Well, it's New Year's Eve, and what could be more appropriate for this time of reflection than a top 10 of 2007 lists?
How about 50 of them.
TIME recently posted their "50 Top 10 Lists of 2007" complete with pictures, text blurbs, and lots of video clips, a testament to the popularity of online communities like YouTube and Google Video.
It was fun reading all the articles today revolving around the Patriots win last night that capped off a perfect regular season. Many featured speculation about the upcoming playoffs, some basically hated on the achievement altogether, and most touched on the various records the team set during the game.
Around halftime last night, we tried to bring up an actual listing of all of the records that could have potentially been broken during the game...and it took longer than expected. Although Boston.com has a nice pictorial review of most of these records, I decided to compile a listing of all of the NFL team and individual player records the Patriots either set or tied during this 2007 regular season:
The Patriots set the record for most wins in a regular season (which I suppose they would have had even if they finished with a 15-1 record, right?)
Tom Brady set the single-season record for most touchdowns in a season with 50, breaking Peyton Manning's mark of 49 from 2004.
Randy Moss broke the record for most touchdown receptions in a season with 23, surpassing Jerry Rice's total of 22 set in 1987 (in 12 games!).
The Pats scored 589 points in 2007, more than any other team scored in any other regular season. The previous record was 556 points by the 1998 Vikings.
Last night the Patriots broke their own record set in 2004 by winning their last 19 consecutive regular season games (and counting).
Tom Brady connected with Randy Moss for more touchdowns this season than any other quarterback has to any other receiver in any single season, ever. With 23 touchdowns, they shattered the previous high of 18 held by Dan Marino / Mark Clayton and Brett Favre / Sterling Sharpe.
The 2007 Patriots also set a record for most touchdowns scored in a season with 75, breaking Miami's record of 70 (breaking Miami records seems to becoming a theme here...)
Randy Moss became the first receiver in history to get 100 yards in his first 3 games with a new team (oh, and he then got 102 yards receiving in week 4 as well).
In the now infamous "spygate" game against the Jets, Ellis Hobbs returned the opening kickoff of the second half 108 yards for a touchdown setting the NFL record for longest kickoff return.
During the 2007 campaign, 21 different players scored a touchdown for the Patriots, tying the record also held by the 1987 Rams and the 2000 Broncos.
As if that weren't enough, the Pats almost set the record for most points per game as well as the biggest average margin of victory this year too.
Unreal. How anyone thought this was going to be a cakewalk is a mystery to me. Somehow the Giants came out fully Red Bulled and put the pressure on early. At one point in the game they had the biggest lead any team has had on the Patriots all year: 12 points (in the 4th quarter!)...yet somehow Brady and company prevailed.
"It's a great win for our team." -Tom Brady "This is one for the ages." -Chris Collensworth
After Moss dropped that pass I dropped to the floor, laying there silently staring at the ceiling until TLM wasn't sure if something was medically wrong. She then urged me (sorta forcefully) not to count Brady out. Naturally, on the next play, Brady connects with Moss to break both the single season TD passes record and the TD receptions record simultaneously...oh, they took the lead on the play too, by the way.
All records possibly achieved in the game were reached, and there's only one major goal left for this 2007 Patriots team:
The Patriots game against the Giants this Saturday night can now be watched by more than just people in the Boston market (no, not the restaurant chain) and subscribers to the NFL Network, as originally slated. In what will be an unprecedented simulcast, the game will now also be broadcast by CBS and NBC.
"It'll be like the State of the Union address, you can flip to every channel and see it." -Bill Belichick
I'm sure of two things: the people over at ABC must be fuming unless they've already received some kind of compensation for no longer having the exclusive rights to the local market, and that we'll be seeing p-l-e-n-t-y of NFL Network ads and general hype during the game. Believe me when I say that all of those records, starters playing or sitting, even the score in the game will at (most) times be playing second fiddle to NFL propaganda.
Point Two:
It's good to finally see at least one Patriot break away from this "our only goal is to win the Super Bowl" mantra and tell it like it is. Tom Brady laid it out in a locker room interview the day after Christmas:
"We've got a lot of records at stake, the most important one being the 16-0...I hope we achieve that. It would be a great feat for the team. We'd go down as the only team to be 16-0, so that's the goal I've got in mind." -Tom Brady
Though I'm sure winning the Super Bowl is still the supreme goal, it's nice to see a little honesty from the players (if only one so far publicly). Here's a thought: if realizing what they are on the verge of as a team is sinking in, what about all those other records, particularly the individual ones?
What will happen if the Patriots score three defensive touchdowns in the first quarter and essentially lock up the game by the half? Will Brady, Moss et.al. come back to take the field for the third quarter, risking potential injury? What if the team they are facing has already (and most likely will have) pulled their starters? How important are those records, even if only secretly to the individuals themselves?
I know this: we care. We want to see all those records broken. We want to see it happen, no matter what it takes, because we know these types of seasons and these types of chances don't come by everyday. So, Coach, give them a chance to do it, even if it's in the second half.
"Being associated with Santa Claus...there is a lot worse, so I'll take it...When you're a kid, sometimes you dreamed of being on the cover of Sports Illustrated, but that's not the [cover] I pictured." -Bill Belichick
Is it jealousy? Spite perhaps? It's no secret that right now Boston is the place to be a sports fan, what with the World Champion Red Sox, the undefeated Patriots, and the NBA-best Celtics, etc. It's simple: the Patriots (and Boston sports in general) are no longer the underdogs, and subsequently it is no longer hip for peripheral sports fans (if you can call them that) to root for them. Instead, the American way dictates the common moron to shout "down with the victors" and mock guys like Belichick and Brady.
...and so St. Nick somehow managed to find our small little condo yet again, as evidenced by presents under the tree, stockings full of stocking stuff, and some bites taken out of the cookies we left out.
