Werner Heisenberg delivered his research seminar in Zurich in December 1944, unaware that there was an American spy in the audience under orders to assassinate him if he offered hints of progress toward an atomic bomb. Luckily, Heisenberg’s talk was an innocuous look at scattering matrices in quantum mechanics.
Strangely enough, the spy who watched Heisenberg speak and was prepared to shoot him if he talked about a bomb was former major league baseball catcher and coach Morris “Moe” Berg
“Explosive” is a stretch, but compared to the barren desert landscape that has been the San Francisco Giants offensive offerings as of late, Sunday’s 6 runs against the Oakland A’s felt nuclear.
LaMonte Wade Jr. after his second RBI single of the day in the 5th: “I am become Death, destroyer of worlds.”
After a couple of thrilling affairs to open up this rivalry series, the Dodgers and Padres put forth a more lukewarm matchup on Sunday Night Baseball, with the visiting team beating the Friars 8-2.
In a battle of recently acquired veteran starters, the right-hander Lance Lynn followed up on his positive debut with another strong outing, this time against a much better offense.
On the other hand, Rich Hill struggled heavily to put away the Dodgers hitters and ended up allowing the maximum damage he could’ve, with a collection of inopportune hit by pitches, and home runs.
There was some oddball programming on one of the ESPNs all day yesterday: pillow fights, tetris competitions, and even competitions to see who can hold a beer stein for the longest time.
Growing up, we had some really old feather pillows that had lost all the fluff to them. All the fillings got matted and dense and only filled the far end of the pillow-cover. The long pillow case and dense feather ball was a wicked medieval flail. It could hit you around any blocking arm, smash away any pillow in its way, and would fly at After a discovery period where lessons were learned, my siblings and I created house rules banning those pillows.
I still don't really understand why there was a fight in the first place. The slide and tag didn't seem too out-of-bounds. Was there history between those two?
As a kid I would have loved this, but I now find these brawls really moronic. It’s assault and battery, basically, should not be tolerated by commissioner’s office
NY Liberty (22-6) smash league-leading LV Aces (24-3) 99-61, lead by Ionescu. Makes me want to punch Twist in the face for scaring Ionescu away from Cal.
Miami advances to the semis as this up-and-comer named Messi scores his 7th goal in four games. I have no doubt that South Florida has lost its collective mind for him.
It certainly was a decision on the part of Fox Sports to have two analysts (Alexi Lalas, Karli Lloyd) with political and personal axes to grind while talking about the US team. Lots of mystical nonsense about grit and team first and wokeness detracting from some fair points about team composition, playing time, and bad tactics.
Even with the team composition and tactics the US was incredibly unlucky to lose to Sweden. They put 11 shots on target to Sweden's 1, but the Swedish goalie played out of her mind. And then the US was on track to win the shootout until a player who had hit 17 of 18 previous penalties missed one. If they had even won the shootout most of the talk probably would have been about how they were back on track now.
I wish I could find it but I saw a really good chart somewhere yesterday showing just how statistically unlikely it is for the US to have had that many shots *not* go in. Sometimes it’s just like that
I think Bill Connelly posted it on Twitter. IIRC the US' expected goals based on the shots on goal was 1.82, but they ended up with zero because the goalie went ham.
Teaching a morning class and trying to finish novel number three. Also simultaneously looking forward to the upcoming Cal football season and dreading the end of the Pac.
Work, and up until about midnight last night, trying to keep the older daughter from having a breakdown over a bathroom paint job that has gone completely sideways and burned up over a week in trying corrective actions that themselves uncover more problems.
"trying to keep the older daughter from having a breakdown over a bathroom paint job that has gone completely sideways and burned up over a week in trying corrective actions that themselves uncover more problems."
all she wanted to do was cover up some mold stains, replace the caulk for the tub, and put on a fresh coat of paint. Unfortunately, what neither of us realized was that this bathroom is the only room in the house that had oil paint, so the primer and top coat were just peeling off the edges of the walls... the advice we got was to just peel off the latex paint, but then the oil based paint started coming with it in uneven sections, which meant it all had to be removed, which meant that we found both plaster and spackle patching on top of drywall in some walls, and one wall that somehow is the original plaster from 1958 at the top and drywall with 1/4" of different plaster on the bottom half... it's a fucking shambles. So last night we decided that at this point, best case is get a fresh coat of paint on the uneven walls and then my wife and I will hire someone to make better fixes when the girls are off at school.
bisy -- i purposely misspell busy in my most of my writing except official stuff because of this little part from the Tao of Pooh.
