Muttroxia

Cleary I am terrible at NFL predictions. One out of four, yeesh.

Falcons/Cardinals: Turnovers. And poor defense by Atlanta in the second half. With the game on the line, you have them at 3rd and 16, how do you let someone catch a pass with no one even around them? Ridiculous.

Colts/Chargers: I predicted this one wrong and I’m glad I did. I hate the Colts. I hate everything about them, from their holier-than-thou coach to their shill-anything-for-a-buck-buck-buck chicken-dancing quarterback to their marginally retarded waterboy. (Okay, I made that last one up.) And Phillip Rivers has been a stalwart on my fantasy team, so even though I don’t like Norv Turner and LT is a huge whiner, I’m still glad they won.

Which they shouldn’t have. again, stupid interceptions. And the Colts touchdown in the 3rd quarter? For those who didn’t see it, let me set the stage. All game, the Chargers and Colts are messing with each other at the line. The Chargers shift players around trying to confuse the chicken, the chicken sqwuaks at his team to counter it until the play clock gets to 1. The Colts run a lot of no-huddle to mess with the Chargers.

In the second half, the Colts continue to no-huddle. But now they don’t always go to 1, they snap it earlier. One one play, the Chargers are in the middle of trying to substitute as the Colts are getting ready to snap. The Chargers safety, Cromate, is looking at his sideline figuring out what he’s supposed to be doing. He has no idea that the Colts have lined up, he never sees the play start, and only wakes up when his man is ten yards beyond him and every other Charger and catching the ball for the easy touchdown. C’mon!

John Madden said of LT: “He’s just sitting on the sidelines, spectating!” I have already incorporated the word spectate into my everyday vocabulary.

Ravens/Dolphins: Holy cow, that’s a lot of turnovers. You can wildcat until the cows come home, but it won’t matter when you keep giving the ball away.

Eagles/Vikings: Eh, who cares.

None of these four winners looked very good — I suppose the Chargers played the best of them.

I’ve spent the last year and a half in exile. I speak of work. With our company bursting at the seams, many people have had to move locations away from their normal groups. My group was the right size to get the short straw. In the summer of 2007 we were moved to a space that was… not so great. We call it the extension trailer.

What was the worst part about it? The lack of sound insulation. The bathrooms were right across from the cubicles of a couple of girls. They could hear most everything that went on, even with the fan on. We found ourselves with a dilemma. On the one hand, people have to able to go the bathroom. The next one is in another building, a fair sized walk and two security swipes. On the other hand, c’mon, it’s kinda gross to listen to, no one should need to put up with that. With the wisdom of Solomon, the compromise was made. Doing Number One locally is allright. For Number Two you gotta walk to another building.

After 18 months we were just moved back to the same floor as the rest of my department. There are lots of good things about rejoining the gang, but the best thing is finally being able to do my business without a five-minute walk to the proper facilities. 2009’s gonna be a good year!

Indianapolis Colts vs San Diego Chargers:
The Colts started weak this year. Somewhere around Week 5 they have become the old Colts, the ones who are virtually unstoppable. They are 12-4 vs. San Diego’s 8-8, they are clearly the better team. The Chargers have a bad habit of poor coaching and playing in the playoffs also.
Winner: Indianapolis Colts

Baltimore Ravens vs. Miami Dolphins:
Can the gimmick offense of the Dolphins beat the solid unspectacular Ravens? I don’t think so. With two weeks to rest and scout them, the Ravens defense will be ready. Miami has played a good season, but I think it ends now.
Winner: Baltimore Ravens

Atlanta Falcons vs. Arizona Cardinals:
The Cardinals have improved a lot since last year. And they’ve been able to beat their own division. But let’s get real. They aren’t a good team. Atlanta is. End of story.
Winner: Atlanta Falcons

Philadelphia Eagles vs. Minnesota Vikings:
I haven’t the vaguest. I’ll go with the home team.
Winner: Minnesota Vikings

Overall prediction (aka, how good do I feel about my picks): I think I’ll get Colts and Falcons right, and one of the other two randomly. I see a 3-1.

