparison that this book suffers. Collapse is an interesting look at anthropological stories you may have heard, but not with the most recently learned details. It does a good job of judging societies by their contemporary knowledge and attitudes. Yet, it also shows where these mores failed their societies, and ways in which are modern attitudes may be similar. This is an important read as we face potential tipping points in our modern world.

Fourteen years, four bankruptcies, three franchise moves, two lockouts, one lost season and no effective leadership.

2007-01-29T22:38:00.000-05:00

Yeah, that about sums it up.

Gary Bettman has been poor to awful for the NHL. Perhaps it's not all of his own doing--I certainly wouldn't blame him for the FOX broadcast inanity, such as dueling goal robots--but he certainly has been on watch for it, and needs to go.

The thing that has always annoyed me about the broadcast situation is how every other sport gets to build its audience with national weekend broadcasts, starting at some point a ways into the season and continuing until the end. Hockey? Everytime they swing a network deal--FOX, ABC, NBC--it's 5 games, non consecutively, and then playoffs. Even if they have to take a hit in the per-game rights fees--or hell, subsidize it--they have to get on every weekend, so viewership can drop in, get interested, and come back at some point, even if it's not the next week. What they do now doesn't help grow the fanbase one bit.

Booze and Islamic Cab Drivers

2007-01-25T22:24:00.000-05:00

Since I haven't had much time to write, I'll let you chew on this story. In which, we see there is a religious conflict brewing in Minneapolis. It seems many of the Muslim cabbies believe their religious prescription against alcohol extends to not transporting it in their cabs--such as, airport customers who have partaken of duty-free goods. The airport, of course, doesn't want a large fraction of its taxi fleet refusing to serve a sizable fraction of its customers.

So the question is, upon whom will the hammer fall? Those trying to stay true to their faith, or those legally purchasing an entertaining chemical? The general principle of allowing free practice of religion in this country (as long as it does no harm to the unconsenting) butts heads with the notion that all people should get equal service (if they are not being belligerent or threatening.) I guess the question is if "waiting for the appropriate cab" is sufficient harm ask people to decide between their faith and their meager livelihood.

The thing that gets me, that the story doesn't answer, is what these cabbies do in regards to one of their other societal roles--getting drunk people home from bars safely. Do they refuse service to the intoxicated? If so, is that person more likely to get in their car? Or even to have driven it in the first place, instead of taking a cab? To me, it would seem that taking someone to a bar is just as much "making money off of alcohol" as is transporting someone with a bottle of wine. I'm curious about this angle, and how it affects public safety, but apparently the reporter is not.

Given that, and the fact that as word gets out, people will just stuff their duty-free booze in a bag and not say anything about it (making the cabbies transport it anyway), I want to say I'd side with the airport commission here, but it's not as if most cabbies could easily slip into another line of work. For many it's the best living they'll be able to make, and it seems harsh to tell them to take it or leave it. And it's not like taxicabs are some inalienable human right. So I don't know. Thoughts?

Hockey Close-Up

2007-01-16T20:19:00.000-05:00

We got really good seats (below face value) from Stubhub for the 1/9 Capitals vs. Flyers game. No doubt they were being dumped at the last minute because the Flyers are awful this year. Anyway, you can see from these pictures from Julie's cell phone how close we were--that's Kolzig on the left, and the face-off dot directly in front of us. We were about ten rows back for a nice 6-2 Caps win.

I like to splurge on lower-bowl seats once a year, if I can. There's nothing wrong with watching hockey from the "cheap" seats, but there's something to be said for being able to see faces shmushed into the glass, as well. And the speed is even more incredible up close. Now, if the prices more adequately reflected demand and quality of product, so that more people could get a look at the game, maybe the game could re-establish footholds and be in position to take Mark Cuban's advice.

About Damn Time

2007-01-08T21:39:00.000-05:00

I love Edy's. I really do; they make excellent No Sugar Added Ice Cream in a variety of interesting flavors.

But for years, I have begged them to make a Cookies and Cream. It's my favorite flavor, and given that both NSA Vanilla and artificially sweetened Oreo clones exist, it shouldn't be so hard, right?

Finally.

Now, could they send me a notice or coupon to reward my pestering? Noooooooo.

Also my nearest Safeway doesn't carry it. I may have to threaten to take my shopping elsewhere.

Capital Punishment and the Social Contract

2007-01-04T20:00:00.000-05:00

Something struck me in this Eric Zorn blog entry, and it was this sentence:

I can't make a persuasive moral case that, say, Timothy McVeigh or John Wayne Gacy deserves to live; that it is wrong for a society to hang a Saddam Hussein.

If you don't have time to read the whole entry, he's arguing that his opposition to capital punishment is pragmatic, as opposed to on moral grounds, in that he admits there are criminals so heinous and obvious they should be executed (but that in most case, we can't know guilt with enough certainty that execution benefits society).

I don't see these things as necessarily following from one another. I wouldn't argue that the most awful tyrants, terrorists, mass murderers and genocidal maniacs have abused their right and privilege to breath the planet's oxygen. But I would argue that a society should not execute any one of them. The question in my mind is, "At what point can a group of individuals, bound by social contract, perform an action that it is wrong for any one individual to perform?" And I would argue that, no matter how duly constituted the social body, it does not have the right to terminate the life of a human being.

The entire justice system, of course, is an illustration of that question; it allows a means for determining and punishing guilty actions where an individual would be a vigilante for doing so; the civil system provides a means restitution where individual retribution would be no more than self-justified theft. But I'm not comfortable with the justice system ending life in my name. (And it is in my name, in part, in this government of, by, and for the people.) So I guess I seem to hold the contradiction in my head that there are those who have so wronged decent society that they don't deserve to live, but they should continue doing so anyway.

I guess that makes my objection principled.

Well, it's been fun...

2007-01-02T22:10:00.000-05:00

But I suppose I have to put an end to the creative exhortations for me to post. They were counterproductive though--I was enjoying them too much to give a reason to stop. :P

Well, what's new? I've been watching the Steve Yzerman number retirement ceremony and game tonight. Pretty good, if the production is as cheesy as expected . My favorite moment was the part of his speech where he questioned his reputation as a leader, saying all he did was go out and play hard like everyone else did. In this day of pampered superstar/Terrell Owens crap, that is leadership, especially from your one-of-the-greatest stud players.

What other newness? Applying for faculty jobs again...no word yet. I think most of you know I've been seeing a wonderful woman named Julie for several months now...we've survived family Christmases into 2007. We barely survived United airlines though. I'll repost a diatribe I wrote for elsewhere as a comment in this thread. I haven't decided whether to bowdlerize it yet. I mean, the cursing's creative, but I suppose this is public, you know?

I have taken care of some of my reading list. Cryptonomicon and Bringing Down the Househave been finished, but World War Z and The Last Town on Earth have been added. I've decided this is how I should keep pressure on myself to read--always have a list of at least half a dozen things to shame me into not watching "Celebrity Deathmatch" or some such nonsense.

One Year Later

2006-08-26T15:42:00.000-04:00

Well, we're about a year out from Katrina, covered a bit here before. You already know I follow the hurricane news anyway, so you know I've seen this, the suggestion that (as of this writing) Ernesto will be bearing right down on the gulf coast. It's too soon of course to pick a state, let alone a city as a target, so here is the updating forecast track. There's even a fair bit of uncertainty as to whether the system will stay strong into the gulf, but if it does, the water there is warm and it's a good bet to explosively intensify as Katrina did.

That's the future; let's not forget the past. The Wiki has a good page, of course. NPR will be running stories all week, as will the news channels I'm sure. The Discovery Channel will be running a special on Sunday, and I've heard good things about (but can't see) the Spike Lee documentary on HBO.

Stevis's Library of Shame

2006-08-15T22:03:00.000-04:00

I decided to look about the house, and figure out which books I've started and not finished. Cripes, I found eight. This is ridiculous and I will now post the list in the hopes that public shame will get me to finish them.

I don't read like I did as a kid...sure I'm busy. And my life challenges my brain more than the K-12 system ever did, so I don't need as much of the intellectual stimulation a book provides. And I have more and cooler electronics, and those distract me. But I've got to make time, if I wish to continue to call myself a smart person, instead of just a smartass.

So here they are, in the rough order I might attack them. I will, however, listen to your suggestions on the subject.

Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson.
I have of course read Snow Crash, and liked it. I started Cryptonomicon right after..and I like it, but I've put 500 pages behind me, and I'm still pretty much in the middle. The bookmark in this is my boarding pass from Christmas.

Collapse, Jared Diamond
Guns, Germs, and Steel is of course now the classic "this is how the world got this way" book for geeks. So this examination of why some societies completely vanish while others thrive was a clear purchase for me...I've only read the intro though.

Baseball Between the Numbers, the Baseball Prospectus folk (Jonah Keri, editor).
This is a bunch of analytical essays on baseball. I've read some of these. Because of the shorter format, I've tried this as a bathroom book, but they're a little too long and a little too full of numbers and charts to be good for that purpose.

The Making of the Atomic Bomb, Richard Rhodes
The definitive history of the Manhattan Project, I had about 100 pages down on this and then that copy was ruined by a curry spill. Probably need to start from the beginning here. Perhaps I should move this up the list--as a physicist, I show know more of the intricacies of this. I will have to follow up with Rhodes's Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb, but that's another giant tome...