In A House at Pooh Corner, Rabbit goes to visit Christopher Robin, but he isn’t home. Christopher has left a note that says,
GON OUT
BACKSON
BISY
BACKSON
here is what ChatGPT has to say about it which is good enough ...
"Bisy Backson" is a phrase from the book "The Tao of Pooh" by Benjamin Hoff, published in 1982. In the book, Hoff uses characters from A.A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh stories to introduce the principles of Taoism. The term "Bisy Backson" is a play on words and represents the concept of a busy, frantic person who is always on the go and obsessed with productivity and accomplishments, often at the expense of enjoying life's simple pleasures.
I thought the last 1/4 of it was quite good with some good laughs and social commentary that was both spot on and amusing. The first 3/4s... I slept through most of it and legitimately hated it. The fam didnt hate it as much as me but no one emerged overly enthused. Genuinely baffled by the over the top love this movie is getting.
- did not see the Barbie movie (yet) which started 5 min after
- went to Holocaust Museum in DC during the day - this was a good pairing
- overall, thought it was great
- especially liked all the scenes in and around Berkeley campus as i myself have walking in/out of those back stairs to the physics building (formerly LeConte Hall) 100s of times.
Alums Byeong Hun An and Michael Kim won almost $1 million this weekend. They should be able to help out the athletic department. An, Max Homa, and Colin Morikawa all in the top fifty going into the FedEx Cup playoffs so more money coming in.
I just heard this on news radio while eating dinner. Not big on all the travel that would be required but there are at least some good academic fits with a number of the schools.
My best guess is that this is a leverage play to try to get the B1G to offer a larger share. But if Cal landed in the ACC it would not be the worst thing, aside from travel.
On a walk Saturday I saw a young woman who looked like she could be a gymnast wearing a Cal Gymnastics t-shirt. I thought about saying something but she was with a group of friends and they were all laughing and chatting so I left her alone. Not even a Go Bears. Sad times.
Now that we know that 100+ year old conferences can dissolve in the space of a day, we have to really jump on the pace here vis a vis finding a new conference
I suspect that it's procedural. If it's like other schools, you need permission to discuss with other conferences. Most other schools are went through this step - some earlier than others.
I’m with Wilcox. So basically, all conferences will just realign now every time the TV contracts are up? What a bunch of bullshit. I think the conference commissioners, the networks, and the ADs are all missing why people (used to) like college sports.
Some years ago there was a kerfuffle about English soccer ticket prices spiking for Premiere League teams with a lot of ill feeling about being charged high prices when the suspicion was that fans in person were just adding color / sound for the broadcast. College football has just about completed the transition to the crowd being there to be "more realistic atmosphere than recorded noise"
It's been trending that way for 20 years or more. College football has been moving towards becoming NFL Lite since the mid-to-late 1990s, at least.
This is what the networks want, and the networks will get because of the money involved. The networks will kill the goose that lays the golden egg because they have no earthly concept of what makes college football relevant to people or what builds affinity.
The networks are all about the eyeballs as the most recent realignment shows. But by cutting loose the Pac-4 from FBS (and let's not pretend that isn't happening), they have begun to undermine the very structure that is college football: regionalism.
Tornado warning in DC area this afternoon/evening
U of Maryland is officially closing early, so i guess i'll head home.
The first line of rain just arrived in Arlington. The more severe line still to the west.
PRO
Baseball And The Atom Bomb
https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2018/01/02/baseball-and-the-atom-bomb/
Werner Heisenberg delivered his research seminar in Zurich in December 1944, unaware that there was an American spy in the audience under orders to assassinate him if he offered hints of progress toward an atomic bomb. Luckily, Heisenberg’s talk was an innocuous look at scattering matrices in quantum mechanics.
Strangely enough, the spy who watched Heisenberg speak and was prepared to shoot him if he talked about a bomb was former major league baseball catcher and coach Morris “Moe” Berg
A's sweep the Giants. Beat them 2-1.
...and something higher yesterday, even after getting screwed by the ref in the first inning as he gave the Giants a free run.