1. New Links in the blogroll. They’re all by people I know, arranged in order of how long I’ve known them.
• Katherine in Japan. My cousins blog. She is spending a couple years teaching in Japan. You may have to register to see it.
• My Zen Arcade. More like mine - just an old pal babbling about whatever is on his mind. Frequently updated.
• Montyland. Monty is another high school pal of mine. He doesn’t post much, but I like what he does.
• Brand Ng. A not-so-old and not-so-new friend. He writes about the power of branding and other smart-type things.
• The Dad Show. The author is a newer friend who hardly ever posts, but I like his writing. Maybe if we add in some comments he’ll be motivated to add more…
2. I updated the theme slightly, mostly adding another 200 pixels in the content area. That puts it over 800 pixels total, which was the old standard. I am assuming all my readers are okay with this. If it isn’t displaying properly, let me know.

   This is how it begins. Add a few pixels, modify the credits in the footer, change the way followed links display (to be done, can’t distinguish normal bold from link bold)… this is how I got in trouble with the last theme. It got to a point where I had hacked it so much I couldn’t edit it. Also, I can change out the background image… any nominations?

3. During the upgrade, quotes and apostrophes from old posts and comments got translated into weird special character triplets. I’m gradually cleaning them up. If you notice any, feel free to drop me a line.
4. Some images from old posts don’t appear correctly all the time — if old posts don’t have images, please let me know.

The presidential race:
Edwards quits, so I change from Edwards to Hillary. An analogy on choosing my candidate. I switch to Obama. Hilary gets screwed again by the media. Is McCain Bush’s lapdog? What do you think of Sarah Palin (lots of good comments)? We learned more later about howshe was picked. McCains fundamentals. I called the election on Oct 20th, and gave some perspective on American elections.

Other politics:
Torture Update
(By the way, recent document dumps confirm that the torture policies were agreed on and implemented by the very very top people.)
Senate Holds (though Coburn has steadily been gaining points with me)

Social Security Update, with a couple of key graphs (1 and 2).

Random Funny:
Fountain drink and buffet lines.
Restaurant floor managers
Nice Brains
Gender prediction
Crazy marketing
Arguing with Papa Johns.
Disney World, and the worst ride ever.
Building Security
Analyzing basketball names at the Olympics, and my favorite Olympics moment.
Dumb T-Shirts
Too much Excel

Childrens Wisdom: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. And a bit from the wife.

Semi-serious:
Applied Math
Muttrox’s Day in Court
Benfords Law
New Years Resolution and update.
Led Zeppelin are cheaters
Ignorant letter
Sign of the Times

More…
I started giving updates on every poker game starting in March. Search for “Poker Updates.”
Search for “Links o’ Interest” to get my many links to the wonders of the internet.
Here are the previous best of editions, 2005/6 and 2007.

New Years Day is a pathetic excuse for a holiday. What is it celebrating? The arbitrary reset of our consensus calendar system. Who cares? This is a remnant of our superstitious past, where we thought the way we measured time affected the way time passed. This is cut from the same cloth as stupid Russians revolting when the change to Gregorian calendar moved them from Jan 1st to Feb 14th overnight. Hey Nikolai, it’s just bookkeepping, you didn’t really lose six weeks of your life!

We might as well have a holiday every time there is daylight savings time, or they add a leap second.

You want to drink and party? Do it any ol’ day. You want to mark the turning of the seasons? Use the Winter Solstice - you’ve just passed the shortest day of the year and you’re now turning towards spring. You want to make a resolution? Make it on your birthday - it makes more sense.

Bah Humbug. Just a stupid idea for a holiday.

In 2009, the Patriots were both the best team ever to lose the Super Bowl, and the best team since 1985 not to make the playoffs.

