Saturday, November 21, 2009
Friday, November 20, 2009
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Check out this short documentary on Passion Pit
Sorry...wasn't able to trim the video here. Skip to minute 7:00 to watch the Passion Pit segment only.
Lady Gaga vs Christopher Walken-Poker Face(Mashup)
I like this...Walken almost makes me like this song
The New Jersey Nets have started the season 0-12...where does this stand in the world of dismal streaks in the NBA?
Well...
In terms of 'worst start to a season', they're not quite there yet.
In 1988 the Miami Heat went 0-17 to kick things off and finished 9-73 (which is tied for the worst record for a single season)
In 1999 the Clippers also started the season 0-17. However, this was the strike-shortened season so they ended up 9-41. That's a better finish than the '88 Heat, but a much larger % of total games lost to start the season.
As I mentioned above, the '88 Heat tied for the worst season record with the '73 76ers. So...we'll just have to see where this season goes for the Nets.
Lastly, here is a look at some gross single-season losing streaks from the history of the NBA (single-season so we can compare them with today's Nets):
'96 Grizzlies - 23 games
'98 Nuggets - 23 games
'73 76ers - 20 games
'94 Mavericks - 20 games
'82 Clippers - 19 games
'89 Clippers - 19 games
'93 Mavericks - 19 games
'96 Grizzlies - 19 games
With all of this in mind, you have to wonder what sort of train wreck the Nets' current season is heading for. Getting off to an 0-12 start certainly makes it seem like the somebody cut the brakes already.
In terms of 'worst start to a season', they're not quite there yet.
In 1988 the Miami Heat went 0-17 to kick things off and finished 9-73 (which is tied for the worst record for a single season)
In 1999 the Clippers also started the season 0-17. However, this was the strike-shortened season so they ended up 9-41. That's a better finish than the '88 Heat, but a much larger % of total games lost to start the season.
As I mentioned above, the '88 Heat tied for the worst season record with the '73 76ers. So...we'll just have to see where this season goes for the Nets.
Lastly, here is a look at some gross single-season losing streaks from the history of the NBA (single-season so we can compare them with today's Nets):
'96 Grizzlies - 23 games
'98 Nuggets - 23 games
'73 76ers - 20 games
'94 Mavericks - 20 games
'82 Clippers - 19 games
'89 Clippers - 19 games
'93 Mavericks - 19 games
'96 Grizzlies - 19 games
With all of this in mind, you have to wonder what sort of train wreck the Nets' current season is heading for. Getting off to an 0-12 start certainly makes it seem like the somebody cut the brakes already.
Col. Lewis Millett, Who Led ‘Bayonet Hill’ Charge, Dies at 88
This is just an interesting story...
When he became a company commander in the Korean War, serving as a captain in the 27th Infantry Regiment, 25th Infantry Division, he seemed a visage from battlefields past with his red handlebar mustache. On Feb. 7, 1951, he employed a tactic of bygone wars with a fury that overwhelmed the enemy.
During the fighting near Osan, South Korea, Captain Millett’s unit encountered Communist troops atop a spot called Hill 180.
It would be remembered as Bayonet Hill for what the military historian Brig. Gen. S. L. A. Marshall would call “the most complete bayonet charge by American troops since Cold Harbor,” a reference to the carnage at an 1864 Civil War battle in Virginia.
After ordering his men to fix bayonets, Captain Millett charged up the hill in front of them in the face of heavy fire, blasting away with his carbine, throwing grenades and, most spectacularly, wielding his bayonet when he encountered three enemy soldiers in a V-shaped gun position.
“I assaulted an antitank rifle crew,” he told Military History magazine in 2002. “The man at the point was the gunner. I bayoneted him. The next man reached for something, I think it was a machine pistol, but I bayoneted him — got him in the throat.”
The third soldier had a submachine gun.