Runs! Just not enough of them...
https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2023/8/7/23822688/mlb-final-giants-athletics-8-6-2023-recap-alex-cobb-nick-allen-bay-bridge-series
“Explosive” is a stretch, but compared to the barren desert landscape that has been the San Francisco Giants offensive offerings as of late, Sunday’s 6 runs against the Oakland A’s felt nuclear.
LaMonte Wade Jr. after his second RBI single of the day in the 5th: “I am become Death, destroyer of worlds.”
Dodgers rock Rich Hill, Lance Lynn cruises to beat Padres
https://www.truebluela.com/2023/8/6/23822444/dodgers-home-runs-rich-hill-lance-lynn-padres
After a couple of thrilling affairs to open up this rivalry series, the Dodgers and Padres put forth a more lukewarm matchup on Sunday Night Baseball, with the visiting team beating the Friars 8-2.
In a battle of recently acquired veteran starters, the right-hander Lance Lynn followed up on his positive debut with another strong outing, this time against a much better offense.
On the other hand, Rich Hill struggled heavily to put away the Dodgers hitters and ended up allowing the maximum damage he could’ve, with a collection of inopportune hit by pitches, and home runs.
These guys are pros
https://twitter.com/JomboyMedia/status/1688212544463187968
There was some oddball programming on one of the ESPNs all day yesterday: pillow fights, tetris competitions, and even competitions to see who can hold a beer stein for the longest time.
Growing up, we had some really old feather pillows that had lost all the fluff to them. All the fillings got matted and dense and only filled the far end of the pillow-cover. The long pillow case and dense feather ball was a wicked medieval flail. It could hit you around any blocking arm, smash away any pillow in its way, and would fly at After a discovery period where lessons were learned, my siblings and I created house rules banning those pillows.
Hammy's call of the Joes Ramirez-Tim Anderson fight should be bronzed and then put into the Smithsonian
https://twitter.com/awfulannouncing/status/1688005649651707905
I still don't really understand why there was a fight in the first place. The slide and tag didn't seem too out-of-bounds. Was there history between those two?
History.
And Tim Anderson had been talking schitt to CLE IF Gabe Arias earlier in the game.
I like how the ump nopes out of there as soon as he realizes they're about to throw down
Like a Secret Service Agent side-stepping that bullet.
As a kid I would have loved this, but I now find these brawls really moronic. It’s assault and battery, basically, should not be tolerated by commissioner’s office
Plus it's gonna cost Cleveland their best hitter for a week when they're still within striking distance of the division.
that White Sox player was LARPing as Glass Joe (that's one for the kids)
A better angle of the right to Anderson's jaw
https://twitter.com/TalkinBaseball_/status/1687992039793725440
NASCAR driver gets suspended for turning too far to the right
https://www.espn.com/racing/story/_/id/38139601/nascar-suspends-noah-gragson-undisclosed-social-media-activity
Old and busted: Guy retires from the NFL, trades Pokemon cards as his new job, made $11m last year.
New hotness: He gets banned from the Pokemon trading platform
https://bleacherreport.com/articles/10085267-former-nfl-lb-blake-martinez-banned-from-selling-pokemon-cards-on-whatnot-after-probe
NY Liberty (22-6) smash league-leading LV Aces (24-3) 99-61, lead by Ionescu. Makes me want to punch Twist in the face for scaring Ionescu away from Cal.
https://www.espn.com/wnba/boxscore/_/gameId/401507292
Miami advances to the semis as this up-and-comer named Messi scores his 7th goal in four games. I have no doubt that South Florida has lost its collective mind for him.
https://www.espn.com/soccer/report/_/gameId/685175
[USWNT] US crashes out of the World Cup, losing in PKs to Sweden
https://www.espn.com/soccer/match/_/gameId/622598
That was a brutal ending on that final PK
Trump sends his condolences to the USWNT on their loss. Just kidding, he made fun of them, blaming Rapinoe, wokeness, and Biden.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/donald-trump-blames-joe-biden-for-us-womens-world-cup-loss
It certainly was a decision on the part of Fox Sports to have two analysts (Alexi Lalas, Karli Lloyd) with political and personal axes to grind while talking about the US team. Lots of mystical nonsense about grit and team first and wokeness detracting from some fair points about team composition, playing time, and bad tactics.
