I appear to have recovered from whatever perma-ban was enacted at SBN. I went to Conquest Chronicles and discovered that in fact it could get even more dead in the comments department 😬
@THECITYNY: 1/ We just did an analysis of five years of data from New York City’s housing lottery system and found that those applying with the *highest* incomes are six times more likely to have their number picked than those with the *lowest* incomes.
Jon Wilner is advising the Pac-12 will announce plans week for a 10 game Pac-12 season starting mid-September, with an option to retain the 9 game schedule (with a few modified dates), and 3 possibilities for the Conference Championship Game.
What is less clear is what the indication is that leads to the belief that the surge in the Covid virus will subside by then. What is totally unclear is how college football can be conducted legally, never mind safely, when football as an activity at any level is currently prohibited in (at least) 1 (maybe 2) state the conference is in, and most of another, or how limits on gathering sizes can be exceeded for a few organizations, but not others.
There is no indication of what the situation would be as far as fans in the stands. That's likely going to be a local, case by case situation, and should be a nightmare for making travel plans.
I'm pretty sure that's not the plan at at least some of the Universities, due to the $s involved. Many of the suits involved will sell anyone's soul for a dime under normal conditions, and given that the company line all along has been that games will be played, oblivious to pretty much anything, I expect at least some will try, until and unless local health authorities shut them down.
I have been to South Dakota and there is sunshine there...that's enough? Should one of the more extreme latitude places that has long days of sunshine during the summer (and really short days on sunlight in the winter) have that moniker instead?
I will be on my way to South Dakota from Cheyenne, WY in an hour. The Coast to Covid road trip is off and running...GoldenSD will be soooo disappointed in me!!
It was prevalent before then, but he certainly helped accelerate it. He wasn’t make coozies and flags and bumper stickers and so on and so forth though
If you go to somewhere like Sharpsburg, which is where Antietam battlefield is, you will see Confederate flags (or at least you would have the last time I was there which in fairness was ages ago) but not the red part of the Maryland flag. Put it this way, while I don’t spend any time in rural Maryland, I’ve lived here since 1997 and not once have I seen the pro-confederacy portion of the flag.
Apparently the pro Union Marylanders used the yellow and black design and the pro confederate Marylanders used the red and white design - but you’re right, the components do predate the civil war
I don’t think this really belongs under the crumbling democracy header so I’ll put it here: watching AOC dismantle angry Republican congressmen and professional reactionaries makes me wonder why any of them think it’s going to end well when they try her.
for most of them it is the first time someone with equal or greater media clout is ripping them. So, they don't expect it. Reading the room is hard when you can't read very well.
Zoom call with a friend in Singapore, watch a livestreamed play with my grandfather, science fiction book club virtual meeting, make a chocolate wedding cake topper, write out and illustrate and mail recipes for a Reddit exchange, do a jigsaw puzzle with my mum, do some preliminary sketches for paintings for a friend’s nursery, and attempt not to read more than 5 books.
My older daughter is a July baby and as a friend helpfully pointed out as the due date came and went, the midatlantic is a place where it’s cooler in utero than outside in the summer
Driving from Fargo, through Lake of the Woods in N. Minnesota...apparently the farthest Northern part of the lower 48 States. I will be re-watching Frances McDormand’s Fargo tonight.
Today, SGB Jr went to go volunteer handing out free meals for kids who would have otherwise gotten subsidized food from schools. The gut-punch observation of the day was that a large number of the folks picking up the meals were wearing census 2020 t-shirts.
Since I started getting "American Announcement" emails, I see the bullshit the MAGA crowd believes, and they are STILL peddling lies about Hydroxychloroquine saving 100,000 lives.
Washington Football Team will be the name used for that team for 2020. Funny thing is that if I had just woken up from a coma, I actually might think "Washington Football Team" is the name of a new soccer team (in either DC or the state of Washington).
MLB is back tonight! There were some rumors that MLB is trying to expand the playoffs for this 60 game season but that agreement needs to happen before the first pitch of the season at around 7pm ET tonight.
Watching preseason games being played in empty stadiums wasn't nearly as odd as I expected. Maybe I'm used to it from watching a handful of Premier League matches over the last month. However, I watched some preseason NBA last night and it seemed odd: the videos of crowds in the stands, the overzealous arena announcers, sound issues with television announcers.
It will be nothing new in some places, such as Tampa Bay, and places like San Diego and Seattle after May 1st (when they are normally officially eliminated) when the series isn't against an opponent that is the whole draw.
The Padres typically still fill Petco to respectable attendance even once eliminated. This is mostly due to it being great weather to spend a day at the ball park, a beautiful ballpark with lots of good food and drink options, Petco being in downtown SD, and of course opponent attendance.