Heat Wave, Eric Klineberg
Mostly finished, but I was reading this back in Chicago. It's a sociological examination of the killer Chicago heat wave in the summer of 1995, which I lived through with no AC in the 5th floor of a brick building in Holland, MI. We got a lot of research done that summer because the physics building had good AC. Probably need to skim some of the earlier chapters to be sure I have a gist of the thesis.

Schindler's List, Thomas Keneally
Started once, but would probably go from the beginning. Not an appropriate make-out book.

Bringing Down the House, Ben Mezrich
The story of the MIT blackjack team that engaged in elaborate card-counting operations to make money in Vegas. I've read excerpts, but have not done more than flip through this copy.

The Year the Yankees Lost the Pennant, Douglass Wallop
You may know it better as Damn Yankees. I picked it up at the SABR Bob Davids Chapter annual fundraising raffle. Only read the first chapter so far.

OK...if any of those links don't make sense, let me know--I may have copied something to the wrong place.

And I Feel Fine

2006-07-30T10:43:00.000-04:00

I think I've finally figured it out, what with the Israeli forces massing at Megiddo Hill and all. R.E.M. told us years ago:

That's great, it starts with an earthquake,
Birds and snakes, an aeroplane

Guess what opens August 18? Yep. Enjoy the end times...

Cubs get toasted, but it's still fun

2006-07-23T21:58:00.000-04:00

Despite their awful performance last Sunday night, I went to all three Cubs@Nats games...the Nats were having a "Grand Re-Opening" to celebrate both the new owners and some improvements. I had to snicker as they gave me a hat, t-shirt, and "Rally Towel" while I was wearing my Aramis Ramirez jersey...

Speaking of him, he was they only Cub to have a good weekend...Lee didn't start the first two games--supposedly they were resting his wrist--but Aramis had a pair of two-homer games. That's pretty cool when you're wearing the jersey. He didn't homer Sunday as the Cubs took their soundest thrashing of the sweep.

Also of news, they replaced the lame "Presidents Race" animation on the scoreboard with a super-cool "giant-headed Presidents" race on the field, reminiscent of the Sausage Races in Milwaukee. See below. The only thing that would make it cooler than the Sausage Races is if they had Secret Servicemen running alongside. Giant-headed costumes, or just guys & gals in black suits, I don't care. But they need Secret Servicemen to go over the top with this.

The pics:

  Austin Kearns

  Nick Johnson

  Alfonso Soriano

  Ryan Zimmerman

  The view from this year's 20-game plan seat (Saturday)

  The umps, from Sunday's seat

  Aramis. All for one!

  Derrek Lee, fouling off a ball

  Neifi the Outmaker, Black Hole of Suckitude

The next five are the Giant Headed Presidents (band name!):

Science Link Post

2006-07-09T22:49:00.000-04:00

From the world of combustion chemistry, I bring you grilling with liquid oxygen. Do not try this at home. At least without me. Not that it would be safer, but I want to see it. (Some of you have probably seen it before; I couldn't find it on the net for quite a while.)

From the social sciences: computer simulations of societies, with very simple rules for the individual units, have surprising and disturbing results.

From the lines of the science-religion discourse, a physicist addresses how to talk to the general public about the "conflict." Probably of more interest to the scientists among the handful of readers; as a suggestion on how to approach the topic.

I am a Patriot

2006-07-04T04:52:00.000-04:00

I will not wrap myself in the flag; I will declare this to be the greatest country that ever was. I will not allow that to blind me to calls to make it better. Rectifying an injustice is not unpatriotic; nay, it is the height of patriotism. It's certainly how we got started.

You could argue that the current administration, and their enablers assembled in Congress (on both sides of the aisle), even hit these listed "Injuries and Usurpations," albeit only passively on the final:

HE has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

HE has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our Laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

FOR depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:

HE has plundered our Seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.

Fortunately, we are not forced yet to pledge our Lives, our Fortunes and our Sacred Honor. (Yes, I spelled it as we do today. Sue me.) It's a critical campaign season coming up; do what you can, give what you can. OK, so maybe that is pledging your Fortune. As cynical as many of us have become, including me, it's not going to get better unless we work at it.

They say that the top athletes are those who are never satisfied, and constantly work to make themselves just a little better. That's how I feel about patriotism. Just because we have a lot of which to be proud, doesn't mean it's wrong to focus on being even better.

Rain Wrap-up

2006-07-02T09:34:00.000-04:00

Washington evaluates its repsonse; I can't really say it was too bad, although as they point out in the article there are obvious traffic flow issues to work on. Of course, they're going to treat the mass of people trying to leave the Mall area after the Independence Day fireworks as an evacuation drill. Mostly in terms of reconfiguring the roads to be outbound-heavy, I would hope. Fake emergency announcements would be bad.

The opening 9/10 tourney game at CSLL on Thursday was rained out...by a brief thundershower. At that, you would have needed water wings to go from 2nd to 3rd. The fields were mostly alright on Friday night, but one of the bullpens (in foul ground) was a soggy mess. Fortunately no ball in play ever found that area.

In unrelated news, DC is experimenting with rubber sidewalks. If you could only chalk them up, that would be a hell of a hopscotch court.

The Competitive Eating Diet

2006-06-30T23:58:00.000-04:00

How to eat like this crazy chick from Alexandria, or, how you too can lose weight on the competitive eating circuit.

I'm doubtful that any of us in high school could have drank 126 ounces of liquid in one sitting. I mean, that's two of the giant Wesco* mugs, and I never even got one of those.

*For you non Michiganders, that's just a local gas station chain.

How High's The Water, Mama?

2006-06-27T18:59:00.000-04:00

Five feet high and risin'.

Pull out a $20 bill; look at the back. That tree on the right of the White House isn't there anymore. All of the wet-dry vacuums are already gone. Here's a summary for the graphically inclined. The Capital Weather blog will probably have the most up-to-the-minute info, if you care.

Another 2-4 in. overnight (Tuesday) We're going to get brushed, although not too badly, with that tropical system that didn't organize off of North Carolina.

I have ice cream, scotch, and a "Rain" playlist on iTunes. I'm good to go.

Just Another Manic Monday

2006-06-26T07:27:00.000-04:00

I've bitched before that no one here can drive if a single molecule of water falls from the sky in any way, shape, or form. But this time it's legitimate; we've suffered a deluge. (WaPost; registration/bugmenot). Roads have been closed, people endangered on the roads. On the traffic website I check, I've seen reports that my road to the Beltway is flooded; the Beltway is closed at alternate route on; and when that opened that their was a mudslide onto the Beltway in between me and work. The mudslide is I'm sure from the construction--last Monday, when trying to escape a downpour that washed out our softball game in Maryland, it was clear all the runoff from the Wilson bridge & related construction project was focused on to the Beltway--stupid whether or not it was on purpose. See, where I grew up, the roads drain to the side.

The feds are actually on unscheduled leave, wherein you can burn a vacation day unplanned--I've only seen that happen for snow, so far. And I was even going to get moving early today--since I woke up an hour before my alarm because my blood sugar was low, I figured I'd get moving...but it doesn't seem like a good idea to gas up the car and go right now. Since the sound on ESPN isn't coming through my cable right now, so I can't even catch the highlights I missed....this is a rough day, and I'm not even dressed yet.

I singled to right. No, seriously.

2006-06-21T23:47:00.000-04:00

Those of you who played softball with me in Chicago will struggle to believe me, but I singled to right today. Right over a leaping firstbaseman, driving in two runs.

Famously--or maybe the opposite of that, wherein no one gives a crap--I went through a stretch in slow-pitch softball in grad school of being unable to hit a fair ball, on account of always swinging way to early. My solution was not to learn patience, but to start with my bat in front of the plate, and yank it back to the elbows-out position only after the ball was released. This cockamamie system worked, but I could still only rip balls down the line, in the hole, or just to the left of second base. Even if I was trying to aim to right. I defined dead-pull hitter.

Well, in this modified fast pitch league I'm playing in, I don't have that luxury. There's no windup, so the delivery is sort of like a bowling motion--it's not that fast, but too fast for my loopy swing. Mostly I'm looking for a pitch inner-half to pull inside the 3rd base bag. Except for with two strikes on me, when I'm actually choking up and slapping at the ball a bit. It's worked pretty well.

The exact pitch sequence, for posterity:

1. Taken, strike on the inside corner. Not a good pitch to swing at for the first strike.
2. Taken, ball high.
3. Taken, strike about 4 inches outside. Ok, if that's the way we're going to be...
4. Taken, ball low. Almost got me to swing.
5. Pitch about 2 inches outside. Sorta had to swing there. Stepped into it and drove it to the right side.

Surprisingly, I did not hear trumpets or see horsemen.

This must be a Thursday..

2006-06-15T21:22:00.000-04:00

I never could get the hang of Thursdays. Or blog posting, apparently...

While my side project (and way to stay here next year) is going swimmingly, the main imager project isn't. It's frustrating, and I need to bear down harder, but things will not get done on the schedule we've hoped for all 2006. Some of it is us not figuring crap out, a lot of it is things breaking out from under us...but oh well.

League umpiring is done...I'll be doing districts again the first two weeks of July. May just have to see about driving up to Williamsport this year, or next...it'll be tough this year because, with the project, there's no way to take a weekday off right now. Ah well.

Weird baseball stories

2006-05-23T22:56:00.000-04:00

Thankfully, no one in the league I ump for is quite this stupid.

Someone(s) got busy in a Minute Maid bathroom.

Start lifting weights so you can shave

2006-05-15T22:49:00.000-04:00

I've been saying for years that the adding of blades to razors is getting out of control. Now, the Economist even shows that the time evolution of blade number follows a hyperbolic funtion. Thus inside of ten years we will have a fourteen-blade razor.