Even with the team composition and tactics the US was incredibly unlucky to lose to Sweden. They put 11 shots on target to Sweden's 1, but the Swedish goalie played out of her mind. And then the US was on track to win the shootout until a player who had hit 17 of 18 previous penalties missed one. If they had even won the shootout most of the talk probably would have been about how they were back on track now.
I wish I could find it but I saw a really good chart somewhere yesterday showing just how statistically unlikely it is for the US to have had that many shots *not* go in. Sometimes it’s just like that
I think Bill Connelly posted it on Twitter. IIRC the US' expected goals based on the shots on goal was 1.82, but they ended up with zero because the goalie went ham.
ELSEWHERE IN COLLEGE
[slow clapping] All right, which one of you wise-guys
https://pac-4.com/
So much (mis)information out there
https://twitter.com/jasonscheer/status/1688364287008575488
https://twitter.com/max_olson/status/1688402342087905281
What are you excited about in the near future?
My son's high-school adventure, which starts on Friday.
so soon!
A#2 gets picked up from camp on Sum another 4 wks of summer before starting after Labor Day.
i know we are on the late end of the spectrum in NY w/ school start/end dates.
What’s keeping you busy these days?
Teaching a morning class and trying to finish novel number three. Also simultaneously looking forward to the upcoming Cal football season and dreading the end of the Pac.
Looking for Big 10 invite news
Having a four-month-old
that will keep you bisy for a while!
Work, and up until about midnight last night, trying to keep the older daughter from having a breakdown over a bathroom paint job that has gone completely sideways and burned up over a week in trying corrective actions that themselves uncover more problems.
"trying to keep the older daughter from having a breakdown over a bathroom paint job that has gone completely sideways and burned up over a week in trying corrective actions that themselves uncover more problems."
What?!?!?!? Is she a contractor?
all she wanted to do was cover up some mold stains, replace the caulk for the tub, and put on a fresh coat of paint. Unfortunately, what neither of us realized was that this bathroom is the only room in the house that had oil paint, so the primer and top coat were just peeling off the edges of the walls... the advice we got was to just peel off the latex paint, but then the oil based paint started coming with it in uneven sections, which meant it all had to be removed, which meant that we found both plaster and spackle patching on top of drywall in some walls, and one wall that somehow is the original plaster from 1958 at the top and drywall with 1/4" of different plaster on the bottom half... it's a fucking shambles. So last night we decided that at this point, best case is get a fresh coat of paint on the uneven walls and then my wife and I will hire someone to make better fixes when the girls are off at school.
Oh man, that's ROUGH! I know too well.
Sorry.
BUSY
Have to see a City inspector today, hopefully I can.
bisy -- i purposely misspell busy in my most of my writing except official stuff because of this little part from the Tao of Pooh.
In A House at Pooh Corner, Rabbit goes to visit Christopher Robin, but he isn’t home. Christopher has left a note that says,
GON OUT
BACKSON
BISY
BACKSON
here is what ChatGPT has to say about it which is good enough ...
"Bisy Backson" is a phrase from the book "The Tao of Pooh" by Benjamin Hoff, published in 1982. In the book, Hoff uses characters from A.A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh stories to introduce the principles of Taoism. The term "Bisy Backson" is a play on words and represents the concept of a busy, frantic person who is always on the go and obsessed with productivity and accomplishments, often at the expense of enjoying life's simple pleasures.
BEE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLKsmJzn5Q8
OUR CRUMBLING DEMOCRACY
[Judge, on Thursday] "No witness tampering. I mean it. Understand?"
[Trump] "Yes Judge"
[Trump, later] IF YOU COME AFTER ME, I'LL COME AFTER YOU
[Judge, on Saturday] "The Court orders you to explain yourself before Monday at 5pm"
[Trump, Sunday]: https://www.showbiz411.com/2023/08/06/donald-trump-has-sunday-morning-meltdown-on-social-media-attacking-judge-in-dc-case-nancy-pelosi-jack-smith-contempt-coming
DBD AV CLUB
Only TV shows & an old movie: T2, which my daughter liked quite a bit - we hadn't seen it for decades. It's fun.