Ok, so we didn't leave out any cookies, but we still managed to start off what could have been one of the most stressful days of the year with an enjoyable exchange of gifts. Then both TLM and I went into full family-holiday-preparation mode, a process involving not only showering, shaving and getting ready to go out, but also preparing ourselves mentally for the socialization that lay ahead.
As opposed to what many of you many be inferring right now, this didn't have anything to do with mustering up enough patience to deal with an annoying relative or friend, but rather beating back the trepidation of us (ok, me) saying something stupid, incoherent, or (and this is my forté) entirely inappropriate to anyone during the course of the day. I think that save for a side conversation I had in front of my uncle's mother about a novelty book about "how to swear in every language", I did ok. Many others will not be able to say the same, I'm sure, before the day is done, and it is in recognition of such accomplishments of verbal tomfoolery that Wired has put out their 2007 Foot-in-Mouth Awards.
My personal runaway favorite from the list: James Watson of Watson and Crick DNA discovery fame:
James Watson, the co-discoverer of DNA, talked his way into retirement by telling a London newspaper that he feared for Africa because black people aren't as smart as whites.
Watson told The Sunday Times he was "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours -- whereas all the testing says, not really."
TLM and I started what we hope will be a couple of new traditions this year. The first is me making a Christmas Eve Spencer-special meatball dinner, and the second is something both of us would have loved as a tradition growing up but never really had: opening one gift on Christmas Eve.
Well, we're both adults now (at least that's what people tell me), and we can do whatever we want, so we did. I gave her a big plastic bin with 100 plastic cookie cutters inside (which we hope to be using soon), but that pales in comparison to what I saw when I opened the gift she gave me: a Wireless Weather Station featuring Oscar Outlook Forecaster.
For some reason, I've come close to buying some sort of indoor/outdoor thermometer (weather stations as they're called I know now) more than a few times last year, and TLM apparently picked up on it. The gadget she gave me is better than anything I was eyeballing, I assure you, and it even comes with a name (we...ok, I...like to name our gizmos). As for Oscar the weatherman, I'll let the video speak for itself.
The weather held off, but it's fifteen down, one to go. The Patriots are too far along now to not achieve this. I know they'll preach the "15 one-game winning streaks", but I doubt in the locker room next week they'll be thinking about moving on the the playoffs. Next week is about a lot of things, but what will be on the mind of everyone is nothing except one thing:
In my meandering across the web for yesterday's post about Futurama, I came across lots of images and stills from the series. I also came across some original artwork, like the image above by "Satomi-Chan", that portrayed the show's characters as if they were anime. I was particularly impressed with the less-bubbly work of "spacecoyote", and her vision of the Futurama world (and also the Simpsons world), as seen below. Both galleries, hosted at deviantart.com, are definitely worth checking out.
I just finished watching "Futurama: Bender's Big Score", and it was like seeing an old, witty, yet still very adolescent friend.
You read correctly; "Futurama", quite possibly the most underrated of all the modern cartoon series, is back after being canned four years ago ending with a shortened fourth season. Apparently the execs at FOX had only so much time for a sci-fi cartoon with esoteric references, math-based humor, and an alcoholic robot with more one-liners than Rodney Dangerfield in his prime (who I'm pretty sure makes a virtual "head-in-a-jar" cameo in the series).
There will also apparently be a fifth season, interestingly slated to be first released as DVDs and then shown on Comedy Central. FOX's decision to give the go ahead was due in no small part, I'm sure, to the show's massive fan base and it's success while being rerun on AdultSwim (it ate up half the space on my DVR, at least).
Wired has been running some great articles revolving around "Futurama" and video games. Video games, you say? Yes, and the first is a review of the quintessential episode "Raiders of the Lost Arcade", a must-see for anyone who ever played an Atari.
I need some Slurm...
UPDATE 12.23.07 Oh, and as for a movie rating for "Futurama: Bender's Big Score"... 3 and a half starts, so there.
TLM found the compliment to "ICanHasCheezBurger" today...and this one is (dare I say it?) for the dogs. It's called "IHasaHotDog" and is similar in format and unique vocabulary to it's catty cousin. There's another post about it over on TMT today, too.
Though we may be just a little biased, we both agree after going through lots of the pics on the site that cats are definitely funnier than dogs...but there are still gems like this:
Denise Martin told us all a tale during the "Survivor: China" finale that not only gave rise to a collective sob of compassion from the audience akin to what one might hear after seeing an impoverished child in a CCF commercial for the first time, but also a check for $50,000 from producer Mark Burnett. It seems, however, that she stretched the truth in places and skipped the truth altogether in the rest. Her nonchalant recitation of how the powers that be in the cafeteria hierarchy wouldn't let her keep her job as a lunchlady because she was "too popular" turns out to be more of a fictitious appeal to the masses than an actual lunchpail sob story.
According to Nancy Lane, the Superintendent of Douglas Public Schools, Martin was promoted to janitor, and given almost a $10/hr. pay raise along with it, in March of this year, before she even tried out for the Survivor. This, to be sure, is not what Martin wanted us to believe during that reunion show.
"They did explain to me today that reality doesn't necessarily mean factual" -Nancy Lane, Douglas Public Schools
Martin appeared on The Early Show this morning and admitted that the implication she made about being demoted because of her appearance on Survivor was false. She also said that she tried to get her old job back but the position had already been filled. Also, when the question of whether or not Martin would still accept the $50,000 was proposed, she gave the impression that she would, if it was still being offered.
In the words of my friend Bugman, "Another classy Masshole."
Last night Todd Herzog was announced as the winner of Survivor: China, and once again the Achilles' heel of reality television shows was exposed: they lose steam as time progresses and the finales totally or mostly suck.
Last night was a case of mostly sucking, as is the Survivor way. All we care about is when the jury gets their chance to congratulate, question, and chew out the remaining survivors....the other 2.5 hours you can fast forward through and not really miss a thing. Though it sounds like a waste of time (and it is), it's more than other reality shows can say for themselves. At least Probst used to jump out of airplanes and parachute into a live studio audience to deliver the results...
