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I put together a quick survey about this site. It’s totally anonymous and it’ll take you less than five minutes. I’d especially appreciate it if you write something in the suggestion box at the end. Click here to take survey
Taking out your private part anyplace else is totally cool with the Colombo crime family. Also, obligatory Ziggy Sobotka reference.
OK, I apologize for going heavy on non-sports posts the last few days but this is super f@#$ing important cryptozoological breaking news that just happened to hit during Sandwich Week:
An animal control officer in Hood County, Texas, may have killed a Chupacabra this week. Well, he definitely killed something, and it may have been a Chupacabra, the elusive goatsucker that’s been terrorizing Texans and Mexicans for years.
And that’s not all! Another Chupacabra was shot just a few miles away by a rancher this same week.
Also, Chupacabras apparently look a lot like really ugly dogs, like maybe dogs with some sort of disease or something. And in fact, a witness described the supposed Chupacabra as acting “like the neighbor’s dog.”
So, you know, good thing they shot it. Gotta play it safe with friendly animals no one’s ever seen before. Sure, he’s cozying up to you now, bringing you the ball and begging you to play, but next thing you know that little bastard’s going to be draining your goat’s blood.
Luckily, Texas scientists are doing DNA tests on the dead carcasses to determine if they were actually Chupacabras. Because, you know, we have some way to identify Chupacabra DNA.
Watch the video. Also note that if you click “Playlist” you’ll find an entire playlist devoted to wacky animal stories, which means the chances of me getting anything done today just plummeted. “Wayward moose ransacks grocery store.”
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Yet researchers who study gray squirrels argue that their subject is far more compelling than most people realize, and that behind the squirrel’s success lies a phenomenal elasticity of body, brain and behavior. Squirrels can leap a span 10 times the length of their body, roughly double what the best human long jumper can manage. They can rotate their ankles 180 degrees, and so keep a grip while climbing no matter which way they’re facing. Squirrels can learn by watching others — cross-phyletically, if need be. In their book “Squirrels: The Animal Answer Guide,” Richard W. Thorington Jr. and Katie Ferrell of the Smithsonian Institution described the safe-pedestrian approach of a gray squirrel eager to traverse a busy avenue near the White House. The squirrel waited on the grass near a crosswalk until people began to cross the street, said the authors, “and then it crossed the street behind them.”
In the acuity of their visual system, the sensitivity and deftness with which they can manipulate objects, their sociability, chattiness and willingness to deceive, squirrels turn out to be surprisingly similar to primates. They nest communally as multigenerational, matrilineal clans, and at the end of a hard day’s forage, they greet each other with a mutual nuzzling of cheek and lip glands that looks decidedly like a kiss. Dr. Koprowski said that when he was growing up in Cleveland, squirrels were the only wild mammals to which he was exposed. “When I got to college, I thought I’d study polar bears or mountain lions,” he said. “Luckily I ended up doing my master’s and Ph.D. on squirrels instead.”
– Natalie Angier, New York Times.
My wife and I were talking about this not too long ago: I have lived among squirrels my entire life, and yet I have no idea where they sleep. Turns out they “nest communally as multigenerational, matrilineal clans,” which is impressive and ominous but doesn’t really clarify where they’re actually sleeping. Holes in trees? If so, how do they hollow them out to fit their whole squirrel clan in there? Does that kill the tree?
The Times article is pretty fascinating. Turns out squirrels also trick each other when hiding their nuts. They bury them and rebury them to avoid nut theft, because squirrels are super paranoid.
It’s a neat trick squirrels have pulled. How many other rodents live among us that we don’t actively try to destroy? I mean, sure, sometimes some squirrels will overstep their bounds and find a way to burrow in your attic crawlspace and then, you know, chain of animal command and all. Humans are unmistakably the king of the suburbs.
But no one ever puts down squirrel poison or squirrel traps like they do for rats or mice. Really, there’s no other non-domesticated mammal as large and ubiquitous that we so willingly share a habitat with. We fear raccoons and possums disgust us, but squirrels bear no similar stigma. And why? Is it just because squirrels are better looking than rats? Less likely to spread the plague? Less invasive?
And though we don’t seek to rid our yards of woodchucks or chipmunks or any other rodent that doesn’t look to invade our homes or ravage our gardens, they’re not nearly as present and prevalent as the squirrel. So I recommend being a little more suspicious of squirrels. Those little bastards are up to something.
I’m headed out to Citi Field to do some video stuff, then to midtown to help with some technical details on Bob Ojeda’s SNY.tv chat in the third inning tonight, which you should check out and participate in and everything.
I’m not sure I’ll be back at a computer long enough to post anything else today, so in lieu of that, here’s some Buena Vista Social Club for this steamy afternoon:
Jerry Seinfeld will call a Mets game with for mer man-crush Keith Hernandez — 18 years after they paired for a classic “Seinfeld” episode.
Seinfeld, a diehard Mets fan, will join former Amazin’s star Hernandez, now an SNY analyst, and play-by-play man Gary Cohen in the booth for at least three innings during next Wednesday’s Mets-Tigers game.
I left the typo in the first sentence because it makes it look like “merman crush,” and that’s an entirely different thing — albeit, who knows, maybe appropriate when Keith Hernandez is involved.
