Archive for December, 2009

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Bloodletting.

Wednesday, December 30th, 2009

Mike Leach is now officially gone.

In February, Leach and the school agreed to a five-year, $12.7 million contract. According to terms of the deal, Leach was due a $800,000 bonus on Dec. 31 if he were still the head coach at Texas Tech

For the record, here’s a link to the Texas Monthly cover story from earlier this year. (Link does require registration; cypherpunks@mailinator.com/cypherpunks may work.)

Here’s a longish “web extra”,  also from TM that doesn’t require registration.

The local Lubbock paper appears to be slammed right now.

My view? I’m not a huge Tech or Leach fan, but I need to see more evidence before believing he did something wrong (for reasons I outlined yesterday). This sounds to me more like a power struggle, combined with disappointment over an 8-4 season, combined with not wanting to pay a huge bonus.

Posted in Firings | No Comments »

The curse continues.

Tuesday, December 29th, 2009

Texas Tech coach Mike Leach hasn’t been fired yet.

But he has been suspended. The father of one of his players is accusing Leach of treating his son in an abusive and improper fashion after the player suffered a concussion and couldn’t practice.

(The player in question, Adam James, is the son of Craig James, an ESPN announcer.)

I have a feeling this is going to turn into a strange story. First of all, there’s the whole “he said, he said” aspect to it; I find it very hard to believe that, after all the attention being given to concussions at the pro level, any coach who wanted to keep his job would pull this kind of crap. Add to that the involvement of an ESPN staffer (Tech is playing on Saturday in the Alamo Bowl, which is being broadcast by ESPN), stir, and we have a mess.

Posted in Firings | No Comments »

Saturday Dining Conspiracy updates.

Monday, December 28th, 2009
  • Added November and October of 2009.

Posted in Food, SDC | No Comments »

Weapon test and evaluation: NERF N-Strike Vulcan EBF-25

Friday, December 25th, 2009
Caliber 10 mm x 70 mm NERF
Operation Electric (full-auto) or pneumatic (pump)
Cyclic rate 180 rpm (depending on charge)
Feed 25 round belt
Weight 7.5 lbs
Dimensions 30.5” long x 8.5” high x 14” wide (without tripod)
Barrel Smoothbore
Barrel length 12.5”
Sights Post front, limited adjustment for elevation; fixed notch rear
Finish Orange and yellow
Furniture Plastic
Optional accessories Tactical rail accommodates N-Strike line
Price $54 (MSRP), $40 (street)
Manufacturer Hasbro

The  Nerf N-Strike Vulcan EBF-25 is Hasbro’s first attempt at a Squad Automatic Weapon (SAW). It was a surprise to many people that a company specializing in handguns and rifles, with no previous experience in the full-auto realm, would even compete for the contract, and there was considerable controversy when Hasbro won the competition. Our testing and evaluation showed many rough edges on the EBF-25; we hope that these are just early production issues that will be ironed out in the field.

(more…)

Posted in Guns | 4 Comments »

Otters?

Thursday, December 24th, 2009

Seriously? Otters? In your cargo hold? It’s more likely than you think.

Posted in Clippings | No Comments »

Warren Beatty dies at the end.

Thursday, December 24th, 2009

Obit watch: Loren Singer, author of The Parallax View, which was adapted into an Alan J. Pakula directed movie.

Posted in Clippings, Movies, Obits | 2 Comments »

Giggle. Snort.

Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009

Remember the drunk woman from Wimberly who walked into the offices of Triton Financial brandishing a gun and a bottle of wine? Remember that I noted Trition Financial had an interesting history?

That history just got more interesting; the SEC is suing them for securities fraud, and the State of Texas is attempting to revoke their investment advisor registration. I expect this to be an amusing show.

Edited to add: Oh, look, a link from the HouChron. A rather short link, but it does mention the SI article. You know, this one. The one that the Statesman article ignores. Even though one of the co-authors of the Statesman article (the Stateman’s golf blogger) took the trouble to interview Trition Financial officials and provide their rebuttal after the SI article ran. Nor does the Statesman mention the drunk woman from Wimberly. Interesting lack of context there, guys.

Posted in Clippings | 1 Comment »

More brains!

Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009

More Henry Molaison brains, even. But this NYT article is mostly about the mechanics of brain sectioning.

The blade peeled off the top layer, rolling it up in slow motion like a slice of pale prosciutto.

Did they really have to say “prosciutto“?

To prepare a brain for dissection, Dr. Annese first freezes it in a formaldehyde and sucrose solution, to about minus 40 degrees Celsius. The freezing in the case of H. M. was done over four hours, a few degrees at a time: the brain, like most things, becomes more brittle when frozen. It can crack.

I think I had one of those sucrose solutions the other day from Sonic, and yes, my brain did feel like it was going to crack.

An entire brain produces some 2,500 slices, and the amount of information in each one, once microscopic detail is added, will fill about a terabyte of computer storage.

Earlier in the article, it states that the slices are 70 microns thick, so that implies the brain is about 6.8 inches from the very top to wherever the researchers are stopping; but it isn’t clear how far down they’re going. Are they going to section just the lobes, include the cerebellum, or go all the way down into the medulla?

It’s kind of neat to think that all of that data can fit on a single $69 hard drive from Fry’s. (I hope they’ve got RAID. And backups. And restores.)

Posted in Clippings, Geek, Neuroscience | No Comments »

Word of the day: simony.

Monday, December 21st, 2009

No, simony isn’t what happens when you finish in third place on Jeopardy and your consolation prize is a year’s supply of Simoniz.

n.  The buying or selling of ecclesiastical pardons, offices, or emoluments.

I hadn’t heard of anyone being charged with simony since Martin Luther and the Reformation. At least, until yesterday:

Simony was a common transgression in the Middle Ages, when simonists were condemned to hell in Dante’s “Inferno.” The modern consequences aren’t quite so dire, but in the most serious cases they can include a priest’s suspension.

Suspension? I would have expected excommunication.

Posted in Clippings, Media | No Comments »

Open thread: Christmas music that drives you nuts.

Friday, December 18th, 2009

The umpteenth repitition of “Rocking Around the Christmas Tree” last night started me thinking, and I figured I’d do an open thread: what holiday music do you particularly loathe?

My thoughts, other than the aforementioned tripe (Hannah Montana did a cover? We are doomed, doomed I tell you!):

  • “Wonderful Christmastime”. Never been a real big fan of Paul McCartney solo. Sorry.
  • I don’t really care that much for “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”, but if you look into the history of the song, the original lyrics are actually much more suited for the present.
  • I actually kind of like “Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer”, in an ironic “This is so bad, it’s almost good” campy hipster way. I’d punctuate that statement by slamming back a cold Pabst Blue Ribbon, but I don’t have one on hand right now.
  • Edited to add: I say this as someone who likes Springsteen; that version of “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town” is tiresome.
  • One that I actually like: on my home machine, I have a wonderful cover of “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” sung to the tune of “Folsom Prison Blues”, but Google doesn’t turn up a link. Any help here?

So, dear readers, what songs would you like to see kicked around the Christmas tree until they stop twitching?

Posted in Music | 1 Comment »

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