Go ahead. Pick a show. "Big Brother"? "Flavor of Love"? "The Bachelor"? "The Amazing Race", maybe? I defy you to come up with a show that has an exciting finale.
At least the next Survivor looks to be like an "All-Stars 2"...kinda. Rupert and Yul would be a good team up.
The New England Patriots became the second team in history to start a season 14-0 after beating the Jets 20-10 today in a wet and rainy Gillette Stadium. Though the weather may have limited much of the Patriots' game plan to a ground attack, it proved not to be a factor in terms of the outcome.
In a game that also featured two blocked punts, the Jets seemed poised for a comeback late in the game. Chad Pennington, in for an injured Kellen Clemens, threw what was initially ruled a TD that would have made it a 3-point game with just under 3 minutes left. The play was reviewed and overturned, however, as receiver Justin McCareins clearly didn't have possession when his first foot hit the ground. I'm sure the New York media will cry foul, but it was the right call, without a doubt.
The closest the Pats came to losing today was when the game was temporarily suspended because some meatheads were slinging snowballs onto the field with the Pats in the end zone in the 4th quarter, bringing me to the edge of my seat wondering, albeit for a moment, if their perfect season would end with a forfeit.
Thankfully, it didn't.
The only other team to win their first 14 games was...you guessed it...the 1972 Miami Dolphins. For them, the 14th game marked the end of the regular season and clubhouse pat on the back. For the Pats, it's just a step closer to their ultimate goal (no, not a perfect season...another Super Bowl Championship) and a broad smile on the face of Bill Belichick.
The Patriots will face the 2007 version of the Miami team next week, who up until today were the polar opposite of the Pats; that is, they had yet to win a game. The Dolphins beat the Ravens in overtime 22-16 after Baltimore tied the game with a field goal with 8 second left in the 4th quarter. The Ravens kicker Matt Stover couldn't put the potential game winner through the uprights when given the chance in overtime, though, and Cleo Lemon found Greg Camarillo for a 64 yard game winning TD.
The Dolphins finally winning may not be all that bad. It may be the old Red Sox fan in me, but I for one was worried that karma would somehow intervene next week if an 0-14 Dolphins team were to face a 14-0 Patriots team, potentially spoiling the breaking of their own franchise's record, no matter how daunting the task may be. Now that they won a game, I'm back to reality and pretty confident that New England will be playing the NY Giants with a 15-0 record.
TLM and I just got back from seeing "Mamma Mia!" (my first musical) at the Colonial Theater in Boston. I'm still gathering my thoughts on this one, though I can at this point ask: who knew there were so many ABBA fans?
UPDATE 12.16.07 As I went to the ABBA website to get some more info for a more substantial review, I noticed two things: today is Benny Andersson's birthday (he's one of the ABBA guys), and their question of the month is "Do you listen to ABBA every day?", a question to which 67% of responders said "yes". Read into that what you will, but it sounds like ABBA fans are pretty obsessive. When were they big? the 70's?
As for the show, I was taken aback at first. As I'd mentioned before, I'd never been to a musical, never mind one that featured music I'd only heard previously on "best of" anthologies and classic rock stations (classic already in the early 90's).
The set was simplistic yet effective. Two big pieces of faux-stone background that would be positioned in a variety of ways actually led to mostly-believable settings. Yes, I'm giving props to the props.
The story was simple and original and actually wasn't that bad, albeit profoundly predictable. There was frequent humor, though much of it, however harmless to the writers, I don't think was meant for children. In fact, I think it was clearly written for a particular generation of people, specifically those in their late teens or early twenties when ABBA hit this part of the world.
What struck me as unusual was the (often distracting) crowd activity. At times I felt like I was at the Rocky Horror Picture Show, minus Meatloaf and people throwing rice at the wedding. At the end of the show was nothing short of an homage to ABBA. Three of the main characters came out dressed in the spacesuit costumes of the time and led the bopping crowd in a rendition of "Dancing Queen", an image now forever ingrained in my head.
The singing was fine, and the dancing is what I imaging it to be...just a stone's throw from the "showtunes" pieces put together for "So You Think You Can Dance". What they do they do well, and I do respect that.
Overall I had a good time, and I give the show a B.
I have a confession to make. I plan to set my DVR to record the new 2008 version of American Gladiators when it starts in January. I was a fan of the original show in the 80's, and for some reason (maybe that I have extra space on the DVR) I think I might be a fan today.
In honor of that classic and perhaps too short-lived series, I found this clip on YouTube. It's the intro for the first season of the show, though the audio is a little off. All your old favorites are there, from Nitro, Turbo and Zap to Sabre, Blaze and Lace.
The new series will be hosted by Hulk Hogan and Laila Ali. I can't wait for their banter...oh, and the gladiatorial games, of course.
Oh, and as for Clemens: sorry buddy. Eight pages in the report is awfully convincing to me. Maybe the Duque was right about you; that is, your best days were behind you...until you started juicing.
Amidst all my posts about the Patriots, movies, silly websites and sillier holidays, you'll find a post or two about our upcoming wedding. From what I gather, it's never too early to get a date and/or book a venue for the reception. Today we went to the Seaport Hotel and were shown three different rooms, though the one that stood out above all other we've seen thus far, by far, is one of their newest ones called The Lighthouse Room.
Firstly, Happy Birthday Dan. Get all that BAmBUu stuff lined up and ready to go.
Secondly, in light of a conversation yesterday revolving around the many stellar performances Keanu Reeves has delivered to us on film (I know, I know...), I found this on YouTube. It's an animated clip from larger collection at a site called "How It Should Have Ended".
Unfortunately there's no parody there for "Ocean's 13", but I guess that movie's a parody of itself already.
This week was said to be the biggest test left for the Patriots on their way to an undefeated season. However, the mighty Pittsburgh Steelers and their #1 rated defense were still 10-point underdogs going into today's game, even after two weeks where the Patriots seemed to scuffle a bit.
