Early Version

The Vuelta a Espana is not interesting enough to justify watching Chris Horner gesticulate about his chesterfield (沙发).

But the blog needs content and the gridiron slate was disappointing, so I watched him talk for 15 minutes about today's action as if the events were not a foregone conclusion.

💡 this was a "breakaway" stage. The top ten riders agree not to race, and anyone who doesn't like that goes ten minutes up the road.

Unsurprisingly, I was disappointed. It was as dull as I expected.

🔥 is it paradoxical for something to be both "unsurprising" and "disappointing"?

🌎 the more interesting sub-plot is the other cycling podcast coming to terms with their creation of the term "tug buddy" ...

Politics is also spectator sport in today's society.

At the latest cattle-call GOP event in Iowa, it was striking how all the questions are "how will you beat the Democrats and the Democrat agenda" and none of them are "how will you run the country, and what is your agenda".

🔥 none of the candidates even have an agenda, except for Da Vek.

They are more interested in playing to the crowd than anything else.

⚔️ more specifically, playing to their half of the crowd.

And when the name of the game is popularity among the voting public, there is some merit to this strategy.

But only in moderation. At the extremes (as we currently have in American Politics), it becomes an absurd farce.

Cycling is a factory for drama.

The outcomes aren't fixed, but there is a certain amount of rigging going on. Outcomes that make certain people happy are more likely than would be in a pure competition.

<red> we note the existence of certain Criterium races that are fixed.

But the #GCKuss phenomenon this year is certainly the beneficiary of rigging. Certainly Vingegaard would have passed Kuss on GC if they were not on the same team.

But team tactics are extremely allowed in cycling. And if the team management wants to win a third grand tour with a third rider, it is allowed.

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It seems daft to be blogging on the playa.

But I need to keep time-on-feet before a certain level.

And, while there are thousands of unusual wonders here, if one dost love the work it is perhaps reasonable to do so.

💡 or one just wants to prove a point …

count to ten

on

en

wtne

etn

ten

bom boom boom!

this is why there are no Large Cardinals.

(( unsigned ))

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💬 if you ask the machine a question it doesn't know the answer to, don't be surprised when it gets it wrong.

The machine's answers on "why people don't buy solar" are beyond the fold. It is a fairly decent answer, comparable to what a man-on-the-street might say.

It is also wrong.

The number one reason why people don't want solar at their residence is because they are resistant to create a situation that might cause their roof to leak.

Other reasons include that "it seems too good to be true", and an opaque sales-process with no strong brands.

🌎 reasons like "the government should be taxing solar panel production at 25%" and "the government should be requiring a substantial on-site battery for home solar" don't show up. nobody knows to be afraid of that yet.

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so I don't think I can mix dialogue with monologue ...

✨ pride goeth before the fall

💬 ask me no questions and i tell you no lies

a course in 跑步 is on hiatus. i do not yet understand Temperature well enough to speak further.

a course in toki pona is in a different lecture hall. 请有地图。

🔥 computers have a flair for style

💡 a question for research: is this more 好 for native-Chinese speakers or native-English speakers?

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✨ trust not in those who worship mirrors

🌎 some days it seems to be a crime to think in public

The NCAA re-alignment situation continues to unfold.

The obvious prediction is that Stanford will join the ACC.

💬 San Francisco has always been an ACC town.

💡 one wonders: would they rather put on a traveling show for one night or two? and if it is a traveling show, would they invite UNLV instead of Cal?

⚔️ well, actually, they are apparently considering SMU (Southern Methodist University). nothing says ACC like Dallas, Texas.

⚙️ N F L 的东部赛区有达拉斯牛仔队。 与华盛顿、费城、纽约。

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Oh, somewhere in this favoured land the sun is shining bright,The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light;And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout,But there is no joy in Mudville—mighty Casey has struck out.

"Casey at the Bat", Ernest Lawrence Thayer

There is drama on TSFKAT these days.

⚙️ TSFKAT = "the site formerly known as Twitter". The current name is silly, and I can't be convinced there won't be an even worse name in the future. But I can refer to it as TSFKAT forever.

The background: Richard Hanania, exposed as a former racist. As an anonymous commenter said, "it's always the ones you most expect".

Now, Jeet Heer is trying to cancel Matt Yglesias for not canceling Hanania enough.

🔥 I try not to read Hanania, primarily because he talks about Richard Hanania too much. As far as his political writing: I have only found his writing interesting for "contra" pieces; either in pointing out the sins of the modern left that others are too cowardly to point out, or for saying something egregiously wrong that others can rebut.

💡 there is a certain sense in polite society today that "racism is bad" is an axiom. so people invent new ways of ascribing racism to things, or say "a lot of racists agree with this, so it is also bad".

🌎 but "everything that can be associated with people associated with racism is bad" is a bridge too far. it is the respite of liars and fascists. and, of course, most of the fascists know to call themselves "anti-fascist" or "anti-racist", to throw off suspicion.

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The first rule of Burning Man is that you must bring at least 5L of water per person per day.

💡 the phrase "the first rule" is often construed to imply that rules exist in some form of hierarchy, and that the specific rule mentioned has precedence over other rules.

⚔️ well, actually, in some contexts, later rules have priority over the earlier ones.

✨ what do you do when rules conflict? The lawful 人 may say that rules cannot conflict, it is only your interpretation that is in error. The chaotic 人 may say that neither rule matters anyway, and any contradiction is simply proof that one is correct to ignore the rules.

The first rule of Burning Man is that one must always wear a light while outside after sunset. The purpose of the light is not to help you see, it is to help you be seen.

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