Diabetic Babelfish

2006-05-11T22:34:00.000-04:00

I know I've shared this link before, but never blogged it, so some of you haven't seen it. It's a list of translations for "I have diabetes." The Arabic structure is funny (literally, "I have the sugar disease") but the Scots Gaelic is the best--literally, "The diabetes is on me." Get it off! GET IT OFF!!!!!!!!!!

New Gear is Great

2006-05-09T20:51:00.000-04:00

Well, I got to break in the new umpire gear tonight. Could be my imagination, but it certainly felt lighter that the league gear I'd been borrowing. Especially the mask, which I've got adjusted so I can actually get it off consistently without sending my hat flying. Handy.

And lo, did I need it tonight. Took one bounced pitch off of the arm, two bounced pitches off of the cup, and a foul ball off the clavicle guard. The league chest protectors don't all have arm guards, let alone the extra clavicle piece like mine has.

It was a good well played game, with no crap from the coaches. I think I'm going to be happy with this investment.

177 Outs in 28 Hours

2006-05-07T22:48:00.000-04:00

Two five-inning umping games, followed by two Nationals games...that was a lot of baseball this weekend. Some of it was even played well, although there were a couple of little league plays at the big league level...the anthem today was sung by some pre-teen female trio that dubbed themselves "Clique." They were good, but, um...do you want to be self-portrayed as elitist jerks?

I have finally ordered my own plate gear, so I guess I'm in this for the long haul. You don't drop $300+ and stop doing it...unless you're 12 and it's guitar or ballet or mountain biking or something.

I've got to work on backing up, and getting away-from-the-ball obstruction in my field of view though. I've seen too much borderline stuff on the periphery of my vision, I'd better start nailing people on it. I'm happy with my strike zone these days--still needs a little work on consistency, but it's better.

And if I find the people who are spamming the comments, I will beat them with new shin guards.

This Is Where Liking Cricket Gets You

2006-05-06T08:08:00.000-04:00

For upwards of twenty years, it would seem that a troubled Florida man has been passing himself off as English nobility. In England, nonetheless, so that shows you how on the ball they are. He stole the name of a long-dead infant, and even a legitimate coat of arms that had fallen into disuse. And he's still refusing to admit who he really is, although authorities have an idea now.

Dogs and Cats, Lying Down Together. Madness.

2006-04-28T17:51:00.000-04:00

I found myself agreeing with both Charles Krauthammer and Pat Buchanan today. Yikes.

Although I would argue with Krauthammer (and doesn't that sound like a WWII era superhero comic?) that gas companies are taking advantage of the fact that gas truly isn't a basic supply & demand commodity--slashing prices at the pump will only cause all of the other companies to do so as well, with the effect that they all make less money. But prices are not being arbitrarily raised; it's summer driving season and we've tossed so much uncertainty into the supply chain.

On the nukes, see also this flash animation as to why the nuclear bunker busters won't and can't work. Alright, the "can't" is a little shy on details for the scientists among you, but it does convey the sheer volume of unintended consequences from this proposal.

Softball

2006-04-24T22:12:00.000-04:00

So I'm playing softball again...on an NRL team that is playing "modified fastpitch," which is fast pitch rules, only no windmill windups. So you have to throw it flat, with only the slowpitch step forward. More or less what the UC Sciences league ended up like half of the time anyway.

I liked my timing after a year off, but I aggravated my thumb strain and it's only now feeling normal. I've only been taking ibuprofen sporadically, though. I hope this doesn't become a regular occurrence...constantly taking ibuprofen all year just to play is really not a tenable situation.

And just to show you how ridiculous the GOP has become, they've staged a withdrawal from the Congressional softball league over how a Democratic staffer is running the league. If you look at the details of how they get their fields, you'll see they're just as spoiled and priviledged as you might guess.

So, What's Everyone Been Up To?

2006-04-19T23:37:00.000-04:00

I've been up to starting some softball, returning to umpiring, and working on the job search. And, you know, research too. I suppose. When someone's looking.

Shane's been up to handing out his NHL awards, and I can't say I disagree with a choice. I'd mention Lundqvist in the Calder race as well. They really ought to have more finallists brought to Toronto for that, given that they effectively had two rookie classes this year.

I've been up to ignoring Amazing Race postings, since no one was commenting. I think the awful Family Edition sucked the interest out of me. The back to normal show has been good, but it's not sucking me in like it was.

Going rafting again at the end of May, so I'll be sure to blog about that.

OK, I'll try to get back to schedule...one thing I thought of is to institute the feature Stevis's Second Favorite Thing in the Universe, in which I talk about whatever I'm geeking about that moment. We'll see. I also started this blog with the intention of writing essays inspired by hats in my collection, and never have, so don't get your hopes up.

Legal precedent that closed source software is untrustworthy

2006-03-10T21:03:00.000-05:00

Closed source applications screw up you're voting; now you're seeing them screw up DUI convictions. Of course, in this case it's because judges are agreeing with defense attorneys that the rights of the accused to examine the case against them are being neglected. Maybe this sets a hopeful precedent to challenge Diebold.

The Amazing Race 9--"I'm Filthy and I Love It!"

2006-03-07T20:56:00.000-05:00

Ah...real racing...so good. They even avoided the stupid premiere episode campout last week.

World Baseball Classic

2006-03-02T23:40:00.000-05:00

Alright, I admit it--I've got nothing to keep my posting pledge with. But I can remind you that the World Baseball Classic has started--you can listen on the Internets at mlb.com for $10 (for the whole thing.) The Asian bracket is starting earlier so they can get over here and aclimate for the second round. I'd like this tourney better if it were in November, and not so neutered with the pitch counts and what not. But it's still baseball after a cold winter.

The Amazing Race 9--"Here We Go, Baby, Off to Win a Million Bucks! "

2006-02-27T22:04:00.000-05:00

Listen to me clearly: Around the World. Around the World.

Hopefully the return to real racing will include an actual circumnavigation, better tasks, and less "baby." Oops.

Places not to have Pit Stops

2006-02-23T22:17:00.000-05:00

With a real Amazing Race premiering in less than a week, I bring you a link to places they probably won't be visiting.

I would invite you to contemplate, as I did, who in their right mind would have even thought about going to any of those places on holiday anyway. Except Papau New Guinea--I hadn't heard the situation there before this article.

Olympic Hockey Medal Round

2006-02-21T19:53:00.000-05:00

The pairing are set and only bear the slightest resemblance to my preview. I got seven of eight medal round teams right, but a reasonably intelligent chimpanzee could have done that.

Anyway, here is the bracket:

Winner of Finland vs. U.S.A. plays winner of Russia vs. Canada in one semifinal
Winner of Slovakia vs. Czeck Republic plays winner of Switzerland vs. Sweden

Brief Preview and picks:

Sw game
The Swiss scored two surprising upsets over the Czechs and Candians; then proceded to tie two lesser teams. It didn't cost them 2nd place in the group, but still--they were outscored in the preliminary round, and that speaks to a team that isn't as good as its wins look. The Swedes are a better team, and don't want to have a third straight Olympic quarterfinal ouster...I think they'll take it 3-2.

Czechoslovakia game
The formerly united countries face off...the Czech team underperforming and hurt; Slovakia is undefeated and on a roll. I do think the Slovak defense will come back to haunt them, but I think the roll will continue here; Slovaks 4-2.

Summit Series '72 Game
Canada and Russia, minus the whole animosity thing. Did Canada get back on track in defeating the Czechs? The Russians are playing well, only losing to Slovakia while showing the best offensive output of pool play. Canada will probably try to keep this game low scoring and physical--but the Russians are clicking, and Canada will have to find its scoring touch in a hurry. Toughest game for me to call; I'll take Russia in a 5-4 final. This is the most likely game to need a shootout, and if it goes to one I have no idea what will happen.

Game with no catchy reference
Finland allowed two goals in five games. The U.S. has been struggling to score. Gee, what do we think will happen here? The U.S. has improved every game--their effort is closer to where it needs to be, but they still are having difficulty finding the back of the net. Or sometimes, given all the times I've heard "shot wide," finding the net at all. They're also making too many mistakes in giveaways and not covering odd man chances. I don't think they'll find the offense against the currently dominating Finns. Three of the U.S. goals today were against the Russian backup. I say Finland 4, U.S. 1.

Beyond that, I'll run with Finland over Russia; Sweden over the Slovaks; with Finland gold, Sweden silver, and Russia bronze. Note how quickly I abandon my Canada/Sweden/Czech Republic prediction, which is still possible.

Renewing the Call

2006-02-19T12:59:00.000-05:00

Time for me to renew my call to modify the federal holidays. Yes, Washington was very important to this country and we should be cognizant of our history. But we just had a Monday off in January (MLK) after the holiday season; we don't need another day off of work now, in a cold, crappy month, with no holidays coming until the end of May.

When we need it is the first Monday of April. Opening Day. National Pastime, National Holiday--it's got to happen. Tons of people skip work to go to the games anyway, and tons more like me are just this side of useless that day. How does this not make sense? Who's with me?

Olympic Hockey Preview, Part Three--Group B and Medal Round

2006-02-12T12:43:00.000-05:00

Same source cites as Group A preview; I'll make quickie bracket positions based on my predicted order of group finish, which of course will be wrong in several key ways.