It turned out the bookies were wrong...way wrong. Their pick for a winner was right, but the spread was more than doubled as the Pats trounced the Steelers 34-13, clinching a bye in the first round of this year's playoffs. Tom Brady threw for 399 yards and 4 touchdowns today, giving him 45 on the season. He needs 5 more over the next 3 games to pass Peyton Manning's single season record of 49, set in 2004. Considering that Brady passed Dan Marino's record today for most games in a season with 3 or more touchdown passes (11), this doesn;t look to be a problem.
A couple of those touchdowns were caught by Randy Moss (go figure), who almost caught a third on the Patriots' last drive. He now has 19 on the year and is another Patriot on pace to break a single season record, that being the one for receiving touchdowns in a single season currently set at 22 by Jerry Rice.
There were some great plays in the game as well. The Patriots found the endzone with 1:05 left in the first quarter when Brady slung it in to Moss for a 4 yard touchdown, and subsequently highlighted, by the way, by a post-catch jabbering match between Brady and some of the Steelers' secondary. On their very next play from scrimmage, the Pats went long and scored on a 63-yard play-action pass from Brady to Moss. In the third quarter, there was another long passing touchdown, but this one was the result of a play that started with Brady throwing across field to Moss, Moss dropping it, picking it up, then passing it back to Brady who then found Jabar Gaffney 56 yards downfield in the endzone. Because the only forward pass was the last one, the play was entirely legal, and had Moss not picked up the ball quickly enough a Steeler may have recovered what would have been considered a fumble.
After the play the cameras showed image after image of Patriots' coaches, players and fans smiling and laughing, perhaps at the fact that the play worked, perhaps at the Steelers in general.
Oh, and of course there was backup-turned-starter Anthony Smith's bold guarantee of a Steeler victory. As with most declarations of the sort, he was wrong.
No, this isn't just an attempt to get you to say "tanks" (though I would feel obliged to follow up accordingly, for those who know what I'm talking about). This is for real...I think.
Some reports indicate that the U.S. Army are working on a kind of cloaking technology, rendering their vehicles virtually invisible, as in not visible to the naked eye. It gets even more sci-fi: this technology reportedly could involve "an artificial type of matter called metamaterials" that "guide light around an object, rather than refract or reflect the light".
Wow.
Imagine planes, bombs, tanks, even soldiers (and their shadows!) becoming no longer visible. I like watching it in movies, but for some reason the idea of this existing in reality makes me very, very nervous.
As if TLM wasn't the best already, she arranged for us to have a "secret date night" tonight. I write you now from halftime at the TD Banknorth Garden, where the the C's have a 22 point lead over the Raptors.
Whenever I come across stories about new discoveries of prehistoric anythings, I make note. A couple of days ago scientists at the University of Oslo in Norway (my favorite country at Epcot) found what they think to be a new species of prehistoric sea reptile. There appears to be some controversy, though, as they're not sure this new species is really new. Um, ok...it doesn't make for a great story per say, but it's an excuse to include images like this one:
Also, in a more exciting and less vague declaration made by scientists on Monday, a dinosaur mummy has been found, complete with bones, skin, and maybe even organs and muscles. This is great news as now we don't need to mine for those pesky prehistoric mosquitoes fossilized in amber to get our dinosaur DNA for our dinosaur amusement parks...
Pirates vs. Ninja...why is that again? I'm sure there is a story (more than just "the Ninja were jealous that Pirates had their own day"), but today is the Day of the Ninja, so celebrate by busting out your black ski masks (just don't walk into any convenience stores!).
Last year "Ask a Ninja" enlightened us as to the origin of the day (see below), but for some reason I don't think he's being entirely serious...you be the judge.
Did the Patriots get any extra help last night in their victory and quest for a perfect season? If they did, it was from the Ravens, case closed. Consider these plays:
With a 7 point Ravens lead, Kyle Boller launches a pick into a pack of Patriots with 10:37 left on the clock on a 3rd and 14 on the NE 30. Consider this: had the play been a running play, or even a short passing play out to the flat, the clock would have continued to tick and Baltimore might still have had a shot at a field goal (albeit a 47 yarder from that line of scrimmage), or at least a coffin-corner punt otherwise. Instead, the Pats return the interception to their own 43 and march 37 yards in 1:36 o kick a field goal and cut the difference to 4. McGahee had been running all over the Patriots front all day, so why stop then? Fault here: Baltimore.
On the Patriots' final drive, the first time they faced a 4th down came with 1:38 left in the game. Brady had just thrown a short pass on a 3rd and 10 to Kevin Faulk who managed to gain 9 yards to make it 4th and 1, and Brady subsequently hurried to the line and tried a QB sneak only to get stuffed by the Ravens' perfectly positioned front line, seemingly ending the Patriots' drive. The play is called back, though, as "someone" (Rex Reed) on the Ravens' sidelines called timeout just before the snap. The Ravens' defense on the field is livid with their coach. Once again, fault: Baltimore.
"I heard the whistle blow and I stopped...I would've made the first down if the whistle didn't blow." - Tom Brady on the 4th and 1 QB sneak
On the very next snap (thanks again, Rex!), Heath Evans is slammed for a one yard loss. Here is the only place where Baltimore may have gotten some help as Russ Hochstein jumped off before the snap, nullifying the last play (again) and making it 4th and 6. Was this a bad thing, though? No, not at all, and for three reasons, the first being the aforementioned voiding of the Evans play. The second reason is that I believe it contributed to rattling the Ravens, and the third was what came on the next play, with the Ravens' looking for a pass, sleping on Brady who sprinted(?) for 12 yards to get the 1st. Fault: Baltimore.
Oh, on that same play, Samari Rolle tacked on 5 yards after an illegal contact call, giving the Pats now a 1st and 10 on the Ravens' 18. Fault: Baltimore.