A couple posts ago I asked if it was good that an 11-5 might not make it, while (for example) the 8-8 Chargers got in. Even though my own team got screwed, I’m going to say it’s a good thing.

• As soon as Brady went down, the season was written off by most people. Even with as good as we did, the Pats were never going to win the Super Bowl. They weren’t even going to make it there. Not being in the playoffs doesn’t matter so much.
• We had an easy schedule. Not as easy as it should have been (four games against the Jets and Dolphins were expected to be all wins), but still. Our 11-5 isn’t as meaningful as it would have been the last few years.
• It’s not as fair, but it makes sports more interesting. It’s kind of neat that a good team doesn’t make it every once in a while.

For whatever it’s worth, Yglesias agrees with me while Easterbrook calls it Armageddon.

I suppose I’ll have to root for Atlanta the next couple of weeks. Or maybe New York - if they win, then their victory over the Patriots has more legitimacy.

This is one of the cleverest logos I’ve ever seen.

The company looks ridiculous, and advertises at 5:30 am on Sundays (it’s been a long travel day, let me tell ya), but whoever designed that gets my kudos.

The preview of the finals was a great game. Too bad the refs were horrible. In the last few minute they called a charge on Rondo when Fisher wasn’t even close to set, and called a block on Pierce when he clearly was. The last one iced the game for the Lakers.

That puts the Celtics at 27-3, or a 90% win rate. That projects out to a 74-8 season, two games better than the Bulls’ record. I don’t think it’s going to happen. But it’s nice to think about.

Speaking of Rondo: Yes, he’s much better this year. But let’s be honest, it’s not hard to look good when you’ve got Garnett/Allen/Pierce around. All you have to do is be competent. Which he is. The weirdest part is that every part of his game has improved except that little floater move of his. His rookie year it was a great tool, this year it never goes in. Never. I think he is zero for sixty on it this year. Stop it!!

After Week 1, I predicted the Patriots would finish 10-6 or 11-5. With one game to go that counts as a bullseye prediction for ol’ Muttrox.

The Pats need to beat the Bills. Assuming they do, then we need the Jets to beat the Dolphins. If that happens, we’re automatically in as division winners. The Jets have been eliminated (I think). Mangini and Bellicek hate each other. Would Mangini actually throw a game just to keep the Pats out? I don’t think so. I don’t think anyone throws games in the NFL.

In baseball or basketball, no individual game means that much for job security. In the NFL, every game is huge. For a coach, the difference between 10-6 and 9-7 could mean his job. Throwing a game would be very very risky. I also believe the most players are incapable of throwing games. I have tried to throw poker games and for the most part I just can’t. And I’m certainly not a professional who got there partially because of my killer competitive instinct.

This season once again shows how the division structure is unfair. The Pats, Jets, and Dolphins are all good teams. Certainly better than the crappy Cardinals we humiliated last week. Nevertheless, the Patriots could easily go 11-5 and not make the playoffs. Is that bad, or part of what makes football interesting?

AirTran charged me $15 to check one bag for two people. It was expected but that didn’t make any less annoying.

Inside the terminal they had a coffee area. Above it was a big sign that said, “Free Coffee. One more way AirTran is saving you money.”

Screwing me for $15 and giving me a $2 cup of coffee does not even out. Also, I don’t drink coffee.

The best viral videos of 2008

Tom the Dancing Bug at it’s best

European Scams ‘05

The Shoe attack on Bush. Try it yourself! And the Bushtrix version.

Most likely to succeed: Malcolm Gladwell on predicting success

Oh, that’s sneaky

Mad Scientists

A different take on It’s a Wonderful Life. It’s terrible.

As Megan said, these guys managed to shorten “Don’t be evil” by one key word.

Evander Holyfield is trying to regain the title at age 46. I don’t see Mike Tyson following that.