Kazakhstan
They have F Nik Antropov of the Maple Leafs and G Vitaliy Kolesnik, who's seen some time with the Avalanche this year. This figures to be a better learning exercise for Colorado than it does anything else. The team upset Germany at the 2005 World Championships, and played some other teams close, so they could surprise with a win over Latvia, a lazy US team, or Slovakia if their goaltending is worse than advertised--but they'll be hard pressed to pull off enough to get to the medal round once and if they catch someone's attention.

Latvia
Latvia is here on the decaying remnants of the Soviet program--they don't have the depth of talent when it doesn't get to train with the best of a huge nation, and they could fall off of the international stage after this. Arturs Irbe should tend net--he led Carolina to the 2002 Stanley Cup Finals. They could steal a win or two--they have some other NHL-caliber players such as "defenseman" Sandis Ozolinsh. (The next day he plays D will be the first.) It will take a collapse by someone else for them to make the medal round, but they do have the ability to take advantage of such a collapse.

Slovakia
The previews I read seem to be very high on Slovakia. As I mentioned before, they're finally getting a fair chance to compete. And they have a power to turn to. Could it be....Satan??

Alright, tired Miorslav Satan joke done. They have a lot of star power up front-Satan, Pavel Demitra, Marian Gaborik, Petr Bondra, and a pair of Hossa brothers. However it's not a very defensive bunch, and while they do have a couple of star defenders (Zdeno Chara and Lubomir Visnovky), the Slovaks are thinner there than any other serious medal contender. You'll notice I haven't mentioned netminders yet--that's their biggest uncertainty. Neither of their goalies are NHL guys, and if it seems like I'm using that as a crutch for analysis, I can only point out that it is the best hockey in the world. When they're open for business. Between that and their thin defensive talent, I don't see them doing as well as some people think. If they are to do well, one of the goalies will have to step up. They will also have conserve the minutes of their top-four defensemen--by staying out of the penalty box, and by putting away teams early (especially the two weak sisters above).

United States
The US team is in transition. The stalwarts of international competition have gotten old and/or retired, and the team has had to get younger--yet, they're still old on defense, led by 44-year-old captain Chris Chelios. He's been a model of solid play and conserving his effort this year for the Red Wings, but can he keep up the effort for 5 games in 8 days on the bigger ice surface? The same is true for much of the rest of the defense, to lesser degrees. Of random note, injury replacement D Bret Hedican will be shooting for the second gold in his family--the other owned by his wife Kristi Yamaguchi.

Their forward core is young-led by Scott Gomez, Eric Cole, and Mark Parrish--but I think it has the scoring potential. They're not speedy but they are quick enough to pay a pressure game and keep the puck in the offensive zone. They could really use the few veterans to step up with some clutch goals--I'm looking at you, Keith Tkachuk.

The US, like Slovakia, is unsettled in net. They've brought Rick DiPietro (NYI), John Grahame (TB), and Robert Esche (PHI). Unfortunately the best US goalie this NHL season has been Ryan Miller (BUF), who was hurt at selection time, so they passed over him. DiPietro should start as he has the capacity to be great--but he hasn't been great much of this season. Grahame and Esche have similarly not played to potential, but instead of great-> OK they've been more decent->blah->downright crappy. Someone has to step up for the US to medal, and DiPietro's the best bet.

Overall this looks like more of a transition year to a team with a strong chance in Vancouver in 2010. The US will have to bust its collective butt if they want to medal. Coach Peter Laviolette might want to play a soundbite from Miracle--"You don't have enough talent to win on talent alone." They have to win the majority of loose pucks and pounce on the majority of rebounds in both ends. They have to come away from the special teams (i.e. man-advantage) situations with a substantial plus in goals. Any medal would be a good result--but it's not out of the question that if they play up to 90% of their potential they can take the gold. One break they get is starting with Kazakhstan and Latvia, so they potentially get two games to ramp up to top speed. Or they could lose one of them and blow their chances.

Russia
I had difficulty rating these last three teams, and I strongly considered putting the US ahead of Russia. The Russians are talented but dysfunctional. Pavel Bure was appointed GM, and this led a lot of the better Russian players (Fedorov and Zubov among them) to pass on the competition. The fact that the Russian federation is still largely controlled with an old-guard mentality has not done anything for team loyalty, chemistry, or sense of nationalism, and Russian teams since 1998 have been characterized my infighting and lack of cohesion.

That being said, they've medaled in both of the professional Olympics, and still have some of the best talent in the world. They've added some young players and could conceivably ice a line of Alexander Ovechkin (presumptive NHL Rookie of the Year), Pavel Datsyuk (he of the Jedi puck control skills), and Ilya Kovalchuk (no defense sniper extraordinaire.) That line might even make Jack Bauer wet himself. The rest of the forwards (including Alexei Yashin, Alexander Kovalev) should add goals and creative playmaking but little grit. The grit will be made up on defense, where Darius Kasparitis never met a check he didn't like. Sergei Gonchar is also on the blue line, and can add great puck movement if he pulls his head out of his butt, where he's had it all year for the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Evgeni Nabokov looks to get the start in goal with Khabibulin hurting, as soon as he finishes his draft of Lolita. He's seemed to struggle a bit this year, but I think that's as much the change in the new rules changing expectations for goalies as anything. That, and San Jose isn't great in front of him. I think he'll be decent and lead the Russians to second in the group, but that USA-Russia matchup on the last day of pool play could be pivotal and a helluva game.

Sweden
Salt Lake City. 2002. An innocent floater fro Vladimir Kopat of Belarus hits Tommy Salo's mask and bounces across the goal line. And since that day, Sweden have been gacking in international competitions.

I think it stops here. They haven't had a netminder step up, and now they have Henrik Lundqvist, wowing the NHL for the New York Rangers after rocking the Swedish Elite League during the lockout. They've got playmaking up and down the lineup, and while losing Markus Naslund hurts, they've replaced him with Tomas Holmstrom. Holmstrom will be the worst skater of any of the top 8 contenders, but he will be digging for rebounds and screening the opposition goaltender like mad, and that adds something Sweden didn't have that they might need to turn to. They have veterans with international experience (Sundin, Forsberg if he's healthy) and exciting youth (e.g., Zetterberg, the Sedin twins). Their defense is top notch on both ends of the ice, led by steady Nick Lidstrom, still playing 30 minutes a night at age 35 in the NHL. He won't need to here, but he'll be on the ice at all crucial times. Russia will get the attention as the "creative" team but I think Sweden's even better at it.

Of course, one loss and, like Canada, they'll have a nation on their backs, right next to the monkey. If Forsberg is out they'll lose their most dominant forward, but I think they have the depth to handle it. I think they'll be eager to put forth a good showing and come out on top of this group.

So that leaves me with these matchups (& wild-ass guesses) for the medal round:

Sweden vs. Germany--Sweden
Czech Republic vs. USA--Czechs
Russia vs. Finland--Russia
Canada vs. Slovakia--Canada

Sweden over Czechs & Canada over Russia in the semis.

Bronze medal: Czechs over Russia:
Silver: Sweden
Gold: Canada

Olympic Hockey Preview, Part Two--Group A

2006-02-08T19:58:00.000-05:00

For this and the Group B preview, I've gotten information from this CBC preview; Kevin DuPont and Bill Clement writing about team USA at MSNBC; Scott Burnside's breakdowns at ESPN; and John McGourty's preview at NHL.com

In worst-to-first order:

Italy
You see, the host country not only gets a free pass into every sport, they are required to field a team in them. Hence this cannon fodder. No current NHL's on the squad, the only name I recognized was G Jason Muzzati, and that just goes to show I've watched too much hockey. They do have another goalie named Gunther Hell,
which is awesome. Maybe they get up for a "border war" against Switzerland, but other than that it will probably be a bigger upset that Belarus over Sweden if they win a game.

Switzerland
The Swiss have an improving hockey program based on their international standing--but only two NHLers, and both netminders (Colorado's David Aebischer and Carolina's Martin Gerber). Depth is way way overrated in these short tournaments, so I'm leery of those counting multiple netminders as a strength--though with 5 games in 7 days in the preliminary round, and the quarterfinals making it 6 in 8, there might be something to be said for the stronger teams having multiple goalies to turn to. The
Switzerland-Germany game will probably decide the 4th medal round team out of this group, although a goalie really standing on his head might steal one from a better team.

Germany
Olaf Kolzig! That's what there is to know about Germany. OK, Marco Sturm and Johan Hecht are NHL-caliber forwards who should contribute enough for Germany to hold its own and beat down lesser teams. Kolzig's last few seasons on the Capitals have gotten him used to being peppered by more talented teams, so he may be able to parlay a steady hand into greater things, even a quarterfinal win. If Belarus can do it, I'm sure he could steal one. I can't say that it's likely though. Burnside thinks they may be in trouble if the obstruction crackdown is severe, and spend too much time on the penalty kill to accomplish anything.

The team is coached by Uwe Krupp, whom I hate for basically stealing four years worth of salary from the Red Wings after being signed from Colorado. I think he was an Avalanche plant.

Finland
Finland, Finland, Finland...the country where I quite want to be. The Finns by far have the coolest names in all of hockey. Teppo Numinenn! Antti Laaksonen! Saku Koivu! I would have had the Finns as far underrated in this tournament until recently--their previous weakness at the international level had been goaltending, but lately Finnish goaltenders have made headway in the NHL.

However it looks like likely starters Mikka Kipprusoff and Kari Lehtonen will be sidelined with injuries, and the team will have to turn to Antero Nittymaki (another awesome name!). He's been capable with the Flyers this season, but there may not be the trust there for the team to gel around. Other injuries to Tuomo Ruutu and Sami Kapanen will also hurt the team's frontline and depth.