The last 4th down for the Patriots on the drive came with just 55 seconds left on the clock and the Patriots still needing a touchdown. After a New England timeout, presumably to draw up just the right play, Brady tried to find Ben Watson in the endzone, but to no avail as the pass went incomplete, bouncing off three sets of hands. The play (and end of the drive) was once again revoked, however, as a penalty was called for holding on Jamaine Winborne (incorrectly, though, as it was Bart Scott was tackling Jabar Gaffney as Brady was releasing the ball), resulting in a Patriots 1st and Goal on the Ravens' 8 yard line. Fault: Baltimore.
Next play: touchdown pass to Gaffney on an in-route-turned-out-route. Both feet were clearly in, and the ever-vague "did he have possession" question came into play when the replay official wanted to look it over. Where was the pass rush the Ravens had been so successful with all night? OK, really this was a great play by the Patriots, and the following is for the sake of consistency. Fault: Baltimore.
An absolute meltdown of linebacker Bart Scott followed with a 15 yard unsportsmanlike conduct, then another one for throwing an official's flag into the stands. That's 30 yards assessed on the ensuing kickoff, Bart. At this point Baltimore was only down by a field goal and had one timeout. Scott's two penalties, along with another 5 yards for an offsides on Ed Reed, put the Patriots point of kickoff on the Baltimore 35 yard line, essentially making sure the Ravens' next drive would start at best on their 20. Fault: Baltimore (specifically Bart Scott)
Let's see if the Steelers can learn from Baltimore's mistakes.
Well, it isn't exactly the day after Thanksgiving, but it is a day after Thanksgiving, and TLM and I finally put up the tree. It was fun and easy, and the only new question this year was whether to go and get a real tree or not. Thoughts?
An American Legend passed away on Friday as Evel Kneivel died, ultimately losing a three year battle with cancer. Though I have always been fascinated by Evel Knievel and his jumps since childhood, I never thought of why all of his highlight reels were of his unsuccessful stunts. Now it seems like a no-brainer: humans have an innate interest in the failings of others, whether it be breaking vertebrae and ribs while trying to jump over a fountain at Cesar's Palace or just getting voted off in your favorite reality show (finally!).
I think one YouTube user put it best when he suggested that Evel Knievel, upon arrival to Heaven, would hop on a motorcycle and proceed to jump over the Pearly Gates (without injury, of course).
Another year, another 30 posts in November. Some would say I "made it", though I didn't think of it as such a burden (though TLM will attest to more than a few nights where I "still had to post").
Maybe I'll keep this going for a while; see how long I can keep the streak alive.
(to my lovely fiancée: I swear it won't be neurotic about it, promise!)
I couldn't help myself. After a couple of very tough days at work, I went through my "to be looked at later" bookmark folder and found this at (where else) WidgetBox.
I kid you not, I've played exactly once and, yes, I picked the million dollar case, and had a string of "no deals" to win it...
This is a piece of a Red Sox "Sgt. Pepper" Montage AL-9000 sent me. There's a nice page with a full size version of it on the NY Times site, complete with a listing of each person included.
It's always good to see Nuf Ced McGreevey...it's too bad he couldn't just give a quick jolt with his left elbow a bit and tag Harry Frazee in the ear.
Back in high school (not that many years ago, I'd like to think), I was in a programming competition that pitted a program I wrote to play a 2-player game against those of all of my classmates in a single-elimination tournament. I made it to the finals and eventually won, though after discussion with the other finalist we both realized that based on our PASCAL code (ok, that many years ago) the winner would have been the program that went first. More importantly, both of us wrote very shortsighted code; that is, we set up a series of rules like "look for a winning move first" and "look for a block second". It was only a matter of time before I learned the more traditional computer science approach to creating algorithms for 2-player games: game trees.
A game tree is a symbolic representation of all the possible outcomes of a game where nodes are the "states" of the game at a given time and the connecting arrows are the possible "moves" (called "plys" in game theory). Think of it as an inverted tree where the root node represents the start of the game and all its branches representing a player's first turn.
The common example for explaining game trees is the well-known game of tic-tac-toe. Player 1 starts out with a blank grid and 9 possible squares to click in. After a spot is chosen (and an "X" is placed), there are 8 other squares from which player 2 can choose (and place an "O"), which then leaves 7 squares for Player 1, and then 6 for Player 2, and so on. You can guess that even a game as simple as tic-tac-toe, guaranteed to be over in 9 moves, can have a pretty large number of possible ways it can be played. At first glance you may even calculate the number of nodes in the game tree to be 9! (362,880), though luckily there are several factors we can use to trim this number down (to 26,830 nodes, in fact).
The first way to trim a game tree is to consider all of the branches that never make it to ply number 9 because the game has already finished. For example, imagine Player 1 winning with 3 spots still on the grid (however unlikely, it's still possible); the last 3 plys for that branch never need to be calculated. Another important way to "prune" the trees is to recognize any kind of symmetry (rotation, reflection) across branches and represent each by one and only one branch. For example, if Player 1's first move is to a corner, any corner, our game tree only needs to have one branch as each of the other 3 nodes where Player 1's first move is a corner can be rotated to look like the first. The same is true of Player 1's first move if to a side spot. Add in the branch that stems from Player 1's first move to the center spot and you now have 3 branches coming out of the root node, not 9...now that's some good and efficient pruning.
In the project below, I've recreated the commonly seen 2-ply game tree for a tic-tac-toe game. Playing with this visual and interactive model may give you a better understanding of how game trees are constructed. The sitemap of the workBench project is what the (beginning of the) game tree would look like. Look at the number of branches each node spawns and see if you can figure out why none of the 2nd-tier nodes spawn 8 branches. Also, there are lots of other, more sophisticated ways of pruning game trees if you are interested, but they are beyond the scope of this post.