3 Cal alumni on active MLB roster to open the year - Semian and Canha for the A's, Knapp for the Phillies. 3 more Bears on the 60 men roster but at alternative site - 1B Vaughn (White Sox), RHP Jeffries (A's), RHP Shortridge (Pirates).
When I was out this morning I saw a guy on the bike trail that runs parallel to the dirt trail I was on who was wearing a Cal biking jersey. He was too far away for a Go Bears!
Hmmm...Redskins will go by the name 'Washington Football Team' this season.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2020/07/23/washington-redskins-new-team-name-washington-football-team/
I appear to have recovered from whatever perma-ban was enacted at SBN. I went to Conquest Chronicles and discovered that in fact it could get even more dead in the comments department 😬
I haven't been to SBN in months.
https://twitter.com/THECITYNY/status/1286332708432556034?s=20
@THECITYNY: 1/ We just did an analysis of five years of data from New York City’s housing lottery system and found that those applying with the *highest* incomes are six times more likely to have their number picked than those with the *lowest* incomes.
Let’s break this down.
I'm surprised it's only 6 times as likely. I would have expected higher.
Jon Wilner is advising the Pac-12 will announce plans week for a 10 game Pac-12 season starting mid-September, with an option to retain the 9 game schedule (with a few modified dates), and 3 possibilities for the Conference Championship Game.
What is less clear is what the indication is that leads to the belief that the surge in the Covid virus will subside by then. What is totally unclear is how college football can be conducted legally, never mind safely, when football as an activity at any level is currently prohibited in (at least) 1 (maybe 2) state the conference is in, and most of another, or how limits on gathering sizes can be exceeded for a few organizations, but not others.
There is no indication of what the situation would be as far as fans in the stands. That's likely going to be a local, case by case situation, and should be a nightmare for making travel plans.
I think we all just have to assume there won't be fans.
I'm pretty sure that's not the plan at at least some of the Universities, due to the $s involved. Many of the suits involved will sell anyone's soul for a dime under normal conditions, and given that the company line all along has been that games will be played, oblivious to pretty much anything, I expect at least some will try, until and unless local health authorities shut them down.
Didn't UT say 50% fans?
Sunshine State
I have never been to Four Corners
It’s not terribly interesting but it is a reminder of how appallingly poor the Navajo nation is
Navajo Nation is about the size of West Virginia and just as poor.
I will admit that I’ve never spent any time in rural West Virginia for comparison but I was genuinely shocked by what I saw in Navajo Nation.
FYI, South Dakota also called itself the Sunshine State before that name became more synonymous with Florida (who put that on their license plates).
Hmm, is South Dakota really known for its sunshine?
I have been to South Dakota and there is sunshine there...that's enough? Should one of the more extreme latitude places that has long days of sunshine during the summer (and really short days on sunlight in the winter) have that moniker instead?
I will be on my way to South Dakota from Cheyenne, WY in an hour. The Coast to Covid road trip is off and running...GoldenSD will be soooo disappointed in me!!
Are you stopping by Devils Tower on the way? I skipped a half-day of a conference (at Deadwood, SD) to go check that out years ago.
I’m not disappointed in you at all. Enjoy the road trip.
Bad flag
How about every state flag done like California's?
https://preview.redd.it/3j14dqn6u0c51.png?width=960&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=ffdcb05cf68dc712cc0a4c2f5e9e6871577df941
This is fantastic and all the states should just do this.
Terrible! They weren't Republics, only us & Texas!
Just take out the word "republic", and keep the aesthetic.
How has no one mentioned the Maryland flag here
That's about as sacrilegious as badmouthing Old Bay around here.
Is there anything that Marylanders will not put the flag on? There is not.
I thought the Maryland flag on everything was only a thing after the creation of Under Armour...by a University of Maryland alum.
It was prevalent before then, but he certainly helped accelerate it. He wasn’t make coozies and flags and bumper stickers and so on and so forth though
Also, the red/white part has some confederacy ties. Not to mention this unfortunate shirt that said "White Pride". I can't find the photo (it's pretty generic) but here is the student paper article about it. https://dbknews.com/2016/08/12/article_574eeac4-f13a-11e1-9199-0019bb30f31a-html/
What? Nonsense, it's from the Coat of Arms of the guy that founded the colony!
It got adopted by the pro-South Marylanders. https://wjla.com/news/local/history-of-the-maryland-flag-confederate-symbols
If you go to somewhere like Sharpsburg, which is where Antietam battlefield is, you will see Confederate flags (or at least you would have the last time I was there which in fairness was ages ago) but not the red part of the Maryland flag. Put it this way, while I don’t spend any time in rural Maryland, I’ve lived here since 1997 and not once have I seen the pro-confederacy portion of the flag.