The Finns have always played a tough, hardworking game that pushes their opponents to the limit. I have them third in this group but they do have a chance to win gold, especially if they stay pesky on offense. Of note, since the medal round will use shootouts if need be, is that forward Jussi Jonkinen is 8-for-8 for Dallas in the shootout this year.

Czech Republic
Another team with an enviable choice in goal, between legend Dominic Hasek (still succeeding in the NHL at age 41) and Tomas Vokoun. Both tremendous on regular play and shootouts and can cover for a team that may be weak defensively. Their D will move the puck well, but doesn't have a physical presence and the forwards won't help with that. Jiri Fischer will be missed here. They do play a cohesive game that looks to create off of turnovers and the transition game, which can be a problem if they fall behind, and other teams don't have to come at them. The Czechs have the advantage of half their team already playing for the New York Rangers, so they might have some lines that start clicking while other teams are still getting over the jet
lag. They also have a good blend of experience dating back to the Nagano games and hungry young players. They're a definite favorite to medal and probably have the best chance of displacing Canada for the gold.

Canada
Well, I tipped my hand there, but I'm not about to buck the field on this one. I wouldn't say they're the overwhelming favorite (i.e. more likely to win gold than not), but definitely the favorite, and it's not really close. They could possibly field two medal-caliber teams, and in making their choices they thought well about how to win a team game, adding players like Kris Draper and Shane Doan who will provide the grit and mucking rather than just taking the 20 best shooters. They should be able to play to any style of game that develops and succeed at it. Goalie Martin Brodeur is still probably the best in the game, has a gold already, and his backup Roberto Luongo would probably start for every other team here except the Czechs.

However, the flip side of this is the crushing expectations. Anything short of a repeat gold will be a disappointment, and even a relatively meaningless pool-play loss will be dissected and lamented back home. The multiple options mean some good players will be left home or on the taxi squad, and a loss will bring out questions as to why so-and-so wasn't playing.

Although many of the respected veterans are retired or not playing (e.g. Lemieux, Yzerman, Kariya), Canada does return 17 from its undefeated 2004 World Cup squad. The younger stars like Jarome Iginla will have to step up a bit. Their defense corps is getting a little banged up and that could force some heavy minutes on the healthier players. But they still should come out of this group as a favorite to win it all.

We Interrupt This Hockey News to Bring You Nationals Follies

2006-02-07T22:54:00.000-05:00

Ah, the DC City council rejected the stadium lease in a mix of craven pandering and principled opposition. This effectively renegs on the agreement they signed last year and baseball will now take the city to arbitration, as per agreed upon remedies in the agreement. Almost certainly they will win, and get more money out of the city than that agreement stipulated, all in all. And, of course MLB still won't sell the team...obstensibly so that they can be the bad guys who forced the arbitration, and the new owner starts "clean". I still think a real owner would have gotten something worked out because it was in his best interests to sacrifice anything in the name of good relations.

Don't believe the "they're leaving" hype; they still have nowhere to go, and if anyplace becomes remotely plausible the Marlins have dibs. However, early this season Selig can notify the Player's Association that he intends to contract two teams, and the players cannot contest (per the last labor agreement.) Since Selig does not have to name the teams, I now expect he'll waive this baton to scare DC, South Florida and Minnesota into coughing up corporate welfare in the form of stadia.

UPDATE: Well, staying up later than even I do, the council approved a lease with a spending cap. Baseball probably won't be happy with that but they'll have to live with it, as they claim the construction company is already on the hook for some overruns as currently detailed. See Boswell's column for more info, but keep in mind that as he's been pining for basebal since the expansion Senators left, he plans to hold his breath and turn blue if the Nationals try to pull up stakes.

Olympic Hockey Preview, Part One

2006-02-07T20:49:00.000-05:00

I thought I'd cull together information from some sources to go over the 12 teams in the upcoming Men's Olympic Hockey Tournament. I'll certainly watch some of the Women's tournament, but I won't be into it enough to preview it.

The IIHF website has this handy schedule, although it's in local time in Torino; subtract 6 hours for EST. Also, the complete rosters can be found there, as are the world rankings referenced below.

NHL referees will be used, and we're supposed to see the obstruction crackdown continue. If the players relapse and the refs don't then we should see special teams (power play and penalty kill) play a huge role. I supsect the players won't relapse, as fewer "muckers" will make the all-star-like rosters and they will be using the wider (by 13.5 feet) international ice surface. The neutral zone will also be larger at the expense of the offensive zones, more like the pre-lockout NHL. ESPN has the other major rules differences.

The twelve participants are divided into two preliminary round-robin pools; the top four in each group will advance to the medal round for a single-elimination tournament. This is a change from the first two Olympiads with NHL players, where they had two four-team preliminary pools, the winners of each advanced to join another four-team pool consisting of themselves and the six "big" nations (USA, Canada, Russia, Finland, Sweden, Czech Rep.). Since the NHL would not shut down in time for the preliminary pool, the seventh-best team, Slovakia, got hosed--their players could only play the early games if their NHL teams consented to let them go early. Germany, whose hopes have always ridden on Washington Captials goalie Olaf Kolzig, also got screwed over. I'm glad they've finally rectified this. The two groups (World Ranking in parentheses)

Group A:
Canada (1), Czech Republic (3), Finland (7), Switzerland (8), Germany (10), Italy (19)
Group B:
Sweden (2), Slovakia (4), Russia (5), USA (6), Latvia (9), Kazakhstan (15)

Sometime before the tournament starts a week from Wednesday, I'll get previews of each of those two groups up. They'll largely be based on my personal compilation and interpretation of "experts" that I'll be sure to link to & reference, but I'll interject my original thoughts (if I have any) as well.

Jack Bauer vs. Chuck Norris

2006-02-01T22:31:00.000-05:00

Random facts about Jack Bauer (favorite: "Jack Bauer has been to Mars. Thats why there's no life on Mars.") and random facts about Chuck Norris (favorite: "Oxygen requires Chuck Norris to live.")

Renew! Renew!

2006-01-26T23:20:00.000-05:00

No, not back to this crap, but just a post about how I've renewed my Nationals tickets. Of course, I could only renew Plan B, but I want Plan A this year. I'm supposed to call in a couple of weeks and see if I can switch that. If not, I suppose the only bad deal is a few more afternoon games that I think I'll be able to skip away to, plus having to buy 3 Cubs tickets instead of two.

Cringe-worthy Doublespeak

2006-01-18T08:00:00.000-05:00

OK, so death row inmate Clarence Allen (I'm refusing to participate in the "murderer gets their middle name listed" convention) wanted to be allowed to expire if he had another heart attack before his execution. This was refused. Now, I can see the prison wanting to preserve opportunities for clemency or making sure that sentences were carried out as intended. But I don't think you can justify it the way Vernell Crittendon did:

At no point are we not going to value the sanctity of life.

Nope, we will respect life right up until we end it. If you want to be in favor of capital punishment, fine--I'm against it, for the record--but let's not pretend the system we have now treats all life as sacred. Perhaps "all life that has not committed horrible transgressions," but this attitude of pretending this is not state-sanctioned killing irritates me. Again, if you're ok with that as it is, fine. But come out and say it.

Hmm...Not Sure How I Feel About This.

2006-01-11T23:18:00.000-05:00

On one hand, thanks to my support of the teaching of actual science, I now have a song about my very own name. On the other hand...I have a dorky song about my very own name.

01 + 05 = 06

2006-01-05T23:24:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year! I ain't got nuthin' to say but I'd better get back on schedule. DC Baseball is still a pissing contest, Pat Robertson is still batshit crazy, Alex Ovechkin is still a really good hockey player. Oh yeah, and the state of Virginia is going to allow some DNA testing to see if a man who was sentenced to execution is innocent. Too bad they already carried out that sentence.

Happy Solstice!

2005-12-24T00:12:00.000-05:00

Whatever you may be celebrating, enjoy the fact that the days in the Northern Hemisphere are getting longer again.

I am headed to the ancestral homelands for a few days before Christmas, and job applications may keep me busy a bit when I get back, so I taking this as an "announced vacation" of the posting schedule until after New Year's. Maybe I'll get one in, maybe I won't, but for sure in '06 it will be back the two-a-week minimum.

One 6'3" 245 lb Reason to Root Against Team Canada

2005-12-21T23:53:00.000-05:00

Todd Bertuzzi, sucker-puncher par excellence, was named to Canada's Olympic hockey roster. I'm not terribly pleased by this; I was disappointed he was playing already this season--if it were up to me, I'd have let him sit 41 games this season (and maybe train with the team, but not see game action, for the last ten of that.) That would have felt right to me. Anything starting with 20 would have been acceptable.

But implicit in all of that would be that wasn't welcome on the Olympic team. True, he's already missed 2 world championships, the 2004 World Cup and was prohibited from going to Europe during the lockout. But, as much as the spirit of friendly (if intense) competition that I understood the Games to be about is mostly gone, I think Bertuzzi's actions were just too chickenshit to allow him on the stage. True, it's not my country he's representing, but he's a walking embarrassment to hockey and its community. I would be rooting for Team USA anyway--my jingoism only comes out for international sporting competitions--but I can say I'll be disappointed if Bertuzzi gets to wear a medal around his neck. It will just remind me of the brace Steve Moore had to wear around his.