Barbie (17/19 WB)
A delicious piece of fluff that was a lot of ridiculous fun. Definitely smiled and guffawed throughout this movie and credits.
i liked it and found it very funny and gorgeous, much better than i expected the movie to be given Mattel's involvement in the production
I thought the last 1/4 of it was quite good with some good laughs and social commentary that was both spot on and amusing. The first 3/4s... I slept through most of it and legitimately hated it. The fam didnt hate it as much as me but no one emerged overly enthused. Genuinely baffled by the over the top love this movie is getting.
we are going to try to see it this week
my Oppenheimer movie experience ... 17/19
- did not see the Barbie movie (yet) which started 5 min after
- went to Holocaust Museum in DC during the day - this was a good pairing
- overall, thought it was great
- especially liked all the scenes in and around Berkeley campus as i myself have walking in/out of those back stairs to the physics building (formerly LeConte Hall) 100s of times.
I wanted more Berkeley, but thought the movie was great and very tense for being a movie with a bunch of people talking in rooms throughout.
I watched the movie in SLC at a theater showing it on 35mm, I'm not sure the last time I'd seen a movie on film
Still miffed they couldn't include a scene with Oppenheimer taking in a Bear game at Memorial Stadium. Nonetheless a great film.
CAL
Alums Byeong Hun An and Michael Kim won almost $1 million this weekend. They should be able to help out the athletic department. An, Max Homa, and Colin Morikawa all in the top fifty going into the FedEx Cup playoffs so more money coming in.
Go Bears!!!
To the ACC (maybe)!
https://twitter.com/MHver3/status/1688639795721805824
I just heard this on news radio while eating dinner. Not big on all the travel that would be required but there are at least some good academic fits with a number of the schools.
My best guess is that this is a leverage play to try to get the B1G to offer a larger share. But if Cal landed in the ACC it would not be the worst thing, aside from travel.
On a walk Saturday I saw a young woman who looked like she could be a gymnast wearing a Cal Gymnastics t-shirt. I thought about saying something but she was with a group of friends and they were all laughing and chatting so I left her alone. Not even a Go Bears. Sad times.
In SF this past weekend, someone noticed my shirt and said "Cal will be in the Pac-4 soon". I just chuckled and said Go Bears!
You have proper decorum.
If it was me - doesn't matter if they're in a group, on a hike, or at their grannie's funeral - I'm giving them a loud "Go Bears"
Or is it now: Go, Bears
UC Regents to call an emergency meeting about the barn door that was left open last year
https://twitter.com/collegead/status/1688534078499233792
Now that we know that 100+ year old conferences can dissolve in the space of a day, we have to really jump on the pace here vis a vis finding a new conference
Benjamin Hermalin probably didn't expect to be this busy.
https://chancellor.berkeley.edu/about-office/chancellors-cabinet#:~:text=Benjamin%20Hermalin%2C%20Executive%20Vice%20Chancellor%20and%20Provost
Hmmm... litigation?
I suspect that it's procedural. If it's like other schools, you need permission to discuss with other conferences. Most other schools are went through this step - some earlier than others.
Enough! Enough! I've had it with these MFer bears on this MFer plane! https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/aug/07/bear-escapes-from-crate-in-planes-cargo-hold-at-dubai-airport
Wilcox shows emotion. And since it's Wilcox, you know that any show of emotion means that he's super upset. And rightfully so.
https://twitter.com/espnrittenberg/status/1688386795791110144
I’m with Wilcox. So basically, all conferences will just realign now every time the TV contracts are up? What a bunch of bullshit. I think the conference commissioners, the networks, and the ADs are all missing why people (used to) like college sports.
Some years ago there was a kerfuffle about English soccer ticket prices spiking for Premiere League teams with a lot of ill feeling about being charged high prices when the suspicion was that fans in person were just adding color / sound for the broadcast. College football has just about completed the transition to the crowd being there to be "more realistic atmosphere than recorded noise"
It's been trending that way for 20 years or more. College football has been moving towards becoming NFL Lite since the mid-to-late 1990s, at least.
This is what the networks want, and the networks will get because of the money involved. The networks will kill the goose that lays the golden egg because they have no earthly concept of what makes college football relevant to people or what builds affinity.
The networks are all about the eyeballs as the most recent realignment shows. But by cutting loose the Pac-4 from FBS (and let's not pretend that isn't happening), they have begun to undermine the very structure that is college football: regionalism.