Women’s car gets stuck on train tracks. She dials 911 and asks for help instead of getting out of the car.

Real life Dilbert Manager quotes

2008 in pictures.
Parts 1, 2, 3.

Barack Obama’s campaign manager gives a rare interview.

America the melting pot: A neat visualization of immigration to the USA since 1820.

I never had my mojo tonight. My semi-bluffs got called, my bluffs got called, my one good hand did not. Blech.

Already whittled away, I have Ah-6h in the small blind. I call a min raise, the flop is 9-6-4. The raiser raises again. I looked him over and made a read that he was full of it. He often is. I called. The next card is 9h. He raises again putting me all in. I have the sixes and four cards to the flush and what the heck, I call. He did not have much. J-9, so the turn had given him trip 9s. I didn’t get my flush on the river. I rebought.

The next round treated me much better. I wasn’t playing any better, just the cards were falling clearly. I usually either had something or I didn’t, which is much better than marginal hands.

I call a raise with Ac-10c. The flop is Kc-xc-xc. I have the nut flush! It’s me and the same guy who knocked me out. He raises, I call. The turn is nothing. He raises, I call. I glance at my cards — uh oh! I misread my cards! My Ace is the Ace of spades, not clubs — I don’t have a flush at all! But now I have to call, the pot odds are with me. The river is the Qc. I have the flush (again!). It’s not the nut flush anymore, but only Ac and Jc beat me. He raises once more. I again figure, what the heck and call. My 10c beats his 9c. I get my revenge and double up.

I have about 4K, blinds are 3-6. I am having a conversation with another player whether short stack should be thought of as how much you have relative to other people (that’s the way I see it) or relative to the blind amounts. He thinks it’s blinds, and since he has only 10 blinds he is short-stacked. The next hand he goes all-in. Everyone folds to me, I have 6-6. Hm. This guy can play anything. And he thinks he’s short-stacked. I figure him for two high cards. But mainly it’s 10:45 and I have to get home and print and stuff and fold and organize our holiday cards. What the heck, I call. He has A-K. He gets his Ace and knocks me out.

Way too much “what the heck” playing from me tonight. I was definitely making some bad plays just to get some action.

Tonight: -$40
Running Total: $515

A few weeks ago my beloved TiVo broke. It did not break all the way but it was not recording all shows properly. I called their support line. The person diagnosed the problem quickly - it was a “known issue”. The fix was to reset my entire system, which would unfortunately delete all my season pass and preferences. They would all need to be redone. I was annoyed. I have 55 season passes. You heard right, 55 of them. Can’t I back this up somewhere? No. Can I export the list somehow? No. Can you save off my info at TiVo central and send it back to me in some format? No. I would just have to suck it up. Man, that’s annoying. I was angry.

Suck it up I did. I took a pad of paper and carefully wrote down all the season passes. I reset the system (this takes about three hours). I started entering all the season passes back. I hadn’t thought to record my thumbs up and thumbs down, so it has taken a few weeks more for TiVo to learn my likes and dislikes.

Thinking about it later I realized how the support person could have done a better job. At not point did she show any sympathy that this was a giant pain. If she had simply said, “I’m sorry but we don’t have any easy way to back up and re-enter your season pass information. You’re going to have to that manually yourself. I know it’s a lot of trouble for you.” I would have been much more calm about it. A simple admission that she was asking me to do labor to fix their problem in their product would have helped a lot.

No, it isn’t. It just isn’t. Buzzed driving is bad, but it’s not as bad as drunk driving. Duh.

I saw billboards for this all over our drive to Kentucky and back. This is one more reason far leftists are reviled. Not all bad things are the same. Double duh.

Other commentary here and here.

You wouldn’t buy…

Things I’d like to tell students that would probably get me fired.

Poor kid. Girl Accidentally Text Messages Her Dad After Losing Her Virginity. And the internet is hot on the parody trail already…

10 Greatest Videos of Animals Playing Sports

The Drug Czar is forbidden, by law from supporting any drug legalization. I did not know that.