Tampa Report

2005-12-19T22:03:00.000-05:00

Wings win, 6-3. I spent approximately 28 hours in Florida and never saw the sun. I saw them literally carving housing developments out of the swamp from the descending plane. I mean, I knew this is what they did, but it was still odd to see dense greenery intercut by creeks and small ponds, surrounding a housing development next to a equally sized clear-cut area (obviously the next development) adjacent to it. Oh, and pools, despite being surrounded by swamp and bay. And they're surprised they get alligators in them....

We had a great time at the game, and just catching up. Lightning fans, in general, seemed pretty knowledgeable, and definitely into the game. There were fewer Red Wings fans that there were in DC last Friday. The homers directly behind us were real homers, as in "we should never have a penalty called on us and every breath by the opposition is a penalty" type. But they weren't too obnoxious and the row of Wings fans we were in got to rise to our feet and cheer a goal six times. And thanks to the little blinking ornament they handled out at the game, and Shane's method of storing it in his back pocket, they got treated to blinking ass every time.

The St. Pete Times Forum is a loud place though. They don't skimp on the decibels, and Shane compared the goal horn to the Titanic about to crash into the stadium. It's a decent place to see a game though.

Meeting of the Blogs

2005-12-16T23:50:00.000-05:00

I am headed off to Tampa to meet up with Shane, proprietor of The Perveted Mule, for the Detroit Red Wings-Tampa Bay Lightning game. Should be a good matchup of the winners of two of the last three Cups. Of course it is dangerous to have us in the same place at the same time; remember, control of the Manistee High blogs goes to Mike if we are taken out.

I'll be back late Sunday, so early next week should have a report on the game as well as any mobile strip clubs we can get to the hotel parking lot.

Politics and Baseball

2005-12-14T22:53:00.000-05:00

I don't elect anyone to legislate over entertainment industries, like baseball. So I was pissed about the steroid hearings, not because I'm pro-steroid but because there are a lot of better things to focus on.

This one is not directly Congress's fault, but they do keep the useless Cuban embargo going: The Cubans will not be allowed to field a team of (not-yet-defected) players for the World Baseball Classic. This is just crap. We can't even have a friendly baseball competition?

The Amazing Race 8 is Finally Over

2005-12-13T20:05:00.000-05:00

The Hope girls are still in it. I could handle the Linzes winning. The Weavers winning would be an abomination to all that is good and holy, of course. So no doubt they will win.

The first job application...is away

2005-12-12T23:58:00.000-05:00

Well, one job application is out, and the second just needs its cover letter to go out tomorrow. Then I've probably got a week if I think of anything to add to the package. I kind of like my statement of teaching philosophy, at least as well as I can in the abstract. If I get a chance to be completely in charge of a class or eight, my thoughts may have to adjust. As for the research part...I dunno. We'll see. It might be a little vague, but I won't worry too much about it because it's not for me to determine.

You'd think it would be awful to have to send one priority envelope at this time of year, but the nearest post office has an ATM-style machine with scale for those not afraid of technology. Had to wait behind one slow guy, 5 minutes in all.

The Amazing Race 8-"The Family Christmas Card"

2005-12-06T21:51:00.000-05:00

Posting this near the end...at least the Detour was cool. Roadblock was a payola thing and kind of stunk.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year.

2005-12-04T14:17:00.000-05:00

No, not Christmas/Festivus/etc. NFL Playoff Scenarios are out!!

I'm just fascinated by all the bizzare combinations of wins and losses (and ties! don't forget ties!) that can lead to states where the bizarrest of tiebreaker conditions are fulfilled. Best net touchdowns, division, anyone?

The Amazing Race 8--"Don't Talk to Me Like I was an Animal or Something"

2005-11-29T19:16:00.000-05:00

Sorry no post last week...no, not really. My hate for the Weavers burns with the fury of a thousand suns. Which is just what they want.

And your Xbox freezing up represents the Rapture

2005-11-28T22:58:00.000-05:00

(Yeah, that was an unannounced posting absence, but I really was on vacation home. Sue me.)

OK, I know every movie needs its damn computer game tie-in now. But I'm a little wierded out by this rule applying to that Christian semi-allegory, The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. Is playing through the game now symbolic of your journey through sin to redemption? I'd let this go, except they are now prominently advertising going to the game's website to get the cheat code. Now, this seems wrong somehow--wouldn't Aslan and/or Jesus want you to defeat the game honestly? And what could the cheat code represent in the allegory? My suggestion is that it represents selling indulgences. Share your suggestions in the comments.

Colored Soap Bubbles and a New Class of Dyes

2005-11-18T00:18:00.000-05:00

Even for those of you not terribly interested in surfactant physics/chemistry, this is a bitchin' Popular Science article on a years-long quest to make colored soap bubbles--ending in a clever set of new temporary chemical dyes.

And you Thought I Was Kidding About That Civ Addict Thing

2005-11-16T23:47:00.000-05:00

New Scientist:
"Excessive computer gaming has the hallmarks of addiction"

To be fair, they do seem to have picked their controls right--studying gamers who have not reported social problems from their hobby with those who have let gaming interfere with work in socializing. So this is not some anti-gaming "think of the children" crackpot stuff.

That being said, it's not surprising: lots of things can be addictive without a chemical trigger. I just find it funny the silly "Civanon" ad campaign apparently has a real life counterpart.

Now if you'll excuse me, the Romans are encroaching on my territory, and I have to spend three or four hours kicking their butts across the continent.

Imminent Carousel

2005-11-15T17:50:00.000-05:00

If you see any Sandmen coming, give me a heads up, will ya?

Oops. Too late.

The Amazing Race 8--"You Look Ridiculous"

2005-11-08T07:27:00.000-05:00

Two hours tonight. Lord, if it is Your will, get rid of the Weavers.

Civic Duty

2005-11-07T22:19:00.000-05:00

For whatever odd reason, Virginia has state officer elections the year after the Presidential cycle. So I get to vote tomorrow. I don't think I've voted at a booth since...I'm not sure when. I know it would have been at the pink firehouse in Manistee (I know it's red in that photo, but it used to be this color)...I think during the 1996 Presidential primary. But the question then is why would I have been home from Hope? Winter or Spring break, maybe.

Anyway, since I never got around to voting in Chicago, all my balloting has been absentee since then. Tomorrow I get to walk to the elementary school across the road and stand in line. Should be fun. At least the annoying advertising will end--Republican Jerry Kilgore is trying to paint Democrat Tim Kaine as inhuman or something, when it's Kilgore who was used a grieving widow to call Kaine "soft on the death penalty, as Kaine opposes it on the basis of his Catholic faith. The spot actually has a policeman's widow on the verge of tears, upset that Kaine would be against executing her husband's murderer. (I mean, I'm sympathetic, but this is part of the reason the laws are left to representatives duly elected by the body politic, and not by people necessarily running on emotion.) At any rate, I found it to be a cheap, pandering, disgusting ploy by Kilgore--and while I certainly would have agreed with the Democrat on most issues most of the time, had the roles been flip-flopped I could not have voted for Kaine. I was that turned off by the ad.

Jacques Demers

2005-11-03T19:38:00.000-05:00

News came out today that former NHL coach Jacques Demers is illiterate. Wow. That one's hard to believe--he even had some GM duties for a while, meaning he was getting assistants to handle the details of contracts for him. That would sound possible, except for the fact that no one but his wife knew about it. The reason for his illiteracy can be traced to the horrible circumstances of an abusive upbringing. I have to be quite impressed that he seems to be one of the guys who came out of awful circumstances relatively alright. And that you can manage to hide it and apparently no one thought twice about it.

The Amazing Race 8--"I'm Sick of Doing Stuff I Can't Do."

2005-11-01T18:54:00.000-05:00

More Godlewski multiple-underwear madness!

CBS really needs to work on their adds; I didn't especially want to find out during football on Sunday that it was in __________. Of course, maybe that's all they've got to sell this season...

The Makers of Civilization IV care about their customers

2005-10-30T13:12:00.000-05:00

Civilization, the classic computer game encompassing all of history, is back. The fourth release came out this week and I picked it up yesterday.

I am quoting directly from the manual here:

The Clock Options Screen lets you turn on and off a clock to time how long you've been playing, as well as set an alarm to let you know when you should stop playing and go to work. Or eat.

Of course, they had the fabulous ad campaign at civanon.org which appears to be down (overwhelmed or ended, I'm not sure.) I'm happy to announce that the game seems no less addictive and I made good use of my extra hour this weekend. In particular, many of the more tedious actions have been removed, automated or at least present you with more choices so that it's not A, B, repeat.

So if I vanish for a while...yeah, you know where I am. I just have to get my civilization to research Gunpowder...

The Amazing Race 8--"We're Getting Out of the Country, Girls"

2005-10-25T00:12:00.000-04:00

I can get the titles now from my digitial cable, but unfortunately they spoiled their destination for me. It is indeed out of the U.S.; I'm not sure it's exciting. And I'm pretty damn sure someone will make me ashamed to be an American.

No Pain, No Gain

2005-10-23T22:00:00.000-04:00

Gain: Thanks to a concerted effort at laundry today, I have reacquired visual on my bedroom floor. (This is not to say it's all done--the hampers are full--but it's all where it needs to be.)

Pain: I pulled my lower back at some point doing it.

Worse Pain: I'm still sore from touch football yesterday, and the back was the only thing that wasn't hurting.

Of course it was touch football about two hundred feet from the Washington Monument, so that was pretty cool. Sadly, we won't be going back there--when this group used to play there before they renovated the grounds, it was pretty flat; now it's not. There are some flatter spaces in West Potomac Park, so that's where we'll be from now on.