“I guess the sight of me, red-faced and screaming, made him freeze,” he recalled. “Otherwise he would have killed me. I lunged forward and the bayonet went into his forehead. With the adrenaline flowing you’re strong as a bull. It was like going into a watermelon.”
Captain Millett was wounded by grenade fragments, but his men took the hill. President Harry S. Truman presented him with the Medal of Honor in July 1951. As the citation put it, “His dauntless leadership and personal courage so inspired his men that they stormed into the hostile position and used their bayonets with such lethal effect that the enemy fled in wild disorder.”
Read the full obituary here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/19/us/19millett.html?hpw
When he became a company commander in the Korean War, serving as a captain in the 27th Infantry Regiment, 25th Infantry Division, he seemed a visage from battlefields past with his red handlebar mustache. On Feb. 7, 1951, he employed a tactic of bygone wars with a fury that overwhelmed the enemy.
During the fighting near Osan, South Korea, Captain Millett’s unit encountered Communist troops atop a spot called Hill 180.
It would be remembered as Bayonet Hill for what the military historian Brig. Gen. S. L. A. Marshall would call “the most complete bayonet charge by American troops since Cold Harbor,” a reference to the carnage at an 1864 Civil War battle in Virginia.
After ordering his men to fix bayonets, Captain Millett charged up the hill in front of them in the face of heavy fire, blasting away with his carbine, throwing grenades and, most spectacularly, wielding his bayonet when he encountered three enemy soldiers in a V-shaped gun position.
“I assaulted an antitank rifle crew,” he told Military History magazine in 2002. “The man at the point was the gunner. I bayoneted him. The next man reached for something, I think it was a machine pistol, but I bayoneted him — got him in the throat.”
The third soldier had a submachine gun.
“I guess the sight of me, red-faced and screaming, made him freeze,” he recalled. “Otherwise he would have killed me. I lunged forward and the bayonet went into his forehead. With the adrenaline flowing you’re strong as a bull. It was like going into a watermelon.”
Captain Millett was wounded by grenade fragments, but his men took the hill. President Harry S. Truman presented him with the Medal of Honor in July 1951. As the citation put it, “His dauntless leadership and personal courage so inspired his men that they stormed into the hostile position and used their bayonets with such lethal effect that the enemy fled in wild disorder.”
Read the full obituary here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/19/us/19millett.html?hpw
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
"What's so great about punting?" from today's Wall Street Journal
In an article in today's WSJ, the writers focus on the question of whether or not Bill Belichick's decision to punt on Sunday night (a decision that ultimately led to the Patriot's 35-34 loss to the Colts) was the right decision. To give this topic a more interesting slant than the usual Monday morning quarterback diatribes, they dig into the statistics of the situation. Here's an excerpt:
The truth depends of course on how you slice the numbers. Brian Burke, a statistician who has studied the results of fourth-down situations in the NFL, says a team in the Patriot's situation had a 79% chance of winning by going for it (either by converting the 4th-and-2 or stopping the opponent thereafter). That compares favorably to a 70% probability of preventing a foe from driving down the field for a touchdown following a punt.
Above all, though, the essence of Mr. Belichick's "crime" may be something simpler than all this: His decision went against the natural instincts of all human beings when they're forced to make high-stakes decisions. In a recent study, researchers found that when faced with a decision involving risk, people have an overwhelming tendency to make the supposedly safe choice - to err on the side of caution - even though doing so may lead to worse results.
At issue, it seems, is the very idea of what constitutes gambling. If going for it gave the Patriots a statistically better chance of winning - and if aggressive deviations are often better than passive ones - then the gamble would have been to punt, even though that was the seemingly safe play.
Special thanks to Demetrios Frangos for showing me this article.
The truth depends of course on how you slice the numbers. Brian Burke, a statistician who has studied the results of fourth-down situations in the NFL, says a team in the Patriot's situation had a 79% chance of winning by going for it (either by converting the 4th-and-2 or stopping the opponent thereafter). That compares favorably to a 70% probability of preventing a foe from driving down the field for a touchdown following a punt.