Spin the Black Circle. That is one hard game.

Carol of the Old Ones

Why Rickey Henderson should get 100% of the Hall of Fame vote

I found him!

5 Job Interview Questions That Mean You’re Not Getting Hired…And One That Means You Are

Tow truck revenge

This is why Jon Stewart is the best political host out there. He respectfully argues about issues of substance.

Human Slinky

Christmas Lights

The first ever escapee from a North Korean prison camp

Programming a small car with genetic algorithms. Let it run, check in every once in a while.

Wondering how much a Senate seat goes for? The opening bid is $500,000.

In an earlier recorded conversation, prosecutors say, Mr. Blagojevich said he was approached by an associate of “Candidate 5” with an offer of $500,000 in exchange for the Senate seat.

How Obama brought down Blagojevich

I hate sentences like this:

I resolved to return to Lealtad in an attempt to understand the despair at Joys, but also in the conviction that the secret lexicon of 50-year dictatorships can be read only in the details of daily life.

What a load of crap. What you mean it that you’re writing a journal and want to make it seem more important. You walk around a couple areas of Atlanta for a few days and look at the details of daily life and you will know next to nothing about the “secret lexicon” of the United States.

So far I am not super-impressed. It has one deal-killer flaw. Everyone is either friend or not-friend, there is no in-between.

It does a good job of showing me who’s in the system that I might want to contact. But there is no intermediary step where I can catch up, see their basic profile, and then stop. Nope, it’s either full access or nothing. I don’t want to give everyone full access. I don’t mind putting semi-personal stuff out there, but I see no reason to tell 150 people how I blew my fantasy football season. An old buddy sent me an invite. I haven’t seen him for 15 years, I want to know what he’s up to, but I don’t want to give him the same access as my real friends. Mrs. Muttrox is peeved because she crossed the line of professionalism - she has too many colleagues on her friend list. Now she feels that she can’t do anything fun because her next employer will know about it. I am friends with lots of people at work in the real world but I am reluctant to add most of them to my Facebook friend list.

This problem is doubly stupid because it’s so easily solved. All you need to do is add a layer called “acquaintances”. Or add a few layers, you can set any person to be friend “level” 1-4. Or you could have separate access for friends and colleagues. Then you decide what levels can see anything that goes up on your wall and such. It’s a trivial programming issue.

Feel free to send me a friend request. If I don’t accept it’s nothing personal. Unfortunately I am unable to merely dip my toe in the friendship water, it seems you have to take a full dive. I don’t want to.

…is having your baby daughter fall asleep on you.

World War II

Smoking sign fail

Why you should check your kids homework

December 9th is pretend to be a time traveler day. Excellent.

Times are tough – the rich are cutting back on mistresses

What causes War. Could have come straight from Collapse.

Can all conflict be reduced beyond even team aggression and resource competition, down to the single factor of population growth? It’s not quite that simple, but a deeper investigation of the role of population increase shows quite clearly that growth rate and population demographics function as significant triggers for raiding, wars, and even terrorism. …. Their study suggests that population growth accounts for a powerful 80–90 percent* of the variation between periods of war and peace.

What if Starbucks was run like a church?

Sarah Palin on the $10,000 pyramid

Michael Vick bankrupt in prison. How’d that happen?

8 Best recurring gags on Arrested Development

Neil Gaiman on free speech for icky things.

This is where we live

The front fell off. So real, I have no idea what it’s from.

Lunch

Prop 8: The Musical. Heck of a cast. By the way, Neil Patrick Harris is gay. Boy, can he act.

Using electrostimulus to feel the beat. Very weird.

Google shows Microsoft how to connect the dots

Something’s different about you… you’re going bald!

I don’t know the facts, but I’m on the side of the Satch

More Stupid French tricks

Tips for clueless people who get mugged