So why are game trees important anyway? Why would knowing about them have changed how I made that program all those years ago? The answer is simple: if you can make a model of all possible outcomes, you can choose the path that helps you the most. In a 2-player game tree, this can be done in a variety of ways, though an easy example is to "rate" each node, started from the end of each branch, or leaf nodes. If a node gives Player 1 a win, assign a rating of 1 to that node. If it gives Player 2 a win, rate it -1, and if it is a tie, rate it 0 (this is how I was taught, though you can use any rating system you'd like, such as colors or shapes). Once all of the leaf nodes have been rated, the nodes in the ply above them can be rated as well, all the way up to the top using the following rules:
For each node X on ply Z, look at the parent node Y one level up on ply (Z-1).
If all of node Y's children are rated the same way, give node Y that rating.
If any of node Y's children are rated as a win for the player whose turn is on ply Z, rate node Y a win for that player.
If neither condition applies, rate node Y a tie.
This may seem hard to understand, but in a nutshell all it means is that if you have to choose between a bunch of moves, all of which have ratings already, you don't want to choose one that has at least one outcome where your opponent wins, assuming your opponent will see that opportunity and take it (that's the crux of step 3).
If you are an educator and involved in anything that revolves around game theory, recursion in programming, or even symmetry in high school Geometry, constructing (or filling in already started) game trees for simple 2 player games may be a fun and productive activity.
It may even be the key to you winning a programming tournament in your high school computer class...
The Eagles gave them a run for their money last night, that much is certain, but the New England Patriots are still undefeated improving their 2007 season record to 11-0. The toughest challenge of the remaining games still seems to be Pittsburgh, though Philly showed last night that not every game against the Pats is a blowout.
Who was the player of the game last night? Was it Wes Welker (13 catches, 149 yards), Jabar Gaffney (6 catches, 87 yards, 1 TD), or maybe Asante Samuel (2 interceptions, 1 runback for a TD)?
Of all of the questions, the ones that gained the most publicity (by far) were the questions asking students what they'd settle for in return for their right to vote (forever). I'm not sure if this was multiple choice format, but many headlines read something along the lines of "Students at NYU hapy to give up their right to vote for an iPod".
This is, of course, an oversimplification, but reading the article made me think about my own right to vote. I'd always been taught that voting was perhaps the most important thing I could do as a citizen of this country (right up there with jury duty!), and for all intents and purposes this teaching stuck; I make sure I go out just about every November and cast my ballot. However, I can remember some heavy discussions about recent elections (see election, presidential, 2000), many of which brought the actual value of my singular vote into question as well.
How much is my vote really worth? For the moment, forget monetary value...that is, does my vote really matter for anything? I'd like to believe the answer is "yes", but can anyone be so sure anymore? If, then, one's vote is worth nothing, why not take a million bucks or free tuition?
The answer is simple, to me at least. I believe that the right to vote is priceless, and is one of the reasons, nay, freedoms for which people want to come live in this country. Even if my one vote doesn't sway an election, I treasure the fact that I have the ability to choose who our leaders will be and how our laws will evolve...
TLM showed me this today, which I used as a basis for my post over at TRintuition. Somehow this has been around the net for a long time and I had never seen it until today. Still pretty cool...
You're supposed to see the figure spinning one way, then try to get it to spin the other way. Using the shadow underneath the figure makes this easier, and eventually you will be able to do it, trust me.
To commemorate this year's birthday of Baseball Joe, I'm including a clip from the "Baseball History Podcast", something I think he'd enjoy. Too bad most of this week's episode revolves around the Highlanders (soon to be Yankees) and their totally disreputable star, Hal Chase.
If you want to subscribe to the podcast, you can find it in the iTunes directory, or alternatively just subscribe to http://bhp.libsyn.com/rss. Happy Birthday Pop!
I found this comic on BoingBoing, and I think it's an interesting take on today's holiday, it's history, terrorism, and let's throw in illegal immigration (why not).
I'm not sure if it's a consequence of getting older, and it certainly has nothing to do with what the holiday is supposed to represent. It's everything else about it that makes me crazy. The people in the stores, the pressure to plan out tomorrow making sure to be as inclusive of everyone as you can, and of course then there's the actual family members. As far as I can tell, any plans you make with them prior to the day before Thanksgiving should always be disregarded; they always seem to change at the last minute.
Ah, how I miss the days of my childhood, never having to worry about where or when I had to be somewhere for a family event.
I found this on Joel Spolsky's "Joel on Software" blog...and it's pretty fresh. It's a Google Maps mashup called Walk Score, which, once you supply an address, gives you a list of stores, bars, restaurants, and parks in the area. and, as it's name implies, a "walk score". They are pretty big on getting people to walk places, and identify themselves primarily as a tool to "help homebuyers, renters, and real estate agents find houses and apartments in great neighborhoods."
Our place only got a 58 out of 100 (I believe that's just failing), not surprising since we now live in a suburb. My last place in Eastie got a 75, which leads me to believe whatever algorithm they use to calculate this score doesn't take into account personal safety while walking.
Bust out the Black Sabbath clips - Mike Lowell appears to have come to an agreement with the Red Sox for 3 years. Excellent. Things couldn't have worked out better.
Happy Birthday Al! Sorry the Celtics lost, but the Pats are still undefeated, A-Stupid stayed with the Yankees, and now Mike Lowell gave us some good news today.
We decided it was time to give our facelift, and so last weekend we went out, got some paint and some tiles and went to task. Who knew vinal tiling was this easy?
TLM even found a nice replacement for the whiteboard. Note the coat hooks, er, mega key rack on the bottom.
So it looks like A-Fraud will remain a Yankee after all, and the deal was done without superstar sports agent Scott Boras (haha). Good...he can hit all the home runs he wants, but as long as he's on the Yankees, they will never win a postseason series.
"I like to keep all the people I hate together, so I don't feel conflicted." -TLM on A-Rod staying with the Yankees
I agree. Needless to say many others called up sports radio today and shared the same sentiment. My big question is, why the rush? Wouldn't it have made more sense business wise for A-Broad to hold out until January, like Johnny Damon did? At least another month of shopping himself around was, I think, expected.