I'm still impressed so much recreation--football, sunbathing, jogging, Frisbee, etc.--takes place right in the midst of the corridors of power. It's a neat symbol of the openness of our society and our government. Well, at least in the idealized case of our government, as opposed to the current incarnation thereof.

Hmm...I thought this was going to be a "whether I have anything to say or not" post, but I guess it came around to a point. Fancy that.

The Amazing Race 8--"Think Like an Office Chair"

2005-10-18T21:00:00.000-04:00

OK, I'll try...

"Holy crap, this guy has a fat ass."

I couldn't agree more

2005-10-17T07:54:00.000-04:00

Amazon.com decided to remind me that I've bought Elvis movies for my mother for holidays past.

So they sent me an email.

Subject line: Amazon.com recommends Girls! Girls! Girls!

Slow TV Technology Adopter

2005-10-10T22:39:00.000-04:00

I'm surprised how slow I've been to start utilizing the features of my cable box completely. I still don't usually start watching something halfway through so I can zip through the commercials, although obviously I do that if I tape it. (You can get a hockey game down to 90 minutes that way, so that may be the way to go. I might consider also taping the last 1/2 of 1/3 of west coast Red Wings starts, and finishing it over breakfast.) Only recently have I started pausing live TV to answer the phone or run to the kitchen, and replaying goals and close calls and such in slow-motion. Just now it occurred to me I could use the picture-in-picture to follow both the ALDS and Monday Night Football.

Seriously, I feel I should be quicker on the uptake with all this...

The Amazing Race 8--"I Don't Kiss, I Make Out!"

2005-10-10T22:17:00.000-04:00

Heh heh...hope for me and the Hope chicks yet.

This week's US Heritage lesson will include NASA. And probably regurgitation.

Yes, someone got paid to design this

2005-10-06T23:59:00.000-04:00

In honor of hockey restarting, let me present the goofiest major professional sport logo ever:

Trust the Gorton's Fisherman!

Let me also add that NHL Center Ice is awesome, and I intend to never leave my couch again.

The Amazing Race 8--"How Do We Know We're Not Going to Get Shot?"

2005-10-03T23:29:00.000-04:00

Gettysburg, Manassas, or Antietam?

Smart money's on Gettysburg. Antietam was the bloodiest, and might fit the stretcher theme best. Manassas is the only one I've been to.

They've got to be coming to DC in this very special Americana race, so I'll let you know if I can do any lame location scouting once we've seen it.

Oh, and you're not going to get shot because it's a freaking game show, you lamer. Whoever provided the episode quote will be excused from my pathetic wrath if they are under 12.

The end of the Nationals season

2005-10-03T23:14:00.000-04:00

Well, we had quite a good time at the ballpark on Sunday. They didn't put on a great showing, but there were a lot of Phillies fans (?phans?) who came down to watch their team and to scoreboard watch, seeing if the Astros would lose and force a playoff. So naturally we chanted "Let's go Astros!" a lot.

The cheerleader in front of me--this is the hummus guy I blogged about before, and whose approval I have apparently won--managed to get chants going with all of his friends for each fielder, in succession, until they acknowledged our section. That was pretty dorky cool, actually. And they even got on Mr. Church ("Who's your rab-bi?") and he promptly hit a homer. Which even I had to cheer.

The team took the field--after letting Philly finish their post-game self-congratulations--to further rousing standing ovations. It was quite the feel-good close to a feel-good season, despite it ending with a sweep at home.

So the Nationals hit what I thought was their absolute upside, at .500. It's a little disappointing that they do it by going 50-31 and then 31-50, but I can't complain. It was a heck of a summer. I'll definitely get tickets again next year, maybe in a pool. We'll see.

Time for the baseball playoffs--starting tomorrow at 1, in Stevis's annual week of seriously reduced production--and hockey season.

Transcendent Importance

2005-09-29T00:08:00.000-04:00

Senator John McCain at today's steroid hearings:

Don't you understand that this is an issue of such transcendent importance that you should have acted months ago?

Funny. I'd say the same thing about securing the levees in New Orleans. Or perhaps ensuring that important government posts are filled with competent people. Or, you know, exercising oversight power over the President's use of the military. I sure as hell wouldn't say that about an entertainment option that no one is obliged to support at the federal level. (Yes, of course, sports teams do extort awful sums of money from state and local governments...)

I love baseball, but this is not an issue of "transcendent importance." Vast swaths of America couldn't give a crap, especially when so much of the focus was the integrity of the game as opposed to "think of the children" which at least you can squint your eyes and justify.

Banned Books Week

2005-09-26T23:22:00.000-04:00

To keep with my "real post" commitment, I'll remind you all it's Banned Books Week. Check out the list of 100 most frequently banned books of the 90s. How many have you read?

I've read 14 (4,5,7,13,22,37,41,47,56,70,77,83,84,97). Actually, number 97 (The View from the Cherry Tree) was read to us in 6th grade, but I'm counting it. Once again I find myself amazed that the public school system in Manistee was as non-repressive as it was--for a rural education, we could have had it a lot worse. I do remember one board member trying to pull The Catcher in the Rye (#13) from the cirriculum, and it not even getting to us protesting at the board meeting, as all the other board members laughed it off.

The Amazing Race 8--"Go Mommy, Go! We Can Beat Them"

2005-09-26T23:14:00.000-04:00

Aiyee...that title fits with all the fears we have for this season.

Anyway, here's the Spoilerific Discussion Thread to bitch...or be pleasantly surprised.

Nah, to bitch.

I'd wanted to use the fan votes to calculate betting odds of elimination and of winning, but the CBS site isn't doing polls right now.

Hatblog's slight rooting interests lie with the Bransen family, as they have Hope connections. Go Dutch!

I have one fewer National to root for

2005-09-19T21:25:00.000-04:00

I wanted to point out this article in the Washington Post about chapel service in baseball, particularly with the Nationals. Services are organized by a group called (appropriately enough) Baseball Chapel.

Now, let me say that I don't think religion is inherently a bad thing, and I don't find fault with people who find strength in it. I certainly don't think it's a bad thing to set aside a place for non-mandatory services for the athletes whose job scheduled pretty much preclude a normal in-season worship routine.

However I am going to find fault with this:

The players not only pray, but they also discuss personal matters -- marital tension, addiction issues, family illnesses, financial stress -- drawing sometimes surprising lessons. [Ryan] Church was concerned because his former girlfriend was Jewish. He turned to [chaplain Jon] Moeller, "I said, like, Jewish people, they don't believe in Jesus. Does that mean they're doomed? Jon nodded, like, that's what it meant. My ex-girlfriend! I was like, man, if they only knew. Other religions don't know any better. It's up to us to spread the word."

Yes, Mr. Aptly-Named, you were blessed with a monopoly on religious truth. All the beauty, inner peace, strength, and grace afforded by other faiths is crap and the vast billions of this ignorant world need the pearls of wisdom you dispense, if only they could reach up to your perch upon your high horse. And aren't you glad you dumped her, Mr. Church? You'd hate to be lying down with the infidel.

Now I know this is a news piece, and Church didn't go seeking attention, preaching from dugout roof or anything. So I'm being unfair by holding him up as an example of an attitude I despise, without any specific actions to criticize. Well, too bad, I feel like sounding off: Shut up, live your faith, judge not lest ye be judged, and play baseball. It's the sheer condescension in his statement above (and in the chaplain's attitude) that really cheeses me off.

That, and the fact that despite my relatively high opinion of Church as a ballplayer, he still couldn't hold these guys' jocks. But, you know, if only they knew.

Avast!

2005-09-19T07:29:00.000-04:00

Best be ye not fergettin', today (the 19th) be National Talk Like a Pirate Day. Hoist a mug o' grog, ye bilge rats, and unfurl the Jolly Roger, or I'll se ye keelhaulled. Arr!

Rafting Report--Alive, Pancreas in One Piece, A Little Low on Adrenaline.

2005-09-11T10:01:00.000-04:00

The rafting was awesome. We floated down the Gauley river, surrounded by forested canyon walls on a perfect day--sunny, low 80s, just a bit of haze to shroud some of the more distant peaks. This was the first weekend of a three-week period when they release a large volume of water from the dam above the river, in an agreement to give a set period of quality rapids. (They used to release the water anyway for management purposes, but eventually the rafting outfits realized they could make a tourist season if they asked the authorities to do it at a set time rather than "sometime in the fall.")

There's nothing I've experienced quite like bouncing over 3-4 foot high swells which are more or less standing waves set up by water rushing over the rocks. I took a couple of broadsides from walls of water, but it really wasn't too hard to stay in the boat, despite the stories below. Then again I have a nice low center of gravity. Going through a rapid that is an 8-10 foot drop over about 100 feet is something that I'd have to recommend you try at least once. And it wasn't all that scary. Now, the 10 foot waterfall on the Upper Gauley...yeah, I don't know if I'm up for that.

The rapids were swift but we were guided well, although we dumped two people in one of the Class V's (Upper Mash) when we grazed on rock on the front right and our front right passenger flew into our front left passenger, and they took a spill. We had to yank them back in. Yours truly did a fair share of the yanking, thus proving that I know which safety lectures to listen to and which ones are safe to ignore. That was by far the freakiest part; as we were still in the middle of the rapids, trying to get people back in, with very little ability to control our path while we were focused on rescue. But it turned out just fine. We also lost two people (Bess and the poor front right passenger) when our guide missed a rock as she was watching another stuck boat in fairly still water. But that was an even easier rescue. Nonetheless, we clearly earned our merit badges in "yanking people from the water."