Yeah, but that doesn't make the current flag a "confederate flag".
Apparently the pro Union Marylanders used the yellow and black design and the pro confederate Marylanders used the red and white design - but you’re right, the components do predate the civil war
Strong talk coming from someone whose home state couldn’t manage to square off their flag
Well, yeah. We love when WE are special and hate when OTHERS try to be 🤪
Because it's AWESOME! As a flag, it rocks. Trust me on this.
Please, what do you know about aesthetics
😂
That flag is amazingly bad, hard to believe it was done in 1915.
You could be forgiven for thinking that someone had just cobbled it together in PowerPoint
I know! Doesn't it look like that?
Shameless plug for my PowerPoint froyographic https://twitter.com/geneandtonic/status/1284682980888174592?s=20
apparently I already liked your graphic.
Wait, are you one of the gnomes??? Also why are there two gnomes?
yes, i'm gardengnomeii on twitter. there are many more than two gnomes. we are like the air, everywhere and nowhere.
I didn't learn until recently that the Confederacy didn't even use the now-familiar flag until midway through their short history.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flags_of_the_Confederate_States_of_America
traitors flag
Don’t forget losers flag.
Sort of, it was used early as the Battle flag of the Army of Northern Virginia, before being adopted as the flag of the Confederacy.
Socio-political implications aside, I do think the second flag is a better-looking flag.
Tilden Park
VERY challenging golf course. My memory of #1 is looking up at what seemed to be a 45 degree slope about 700 yards to the green.
driving range, too
Memories of taking my son to the merry-go-round and park, his favorite was the friendly giraffe.
Memories of trout fishing.
Ummm..by my house
What's for breakfast?
An egg white omelette
And then because my mum didn’t know I’d already made myself breakfast, apples and cinnamon oatmeal
And then because my dad didn’t know that I’d already made myself breakfast, Death Star waffles
Smoothie with a mix of fresh and frozen cherries.
ennui. and yogurt.
What is this, a Bergman film?
Cereal (well, granola eaten as cereal), which I am eating now and getting started with my day
Coffee and blood pressure meds, the breakfast of middle aged champions
Don’t those cancel each other out?
Surprisingly not.
Yogurt & blueberries
Some Hungarian Goulosh left over from last night
Cold?
After a warm run, gatorade, honeydew melon, and french toast.
Meanwhile, it's 60 degrees and overcast here in the western East Bay
Brrrr
I thought you were in Ohio?
I lived in Ohio in my childhood and again during grad school, but after grad school, I lived in Taiwan, and now I've been back in the Bay for 2 years.
English muffin with jam and bacon.
Gag reel
https://lincolnproject.us/video/trumpfeld/
Awesome! 😂😂😂
I don’t think this really belongs under the crumbling democracy header so I’ll put it here: watching AOC dismantle angry Republican congressmen and professional reactionaries makes me wonder why any of them think it’s going to end well when they try her.
for most of them it is the first time someone with equal or greater media clout is ripping them. So, they don't expect it. Reading the room is hard when you can't read very well.
I'm waiting for my meeting to end so that I can watch the video, but I did read the transcript https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4894466/representative-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-addresses-house-exchange-representative-ted-yoho&fbclid=IwAR26w83q8fAPLiEFG9oZWPCMr0ssq4T8y6qRKJCjbHBjbzqq32fKDotwJPw
Weekend plans
Driving cross country. At Elko now. Probably to Cheyenne-ish tomorrow. Weekend will be through Nebraska, Iowa on Sat and Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, etc.
Zoom call with a friend in Singapore, watch a livestreamed play with my grandfather, science fiction book club virtual meeting, make a chocolate wedding cake topper, write out and illustrate and mail recipes for a Reddit exchange, do a jigsaw puzzle with my mum, do some preliminary sketches for paintings for a friend’s nursery, and attempt not to read more than 5 books.
You exhaust me.
assemble some bookshelves for Mrs. classroom. Even if school is on 'distance learning', she'll need the room set up.
Having a baby maybe? lol. Mrs. Bk97 is due any day now, so we're mostly just waiting around for Cf98's grand arrival
Congrats on Ca-249 (was this the name the DBD decided?)
That’s very exciting! I wish her a painless delivery (as much as that’s possible)
Congratulations, and all the best for a smooth delivery and recovery!
Thank you!
My older daughter is a July baby and as a friend helpfully pointed out as the due date came and went, the midatlantic is a place where it’s cooler in utero than outside in the summer
It's probably just as humid too.