Some say he came crawling back because he always wanted to stay with the Yankers (maybe)...that it was his agent who caused all the friction (highly likely). Others will point out that not that many other teams would have been able to afford his hefty price tag (probably true). Still others will claim that he just wants to be on a winning team, a claim to which I respond "...so why is going back to play for the Yankees?".
I think something else is going on here. The Mitchell report is coming out within the next couple of months, and we already know that there are going to be some "big names" on the list, including over 10 current free agents. We also know that those free agents know who they are. Could it be that the big rush to sign a guaranteed contract with a team was, dare I say it, an act of desperation by a man who knows his value is about to go down? Is there a clause somewhere that will let the Yankees opt out of his contract if that's the case? Are purple lips a side-effect of using too many steroids?
Let him play on the Bronx so he can hold them back...while he is still allowed to play.
How cool is that title? "Aquatron" - is it some kind of underwater computer? Might it be an 80's game where you race fish? Perhaps it's a color most men have never heard of.
In fact, the Aquatron was a "Space Age" 8-track stereo put out by Brother in the late 60's / early 70s. I ran into one today when I went over to see Jaz's new place (finally, seeing as how he's been there a year).
The place was nice, and definitely lived up to the description he gave me, including lots of homemade art on the walls, a dance room, and an impressive ready-to-record music room. There was even an office (work is done between painting, dancing and playing music), complete with at least three Macs in sight - laptops and desktops - and it was in this room I saw the Aquatron sitting innocuously on the corner of a table.
It didn't really stand out at first, as there were lots of other interesting objects to look at in the room, but shortly after Jaz pointed out its suction-cup base and hide-away handle, he casually mentioned what I think is its coolest feature (and the reason I'm even posting about it): they have the Aquatron hooked up to play music through Airtunes.
That's right; one can port any music they want to hear directly to this stereo, (thus completely removing the need for 8-track tapes!). In a house where, and I quote, they "don't have cable, man", I find this to be the best use of Airtunes I've seen yet. Nice.
One of the classics is still the best, and is even available as a widget, though I decided to make it a post rather than a permanent part of the site in the name of productivity. Don't waste too much time, you have work to do!
I thought a little levity was in order today. TLM showed me a site a few days ago called icanhascheezburger.com, and I agree with how she described it to me: you may think it's stupid at first, but then you keep looking and you eventually find something hilarious. This is my recent favorite:
I lost a family member today. He'd been sick for a long time and he passed away early this morning in his home. He wasn't a brother or a grandfather, but I knew him, and he knew me.
Most of my memories of him come from my childhood. He and his wife would always be at family gatherings, and they would even host a Christmas party every year that seemingly everyone went to. I also remember my mother taking me on many, many summer trips out to a house he owned with his brother on a lake, where I learned how to swim.
I would never have to refer to an aunt or my mother and ask "What's his name again?", and I had heard many stories from my parents and others about him, though I never really got a chance to have a good conversation with him in my adult life.
I would see his wife, my 2nd cousin, at weddings and milestone birthday parties, but he was always not well enough to be there in person. I would ask about him and she would give me honest answers, then I'd say something like "Tell him I said hello."
More recently she'd suggest I come over for a visit, and though I always meant to, I never did. Never, that is, until two days ago when I went with my mother and my aunt and saw him nearing the end of his life.
He was mostly in a daze and wasn't able to talk much. All we could really do was talk to him, hold his hand, and ultimately say goodbye.
...
While we were there I saw lots of the things he had crafted around the house. This was his hobby and a big part of his life, and I never knew this about him. He had hand-made decorations everywhere, and I was even shown his workshop. It made me realize I could've known him a lot more, and likewise he could've known me a lot more too. I could've told him about how I met my fiancée, or how I play in a baseball league, or even just how I have my own blog.
I never had the chance to get to know him better, to know him as more than a figure from my childhood or a character in a family story. I never made the time to go and see him, and I should have.
It may sound cliché, but it should never be the case that you "don't have time". If there is something you mean to do, something you want to do, you make the time.
I can remember the first time I signed into Yahoo messenger all those years ago. I encouraged many of my friends to sign up for a Yahoo account just so they could use this wonderful new technology with me. In fact, I remember seeing recently a TXT somewhere on a backup disc that contained a transcript of a chat with AL-9000 (yeah, I was geeky then, too).
Then along came AIM. "Meh, who needs more than one of these things anyway?" I thought to myself, "Besides, all my friends are on Yahoo".
Such was not the case for too long, especially after the introduction of iChat. Even I, an ardent AOL hater, signed up for a free AIM account just so I could use this new IM client. Eventually, a dilemma evolved: how do I monitor all of my Buddy Lists at once? A better question: is there an easier way to monitor them all without having to open up all of these programs.
In fact, many people wondered the same thing, and consequently many solutions have sprung up over the years. My new personal discovery: Meebo. Not only do they allow for AIM, Yahoo, MSN, GoogleTalk, ICQ, and Jabber accounts, but they also have a nifty feature called MeeboMe that lets you put a "live chat" box (or whatever you want to call it) right on your blog (um, take a look to the right). Any visitor who wants to drop a line or chat love can do so through the Meebo widget, and it's as if they were on your buddy list.
You don't download Meebo; it's web-based and you let it stay open somewhere on your screen. Besides that the only downside I can see so far is no audio/video chat, but that's not uncommon. Oh, and let's hope you don't get MeeboMe'd to death from randoms who want to tell you how awesome your blog is....we do have actual jobs and work to do, after all.
So I stumble upon this site called BustedTees and almost immediately my inner adolescent manifests itself and I'm thinking not only about which of these I'd wear, but also of all those shirts I used to own. I had quite a collection, albeit in high school. Among those I can remember were a black Huckleberry Hound shirt, a "Don't Have a Cow, Man" Bart Simpson tee, a Speedy Gonzales shirt...I even had an original black Phillie's Blunt shirt (that wasn't telegraphing anything to the police, noooooo).