Above all, though, the essence of Mr. Belichick's "crime" may be something simpler than all this: His decision went against the natural instincts of all human beings when they're forced to make high-stakes decisions. In a recent study, researchers found that when faced with a decision involving risk, people have an overwhelming tendency to make the supposedly safe choice - to err on the side of caution - even though doing so may lead to worse results.
At issue, it seems, is the very idea of what constitutes gambling. If going for it gave the Patriots a statistically better chance of winning - and if aggressive deviations are often better than passive ones - then the gamble would have been to punt, even though that was the seemingly safe play.
Special thanks to Demetrios Frangos for showing me this article.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Check out "No Excuses" by Air France...nice music video, great song
Special thanks to Jack Piper for sending this link along
Man as industrial palace
This is weird but very, very cool
Der Mensch als Industriepalast [Man as Industrial Palace] from Henning Lederer on Vimeo.
The Decline: The Geography of a Recession
http://cohort11.americanobserver.net/latoyaegwuekwe/multimediafinal.html
Follow the link to a very interesting interactive map of employment rates in the US by county and watch as they've increased from January 2007 until now.
Special thanks to Jack Piper for the recommendation and the link.
Follow the link to a very interesting interactive map of employment rates in the US by county and watch as they've increased from January 2007 until now.
Special thanks to Jack Piper for the recommendation and the link.
I mean...c'mon! The New Oxford American Dictionary picked "Unfriend" as its word of the year
Perhaps in a sign of how the plague of social media has numbed us all to the value of legitimate human connections, the New Oxford American Dictionary has picked the verb "unfriend," or "to remove someone as a 'friend' on a social networking site such as Facebook" as its 2009 Word of the Year. - Caroline McCarthy, CNET
I agree with Caroline here.
From the Oxford University Press Blog:
“It has both currency and potential longevity,” notes Christine Lindberg, Senior Lexicographer for Oxford’s US dictionary program. “In the online social networking context, its meaning is understood, so its adoption as a modern verb form makes this an interesting choice for Word of the Year. Most “un-” prefixed words are adjectives (unacceptable, unpleasant), and there are certainly some familiar “un-” verbs (uncap, unpack), but “unfriend” is different from the norm. It assumes a verb sense of “friend” that is really not used (at least not since maybe the 17th century!). Unfriend has real lex-appeal.”
I agree with Caroline here.
From the Oxford University Press Blog:
“It has both currency and potential longevity,” notes Christine Lindberg, Senior Lexicographer for Oxford’s US dictionary program. “In the online social networking context, its meaning is understood, so its adoption as a modern verb form makes this an interesting choice for Word of the Year. Most “un-” prefixed words are adjectives (unacceptable, unpleasant), and there are certainly some familiar “un-” verbs (uncap, unpack), but “unfriend” is different from the norm. It assumes a verb sense of “friend” that is really not used (at least not since maybe the 17th century!). Unfriend has real lex-appeal.”
Monday, November 16, 2009
Parting shot: Here is an image of the school where I used to teach
The pile of rubble is the former boys' dorm at Crested Butte Academy. While the school did move during my last year, this was it's home for 13 years. It's actually pretty sad to see. Thanks to Alex Fenlon for this pic. Hope they build that water park we always wanted.
Colombia Uses Ads to Persuade Rebels to Turn Themselves In
The government of Colombia now uses TV ads during soccer games to try to convince rebels to turn themselves in. Turns out, when you're a rebel in remote areas of Colombia, watching satellite TV is one of the only ways you are able to pass the time. Below is one of their TV spots...
To read the full article: http://adage.com/globalnews/article?article_id=140548
To read the full article: http://adage.com/globalnews/article?article_id=140548
Sunday, November 15, 2009
The Flaming Lips: The Fearless Freaks.
Everyone needs to check out this documentary. Here's the intro...
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