I definitely can recommend our outfit, Class VI, as we were well lead and well fed.
It worked out well for my insulin pump, as our tour leader's husband was also and insulin pump user--and raft guide. So she had plenty of experience in keeping a diabetic safe. (For the record, we threw the pump and my meter in a "dry box", and kept it safe there, and pulled it out for lunch.)

If you think this sounds cool...well, you're right, and I'd highly recommend you check it out.

Hatblog: Remote From the Mountain State

2005-09-09T22:27:00.000-04:00

Who knew you could get the Internets in West Virginia? Well, OK, I did, since I saw my hotel had free wifi (like I said at Christmas, this should be an expectation and not a perk at this point.) Anyway, why the hell am I in Beckley, WV tonight? Pete talked me into meeting him and his lovely bride Bess to go whitewater rafting tomorrow. I've never done that and it should be fun, as long as I manage not to break my $5,000 pancreas. I will gladly sacrifice bones, short of my skull, to not break that. I do have a hardened, plastic, waterproof enclosure for it. Or perhaps I'll take it off and take shots at lunch and after the trip. I'm not sure yet.

I had my first Google Maps failure, as it decided to confuse the "Hylton lane" this hotel is on (which is course the access road in the middle of hotels, Applebee's, etc.) and a Hilton lane which acquainted me with some of those 16.4% of families below the poverty line the Wikipedia article mentions. But hey, it's not a real vacation until you get lost, right?

Ranting at CNN

2005-09-07T08:12:00.000-04:00

I've ranted about this before, but I haven't blogged it, so there.

Which one of these "Breaking News" emails they sent me yesterday (I am signed up for them) is not like the others:

-- New Orleans mayor issues order authorizing the forced removal of people refusing to leave the city.

-- Louisiana Superdome, where thousands were stranded after Katrina, is likely to be torn down, state official tells CNN.

-- Actor Bob Denver, 70, of TV's "Gilligan's Island" fame has died, his agent tells The Associated Press.

Oh, yes, let me stop what I'm doing and weep. Gilligan is dead.

Seriously, they consider it a news alert all the time when some two-bit celebrity has died at a sufficiently old age, and it irks me. Rehnquist, Pope John Paul II...these are deaths worth alerting me of. Given everything that's going on, this should even make the news, let alone bother me with.

Also this morning, I don't know who the weatherman was, but he was talking about Tropical Storm Ophelia, and had to comment, "Hmm. Unusual name. Don't know about that." Way to whip out that classical training, there, sir.

Sticking My Fingers in My Ears, Chanting "La-La-La"

2005-09-05T20:59:00.000-04:00

As if my outrage fatigue wasn't bad enough, Will's all over a lot of the issues, The First Idiot is staging photo ops in the middle of the disaster, and the statements he and FEMA director Mike Brown have made to the effect of "no one could predict this" are discredited by...oh, well, two posts down, and all the news organizations linked therein, and the experts they quote...oh hell, Jeff Masters says it better in his new Katrinablog:

A horror unimagined by anyone, except by every hurricane scientist and government emergency management official for the past forty years and more. It was a certainty that New Orleans would suffer a catastrophe like this.

So, one last comment which forms a segue into talking about something else, and then I am going to perform metaphorically the title action of this post for a bit. Bush went back to New Orleans today...and at the Nats game, we clearly saw Marine One go overhead on the way back. At 3:52 PM EDT. When I know, from watching CNN this morning, that he was in the White House at 8 AM. Nice trip. The nation's got a fuel crunch, and he can't even be bothered to stay long enough to hand out a blanket or something.

Segue: Nats game! They won 5-2 and still hot in the wild card chase. Let me tell you, even if it's a holiday, there's nothing like being at the ballpark on a sunny weekday afternoon. Especially if the doofuses around you want Livan Hernandez pinch hit for in the 8th, despite the fact that any healthy body on the bench who is actually better than him has already been used, and he comes through with a two-out single to key the rally that breaks the game open. Good times.

Also spread the smile vibe: My hovercraft is full of eels. Just because.

Aftermath

2005-08-30T18:04:00.000-04:00

You've probably satisfied your need for Katrina knowledge before coming here, but I feel like posting a follow-up, given what's happened...

With the levee breaches--two of them now, apparently--Steve Gregory's blog at Weather Underground terms it "a 'slow motion version' of the worst case scenario for New Orleans." A lot of the info I'm going to collect here for you comes from somewhere on nola.com, which is the home for the Times-Picayune, (author of the report Wilhite sent me):

--60,000 people in the Superdome, as hotels have sent their guests/refugees there; (and the aforelinked Steve Gregory reports that the occupants are getting restless)
--Fires have started which can't be attended to (you'll recall similar things happening in Grand Forks, ND after flooding in 1997
--Looting has started
--Devastation photos can be found here, mostly with AP photos though, as the T-P staff has had to evacuate their offices after the levee breaches
--Martial law has been declared in various places (and not Marshall law, which is presumably Adam throwing people in jail, as an understandably frazzled nola.com staffer let slip by earlier today.)

There's little to no water, sanitation, or food, and they'll need to be displacing even more people soon. I'd suggest if you can swing it, try to give a little something to the Red Cross or other acceptable organization.

One last thought: The nola site probably ought to take down the text ad proclaiming "FLOOD INSURANCE BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!"

By the time you read this, there may not be a New Orleans

2005-08-28T09:54:00.000-04:00

Update 9:43 pm 8/28: Now 4th largest storm on record; Dr. Masters' blog:

I put the odds of New Orleans getting its levees breached and the city submerged at about 70%.

Edit: photo removed as weather event ending--Stevis 8/30/05

That's Category 5 Hurricane Katrina, currently bearing down on New Orleans. It's already the sixth strongest measured hurricane ever in the Atlantic. Here's the Weather Underground forecast for Monday in New Orleans, as of post time:

Widespread showers and scattered thunderstorms. Hurricane force winds. Some thunderstorms may produce damaging winds and heavy rainfall. Locally heavy rainfall possible. Highs in the upper 80s. Northeast winds 60 to 90 mph with gusts to around 125 mph becoming northwest and decreasing to with gusts to around 115 mph in the afternoon. Chance of showers and thunderstorms 90 percent.

That is the epitome of a calm statement about complete devastation.

Now, I'm not being facetious with the title of this post. New Orleans is below sea level, and protected by a large network of levees from the Mississippi flooding. Of course, if that system is breached--say by a huge storm surge--the water isn't getting out. The pumps which clear the city of ordinary rainfall would be submerged and useless, and you'd end up with a giant lake full of swamp critters and toxic waste. This article discusses the issue; I first saw these points as a feature out of a New Orleans paper some years ago but can't find it now.

So, in conclusion, I'd wait until late next week before making your Mardi Gras plans.

Link Post #12 & 35

2005-08-23T22:13:00.000-04:00

Yeah, it's just a link post, but it's things I thought were worth sharing.

This guy wants to use Green Flourescent Protein to make deer more visible at night.

Jim Caple's essay on the steroid era calling into question all records and Hall of Fame status. No, not baseball--football.

I'm a sucker for shallow, one-note, rimshot-style political commentary. Enter The Ministry of Reshelving.

Stevis posts. Also in News: Trumpets Sound; Cats, Dogs Lie Down Together.

2005-08-22T17:56:00.000-04:00

Alright. I come to you with a new commitment. Twice a week posts, minimum.

Yeah, that's not exactly setting a standard for journalistic output. But I will post at least twice a week, whether or not I have anything to say. And this will not count the TAR threads. And you all have my permission to call me a piece of crap if I fail to live up to this, unless I mention a specific absence due to vacation or work related trip in advance.

I figure if I at least put it in print somewhere, I can feel guilty for not living up to it, and then I may actually post to avoid that feeling.

So what can I talk about here that is not about me? Well, in baseball news, the Cubs are out but don't know it yet. I'd thought of driving to Pittsburgh (Coop!) over Labor Day weekend, but I need to get my car fixed to do that, and if I do I probably shouldn't spend money on the trip. Oh well.

The Nationals are improbably still in the wild card hunt. I haven't heard that they want my money for playoff tickets yet, but they almost certainly will take a deposit, earn interest on it, and hand it back if they don't make the playoffs. They do have the most remaining home games of any of the contenders, but their early-season home field wonders haven't carried over. Which is not surprising, of course.

That's all for now. There will be more. Really. I mean it.

Spoilerific Discussion Thread--Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

2005-07-16T09:12:00.000-04:00

The ground rules: You enter the comments section, you take your chances. Don't go in until you've finished, and if you post there don't worry about spoiler tags. I might not be in for a bit as my folks are in town this weekend....but I got quite a ways in before shutting it and going to bed last night...

I picked up my copy at the party held by A Likely Story, in which they turned the small Amtrak stop down the street from their store into Platform 9 3/4 (by covering the two glass doors with butcher's paper painted to resemble brick, so you had to walk between the bricks once you opened the doors. Neat.) They then lined everyone up in houses (i.e., they'd sorted the pre-orders) and marched, post-opening-feast style, down the street to the store--complete with a cop stopping traffic for this motley procession.

Anyway, happy reading.

My Parents are not allowed to follow this link

2005-07-10T22:51:00.000-04:00

Specifically, as they are flying out to see me this week, they should not read thisreport from the Guardian about uncovering embarrassing secrets about the airline industry.

Nothing about dangers, mind you--except pilot boozing which you know about--but the question of what is done with people who die on long-haul flights is...intrestingly answered.