As I'm about to add to my cart a red shirt featuring a chimp in a beret with the words "Viva La Evolution", TLM walks in. I think to myself, "Great"...who better to enjoy a little online shopping with me? Instead, I'm told "I would rather you get something more age-appropriate. You can quote me on that." (see below!). Well, all it took was another look at their online catalog until we found something she thought was worth buying: a tee that read "Jesse and the Rippers", a reference (obviously) to the band John Stamos fronted in the TV show "Full House".
"I would rather you get something more age-appropriate." -TLM
So, is TLM right? Are these shirts meant to be worn only by high-schoolers and people born in the 90's? There were definitely some that I would guess people that young wouldn't understand, yet still there does seem something weird about wearing something that said "Leave Lindsay a-Lohan" or had a picture of William Shakespeare and the phrase "Prose before Hos". Should I live with reckless abandon and buy a few?
Hmmmm....maybe I'll just buy a few as "Christmas presents"...
Part 2 of 2...otherwise known as the top half. Before we continue: Number 6 is a tie. Ok, so some may think a tie in a top 10 list (or 12, whatever) is cheating, but when coming up with the shows I wanted to include, I could only trim it down to 13...and since it's my blog I say ties are allowed.
House features perhaps the most sarcastic character in the history of television, rivaled by only the likes of Archie Bunker. This season there's a slew of new characters in the form of candidates to fill the now-empty House assistant positions (Kumar!). The writers were smart to find ways to keep Omar Epps et. al. in the show while still introducing some much needed new blood into the mix. The most interesting part is that these new characters are systematically being "rejected" as the season moves on...sort of like a reality show.
Speaking of reality shows, no one does it better than the original: Survivor. This year they're in China, and so far it's a great season, full of controversy, drama, innovative challenges, new twists, and plenty of both characters we love and characters we love to hate. James looks unstoppable, albeit unintelligible, so much so that at times the producers give us subtitles. One weird name is gone (Chicken) and the other is becoming a favorite (Frosti). Peih-Gee and Courtney need to go home soon. Denise, the "school lunch lady" from Revere who happens to have a black belt in karate and loves throwing axes and knives, is my current favorite to win.
Any show that is crazy enough to include Tracy Morgan signing "Werewolf Bar Mitzvah", in HD no less, seems sketchy (sorry for the pun), but throw in some witty situations, a ton of one-liners, big name guest stars, Kenneth the Page, and Alec Baldwin (in perhaps his best role ever), and you have a quality show worth catching every week. Only downside for me: 30 Rock is just 30 min. long.
This one is 90% about the characters and 10% about the storylines, but that's fine when you have characters like Henry, Justin, Amanda, Marc, and of course the show's namesake, Betty. Oh, and as TLM may excitedly point out, Posh Spice is guest starring next episode. All of the people you see on the show epitomize some specific aspect of people's personalities in an extreme way, yet we find ourselves able to relate to them all at one point or another - something I think to be maybe the strongest part of the show. On a side note, I'm glad they finally ended Hilda's mourning over the loss of Justin's father (some pretty sad moments in there).
This show is funny, funny, funny, and gets my vote for "most underrated show on television". Every once in a while I'll throw out something I heard Barney or Ted say on a recent episode and three different people within earshot will turn around and smirk knowingly. Every episode makes me laugh and I don't even care anymore who Ted eventually has kids with (ala the show's title).
So suit up and watch this show, because the viewing experience is.....wait for it.....legendary.
The only reason this isn't tops on my list is because it got beaten out by a show everyone I know watches, and that's it. I've been hooked on Heroes since episode 1, and I can't think of any show ever that has a storyline as amorphous almost to the point of being too convoluted yet compelling enough to not lose its viewers. I watch this one as close to broadcast time as I can.
[DISCLAIMER: GEEK ALERT] I subscribe to a podcast about it.
This season Hiro is off fixing history in feudal Japan (he just got back), there is a mysterious villain killing off what is turning out to be a previous generation of heroes (Takezo Kensei / Adam, anyone?), and once again an ominous future is spelled out via a trip to the future by Peter - I think the stat was 93% of the world's population dies. Of course, we were introduced to several new characters, and as of yet no one has been killed off. If you've never seen an episode, it's worth starting at the beginning...of season 1.
This may not be a surprise for many, as it's one of the most popular shows around. As I mentioned in the Heroes blurb, everyone I know watches this, and if you work in an office environment I'm sure you're used to the water-cooler Michael Scott impersonations. This show has become so popular there was even a convention" this year in Scranton, PA (yup, the town agreed to it).
[DISCLAIMER: GEEK ALERT #2] I thought for a moment of tricking TLM into a "vacation" to Pennsylvania around the same time. Then I remembered about the real world.
This year we've seen, among other things, the irrigation room at Schrute Farm, Ryan's promotion and launch of a new website for the company, and Andy's problem with nipple chafing when running (byugh). Will Pam and Jim continue to be an item or will Roy come back? Will Dwight and Angela get back together? Can Darryl reign in Kelly? Can Kelly not annoy the hell out of anyone she's dating? Will Toby (the HR guy) ever find love at all?
In review:
The Office
Heroes
How I Met Your Mother
Ugly Betty
30 Rock
House / Survivor
Chuck
Gossip Girl
Journeyman
My Name Is Earl
The Sarah Silverman Program
Bionic Woman
So there you have it. NBC takes the cake broadcasting 7 out of the 13 shows mentioned, followed by CBS (2), ABC (1), FOX (1), the CW (1) and Comedy Central (1).
Which shows do you think got snubbed? America's Next Top Model? CSI? Bridezillas? Biggest Loser? The Hills, perhaps? Comment away...
Content found on The Neoteric is of no particular genre, topic, or focus, other than it was all at some point, in some way, interesting enough to me to write about.
In light of Google's announcement that 