Best of luck!
also, nap now.
I'm relishing the uninterrupted nights of sleep.
I got nothing. Maybe dealing with the various family members’ tech refresh needs
Try to stay out of the sun as much as possible. That may mean watching a lot of baseball on TV.
My brother's birthday is Saturday, so I'm making a coconut cream pie for him.
Will you also be making a cake?
Pie only
Mmm, pie
Staining some new benches for the backyard patio...
Driving from Fargo, through Lake of the Woods in N. Minnesota...apparently the farthest Northern part of the lower 48 States. I will be re-watching Frances McDormand’s Fargo tonight.
Today in CV19
Today, SGB Jr went to go volunteer handing out free meals for kids who would have otherwise gotten subsidized food from schools. The gut-punch observation of the day was that a large number of the folks picking up the meals were wearing census 2020 t-shirts.
Well, that’s who’s available for short term piece work 😐
Since I started getting "American Announcement" emails, I see the bullshit the MAGA crowd believes, and they are STILL peddling lies about Hydroxychloroquine saving 100,000 lives.
This country is bonkers.
My work phone keeps getting texts like, "This is Don Jr. We MUST stop Pelosi and Schumer!" 😡
Just picked up my mail and I got a letter from President Obama.
Have even that many taken it for covid?
the crazy I see is them saying that in India the gov't is giving it to everyone.
Hydroxychloroquine also prevents vampire attacks
And garlic cures covid19
what if I want to become a vampire?
I can send you lots of cautionary and angsty media that advises you otherwise
I’m starting to worry about vampires now
OUR CRUMBLING DEMOCRACY
Stephen Miller is an awful person, part whatever
https://twitter.com/davidcorndc/status/1286372233926057984?s=21
Unfortunately it didn’t take Stephen Miller.
the apocalypse is young.
Can vampires die from the Rona? I guess we will find out.
Since it seems to affect blood vessels, I'm thinking they might have a reaction to it.
PRO
Washington Football Team will be the name used for that team for 2020. Funny thing is that if I had just woken up from a coma, I actually might think "Washington Football Team" is the name of a new soccer team (in either DC or the state of Washington).
NHL: Seattle Kraken
https://twitter.com/ByTimBooth/status/1286332548361068544
I like the logo, particularly the Space Needle in the anchor. The name, not as much.
MLB is back tonight! There were some rumors that MLB is trying to expand the playoffs for this 60 game season but that agreement needs to happen before the first pitch of the season at around 7pm ET tonight.
It will be somewhat less fun for me to watch as Juan Soto has tested positive for the virus.
But with the news of an expanded playoff to 16 teams, Nats can start very slow yet again and still salvage the season.
16 teams will be in the playoffs this year...I'm definitely not a fan and hope it's just an one year thing. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2020/07/mlb-playoffs-expanded-postseaon-16-teams-2020.html
Watching preseason games being played in empty stadiums wasn't nearly as odd as I expected. Maybe I'm used to it from watching a handful of Premier League matches over the last month. However, I watched some preseason NBA last night and it seemed odd: the videos of crowds in the stands, the overzealous arena announcers, sound issues with television announcers.
It will be nothing new in some places, such as Tampa Bay, and places like San Diego and Seattle after May 1st (when they are normally officially eliminated) when the series isn't against an opponent that is the whole draw.
The Padres typically still fill Petco to respectable attendance even once eliminated. This is mostly due to it being great weather to spend a day at the ball park, a beautiful ballpark with lots of good food and drink options, Petco being in downtown SD, and of course opponent attendance.
The one Dodgers/Padres game I went to in August or Sept was mostly Dodgers fans.
CAL
Did you guys see the new Berkeley Zoom backgrounds?
https://lnkd.in/es9UtGR
3 Cal alumni on active MLB roster to open the year - Semian and Canha for the A's, Knapp for the Phillies. 3 more Bears on the 60 men roster but at alternative site - 1B Vaughn (White Sox), RHP Jeffries (A's), RHP Shortridge (Pirates).
https://calbears.com/news/2020/7/23/baseball-ready-for-opening-day.aspx
When I was out this morning I saw a guy on the bike trail that runs parallel to the dirt trail I was on who was wearing a Cal biking jersey. He was too far away for a Go Bears!
Jack Follman of SBN Pac12 focused Pacific Takes with a hot take:
https://twitter.com/jackfollman/status/1286004072235978753?s=19
Chase Garbers Fifth after Davis Mills? Rubbish.
I should add that Garbers is a "winner" who excels in the 2-minute drill. His nose for being tough and winning reminds me of Pawlawski.