ABC was on to something when they tapped a comedian for the Monday Night Football booth in 2000. Problem was, they picked the wrong comedian. Dennis Miller’s material is esoteric and tightly scripted, so it almost always felt forced when he interjected his jokes into otherwise interesting football games.
It’s a shame, then, that the experiment was such a notable failure that no one has ever thought to revisit it. A funny, improvisational comedian would probably add more to the enjoyment of a televised sporting event than 90% of the analysts employed by networks. Who would you rather hear dissect a baseball game: Tim McCarver or Bill Cosby?
I don’t think the addition of Jerry Seinfeld to SNY’s booth for a few innings represents anything more than the combination of this network’s effort to keep Mets broadcasts interesting and Seinfeld’s own vanity. But at the risk of sounding like a shill, I’m excited for it.
This particular clue appeared in a mock version of [Jeopardy!} in December, held in Hawthorne, N.Y. at one of I.B.M.’s research labs. Two contestants — Dorothy Gilmartin, a health teacher with her hair tied back in a ponytail, and Alison Kolani, a copy editor — furrowed their brows in concentration. Who would be the first to answer?
Neither, as it turned out. Both were beaten to the buzzer by the third combatant: Watson, a supercomputer.
For the last three years, I.B.M. scientists have been developing what they expect will be the world’s most advanced “question answering” machine, able to understand a question posed in everyday human elocution — “natural language,” as computer scientists call it — and respond with a precise, factual answer. In other words, it must do more than what search engines like Google and Bing do, which is merely point to a document where you might find the answer.
– Clive Thompson, New York Times Magazine.
This article is far too long and fascinating to properly excerpt here, and I heartily recommend you check it out if you’ve got a half hour to kill.
The piece explains how “Watson,” I.B.M.’s supercomputer, determines the answers (well, the questions, but that’s semantics) to Jeopardy! clues. Plus it outlines the machine’s limitations and describes how it matches up with humans.
Because I’m a big fan of both Jeopardy! and information that forbodes a dystopian future, the story is important to me for obvious reasons. But on top of that, I happen to live in the tiny hamlet of Hawthorne, N.Y. where this is all going down. So I’m at ground zero for the inevitable robot uprising. That’s terrifying, but also kind of awesome.
Upon starting the article, I initially considered how perfectly it set up a Ken-Jennings-as-John-Henry scenario, wherein Jeopardy!’s folk hero hurriedly scribbles his correct Final Jeopardy! answer before collapsing at the podium, winning the match but losing his life in the process.
But it turns out the machine has pretty much no shot of beating Ken Jennings, which is even more awesome. A team of scientists can spend years working on a computer specifically designed to succeed at Jeopardy!, and it still can’t match the best human contestants. Also, Ken Jennings can walk and give lectures and, presumably, love. Suck it down, Watson.
Also, Ken Jennings probably wouldn’t do this:
In another game, Watson’s logic appeared to fall down some odd semantic rabbit hole, repeatedly giving the answer “Tommy Lee Jones” to several clues that had nothing to do with him.
Well that’s ominous. The machines have targeted you, Tommy Lee Jones.
To be fair, though, former roommate Ted points out, “that sounds like something I’d do when drunk and shouting Jeopardy! answers at the TV screen.” And he’s right. I’ve seen him while drunk and watching Jeopardy!, and that does sound like something he’d do. So maybe Watson was stewed.
In any case, the article suggests that Jennings himself will take on the computer in a forthcoming televised Jeopardy! exhibition. Smart money is on the humans. For this round, at least.
I had a few more items I wanted to get to today but everything else I had to do took longer than I expected. For now, please enjoy this oddly mesmerizing video of Michael Winslow reciting the history of the typewriter:
History of the typewriter recited by Michael Winslow from SansGil—Gil Cocker on Vimeo.
Some shameless friend-promotion. Mike is a talented dude, and you’ll probably notice pretty quickly that we have some overlapping interests:
The President of The Universe from mike Carlo on Vimeo.
For more of Mike’s work, check out his animation blog. Also, you’ll note that he’s clearly out to make a liar of me — in the second picture of last night’s event, you might spot me in the foreground on the right, watching the screen with the animation that’s out of frame. And pretty clearly you can see that the Mets game is on two of the four TVs, even though my attention is diverted away. But by the time the cartoons ended the bar had switched to the NBA Finals, so no Niese for me.
“Since their inception, the Zones have served sports fans very well,” said an ESPN spokesman, who declined to comment further. “But from a pure business perspective, the economics have been challenging.”
Harry Balzer, chief industry analyst for research firm NPD Group, said the restaurant business was undergoing its biggest decline in three decades.
“This year was horrible,” Balzer said. “A restaurant meal is a very discretionary behavior. You could always eat at home and save money doing it. And going out for dinner is the most expensive food you could buy.”
– Dawn C. Chmielewski, Los Angeles Times.
Turns out Disney is closing a lot of ESPN Zones, which, well, whatever. The important thing is: HARRY BALZER?
I’m sorry.
But seriously, your name is Harry Balzer? Of course this year was horrible, bro. Every year must be horrible when your name is Harry Balzer.
For Pete’s sake, go by “Harold.” Or, hell, Pete.
Hat tip to Can’t Stop the Bleeding.
Tedquarters 